Tag: Bank

Life Update: Who’s Laughin’ Now?

Not in the sense of Jessie J’s song “Who’s Laughin’ Now”, which is a great song mind you and I love Jessie J, but more in the sense of Todd Howard’s little lobotomised gremlin tone.
“Who’s laughing now? …. Yes, I was in the chess club.”

Throughout the whole time, there have been big steps, small steps, back-steps and completely falling off; I am still struggling with mental health, we were all aware this was going to be the case. However, am I worse off? No.
I’m out here, on my own, struggling like everyone else, and leaving my nest was the best thing for me. I purchased my flat in 2022 (I believe, I forgot already) and slowly moved into it via sneaking huge shopping bags filled to the brim with my “stuff” to my flat over the course of about 5 months. Leaving my parents a note with full intent to completely cut them out of my life, and this book, with every single thing highlighted in there which I felt pertains to their behaviour. To this point, I have no idea if they even read it, nor do I want to ask, nor would they like to remember just how aggressively I tore away from the family.

Have I managed to achieve my goal of completely isolating myself from my family after 3 years? No.
I’ve got too much of a guilty conscience and always reply to them (eventually) when they text me. I spend days and nights just wishing for them to leave me alone, but all I can do is continue replying. Even with my grandmother, who’s recently had a lump taken out of her breast, had her whole breast removed then went through radiotherapy; I just wish they’d leave me alone. I love them; otherwise I genuinely wouldn’t reply, but even talking or thinking about them brings me back to a dark place I’d rather not return to.
Thinking back to what my counsellor said years before I purchased my flat, I do love them, but my love for them doesn’t matter when they won’t inspire the change they need to love me back the way I need it.
They’re not ready to change or don’t want to, and that’s not an environment I can survive in.

I was told by who, I thought, was a good friend of mine that if I moved out, I’d only become more miserable and wish that I hadn’t. I’d end up moving back in with my parents, and that in itself would be an awkward shambles which could’ve been avoided by me just not moving out. Am I still miserable? Technically, no.
I’m not miserable in the way I was before: I’m no longer suppressed by the life my parents had me lead. Stuck in a single room, with little space, even “littler” privacy, and even “littler” respect from both my parents and my little sister. I’m no longer feeling trapped and controlled, no longer comfortably idling through being emotionally neglected and mentally abused.

I am, however, more lonely in a way that I predict that I would’ve found out at some point if I would’ve stayed. Being alone has heightened all of my experiences and put it on the fast track. I’ve not had to experience debt, but the feeling of only having 1k in the bank is still enough to make my butt clench. I’ve had to deal with remortgaging, and god was that horrible. Likewise, I’ve witnessed my electricity bill go up and felt the sting of having to replenish my electricity more often through the winter.
Through this, it also opened up everything emotional about me. I feel terminally numb to emotion, yet at other times feel it so deeply. Regardless of whether I surround myself with friends, or I’m at a stage in life where I’m completely alone, I feel the same; empty and lonely. The issue is that I have no idea how to fix this as I’ve done what “normal” people do when lonely and gather friends, but it doesn’t seem to work for me, and it’s not like these are not meaningful friendships. These friendships fill me to the brim and I completely forget about everything- until they’re gone, out of sight or out of the voice call, the curtains drop and the loneliness drops in again.

My self-loathing is also getting the better of me again, hurting others as I put myself down when they genuinely care for me, and I’m still not able to take any compliments. I don’t know what the best approach to that is either; I have people who say that I’m “genuinely one of the nicest people they’ve ever met”, people who say “you are loved by us not because of what you can provide us but because you exist.” and my brain will immediately hear that and cast counter spell with “No.”. Something in my very being just can’t accept it, and the thing is that it doesn’t hurt me at all to say “no”; I just laugh, smile, shake my head like these people are ridiculous and get on with whatever I’m doing.
Also correlating with a lack of self-worth is my inability to get doctor’s appointments. I could make a lovely collage from friends currently and friends of the past telling me I need to see a doctor, and honestly, I’ve only just started going. Just for migraines at the moment, but it’s a step in the correct direction. I still need to get an official autism diagnosis, ADHD diagnosis, find out what’s irritating my ears, see if they’ll give me depression medication after being told I’d get medication for it in 2018, see if I need anxiety meds, figure out what’s wrong with my stomach… There’s a big list, and for some reason, the ones I’m most hesitant about are the ones that benefit me the most.
I promise I’ll get there.

