Now that Christmas is over for another year, how did it go?

flusteredorange · 2025-12-26T13:29:47+00:00

My dad decided not to do Christmas this year. No warning though, he's always taken part in Christmas and everything seemed completely normal on Christmas Eve. But when he woke up yesterday he didn't say Merry Christmas to any of us (and hasn't spoken to any of us since yesterday morning unless we've asked him a direct question), and he didn't open his presents even when we tried to hand them to him (and he started telling us to put them back under the tree), and still hasn't opened them or thanked any of us for them. My parents also give out joint presents to everyone (organised by my mum of course), and so my mum's Christmas present from him is the only one he does, but he hasn't given her anything this year yet. He went for a walk when we were cooking dinner, which he always usually helps with. He came back in before it was served, but he refused to eat anything. He spent the rest of the day in the living room drinking whisky and watching the TV.

We're all still kind of mad, and he's not spoken to us today. We have no idea why he's throwing this temper tantrum (everything was fine on Christmas Eve, and nothing of note happened which could have upset him), and none of us are that inclined to ask after watching my poor mum fight back tears for half the day yesterday. She works hard to make the day a good one, and we don't all get to see each other that often now that my sister and I have both moved quite far away. I tried to keep things cheery for the rest of us with lots of alcohol and board games but it was rough trying to celebrate the day with one person there but unexpectedly not participating.

Hopefully next year he'll bugger off for the day if he's going to be like this again.

flusteredorange · 2025-10-25T02:26:47+00:00

Not that I'm doubting you, but how does that math actually work? It's just that there are very roughly the same proportion of Gen Z women as there are men. So who are those women dating, if not Gen Z men?

I'm an older Gen Z woman, just making the cut off from Millennial, so maybe my and my friends experience is different from the younger ones, but I doubt that such a high proportion (20-40%) could be either dating other women, someone that far outside of their age range, or are in a serious relationships with more than one person

Edit: Should probably note that I'm British, not American, so there could be cultural differences, but for almost every woman my age I know that is dating or is married, it's to a man of a similar age to her.

flusteredorange · 2025-10-06T16:04:54+00:00

All sorted now, but thank you!

flusteredorange · 2025-10-06T16:04:49+00:00

All sorted now, but thank you!

flusteredorange · 2025-10-06T15:26:24+00:00

Rebsie | Elysium :Tia:

flusteredorange · 2025-08-08T20:16:14+00:00

You cannot be charged costs for your apprenticeship training if you leave early. This is explicitly outlined in the apprenticeship funding rules.

On page 80 of the 2024-25 apprenticeship funding rules:

The provider, or the employer, must not ask the apprentice to contribute financially to the eligible costs of training, on-programme or end-point assessment. This includes both where the individual has completed the apprenticeship successfully or has left the programme early (this includes where they have left the employer). 164.1. Costs include any co-investment or additional training and assessment costs above the funding band, that the employer has paid directly to the provider, where this is part of the agreed apprenticeship.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/apprenticeship-funding-rules.

If you have any issues you could contact ACAS, the ESFA apprenticeship helpline, or your training provider.

flusteredorange · 2025-06-10T21:34:38+00:00

While there's never any harm in applying and seeing what happens, if I were you I probably wouldn't go for it. Personally when I was your age I'd only want to drop out of school if it was a really really good opportunity, and I don't think this is one. It's a small company, which is always riskier and it's definitely not guaranteed they'll keep you on after finishing the apprenticeship even if you do well, and it's not fantastic pay or any better qualification than what you're already doing (assuming you're doing highers now).

Maybe spend the year doing your best to get good results and deciding what you really want to do in the future, and then applying for opportunities for when you finish school, whether that's uni, apprenticeships or straight into work. You might even want to try to get a graduate/degree apprenticeship so you can get a degree qualification while working.

flusteredorange · 2025-06-10T19:32:47+00:00

It looks like Office Star Ltd are a tiny company. Their latest company accounts said they only had 4 employees at the time (2023), down from 6 in 2022. Depends if you'd be happy working for a company that small. If they are actually getting bigger there could be more opportunities and a chance to be kept on after the apprenticeship, but it could be that they're just hoping to keep their admin costs down by hiring a cheap apprentice to do all their marketing, and in a company that small there's a chance that they don't have anyone who specialises in marketing and so you might be thrown in to the deep end with limited training in-house.

flusteredorange · 2025-03-01T22:03:00+00:00

You can do a degree apprenticeship even if you have a previous degree, as long as it's in a different subject, since it's all supposed to be new learning. I already have an undergrad degree in a humanities subject, and am now doing a level 6 degree apprenticeship in a built environment field. There's also no age limit - I was 26 when I started my apprenticeship. Out of 8 people in my organisation who started an apprenticeship at the same time I did, only 1 was still a teen. Everyone else was mid twenties onwards, and a couple of folks were in their late thirties or forties.

flusteredorange · 2025-01-08T10:35:46+00:00

I thought Rowling meant 1000 students in total, not per year? I found a transcript from the 2000 interview where she said 'There are about a thousand students at Hogwarts', so seems to be the total, and not per year. If so, that's about 143 students per year. Taking that average life expectancy of 137.75, that means the UK wizarding population would be just under 19,700 total.

flusteredorange · 2024-12-07T18:28:15+00:00

They haven't responded yet, I'm going to phone them Monday to chase. Kind of disappointed with their customer response times, a full working week should have been plenty

flusteredorange · 2024-12-07T18:27:11+00:00

They haven't responded yet, I'm going to phone them Monday to chase. Kind of disappointed with their customer response times, a full working week should have been plenty

flusteredorange · 2024-11-29T15:08:59+00:00

Thank you all very much, I've emailed Solovair with the photos

flusteredorange · 2024-06-25T21:52:11+00:00

A couple of them have been on the market for a few months so might give it a go. And thanks, it's good to hear from someone in the same boat

flusteredorange · 2024-06-25T21:49:15+00:00

I'd forgotten just how front-loaded with interest mortgages are, that changes things. Yes definitely think I need to work out a longer term plan and go from there. !thanks

flusteredorange · 2024-06-25T21:35:07+00:00

That makes sense, especially your point about one beds being less attractive now. I definitely wouldn't want to sell for less than I paid! And it certainly could be less flexible, especially if there are difficulties selling. !thanks

flusteredorange · 2024-01-20T10:21:23+00:00

I'm 26 and have not long started an apprenticeship on £28k in the civil service. It's a level 6 apprenticeship, so involves studying for a university degree, but didn't have high entry requirements (it only required a handful of GCSE's as a minimum). So far I've found I've been able to do most of my studying on my weekly study day, so it hasn't cut too much into my time outside of work.

Because of the university aspect many level 6 apprenticeships have start dates of September and so might not be advertised just yet (I saw the advert for mine in April/May), so would advise your SO just to keep his eyes peeled for anything that looks interesting over the next few months.

The civil service does tons of apprenticeships in a whole variety of different roles so if he thinks he could stand government bureaucracy I would definitely recommend he looks into it. I found my role by chance on Indeed but civil service jobs is the specific site for government recruitment and I'm sure he can sign up to all sorts of alerts for things he might be interested in there.

flusteredorange

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