Single workers hit by financial crisis

As news reports yesterday stated, inflation has reached an 11 year high.  

This is further bad news for the “invisible poor” who were identified by a National Consumer Council report as being primarily young single workers living on their own with no dependent children.  These are people working long hours on a low income, who pay their bills, their tax and their contributions, but are struggling to pay for more than basic essentials.

The report says they are being “neglected” by government whose policies (rightly) help families, children and pensioners, but ignore the low-waged singles. Similarly, many businesses, from phone companies to insurers to utility companies, overlook singles. Yet this group makes up one sixth of the UK’s workforce, and could be you or someone you know.

The Bad News:

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation reports that a single person needs to earn at least £13,400 a year in order to achieve an acceptable standard of living, which is half the amount needed by a family of four.  The problem for poorer workers is that the proportion of income spent on essentials is now growing at a faster rate than their wages.  This has not been helped by the rising cost of food, petrol and household energy bills, which have nearly doubled over the last four years.  

The removal by the government of the 10p tax band means that, despite the compensation announcement at the last mini-budget, 500,000 single childless adults under 25, another 115,000 childless single people aged 25 to 55 and 140,000 childless couples aged 25 to 55 will lose an average of £83 a year.  

On top of all this, many single people who bought a house a few years ago, are now finding their fixed-term fixed-rate mortgages coming to an end – typically pushing up the payment by over £100 per month on a £100,000 mortgage. Those faced with negative equity can’t re-mortgage to find a better deal and are now stuck paying even higher rates of interest.  These mortgage rate rises are also seeing to the rise in private rents.

The Better News:

If you are struggling financially there are a few things you can do to help your situation. 

• Read the Bookshelf Boyfriend guide to budgeting and planning your finances, and check out the rest of our finance section.
• See if you are entitled to any benefits such as Working Tax Credit, which many people fail to claim.
• Shop around and switch your gas and energy supplier regularly.
• Install a water meter if you are in England and Wales. If for practical reasons your water company refuses this, ask them to offer you an “assessed charge” based on an estimate of your use as a single householder or on what other metered customers in your area pay. 
• If you are getting motor insurance, again, shop around, and include another person (such as a friend or relative) on your policy, which can help to reduce the cost by up to £200.
• If you think you are going to struggle with your mortgage payments soon, it may be worth considering renting out a spare room or all of your property and becoming a landlord.  In which case you will also need to consider the pros and cons of renting, if you don’t have family to stay with.  
• If your money is out of control and keeping you awake at night read our article on borrowing and debt, which has lots of handy information and links for further help.

Quaker Social Action is a London based organisation, but has a very good selection of links to places for further help.

[ASM]

Real ale – good enough for a prince.

The Prince of Wales’ organic food and drink company Duchy Originals has just produced their first batch of draught beer, to be made available in a limited number of pubs as of next month.  They have been producing their organic real ale in bottles for a while now, but this is the first time that it will be available hand-pulled behind the bar.

We at Bookshelf Boyfriend strongly advocate the drinking of real ale over standard mass produced lagers, apart from anything else they taste scrumptious (and go perfectly with a good organic cheese!).  There are also a whole lot of other reasons why we should all be getting into our real ales.  Real ales are generally produced in microbreweries using locally grown ingredients, so you are supporting small businesses and the local economy around them.  By buying beer that hasn’t been shipped long distances you are also reducing fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.  If you are buying organic beer, you are supporting a farm system that uses fewer pesticides or synthetic fertilizers, which in turn enhances soil fertility, increases species diversity, conserves water and produces fewer greenhouse gases.

A top tip:

A few of us here were at the most fantastic wedding this weekend, where the father of the bride bought a couple of kegs of delicious locally produced Blacksheep beers.  Everyone was helping themselves to glasses of beer throughout the night, and the following morning(!) and a great time was had by all, and there were no cart loads of cans and bottles to take to the recycling dump.  So, when throwing a party for large numbers of people, look for breweries that sell beer in kegs, which will both keep your costs down and will hugely reduce waste, whilst enabling everyone to have a jolly good time!

Read the Bookshelf Boyfriend article about real ale and beers. 

Treat yourself to some good beers from Real Ale.com

 

[ASM]

Bad girls’ guide to good DIY

…or maybe it should be a good girl’s guide to bad DIY?

Despite one’s best efforts, it isn’t always easy pulling the right guy in order to get a particular job in the house done, and you may often find yourself having to tackle the tasks yourself.  Particularly in this current financial climate, the lack of free-flowing money also means that one can’t always justify getting professionals in for small jobs that with a bit of time and effort we could do ourselves.

