55 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 46 Miles in November 187 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £175 at work (£61 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

Quite a few different thoughts, and as usual another different tack chosen for a given subject. Another rainy day yesterday so I didn't walk in, just the prison walk at work. The thoughts about spending money at work have almost diminished, they just pop up from time to time if prompted when getting a coffee, but yesterday just took a glance at the vending machine and went back to work, no self justification process, or it wouldn't hurt if. Which is quite positive.

In other thoughts, the share plan is for ever evolving, I was going to check the price of shares, how many I could buy in bundles of £5,000 and then how much dividend I could expect from each one to see which would be the best to buy. I started with Royal dutch shell, I could have bought 2 shares as they are over £2,300 each. The dividend became difficult to see. as it would mostly only display in dollars. I then went onto HSBC, and also it became confusing to how much dividend they actually paid out and in which currency. So I stayed simple and went with morrisons, which I would get over 2,000 shares based on last years dividend that would pay out over £200.

Conclusion, stay with the scheme I have currently as I get my 20% off the price it allows me to get more shares and more dividend. The company I work for are firmly in the FTSE 100 so are as safe as anywhere, this is certainly something for the future, but a little bit more complicated than I first thought, So plan B, get as much money together as possible, and as my November stats will show tomorrow, we have had another good month and will be getting ever closer the final goal target.

54 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 45 Mile in November 186 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £170 at work (£56 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

First thought, is of disappointment. I didn't get to walk to work on Monday, it was a mucky day and there is no point in being soaked through for a 12 hour shift. I did manage the prison walk at dinner time, so have added another mile to the total. But soon enough money saved is going to exceed miles walked. Which isn't a bad thing but I would love them on a par.

I also await the return of my old phone, according to music magpie there was screen burn. Which I know there wasn't any, so it will be interesting to see what phone I get returned. But I wasn't going to accept £24 when they offered £240 when I know there is nothing wrong with the phone. It has not been the only news where what I thought I was going to get never matched then end result as a work bonus scheme slashed by two thirds of what I thought I was going to get.

It is why I normally don't talk about or deal with what I have got until I have done it or have it. But with the next stroke of the keypad I am going to talk about how I am going to add the £66 for this months not spending at work before I have actually done it. I guess in this scenario the situation is different as it will be down to my own actions and input and I am not dependent on someone else.

It does mean I am fifty odd quid off a grand in cash saving, which is also annoying as that £240 would have meant I would have whizzed passed that figure. But all things for a reason, means I get to walk to town and sell the phone. Which means miles added to fitness and money in the bank. win win.

53 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 44 Mile in November 185 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £165 at work (£51 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

Well, these are combined thoughts today, of Friday and Saturday. The weather was better, cold but dry so I got the walking in to work. I do genuinely feel bad if I don't get a days walk in. So it was good to only miss the one day.

As for my real thoughts, well it is the mulling over of the past few days, I had gone to work on Thursday having had a strong start to the month sales wise, thinking it would fairly easy to kick on and get more sales and potentially get myself one of my best bonuses for the year. Thursday, fell flat on it's face, Friday was dire. It wasn't until Saturday that things improved. One thing I put this down to was the more relaxed attitude from myself, Thursday/Friday was jump on every opportunity, Saturday was plant the seed and see if it would grow.

People on Saturday actually sold the products to themselves, which made it all the stranger to comprehend when on the previous 2 days you had observed the need, advised how your product would help them, get agreement from the customer that you were right, but still not get the sale. Yet on Saturday I would just say you could get this product if you like, and the customers would then talk about how it was good for them or if they bought these two it would be the same price as one really good one. All my lines of sale, but I just had to sit back and let them have the discussion with them self.

It can be frustrating as you feel you have worked harder on the previous 2 days and got nothing, and sit back and simply reap the rewards. I then got to thinking about this blog, I would like it to be somewhere folks would come have a look, pass comment, share and so on. But my come see me approach doesn't work, my best sharing has been for random things. What has worked is adding the cartoons at the bottom. The message folks might not be interested in, but the cartoon may have made them chuckle so they share it.

As for if I get folks to to come and look or not, I would be happy to hit my goal and no one see it then have everyone watching and miss the goal. 

