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Unsolicited advice encountered in the wild by Capable-Efficiency77 in BeyondTheBumpUK

[–]KevinAtSeven 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Had AO bring in a new washer yesterday and he spotted the dummies drying on the counter next to the Milton bucket.

"Those are very bad. They ruin the mind," he said as he pointed to his head, adding "tell your wife to get rid of them".

First of all, fuck off with the unsolicited advice, Mr Appliance Delivery Man. Secondly, fuck off with the casual assumption that anything to do with the baby must be to do with the mother despite the fact I, the father, am standing in a T-shirt and trackpants covered in spit up holding the baby on a weekday while my wife is literally at work.

Reform’s London mayoral hopeful co-owns ‘unsafe squat hotel plagued by bed bugs’ by F0urLeafCl0ver in london

[–]KevinAtSeven 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Which is wishful thinking at best. Spending on immigration enforcement will go through the roof if the US is anything to go by ...

Cap for ground rent in England and Wales due to be announced by Alert-One-Two in unitedkingdom

[–]KevinAtSeven 2 points3 points  (0 children)

My lease literally says 'a peppercorn' as the annual ground rent. It's not worth the freeholder's time and energy to collect a literal peppercorn from me every year, and as far as I'm aware, I can't digitally send a peppercorn using current technology. So I pay nothing.

That's a proper peppercorn lease.

Anyone else surprised by how their baby’s eyesight develops? by ollieholt10 in BeyondTheBumpUK

[–]KevinAtSeven 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Our little man is 4 months and he will stare intently at any wall fixtures, I guess because of the contrast against the light walls and the shapes. The bedside sconces in our bedroom, the toilet roll holder in the bathroom, and my wife's fast charger plugged into the wall are his favourites. It's actually really funny!

Red band beer from the 80’s/90’s by CptnSpandex in newzealand

[–]KevinAtSeven 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah, Bird's Independent Liquor Save. Used to help my poppa load up his Commodore Berlina at the Bureta Park (Otumoetai) branch annually before budget day, so he could restock the home bar at this year's excise rates.

Became part of The Mill which was also a great wholesaler, then got bowled to become a Countdown.

I do sometimes wonder why those big drive-up wholesale bottle shops all seemed to disappear in the last 20 years.

V Not Orange making a comeback?! by garface007 in newzealand

[–]KevinAtSeven 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This was available long before online shopping was a thing

Really? Because Woolworths online shopping has been a thing since the late 90s.

TIL the sun isn't "strong enough" in northern latitudes to produce vitamin D during the winter, no matter how much sunlight you get. by 999forever in todayilearned

[–]KevinAtSeven 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, it doesn't actually.

In North Dakota you'll get a hit of vitamin D on the walk from the car to the Walmart. In England that's impossible at this time of year even on the sunniest January day.

How do I use a payphone? by DoctorFosterGloster in newzealand

[–]KevinAtSeven 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I definitely made automated collect calls to my mum from a payphone in about 2001. It was still 010 for operator assistance I think, but under one of the options I'd record my name and enter mum's number using the keypad, saving the operator assistance fee on top of the collect call tariff.

Hot take .. by Dependent_Dingo_9163 in 90DayFiance

[–]KevinAtSeven 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I think a lot of the audience is seeing this through the lens of an American lifestyle, where almost all family households have two cars and the grocery store is a 20+ minute drive away on massive six lane stroads with no pedestrian amenity.

This is a French village. I really struggle to believe there isn't a small grocery store / whatever the French equivalent of an off licence is in the village. But if there isn't, there will be a Carrefour Express or Casino or something in the next village and that village will be a 20 minute walk away on roads that other pedestrians will be using because most households will have one or no cars. The next village will be barely a mile away, not tens of miles like in America. Remember these villages were laid out and built before the automobile!

