Thread 3 - TalkExiles: "The Planet Goes On Being Round"

[Kucingsparkles]

Continuation of previous lifeboat threads 1 and 2.

Gather here all ye refugees from the JTT Flat Earth Society, welcome to the reassuringly oblate spheroid of MN! Ye all already know the answers to the questions "How the heck do I format my post?" "Why can't I edit my typos?" "What do those acronyms mean?" and most importantly, "Where is everybody that I used to know?"

So really we're all here just to chat randomly.

Hi @Itwasntevenblackpudding . I am also an expat (Maine) but I won't be seeing my kids and grandkids in the UK until February. My US-based son and his family are coming up from NJ the day after Christmas though - woohoo!

Damn the lack of an edit button - just wanted to add that I hope you have a splendid time with yours at Christmas.

@Britinme

You must be wishing the days away!

We have several things planned for this year, making up for lost time, and we are also planning to go back to the UK. The children don't know this yet so I'm a bit nervous of their reaction - particularly the one that lives in the UK. (DD lives in another European country).

I shall be scanning MN for threads from my DIL 😅

@Itwasntevenblackpudding - oh dear that might be awkward if she regarded the prospect dubiously!

Hooray! My Dad’s Christmas present to us has arrived from the Wine Society - 5 assorted reds, 5 assorted whites, a bottle of Cava, and bottles of gin, whisky, port and sherry. And, having just sampled the sherry, it’s not the same undrinkable paint stripper it usually is, although it’s still not very pleasant. Think I must be a sweet sherry kinda gal.

Now that is a very acceptable Christmas present.

Hello @Itwasntevenblackpudding, welcome!

Good haul, Mavis!

@CyanCyan I think fire brigade sounds like a good idea. I think I understand the set up now - the meters are in a sort of outbuilding attached to the block of flats rather than being in an internal cupboard?

Another thing you could do is ask to see the most recent fire safety assessment (which of course the RTM company will have commissioned!) for the building including the meter annex/cupboard.

I am a public servant working in a highly regulated industry - I can break people like Mr RTM through the power pf pass agg emails alone.

It’s a great present, we each get a mixed box of red wine for our birthdays and at Christmas we get the extra special box with spirits. Easy for him and great for us. He gets great deals on the boxes, being a Wine Society member. And apart from the sherry, there’s never a duff bottle among ‘em.

@Itwasntevenblackpudding Welcome - it isn't an exclusive thread at all - all welcome to join.

I am 99.99% confident that she will be delighted, just that tiny 0.01% of me thinks that I might see all the blood drain from her face :-)

My Christmas present to myself arrived today, Turtle Doves fingerless gloves for my aching hand joints. I’ve got quite an expensive Christmas present for a friend who I won’t see until just after, hope she likes it as probably too late to return now!

Sherry is handy for cooking, in place of rice wine, and a slug in a casserole can be good.

A mixed box of red and white wine, I meant to say.

I've just had a present to me arrive, a tiny lapel pin of the Owl of Minerva. It's gorgeous.

Yes exactly! Before we had RTM our housing association was very clear that nothing should be stored there and anything that was would be removed.

I wish I had the expertise to go to town on this. He’s a piece of work with a vendetta against anyone who challenges him. I hate people like this, I don’t know what’s wrong with them.

@CyanCyan
@Ginmonkeyagain

Thank you!

I'm trying to avoid all the negativity, nit picking and obvious fantasy lives elsewhere on the site.

Glad I had a look at this thread.

@MavisMcMinty Our 18 bottles of lovely wine* have been safely delivered in the UK. The kids are there 24 hours before us (Airbnb) so hope there's some left!!

*we may live in France, but not a single bottle is French. Change is as good as a rest and all that.

@CyanCyan Hope the fire brigade puts him back in his box. Firmly. Little Hitlers like him deserve it. People should be on committees because they want to improve the place for everyone, not just feather their own nests or have control over people.

Our guiding principals are generally:

1. Everyone has to abide by the rules set out for use of communal spaces, especially those that relate to H&S. No exceptions.
2. Everyone contributes fairly and uses communal spaces properly and unselfishly.
3. Agents and contractors are treated with politeness and respect by all residents and leaseholders
4. Unless it impacts negatively on the building or other residents, we have no interest in telling people how to live their lives within their flats

The Christmas decoration is up!

I'm just going to belch hugely at the thread.

DH was practically hammering the doors down at the newly reopened fish&chip shop and we came away with an enormous paper bag of beef-dripping-fried savoury deliciousness for our lunch. It feels like an eternity since we've had a proper Yorkshire F&C, rather than just a couple of months. So we may have overindulged a teeny bit.

oooh - I really want fish and chips now.

@Kucingsparkles - deep envy going on over here!

Haha, is that genuinely your singular decoration? It looks very fancy, I can't quite work out what it is made of - brocade?

Yes, it is The decoration. It's brocade with beads and copper wire stitched on. I found it in a charity shop last week and couldn't resist.

an enormous paper bag of beef-dripping-fried savoury deliciousness

Ohgodohgodohgod 😘