Anyways thanks for reading if you have done so, and feel free to comment.

Supercharged 1p challenge update

It's the time of the month when I start putting the money to one side from what I have saved that month, For November as you can see from the chart below it is £60, equates to £2 a day which brings the total to £110 saved and makes me £77.60 ahead of the challenge of I had just done 1p on day 1, 2p on day 2, 3p on day 3 and so on.

Follow the red link at the bottom to see how that has contributed to the grand total.

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end of month	days in total	money saved per day	Total saved	comparative 1p challenge	How much ahead of the standard challenge
up to the end of Oct	50	£!	£50	£12.75	+£37.25
Nov	80	£2	£110	£32.40	+£77.60
Dec	101	£3	£203	£51.51	+£151.49
Jan 2019	132	£4	£327	£87.78	+£239.22
Feb	160	£5	£467	£128.80	+£338.20
Mar	191	£6	£653	£183.36	+£469.64
Apr	221	£7	£863	£245.31	+£617.69
May	252	£8	£1,111	£318.78	+£792.22
June	282	£9	£1,381	£399.03	+£981.97
July	313	£10	£1,691	£491.44	+£1,199.56
August	344	£10	£2,001	£593.40	+£1,407.60

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Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

51 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 38 Mile in November 179 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £155 at work (£41 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

My head is a complete shed at the moment, is my first thought. You set off in one direction for your day, and then something completely different happens. The day itself has been full of good news. I have a brand new phone from Google, so it means I can sell my old one and add £240 to my total. I am well on target for getting bonus this month, I have already earned £60 worth of vouchers for Christmas. Yesterday I had quite a successful day with advertising myself on twitter with this tweet earning over 20,000 impressions.

Don't be a stranger, why not say hello in the comments thread

Remember it's #WorldHelloDay pic.twitter.com/u0YhLxGmJb

— retireatfifty (@retireatfifty) November 21, 2018

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So why am I not at least content? Honest answer I don't know, I guess a lot of things are up in the air, I don't like change so I have to get used to my new phone which will take a few weeks, getting used to how to handle it, how to find the things you go to without thinking with my current phone. I stress about will I get the £240 for the phone which I have sold, and so be happy when that is sent off and the money received. Even though I have got my bonus almost secured, today has been a very slow day, and I have found it difficult to kick on, and yes I have got the vouchers but they will come just the week before Christmas if I am lucky. 

But all the time I say to myself everything happens for a reason. Today you may notice that the mileage has only gone up by one, that is because it was one of those wet you through rain days, which I just noticed on the way out to putting the bins out, which was in itself lucky because it gave me chance to divert my day, get a lift with our lass, and simply walk across from where she works to my place of work, and do the prison walk at dinner which totalled the one mile.

So I look forward to calmer times, when money is banked and things return to normal. My OCD can get the better of me, and I do try my best not to unravel but its so difficult. Do you have any tips folks?

50 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 37 Mile in November 178 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £150 at work (£36 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

50 Days!!! YAY!!! An over use of the exclamation mark, but it is a good feeling, quite an achievement, if done in a comparison with cricket, it is an innings without any boundaries, they have all been run singles, well, walked shall I say.

The times when I wish to break my run, and buy food at work is getting fewer and further between. The money is mounting up, now at £150 and as I mentioned in previous posts I am going to up it to £5 from now on, as inflation would effected the price and some days, especially on the 12 hour shifts I would have bacon butties in the morning a meal in the afternoon and a snack right at the end, so easily coming to more than a fiver. 

Quite proud, it may not seem much to many but it is a lot to me.

#GoMe

49 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 34 Mile in November 175 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £147 at work (£33 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

Just one away from the half century which I will gladly celebrate on my next post, today is thoughts on day 48 and 49, Friday and Saturday. I didn't do a blogpost for 48, as life does keep on coming and just didn't have the time.

Yet Friday I had one of those light bulb moments for me. Now for some they may have thought it quite normal and why hadn't I thought of it before? But what may be a simple thought process for one may well be a land of illusion for another. As I was walking to work I was thinking about the shares that I am buying, and the thought at the time was to get to the end of the 5 years, and if they are worth more than the the 6 grand I have put into the scheme, sell them and save the money or if they devalue then just get my 6 grand back.