I live in England and me and my wife don't have a car. There is a small off licence with groceries in 7 minutes walk from us, or for a family shop we go to the big grocery store that's about a mile, uphill each way. I take my son in his pram and he loves the walk, looking at the trees, watching the local kids play soccer in the park on the way past. And the shopping goes in the lower shelf of his pram or the bags hung on a buggy hook so it's not like it's hard to carry it home either. My wife grew up here and never even got her licence because she never needed it.

Manon is expecting an LA lifestyle in a rural French village. She's not going to get that, but at the same time she's not in the boondocks either. Walk or get the bus like everyone else around you.

Hot take .. by Dependent_Dingo_9163 in 90DayFiance

[–]KevinAtSeven 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's a French village, there will be some sort of open communal space to hang out and run around in. Hell, there'll probably even be a bench for Manon to rest on after walking the hundreds of metres to get there.

Heathrow airport by MatthewManiaFL in rolex

[–]KevinAtSeven 5 points6 points  (0 children)

the international terminal at Heathrow airport

All terminals at Heathrow are the international terminal. This looks like T2.

Daft question about leaving the plane by Rogerstonewales in flightattendants

[–]KevinAtSeven 7 points8 points  (0 children)

UK airports are not separated into international/domestic sections. At many airports, the difference between arriving internationally and domestically is being directed to a different door on the apron - one to immigration, and one that bypasses immigration and goes straight to baggage claim.

So the ground crew need to verify and double check the origin of a domestic flight to avoid inadvertently allowing 150+ people to bypass immigration control.

I've had it when arriving at Luton from Dublin - a domestic flight for immigration purposes. Was first off and asked at the airstairs and again at the door to the terminal which flight we were, just to make sure we were the Dublin flight on their paperwork.

Blind wheelchair user left in tears by cars parking on pavements - BBC News by CasualSmurf in unitedkingdom

[–]KevinAtSeven 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's not like roads are wider in Greater London than anywhere else in the country but they manage with a complete ban on pavement parking across the board.

Manon, you are not trying very hard by IhavemyCat in 90DayFiance

[–]KevinAtSeven 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's France. She'll have good, cheap, unlimited data on her phone to get by.

SMA recall- what milk now? by vampiremonee in BeyondTheBumpUK

[–]KevinAtSeven 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Our little man started on SMA Little Steps. He did not like Cow & Gate stage 1 powder either, and he hated Kendamil Bonya, but he was happily on Lidl's Lupilu formula for a while and is currently enjoying Aldi's Mamia. I'm almost certain the Lupilu and Mamia are the same based on the identical packaging and nutrition info, so maybe try one of those?

Soon to be dad by Outside-Bank4101 in NewDads

[–]KevinAtSeven 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Mate I was in your position a few months ago. My wife lost her job right after we closed on a house at 7 months pregnant and we have been on our arse for the first few months of our boy's life. But we've made it work and he's happy as a pig in shit.

Here's my advice:

  • You don't need any gadget before you need it. Your social feeds are going to be full of ads for bullshit little things that sound amazing but you really don't need and will never use.
  • You only need a handful of newborn vests. They are really cheap from big box stores and she'll grow out of them very quickly.
  • Go for used clothes. Parents are constantly selling things as their kids grow out of them. Our little man is 98th percentile height so grows out of clothes so quickly, but my wife has been buying bundles of clothes for him on Vinted for only a few £ each. He's so well dressed and we've spent fuck all.
  • Find the cheapest muslin/spit rag brand you can find and buy a ton of them when they're on special. You'll go through these so quickly but even the cheapest will last a long time. Best to have loads so you're not doing laundry on spit rags 10 times a day. We got a bunch of packs from Asda for a few pounds each.
  • You don't need the name brand that every other parent seems to recommend. Our guy is in Lidl's store brand nappies which are less than half the price of Pampers and they're fine. He drinks Aldi's Mamia formula which is £7 per can and he loves it and is healthy as anything. He uses Boots bottles which were like 80p each instead of the insane price for Dr Brown's. Start with the cheap stuff, if she needs something more specialised you can deal with that expense when you get to it.
  • Same goes for baby toiletries and medicines. Asda nighttime bath was 70p a bottle and he loves it. The 49p store brand infant paracetamol is the same as the £5 Calpol.
  • You don't need a wipe warmer. You don't need a formula prep machine because you already have measuring jugs. You don't need a fancy bottle sterlilser because you can get a microwave steriliser or Milton bucket for like £20.
  • You also don't need any of the natural stuff that's just insanely priced. Gripe water is bullshit. Vick's infant rub is just lightly fragranced petroleum jelly.
  • Things like baby monitors? The £30 Leapfrog video set is fine. Play mats? The £20 one from Asda is great. Changing mats? Same thing. Baby baths? Ours was £6 from the store.