If I’m just doing what I’m supposed to be doing, I’m not doing anything special, I’m just doing what needs to be done. There needn’t be praise for being less than exceptional. I’m being a standard, good-mannered person who treats people with respect, that shouldn’t be some achievement people are proud of, that should be just the baseline and what’s expected from everyone.

Oh, and for that one friend who told me that I’d be miserable if I moved out, I notice you’re not streaming any more, or creating your mental health podcasts, or writing anything on your website. I hope things are going well in your new flat after I forked out a lot of money to help you move, and that shit hasn’t hit the fan. I’ve started streaming again, and I’m sure you know this, as I raided someone who has ties back to you. I’ve not exactly got my motivation back, but I’ve certainly got the means to return to form; charity streams, constant streams… It’s still all just an idea, but I’ve got people worth streaming for and a community of people that don’t slander me behind my back.
I’m still creating Keymailer content, uploading more regularly to Youtube, editing content for another streamer and taking a sliver more pride in my work.
And I gotta ask one thing, are you miserable too? 

Also, I'm helping this little baby. -> https://www.twitch.tv/lannpaige

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[LEGACY] Perfect Heist 2

Another game from Keymailer, this time I was hoping for a good, fun experience, akin to PayDay 2 but a little more lax and a lot more goofy.
While I can definitely say that this would’ve been the case if it weren’t for the fact that the game is only suited for multiplayer.

Now, I can’t blame a game for being bad, just because it is dead.
There are certain things you just can’t control, nor can you do much about. There is an over-saturation on the market of multiplayer games. So much so that I doubt every single multiplayer game ever made is being played right now, a lot will have dropped out of relevancy and a lot will have never actually been picked up.

When it comes to Perfect Heist 2, I can’t reasonably say that “the reason that I didn’t get to experience this game fully is because there was no one playing at the time”. I was not monitoring the number of people playing the game that day.
Looking back on the statistics of gameplay, however, it appears that it would’ve been extremely lucky for me to even consider catching anyone else playing due to the fact there were only 5 other people playing on that day.
I could’ve, of course, just assumed that the “Quick Play” button wasn’t working and that’s not how other people were finding each other. That would, however, be rude of me to just assume nothing works, and it’s way more likely that I was just unlucky.

So, generally, what can I say about this game?
I wish there was a legitimate Singleplayer mode.
What I can do is set up a custom lobby and just fill it full of bots and see how things turn out, which was the majority of what I did when “playing” the game. The A.I. seems to just charge full force in with not a care in the world for anything, regardless of what level I set their difficulty to. This led to a few funny moments where the police officers were emptying full clips into the lifeless bodies of my former comrades over and over again until I was red in the face laughing, only feet away.
There’s honestly not much else that I’d like to discuss in great detail, as I don’t think I can get the entire feel of this game without playing with other real people, as it’s intended to be.

Pros:

  • The game works, with no graphical errors or glitches (as far as I’m aware)
  • The art style of the game gives off a great vibe, while the styling lets you know that you’re getting into a serious situation (with the colour palette). The chunky, lower poly-count lets you know you’re in for a goof and a good bit of fun.
  • The amount of selectable characters in the game with different weaponry is refreshing and interesting. I’m sure it’s more than what PayDay has, you can really feel that you’re helping out the team in different ways with all these roles, which all have some things in common too.
  • The custom mode with bots is essentially what made this review, whoever had the idea to have this in the game needs a pat on the back. The A.I. may be very “special” but it provided countless good laughs.
  • The U.I. of the game is actually rather decent for an indie game, everything is clear and concise and nothing is obstructing the view of the player.