But you do get dividends from the shares, paid twice a year, for the amount of share I would be getting and even at this years dividend pay out that would mean £350 twice a year. A gift which keeps on giving. It is what amazes me about governments and councils when they sell off what belongs to them and then have to pay to hire it back. Anyways lets not get all political. The thought about selling the shares was to say it's better to have the money than have something which may devalue, a bird in the hand and all that. 

Then I thought, if I then keep the shares I still have that money which I can access by selling the shares but twice a year get a dividend. The shares actually only made up of the third of my goal, two thirds were liquid assets (cash) there is me talking as though I am a professional. Then I did a little bit more thinking, walking to work is a great time to think. I thought about how I get a 20% discount on the shares I buy, if I buy them over 5 years. I can invest up to 300 pounds a month at any one time (currently £100 a month) So next year when the scheme opens again invest another £100 a month the year after set another scheme going having reached the full £300.

As each investment scheme matures, depending on the price of the shares at the time. I would keep the first one and see how the dividend payments go, then when the 2nd and 3rd ones mature I can sell them at least making 20% which I get as a discount, hopefully anymore from the increase of the shares (fully aware they may go down) and then invest that money into another set of shares. then keep the process going until I have 12 sets of shares. Now this does have risk, shares can go down as well as up. I would only deal in FTSE 100 companies. Even then monitoring whats happening. But I did feel this is the best way to ensure an income when I retire. It does involve not actually fully retiring at 50 but semi retirement so I can continue with the work share scheme. But this was the basis of my thoughts.

Will dreams become reality? Well its another slow burner, but it can't but help to dream.

47 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 28 Mile in November 169 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £141 at work (£27 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

It has been over 2 years since the EU referendum was held in the UK, now I don't mention this as something to bang on about the rights and wrongs of it, but more to do with timescale. I remember talking to folks about it, I am remember the results morning, all very clearly, as though it was this summer, and if pushed I would say it happened last year but would have struggled to grasp as I do now that it is over 2 years ago,

Now the point of all that? Well it is the concept of time, at the moment I am still in the very early stages. Looking forward to the future, looking forward to future targets. Still with the nagging doubts, of will I achieve my goals? Will I get anywhere close? The answer comes from experience itself, and to simply take each day as it comes, as I do now by writing these blog posts. Complete one each day. Note down what I have added to the total and move onto the next step. At some point in the future, I hope at least, I will look back and say "Wow!" I remember when I had only collected £141 and now I have over a grand or two grand.

It is all step by step moment by moment, your goal sometimes arrives without warning and surprise and when you look back you don't always realise just how far you have travelled.

Yougov 0 v 0 Populus

Every week or so I write a blog post about how the revenue is coming along from the opinion poll surveys that I complete. Once I hit a £50 payment that is converted to a score which you will see above, currently no payments so currently nil nil.

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I need to thank you for the heads up. I joined after I saw your posting and am on £5 already...

— TPO (@tpomanners) November 14, 2018

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The above post was a nice one to get, as you put these tweets out and wonder, do people actually see them, from the response they obviously do.

Populus

Currently sitting on £26 which is quite a lead over Yougov, must admit at the moment I am normally happier to receive a Populus poll compared to a Yougov one. There is still the in trepidation of will I get accepted as one the other day got you to fill out about 10 questions and then tell you that you are not needed, but at this rate it seems populus will be the first to hit £50. But as they pay out on the points you have on the first of the month it could well be the 1st Jan total which is the one which means I have hit 50

Yougov

Now you get a steadier trickle of surveys from Yougov, but at 50p a time I must admit I have skipped at least one, I am guessing that if I was retired I would be all over them, but as this is in my free time, I simply pass it by, but if I want to get towards the £50 I must get a bit more orderly, it is after all just 8 or 10 mins. I can waste that watching the news.