Previous experience has shown the amateurs among us at BB:

1. That doing a job yourself can be more enjoyable than you might anticipate, and really satisfying once its done, especially when its something tricky you’ve never tackled before.
2. Quite often you can get away with adopting certain ‘cowboy’ tactics and shortcuts without opening any DIY books beforehand.
3. More often than not you can’t get away with adopting cowboy tactics; you do need to open a DIY book before starting a task; and it really does help reading up BEFORE you start (I usually remember this half-way through a project).
4. As a girl living on your own, it can be quite amazing how many neighbours are willing to help you out of a sticky situation, lend you a tool, or give you a hand with the odd job here and there.
5. Sometimes you really do just have to bite the bullet and hire the help of a professional!

 
As moderately technically minded but essentially quite lazy girls here, we lack in patience when it comes to reading and working out long instructions. We do tend to dive straight into a DIY project, and reap the benefits, or other consequences, of our actions later…

So we thought we’d add a few ‘rules’/tips that we find help us get through a day of good or bad DIYing. We hope that some of these can be of help to you too.

1. Get your hands on a pair of nice but cheap jeans and tops that you won’t mind getting indelible dirt on. They should be stylish enough that you don’t mind your hunky next-door neighbour (lucky you!) seeing you in, and (most importantly) very comfortable as there’s nothing worse than having to readjust yourself every few minutes when you’ve got filthy hands and you’re already feeling a little tense because things aren’t going quite as quickly or smoothly as you had hoped.

 

2. Have a half-decent tool collection, which should include:
   a cordless drill and power screwdriver (combined is fine)
   a large and small flat head screwdriver
   a medium and small phillips screwdriver
   a hammer
   pliers
   a utility knife
   a Leatherman multi-tool – such as the ‘Wave’ model – they’re great for getting you out of all sorts of scrapes. Keep it in the kitchen draw so you can grab it in an instant – minimum effort being key! (thank you handyguys for that reminder!)     

   and for any work you’re doing on your car:

   a socket set
   extra pliers and some spanners

   For great tools ergonomically designed for women, check out Tomboy Tools.

 

3. Have a copy of a decent DIY book, such as the Collins “Complete DIY Manual”, which you can refer to before you start, or once things go a bit wrong.

 

4. Allow at least three times as much time as you expect you will need to get a job done. If you’re prepared from the onset that its going to take all day, you won’t get annoyed when it does, and you’ll be pleasantly surprised when it only takes you twenty minutes!

 

5. Borrow your friends’ husbands and boyfriends. Ask people (who you trust enough to offer you sensible help that is) for any advice or to clarify anything you’re not sure about. Quite often they’ll be more than willing to jump in and do the job for you. Don’t get proud in these situations, be grateful that you’re not working up a sweat today, there will be plenty more days when you’ll be wishing someone would jump in for you. (Now, we’re not suggesting that your girlfriends wouldn’t be able to help you out with DIY advice. Far from it. It’s just that in our experience none of them are daft enough to jump in and do the job for you – so what’s the point of asking them…)

 

6. Have access to tea making facilities close by, it allows you to walk away, calm your nerves and regroup your thoughts when things are getting a bit strained.

 

7. Finally, have a decent bottle of wine or some tasty beers standing by for when you’ve finished – you’ll deserve a treat, and my god it’ll taste good. It really can be worth putting yourself through a lot of hard work for this reason alone!

 

This is a blog written by the less than expert section of the editorial team at Bookshelf Boyfriend.  For really good practical advice written by professionals, experts and knowledgeable enthusiasts, then log on to BookshelfBoyfriend.com!

[ASM]

Women’s troubles, shhhh, don’t talk about it…

I am this week’s Bookshelf Boyfriend blogger, but as you may have noticed for most of this week I have been silent.  This is because I have been suffering from the most god-awful bladder infection, aka cystitis, …de da duhh….  

The pain has been excruciating  - the sensation of urinating a combination of mini corn-on-the-cob knives and caustic soda; a constantly burning urethra and throbbing bladder, and the feeling of desperately needing the loo all the blimmin’ time.  On top of this I’ve been sleeping for Britain whilst my body’s been trying to fight the infection.  Consequently it has rather taken over my life this last week and pre-occupied most of my thoughts. When people (friends, family and colleagues that is, not just any mere acquaintance) ask me how I am, as an honest chick I feel compelled to tell them that “I’m very well thank you, apart from this goddamn bladder infection that’s taking over my life right now.”  And that’s when the looks of prudish horror and disgust start to appear.  