Cons:

  • The game does have a GPU issue on the main screen, which is quite weird. Forces my GPU to rise to around 90% only on the main screen, but everywhere else it’s at a reasonable level.
  • The game relies on the player having someone to play with for the game to function as designed, which in itself isn’t a major flaw. Considering the player-base it has, it fails to provide the desired feel of the game.
  • The A.I. for the game seems not to change when adding different level custom bots. The robbers, no matter the level, dash straight into the bank and start smashing glass and grabbing necklaces. The police gun down people immediately, even if it’s supposed to be easy. It may just be only damage scaling, which is fine, but I honestly don’t notice much of a difference there either.
  • When I picked a specific character (possibly called “infiltrator” or something) where you spawn inside the building. The police automatically shot at me, despite my character depicted as wearing the same outfit as the staff, and not holding anything threatening. Not only that, but when I died, my A.I. companions were nowhere to be seen, waiting for a bit, I then flipped the camera to discover they’d spawned outside the map, so that’s fun.

Price: £7.99
Time To Complete: None it’s multiplayer
Achievements: 19
Cards: None
Worth The Money: Honestly, even if you got a group of friends together to play it often… No, not really.

Overall, I wanted this to be a great game, and fundamentally this is an okay game, or a “more okay than the average shit I get from Keymailer” game. Everything works, a few glitches here and there, but its reliance on solely multiplayer is what lets it down greatly. A hollow version of Payday, which would’ve been super fun if there were other people to play it with.

Zesty Rating
5.5 Out Of 10. With no doubt, it would’ve been higher if I’d had access to a single player of sorts or found a lobby with people.
A Payday parody/clone that could’ve been super fun to play, and funny with other people. Looking for a “Quick Game” finds no one, as there’s not many others playing this game at the moment. For a game that is designed to only be played multiplayer, it makes it a tad boring.

Please bear in mind that this is a repost. There have been slight changes to the post such as spelling and grammar fixes, images added, and things generally organised in the fashion I'd like them presented.  Apart from that, the main context of the review has not changed, opinion has not been altered and everything is sacred. I look forward to writing for you all again.

NOTE: This game is flagged as “Retry”.
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Buying a “House” (Flat) – Part 3 of 3

And so it begins…

Or so I’d thought it would’ve.

The proposed settlement date was on the 14th of October 2022. And we’ve missed that mark.
Not because of me, and not because of the seller, the solicitor or anything to do with the whole purchase itself.
God-damn postal strike.

And hey, I know we gotta strike. I understand the striking. I’ve only ever worked in a food-place, so while I’ve not been under the immense pressure of service-style jobs, and key workers experience as a whole.
I’m maybe one or two tiers above that. I’ve more than dipped my toes in that steaming bathtub, but I haven’t got down to the point where you have to brace yourself as you’re about to lower your sack/coochie into the boiling water, but I can imagine it.

But UGH. Now, someone who, as a type of key-worker, has to wait until these “Saturday and Sunday Aren’t Working Days” people to deal with my stuff… which will be Monday. For anyone that knows me, I do have quite a few bones to pick with weekend people, but moreso for the fact that the entire business is shut down for 2 days of the week.
Maybe it’s just because I’m used to jobs being a 7-day service, but it’s super niggly. I’ve worked in a Fish & Chip shop, Caravan Park cleaning vans and again at the same caravan park pouring pints. Now, working at Greggs it’s the same thing (not complaining about Greggs). People have got their days off, and it’s been whichever, and someone else was working that day instead to continue service. It’s probably the autism talking, but that makes 100% sense to me, regardless of the business being run. I’m struggling to try to think what business wouldn’t work on a Saturday or Sunday.