Thoughts,

I have in total £43.40 as my balance between the 2 polling companies, over a 6 week period, not bad. Only get anything when they hit £50 but both well on the way, but it does look like Populus will get there first, yet as you can claim Yougov at anytime the wait till the 1st of the month may well be the advantage to YOUGOV claim anytime you hit £50. We will see.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Want your opinions to be heard? Then why not join YOUGOV polling surveys https://t.co/uUhF7D0qM0

— retireatfifty (@retireatfifty) October 10, 2018

46 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 25 Mile in November 166 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £138 at work (£24 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

It was great to have some time yesterday for just me and our lass, we had a look around town, and on more than one occasion I made our lass laugh. Our lass has the dentist today, so I did want yesterday to be a day of forget whats happening in the future kind of experience.

It also meant with the 3 miles of walking to work, we also did 3 miles yesterday walking around town. I used my Better Points app to measure the distance and I was quiet surprised at how far we had walked. It is also a shame to see how many places which have closed down. You do look and think it is becoming a ghost town where you can just eat, drink or buy other folks cast offs. I do feel that big brands should open up and have more of an experience with their products, so you may well buy them online but you can have a day out trying the different items, as we all love to try before we buy. We should have more places where you can learn new skills or brush up on old ones. Long gone are the days of pile it high and folks will just come and buy it.

In other news, the blog had it's first comments, although this is just a online diary, to help me keep up with the project, it does help to have folks pass by and share their thoughts. The cartoons on the end of posts and on the bottom of twitter posts have worked a treat, people much prefer visuals to a lot of words. Here endeth the lesson.

Feel free to comment.

Will my share investment play it's fair share?

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

The link above is a link I put on a lot of my posts so you can easily get to my scores on the doors, so you can see the latest totals as I work towards achieving my goal. Now the share investment is the 2nd biggest part of the target, with a projection of £15,000 only surpassed by my own 1p challenge saving. It does however have the possibility of doing the whole £50,000 goal by itself.

As share schemes go, it as safe as you can get, I invest £100 per month for 60 months giving me a pot of £6,000 if the shares at that point are less than the value I have an option to buy them at I ask for £6,000 back. So don't lose any money other than say the value of £6,000 over 5 years. But at least you get your money back.

My option to buy was 20% less than the value they were when I started the scheme, so I get them for £1.70 they were valued at around £2.09 so if nothing changed I make 3,529 (shares I will get if I choose to buy) times 39p = £1,376 profit.

for every penny the shares go up by I get £35.29 profit.

So looking at historical data the highest the shares have been over the past 5 years is £5 in their life time they were over £10 in 1999

If the price after 5 years was £4.26 I then make my projected goal of £15,000 which is not a big ask, as it is below the the figure high of the past 5 years and well below its highest ever.

Obviously this basket only has a few of my eggs, and I am well aware you could have a profits warning the month before I sell my shares so all the previous 4 years and 11 months mean nothing, but similarly they could be talk of buy outs and the shares may sky rocket. It is certainly something I am watching, with the safety of knowing I will get my money back, but the dreams of it could well make thousands.

It's always good to have a dream.

I found this cartoon, lets hope it's nothing more than the chuckle it is meant to be.

45 Days of walking to work and not spending money at work

Stats. 

So far I have walked 19 Mile in November 160 miles in total since starting this blog

I have stopped myself from spending £135 at work (£21 of which in November) on sweets and snacks, I don't really need.

Click this link to see how all the endeavours are helping to build towards the final goal. 

Thoughts

It is good to know you are not alone with your thoughts and actions, and yes I knew it but it is good to get replies like the one below.

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We've started tracking what we spend, made me aware of what I was spending, this weeks savings alone for my lunch/breakfast is £41

— PaulSres (@PaulSres) November 10, 2018

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It reaffirms what you are doing, also got to thinking that am I being a little under representative of what I spent, by only saying £3, I had a quick check of a bank statement from a few months ago, totalled then divided by the time in and it was actually nearer £4 a day, so as I like things to be whole numbers and not oddments. When I get to £150 which is on day 50 which will make it all neat and tidy. I will be upping the savings to £4 a day.

As for yesterday, it was a rare day at work, it flew by. I think I will frame it and store that memory. 

Now lets have a laugh, hope the cartoon makes you chuckle as well.