Insignificant/ Significant things that BYP or just wind you up a little

[McNab]

I love travelling by train.

Anyway BYP: pet insurance.
Our lovely dog has just turned ten (ish - he's a rescue, so it's all a bit ish). He now costs more to insure than the fucking Audi.

Cheer up, My 2 younger Rotts are £500 odd each and my Malinois is £800. They won't touch the oldest Rott as she's 13.

But you've not seen how much it cost to insure his Audi

[Noggin]

Shoulders. I've dealt with a shit right shoulder for almost 7 years now. It's my normal. It's no longer actually painful, but it's regularly grumpy/uncomfortable/difficult!

BUT - yesterday afternoon for no apparent reason my left arm/shoulder became ridiculously painful. Like actually painful. With my issue that I've not found any pain meds that actually work, that was a bit of a challenge for doing stuff - cooking, sleeping etc I've mastered with one hand but when the good arm makes movement difficult, well, it's been interesting Although the hot water in the shower seems to have helped a smidge!!

So, no heading far by bike, but the sun is out so I'll see if I can get to town for coffee, and the sun is out so it's totally worth a go! No hairpins from cat sit house and only a bit less than 10 minutes to town. I can change my mind and come back for the car!




But FFS WTF did this happen, what did I do???

[ChrisW]

Just cycled back from a pub - pint of cooking lager, a small lemonade and a packet of crisps. £10.50!

[Pirahna]

Just cycled back from a pub - pint of cooking lager, a small lemonade and a packet of crisps. £10.50!

That's 4 bottles of half decent red from the local bodega. Mercadona own brand beer is as good as the mainstream stuff at €0.37 a can. A pint in the English bar is €3.

[Yorick]

Just cycled back from a pub - pint of cooking lager, a small lemonade and a packet of crisps. £10.50!

Pint here at my local is 1.80€

20240601_200438.jpg (1.36 MiB) Viewed 1701 times

[ChrisW]

Wasn't even a great pub....good to be out in the sunshine though

[Sunny]

Anyway BYP: pet insurance.
Our lovely dog has just turned ten (ish - he's a rescue, so it's all a bit ish). He now costs more to insure than the fucking Audi.

Cheer up, My 2 younger Rotts are £500 odd each and my Malinois is £800. They won't touch the oldest Rott as she's 13.

But you've not seen how much it cost to insure his Audi

Yep > £1000

£1043.35 to be precise. He's a big lump rescue mix from Croatia, so who knows what he is, but the vet reckons there's Irish Wolfhound and German Shepherd in there somewhere. I assume the turning 10 (ish!), has caused the bump up.

[Taipan]

Only had jack Russells for over 30 years and they are like the Hondas of the dog world, they just keep going. So we'd never insured a dog or had booster jabs. Now we also have a French Bulldog which are notorious for health issues, i thought i'd look into insuring her. PetPlan quoted over £200 a month , so that idea got binned!

[Noggin]

Only had jack Russells for over 30 years and they are like the Hondas of the dog world, they just keep going. So we'd never insured a dog or had booster jabs. Now we also have a French Bulldog which are notorious for health issues, i thought i'd look into insuring her. PetPlan quoted over £200 a month , so that idea got binned!

Years and years ago a friend told me that she never insured her dogs (German Shepherds IIRC) - she would put an amount a month in a savings account so that if the dog/s needed anything, she had a reasonable amount saved. This is 20+ years ago, so pet insurance wasn't as costly as now, but I remember her putting what I thought was a big amount away - maybe 50-100£ - so quite a bit more than the insurance would have cost back then, but no excess, no increase if she claimed and I'm pretty sure in the 5 years I knew her, she didn't need any of the money. But knowing her, I suspect that once the dog passed, the money would stay in the savings account for the next dog, just in case

No idea if that's feasible now? No idea what vets cost, except LOTS!!

[cheb]

I've never insured any of my cats, they get regular tick and flea treatments and that's about it. Whether or not they make a one way trip the vets has depended on their age and what's wrong with them. One had its leg pinned, it was young enough to be worth it. The last one had a brain problem that was likely to impossible to cure so that was that.

I miss them when they die but it's only a cat to me, there's plenty more. The current one is a twice rehomed cat that came from a neighbour, very affectionate, very happy to see me but it's still only a cat.

I'm not fussed how people spend their money but it boggles me how much can be spent on pets. Neither do I get the breed thing unless it's a working animal.

[Count Steer]

There were moves afoot to look at/break up some of the big company monopolies on veterinary services. At the moment all the independents keep getting mopped up and the big outfits, in a cosy (incestuous) relationship with the insurance companies (and the drug companies) are cleaning up.

Vets put their bills up, insurance companies put the premiums up, kerrrching! They're all happy...because the actual costs haven't gone up that much. Then they manufacture demand by doing treatments that probably aren't necessary as well just to keep the cash flow going and make people think they're fortunate that they insured.

Ends up with those that can, paying through the nose. Those that can't with pets that need treatment not getting it or being euthanased unnecessarily or being abandoned. The only other resort being charities like the PDSA.

It whiffs rather a lot. Same thing with dentists etc. As soon as the insurance companies get a grip prices rocket.

Self insurance is obvs the way but people aren't very financially disciplined. (That and don't go for breeds with known issues...get a Heinz 57 mutt ).

[Noggin]

I've never insured any of my cats, they get regular tick and flea treatments and that's about it. Whether or not they make a one way trip the vets has depended on their age and what's wrong with them. One had its leg pinned, it was young enough to be worth it. The last one had a brain problem that was likely to impossible to cure so that was that.