But yeah, this is just a big complaint about fucking “business days”, like fuck your business days, every day is a business day if I’m working. This week, I had Tuesday and Sunday off. Next week it’s Thursday and probably Sunday again. The week after, god knows, probably 2 “weekdays” off.
I’m just irritated and whining that I can’t get my house sooner.

I’m easily irritated when I’m excited for something.

So.

Closing Statement here. £6,666.06.
I immediately thought of my friend and how she would, “Fuck no. Fuck buying that house. That’s a fucking sign.”, and drop it.
Brandishing my “devil’s number” and my declaration of “I definitely do not own a house and have never bought property before, please believe me”, I hand it in to my solicitor.
Promptly following getting home I receive an email of where to put the rest of my dosh and boom. I’ve gone from 13k in the bank to 2k. And believe me, spending money has never been scarier.

I’ve spent a lot of money before, but never this much. I’ve given a lot of money before (more than I’ve ever spent on myself at any one time, because helping others in need is so much more important.) and even then… it’s still scary. I’m going to have to be paying money for the rest of my time to pay off the house, house insurance, life insurance, council tax, gas bills, electricity, Wi-Fi… food.
This is such a massive jump and I just took the leap of faith like I’m on the Red Bull diving championships.

My settlement closes on this Friday (21/10/2022), and I couldn’t be any more excited or freaked out.
I’m keeping this post until I get the keys or something else happens. I want to split off the after-purchase blog for the next part. Makes it a lot neater in my brain.

And so this is it!

Friday the 21st of October 2022, I am officially a house owner and a did a lil stweam to show you guys not only the flat, but my mind-state.
I’m fucked.

The settlement was on the Friday, and then I was just told, “Yeah, they have your keys, you arrange with them when you want to take the keys from them and yeah…”
That was kinda “Oh fuck…” My mortgage advisors have been chasing me for my key-date for ages, and it’s just… now?
Cool…

But yeah, I got in and lay in the middle of the living room floor for a bit. Got up and streamed and painted a huge patch of yellow on a pink wall. I’m going back to do it again because it didn’t really do much, and I really want to incorporate yellow and purple in my office space.
But yeah.
Yeah…

This is fucking huge and I have no idea what I’m doing.
Fun.
But I’m happy. So much happier.

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Buying a “House” (Flat) – Part 2 of 3

Come a couple of days after my first post, I received my mortgage offer and mortgage info package from the provider that my advisor got into contact with. Furthering the depth of how much I’ve been thrown into this largely insane and intense worry about this bog-standard thing that people apparently do once every 23 years?
Mind you… Coming to that whole, “once every 23 years” thing, I’m technically only 1 year behind being 24. Not bad.

The day after, I’ve received my solicitor’s email asking for when I wish to settle the transaction.

Uhhhh… Soon? ASAP? Now? In a week? I don’t know… When do you think is best?
I legitimately have absolutely no clue on a good when for this. So instead of answering or not answering, I ask some side questions about what things I would need to do, and if I should have spare time set aside to do it.
My man knows my game and suggests a date while also letting me know what needs to be done.
He knows the game.

So, here we are, with a settlement date and just kinda waiting for things to fall into place.

3rd of October, I received a few more documents concerning what I’ll actually be buying. Layout of the flat and the ground surrounding it. What’s mine and what’s equally my responsibility as much as every other neighbour.
The solicitor’s checks and stuff.

I have my co-workers arguing with me over whether they’ll be buying me Christmas decorations as house-warming gifts, and my unfiltered, reflex response was “You better fucking not.”
As much as the idea of people buying me furniture/furnishings for my flat greatly embarrasses me and completely feels uncomfortably out of the norm, I’m trying to get them to communicate with each other. There is no reason for me to have 5 kettles, but if they don’t know what each other is getting, then that’s what’s going to happen.

“I am a man… with 5 ovens!!”

More documents and guess what, these are signing documents!!

Declaration of Occupancy and the big nasty agreement that if I fall behind on mortgage payments, then the bank gets to repossess my flat.
Nasty.

