Sandra Chapman: Expensive holidays should be put on hold as inflation soars

Inflation this week has risen and is to rise again later this year to 10 per cent. It’s the enemy of us all.

There is no escape other than to sell the car and switch off the heating.

One needs to be proactive though to deal with rising costs.

The other day I dragged out two large items I was planning to take to the dry cleaners – sleeping bags for the boat for our annual holiday.

I do this every year without a thought, pay the cleaning company, glad I don’t have to do that chore myself.

But not this year. Prices have gone up – yes I had noticed – and I decided I shouldn’t throw money around such as I’ve done in the past.

This latest inflationary rise may be the start of something bad and so I have to be prepared, except I’m not good with money.

In fact I’m terrible. Not safe to be let out with a bank card.

To make sure I could enjoy my Christmas spending I decided to run a bath of water, get out the washing powder and dunk the sleeping bags in the bath.

Sure isn’t it nice weather, they would dry in no time.

I’d forgotten that these lightly fluffy things which keep me warm when we are tucked up in a marina somewhere, become a dead weight when you put them a bath.

My back screamed blue murder at the weight of a water filled duvet but I had done the deed, the thing had to be gotten out, wrung out and put on the clothes line outside.

My punishment I suspect for me trying to do the dry cleaner out of income. Try taking a very wet duvet downstairs, through the kitchen and on to the clothes line.

It really isn’t funny and I had another one to go. By the time I had got it tamed with clothes pegs, the rain came on. Ah, there had been no warning about that. I have saved around about £25 on my efforts but honestly if you have a dickey back don’t even try it.

The only consolation I had was that nowhere on my bank statement was there a £25 laundry bill.

There are numerous other things now that should be curtailed whilst this thrifty mood is with me.

The weekly shopping bill is scary so I’ve been sending Himself instead because he’s a lot better with money than me. When he arrived back recently with a pot of expensive honey I informed him we weren’t Harrods shoppers.

He wanted to know why I had bought a £6 plant recently since the garden is full of stuff.

I’m sure arguments like these are going on in many a household as the rising cost of living shocks us all.

The commentators tell us that inflation will rise again before it starts dropping next year. And pigs might fly.

I have to confess I do not understand high finance.

The Prime Minister warns that this ‘Northern Ireland Protocol’ business is ‘holding back Westminster from helping with the cost of living crisis’.

He declares that ‘a new UK-wide VAT cut on renewable energy products cannot be implemented in Northern Ireland because of the terms of the Protocol’.

The war in Ukraine and the Covid pandemic, he says, have ‘created a cost of living crisis on a scale not seen for half a century’.

Yes I can go back 50 years to 1972, we weren’t long married and had a mortgage. The economy wasn’t healthy and when the bank statement came through the letter-box it was a toss-up between us who would open it. ‘Costa’ holidays were a pipe dream then. It was his father’s ex- army tent and a dash to Donegal with its splendid scenery and friendly people.

Those were some of our best holidays.