We all, men and women alike, have bladders and urethras, and we are all susceptible to bladder infections. Admittedly, women are more vulnerable to them because their urethra is shorter, but this doesn’t rule men out of the ability to get them either.  Possible causes for infection can include among others: generally being sexually active; having a weakened immune system; and not emptying your bladder fully when urinating.   So why the look of shock, as if I’ve spilled the beans on a sordid sex life of extreme bondage and wife-swapping, whenever I mention cystitis?  Urinary tract infections are extremely common, and should be no more of a taboo to mention than having a cold.  

This ineffable nature is particularly worrying among men, who I imagine are even less likely to raise the subject. UTIs, including cystitis, in men can be a sign of an enlarged prostrate gland, and consequently it is extremely important that medical advice is got as soon as possible.  In both men and women the infection needs to be carefully monitored and controlled, so that it doesn’t spread up the urinary tract to infect the kidneys or spine. If there is any sign of kidney, back pain or fever then medical attention should be sought immediately, regardless if you are already taking a standard course of antibiotics to treat the cystitis.

Having said all that, I am well on the mend now, having been prescribed my second dose of antibiotics. One of the advantages I’ve had from shouting my mouth off about it to everybody is that I’ve gained a lot of tips and advice from others on how to treat it or at least ease some of the discomfort. So I thought I’d write a few of the tips that I found most beneficial here, as well as some standard and more obvious advice. I hasten to add that whilst this advice helped me it does not come from medical practitioners, and ultimately I still needed to visit the GP twice.  So whilst the below suggestions can help ease the symptoms, if you have any concerns, if your are pregnant or breast-feeding, if your symptoms last more than a couple of days, or if it is a child with the symptoms, seek medical assistance. It is also worth looking at sites such as NHS Direct for further detailed advice.

 

Recommendations for cystitis

• Drink lots and lots of water – a good 2 litres a day. Avoid alcohol, and do not allow yourself to get dehydrated at all.
• Its probably the last thing you feel like doing, but no sex until the condition is completely clear.
• Drinking a glass of water with a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda can ease some of the acid burn when passing urine.  Alternatively sodium citrate, bought generically and therefore cheaply over the counter at the chemist, or sachets such as Cymalon or Oasis, can be added to water. It may well be a case of seeing which of these options works for you this particular time.
• Gently wash your urethra after every time you go to the toilet, with a cotton wool ball dipped into a weak solution of a drop or two of tea tree and cedarwood pure essential oils in cold water. This should both prevent further infection, and ease the continuing burn, especially if a pinch of bicarbonate of soda is added to the solution.
• Don’t be a martyr and do take pain killers! If you find paracetamol or ibuprofen aren’t working, then speak to your pharmacist or doctor about taking co-codamol.
• Have a bath once or twice a day in tepid water with a few drops each of tea tree, cedarwood and lavender essential oils. Do not use soap or shower gels etc to clean with, the antiseptic properties of the essential oils is enough to clean you. This along was the single most relieving treatment for me (apart from antibiotics!).
• There’s no harm in drinking lots of cranberry juice, although it may be better for preventative purposes rather than curing, just make sure its sugar free.

We’re looking to creating a medical section on BookshelfBoyfriend.com.  If you can submit any articles, tips or make further suggestions, do get in touch we’d love to hear from you.  

[PM]

Single girls valentine survival guide – for today and every day…

So, you’re single, you’re heart-broken, all your girlfriends are spending the day with their special loved one, and once again, you’ll be spending Valentine’s on your own. Well, we’ve got a number of reasons for you to be cheerful.

Firstly, there’ll be a lot of girls in relationships having a much worse day than you will be – filled with the disappointment that their beloved hasn’t proposed; has only bought them a cheapo bunch of forecourt flowers; or has refused to acknowledge/pretended to forget about the day altogether. So, stoked up with these merry thoughts of others’ misery, today is the perfect day to relish in your singledom and to be glad you don’t have a Valentine. Give yourself the day off from wallowing in self-pity and crying into your pillow – today with the help of BookshelfBoyfriend you’re going to love love being single and make this your special day of utterly selfish treats.

Start the day as you mean to go, and wear your best undies. So what no one’s going to see you in them? You’ll look and feel a billion times better than wearing your usual greying grannies. If all your underwear is a travesty, then make time at lunchtime to nip out and get yourself a good set. Ensure you get your bra size correctly measured at the same time (this should be done on a regular basis by the way) – and don’t forget matching knickers. Wear these in the afternoon, and you’ll certainly notice the difference. 