I miss them when they die but it's only a cat to me, there's plenty more. The current one is a twice rehomed cat that came from a neighbour, very affectionate, very happy to see me but it's still only a cat.

I'm not fussed how people spend their money but it boggles me how much can be spent on pets. Neither do I get the breed thing unless it's a working animal.

I'm a bit like that - probably a bit more attached just because I've no family, so if I have one it's family!

But, it's very cheap, cheerful and quality of life based for me.

The last cat I had, the vet wanted to give it a special diet for a kidney issue and then have me keep it inside all the time to manage it's food etc. But it was an outdoor cat so for him, zero quality of life if I stopped him going out (he' wasn't particularly old). As it was the vet was wrong about the severity of the kidney issue and after an horrific weekend and calls to a vet, he was put down first thing Monday morning. It was right for the cat not to prolong his life if his quality of life was to be reduced so much

But, I'm a farmers daughter - whilst I may be attached to an animal/pet, it's all about quality of life and lack of pain; age to a point too as you say about the pinned leg.

Can't comment on dogs as I won't have one! LOL

[Noggin]

At the cat sit house, they have access to the MotoGP in English -TNT I think.

I missed the Moto3 but I had set it to record so wasn't too worried!!

FFS - HOW long for the faff and fannyarsing about before the race coverage? I reckon it's almost an hour of mostly fast forwarding it just to get to watch the Moto3. I saw the Sprint yesterday could have done without the rerun of that (I know, I'm a miserable old git!) and soooooo much stuff about almost everything except the Moto3!! I was very close to giving up and getting the iPad out and watching it in French!!!

If I'm here again, I'll make sure I don't miss it!!!

[MingtheMerciless]

There were moves afoot to look at/break up some of the big company monopolies on veterinary services. At the moment all the independents keep getting mopped up and the big outfits, in a cosy (incestuous) relationship with the insurance companies (and the drug companies) are cleaning up.

Vets put their bills up, insurance companies put the premiums up, kerrrching! They're all happy...because the actual costs haven't gone up that much. Then they manufacture demand by doing treatments that probably aren't necessary as well just to keep the cash flow going and make people think they're fortunate that they insured.

Ends up with those that can, paying through the nose. Those that can't with pets that need treatment not getting it or being euthanased unnecessarily or being abandoned. The only other resort being charities like the PDSA.

It whiffs rather a lot. Same thing with dentists etc. As soon as the insurance companies get a grip prices rocket.

Self insurance is obvs the way but people aren't very financially disciplined. (That and don't go for breeds with known issues...get a Heinz 57 mutt ).

I'm going down the self insurance path as it's just a piss take. Oh we've put the premium up by a £100 (20%) this year.....why, oh the dog will reach 5 this year. Piss off you greedy fucks.

[Mussels]

Touch sensitive controls on everything, I'd be fine if they were on budget things but they seem to be treated as a premium option when they are utter rubbish.

[Rockburner]

Touch sensitive controls on everything, I'd be fine if they were on budget things but they seem to be treated as a premium option when they are utter rubbish.

The latest cola machine in 5 guys now has a touch screen lcd display as the "dispense" button. That's literally all it does: turn on the pump.
Why the f@ck would you make it a touchscreen lcd display??

[Sadlonelygit]

The wife!
By trade she's a seamstress, ask her to cut shapes, edges whatever out of a piece of fabric.....done
Give her a bread knife and ask her to cut a slice of bread.........you get angles only Pythagoras could dream of, like some demented CNC programmer has been let loose on your bread.
This bmp as I then either have to follow the angle, or square it up, getting, quite literally a wedge of bread.

[Skub]

Our EPH wireless central heating controller.

The second receiver has just shit itself within a 2 year period and you have to buy the Thermostat and receiver together at 80 quid thanks very much. I'll soon have a collection of the half which doesn't shit the bed.

I've wired the boiler directly into an on/off switch for the mean time,just to get hot water and allow me to get over myself.

Tech = more schitt to go wrong.

[Rockburner]

The wife!
By trade she's a seamstress, ask her to cut shapes, edges whatever out of a piece of fabric.....done
Give her a bread knife and ask her to cut a slice of bread.........you get angles only Pythagoras could dream of, like some demented CNC programmer has been let loose on your bread.
This bmp as I then either have to follow the angle, or square it up, getting, quite literally a wedge of bread.

oooo - I love a nice wedge of crusty bread....

[MingtheMerciless]

My mate was riding his "gravel" bike along a nearby country lane when 5 scrotes on 3 mopeds/125's, two of them without helmets on (wearing balaclavas) kicked him off. 6K bike trashed, badly bruised and shaken up, he spent 45 minutes on the phone to the police to be told we can't do anything, it'll be impossible to find them, the incident gets posted on local social media and the police response comes in for justifiable criticism, especially as the area of town they originate from gets pinpointed by a few posters as they are seen regularly casing motorbikes and push bikes (Eastbourne has a bad bike theft issue at the moment). He gets a call from the local police Sargeant saying we've seen your post, we think we know who they are but we're still not doing anything about it. He's done a bit more digging and probably the same scrotes kicked someone off their push bike a few weeks ago and they ended up in hospital with a collapsed lung! FFS.

Same scrotes are seen regularly riding their 'peds illegally in the local forest and tearing around the car park and still no police intervention.