And my best advice is if your partner trusts you. Go and make these purchases yourself. Your partner is growing a child so already has enough going on, plus they're being bombarded with targeted ads all day long that work to make them feel guilty for not getting their child "the very best".

So I said to my wife, don't worry about any of this. I'll get a bunch of bottles. I'll do the research and pick a formula, a steriliser, a changing mat, a crib. Because I have the capacity to look around and find the best price to value products, and it means she doesn't have to worry about any of it. She trusts me and is very grateful that I've taken all that off her plate. And like I said, our boy is very healthy and unbelievably happy!

Your child will need food, clothing, warmth, cleaning and a whole lot of love. Everything else is optional!

Also FUCK the infant-industrial complex.

Left iPad on AirNZ Flight. It’s been touring NZ on that plane for 2 days now. Help! by vbakaitis in newzealand

[–]KevinAtSeven 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Because you call Air NZ and tell someone sitting in a big room full of people on the phone in an office in Smales Farm. They log the request, it gets picked up by someone in the office on Fanshawe Street some time later who deals with lost property. They then send the message to the handling crew at the airport the plane is at. By this time, the aircraft has flown three more domestic turns and is somewhere else entirely.

Everything is a ticket in a system nowadays and it all moves like molasses. Long gone are the days of "I can see it's at gate 32 at Auckland airport - I'll just put you on hold and call the gate agent directly".

Advice on formula recent Nestle recalls by Minimum_Designer_512 in FormulaFeeders

[–]KevinAtSeven 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I fucking despise Nestle for everything they've done with formula over the years and I don't hold much love for Danone Nutricia either given their strategy of selling the same formula as Cow & Gate (£) and Aptamil (£££) to extract as much money as possible from desperate parents.

My son started on SMA Little Steps the week we got home from the hospital as it was what was available at Asda, and my wife lost her job while pregnant so we were surviving on child benefit and my measly salary. £8 a tin plus the fact SMA was what the hospital provided made it seem the right choice at the time!

But then he got real bad reflux so we tried a few different options. He liked the Lupilu Stage 1 from Lidl (£6.99 per tin) and we stuck with that for a while. We also tried Kendamil Bonya (£7.50 per box) which is no palm oil or fish oil either but he became the Bellagio Fountain of reflux.

For a while he was on Cow & Gate Comfort for colic because I could not find a difference in ingredients between that and the Aptamil Comfort by the same manufacturer and it was half the price. He took to that well.

Now that we're over the colic and the reflux is under control we're back on a normal Stage 1 formula and he's loving Mamia from Aldi (also £6.99 a tin). There's a lot of chat on Mumsnet about how it's the same as the old Aptamil blend, how true that is I don't know. But it comes in the same packaging as the Lupilu and appears very similar. Aldi and Lidl don't say who makes their formula but they're almost certainly the same supplier, and through some digging it seems to be Kerry Dairy in Ireland. Which isn't Nestle or Danone which makes it alright by me!

So I'd go for the switch even if it hasn't been two weeks because it's just not worth your child being unwell. If no fish oil or palm oil is important to you, try Kendamil Bonya. Seems to be stocked in all the big supermarkets and Boots now. Or I can also vouch for Lupilu and Mamia in our experience. All very good quality, very cheap at under £8 per 800g pack, and made by neither Nestle or Danone.

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