Buy yourself some flowers – ones that you actually like.

• Get a nice bunch from your local florist,
• Or avoid all those carbon-emitting air miles, and order some freshly cut British flowers to be delivered to you. We love, the spring joy of narcissi from the Isles of Scilly – www.scillyflowers.co.uk
• If you are still hankering for that feeling of receiving a slightly less personalised pre-packed bunch, then our tip is to get to your supermarket later in the evening, usually after 10pm – this is when bunches tend to be reduced, sometimes to as little as 10p – with just a little TLC they’ll look great and last just as long as a full-priced bunch, but you’ll have the added satisfaction of having bagged such a bargain.Pamper yourself – go out and buy new bathroom treats, or break open those fancy toiletries you’ve been saving for some long-awaited “special day”.
• Get the candles out and run yourself a lovely deep bubble-bath (yes, it’s a cliché, but we all love to luxuriate in a bath)
• If you don’t have a bath, you can still treat yourself here to some super posh shower-gel and fabulous body-lotion scented with your favourite perfume (today is not the day to be worrying about correctly applying and disappointedly analysing the results of your various anti-cellulite creams)
• Ensure some lovely clean bed sheets to climb into later for that extra feeling of post-bath loveliness.
• When you do go to bed wear your finest bed clothes – if its usually just an old T-shirt, then do as Marilyn Monroe did and wear nothing but Chanel no5 (or your own favourite perfume)Cook a yummy scrummy feel-good meal for one, like a huge salad, a stir-fry or a tasty piece of fresh fish, something that’s delicious and won’t make you feel guilty before the next bit…

  Chocolate, chocolate, chocolate – and no no, not your usual 500g Dairy Milk bar, get yourself some delicious Belgian chocolate truffles. Go on, its good for you (well dark chocolate is proven to be), it makes you feel as good as if you’re getting loads of sex (so we’re told), and heck it tastes good too… If you still feel guilty, just ensure that the chocolate is fair trade, and that should be all guilt alleviated.

  Bubbly – ok, we advise caution here, we don’t want you getting so drunk that you’re crying into your glass – so it may be best that you just buy yourself a half sized bottle of really good champers. Accompany this with some strawberries and you’ve got yourself a healthy treat too. Ok, strawberries are out of season, and consequently, not the most ethical purchase, but if you add some Fairtrade vanilla ice cream (like Greene and Blacks) to accompany those that don’t make it into your glass, then that’s some of the guilt lifted…

  Get a good movie to watch. Although really the choice for the perfect film is entirely personal, we highly recommend that tonight is not the night to be watching an overly romantic chick-flick that will send you into lonesome tears. Bookshelf Boyfriend recommends:

• Brokeback Mountain, if you want romance and extra added weepiness (RIP Heath Ledger). With a nice bit of heart-felt boy-on-boy loving, you will also be reminded that you’re better off single: even if you’re married you’ve got no security that hubby isn’t having a long affair with his best mate. Plus its also a very good film.
• Intolerable Cruelty, if you want a jaded and cynical take on romance: George Clooney; comedy; romance; George Clooney; divorce lawyers; divorce; gold-digging; pre-nuptual agreements; revenge seeking; did we say George Clooney; Elvis Presley soundtrack on a great opening title sequence – what more could you want?
• If you want George Clooney but with no suggestion of Romance, then we highly recommend Michael Clayton the thriller; its up for a few Oscars this year and has just been released on DVD – its great!
• Want to try something different? Want strong female leads preformed by perhaps the greatest and most under-rated actress ever? Then how about some classic Gena Rowlands performances from the 1970s in a couple of John Cassavete’s masterpieces like A Woman Under the Influence or Gloria.Have some unashamed and damned good “self-discovery”. That is, you want to be giving yourself an orgasm that’s going to beat anything that anyone else can ever give you. If you are in want of some additional aids then Love Honey have a huge selection of vibrators and dildos and all sorts of other fun toys. If you are in need of a bit of titillation for a warm up, then the archives of Scarlet Letters is a good place to start with a large selection of erotic prose, poetry and art.. http://scarletletters.com/
  

  Most importantly today, we hope you enjoy yourself and have realised that pampering yourself every once in a while is a whole lot of fun and should be done more often…

  If none of this has helped you pick yourself up from a recent(ish) – heck what’s seven years between friends) devastating break-up – then extra help and support can be found out www.soyouvebeendumped.com and remember, you have always got BookshelfBoyfriend to help you get through all the practical day to day stuff on your own.

  [ASM]