For these documents, you need a witness to sign as well after watching you sign them. It’s recommended that it’s not a close family member, someone who’s going to be living with you or someone you’re close to. So, the manager at your job is probably a good bet.
Getting those signed and also having a read over the qualified acceptance to make sure there’s nothing I don’t understand… which realistically, who is even sure they ever fully understand these legal jargons apart from lawyers…
All I need to do now is close my Help To Buy ISA, get the closing statement and hand it over to the solicitor, along with the other things I signed and that should be it!

At this point, I am also going to be making a pilgrimage to every charity shop that stocks furniture and:
1. Asking if I can reserve furniture, and if so, how long is it reserved for.
2. If I purchase furniture, how long can they hold it for. As if it’s big items, I may need a hand getting it to my flat.
3. General prices and items held at that shop. I’ve noticed that each shop is a little different.
I’m uncertain if this is down to limits on things they can accept, standards on what they can accept, or just the customers they tend to get.
There are a lot of charity shops where I live, but most only have clothing and knick-knacks. So, I, personally, would assume, if I didn’t know any better, that any furniture I have would either have to be dumped or sold second-hand as there’s no “furniture charity shop”.
I could possibly stop people at the dump and try to commandeer their stuff. However, it’s a long walk out from where I’m situated, and our local dump requires you to reserve allocated time spots to dump… so… no one really goes any more.

And an update from previous post about having a bed, that is no longer the case.
It’s been a while since I was offered it, and they couldn’t hold onto it for that long. That and I’m pretty sure it was just a single bed, but I was never told, and that’s not what I’m looking for anyway.
I do, however, possibly have a toaster and a microwave. But that was from a rapid word of mouth from someone who is not really around all that often any more, so I’m not putting all my eggs in that basket.

The plan is, fridge-freezer, washing machine, bed.
Couch (fold down double bed), Chair (fold down single), Kettle, Microwave.

The rest is all in the air from there.

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Buying a “House” (Flat) – Part 1 of 3

Note: This is not a guide, but a partial sequence of a full event that I’m currently in the middle of.

I’m currently in the middle of purchasing property for the first time in my life. Now as of writing this I’m 24 years old, and 6 years over the “You’re an adult now, we’re going to boot you out the nest.” threshold.
As of the late teens of the 2000s, I started investing in a Help To Buy ISA. It something that I was completely unaware of until maybe about a week or two before the whole opportunity to get one was closed off to the public, and not that long off being ineligible to start one due to my age at the time.
It was something that was very “detached” to me, as money (showing a weird privilege here) has always been something I’ve been really detached with. But with that lack of bond with money, also comes with a lack of experience in spending it because I never did, and never do spend on myself.
Also, solidifying a lack of experience in transactions and business type things, is also a key contributor to my lack of self-confidence, a lack of experience in life.

I started my first-ever house hunt over a sudden, heavy need for my own space. This need has always been there for me, but it was always fleeting. I was always too “happy” to hold the negative emotion, or it was always too convenient to stay where I was.
Things in my parental household would anger me, sadden and disappoint me. My privacy would feel extremely violated, and I would feel as far as to say, I did not feel safe in my own home.

I have a partial diagnosis of both ADHD and ASD, going as far as to having the verbal diagnosis of a therapist, but nothing in secure writing. My verbal diagnosis was on the cusp of February 2020, by which would’ve been officially recognised later if it weren’t for COVID-19 almost putting a halt to all physical contact everywhere.
So to say that these sporadic and intense urges to move were connected to my mental disability, you’d be onto something there.
This time, however, it’s different. I don’t honestly know what’s fuelling my move. Like a combination of all the small and big things all at once, finally coming together to repair the broken glass. I’m still doing it, I’m still on that train of thought, and I’ve not fallen off for months.

So at first, I was looking at property right across from my work. A second floor flat, 2 bedrooms with a balcony. Situated on the edge of a shitty area, but a colleague of mine (who is a local) informed me that that block is a decent block, and I’ll have decent neighbours.
I went to view the flat and accidentally scared the real estate agent, as I arrived 10 minutes early and caught her coming out of her car.

So to say that these sporadic and intense urges to move were connected to my mental disability, you’d be onto something there.
This time, however, it’s different. I don’t honestly know what’s fuelling my move. Like a combination of all the small and big things all at once, finally coming together to repair the broken glass. I’m still doing it, I’m still on that train of thought, and I’ve not fallen off for months.
People keep asking me, “So how was the flat?” “Did you like it?” “What’s it like?”
Empty.
This bitch empty, yeet.
I am a first-time buyer, I do not have a lot of money to set on a deposit, and I’m buying in a beach-side town. Most property in this area used to be rentals, and they’re all being sold because of new.

The first property I looked at was “great”, and by great I mean there was nothing inherently wrong with the place. And it was a 2-minute walk from work, or 1 minute if you try to traffic dodge.
After a lot of anxiety and faffing around without any confidence whatsoever, I may or may not have hired the first local solicitor I saw and asked them to put an offer on the property.
The bid was unsuccessful, and my bid was 4th from the highest, followed by several others who’d ranked below mine. It was a busy bloody property, with a shit ton of interest.
When going for that property, I listened to the wrong people. A co-worker of mine told me that I was bidding too high initially, as I was close to the market value of the property. And a friend of mine outright said that I was not ready for a move whatsoever, no even ready to buy my own flat. With this confidence blowing measures, I regressed a bit and pulled back, losing me the property. I, however, saw this as an opportunity to build up my tolerance.

I started to view property that I couldn’t afford, picking up some more of the stupid language that’s used specifically for it. Learning the questions to ask estate agents when in the property. I viewed things “way” out of my budget, but keeping realistic with the style that I’d kinda be looking at.
Then, it came up.
Literally 1 property above the one I’d looked at first. I saw it as a sign, and requested a viewing as soon as I saw it pop up.

I went in, and it was dated, and empty. The walls were all painted nice, but unconventional colours, also nice. The dated aspect never bothered me as my things, such as furniture, will be all second-hand anyway. No major damage or anything concerning, nothing needing fixed and nothing worrying. 2 minutes from my work and all it requires is appliances and a bed.
Boom, it’s calling for me, I want it.
I took it. I grabbed that opportunity by the fucking throat.
Not only that, but I made an offer within 24 hours of viewing (as it was the one above the first one, it would be popular as it was cheaper than other flats), market value plus a little extra to give me an edge.
Within that hour, my unofficial offer was accepted.

Now comes the hard part.

Phone calls and endless emails, document gathering, passports, driving licence, prove you have that much, prove you can pay it off per month. The mortgage advisor contacting me every hour to ask for more and more stuff every time. One email she sent me had an opener that had me fucking buckled, though.

To see “Please don’t kill me…” pop up on my email notifications was already funny enough, but from someone I’d consider to “act more professionally” than to use language or a phrase like that was hilarious.

I’m currently now in the process of probably the last few legal documents being exchanged between the mortgage advisor hub and the mortgage lender themselves. (After having to physically go to the bank and get them to print something out, a waste of paper in my opinion). From then, once I’m accepted from the mortgage, I’m pretty sure it’s all about getting the solicitor and the advisor to talk to each other. Then closing down my ISA, getting another statement (ugh, more in-person printing), then putting the money where I’m told to.

Direct debt for the mortgage should be easy enough, but…
Whew…

It’s a lot, but I was ready for this, and I’m glad I’ve done it. I’m getting so much support for doing it and so many people want to help.
There were one or two people who were very adamant I didn’t do this, but honestly, if they were right, then I’d already be fucked mentally right now.

Right now, I feel very on top of things, and it’s been a long fucking time coming.

On getting the house, I’ll post a follow-up, and will be livestreaming my “Keys Day”.
Call me Commander Keys because I’m going down with the ship.

The worse the odds, the better the fight.

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