This is not something I thought I would be saying but to be brutally honest we have to prepare for the worst as it is our future we’re talking about. I do not know much about a recession except that everything will become less affordable and people have to tighten their belts a bit more. The word recession has been thrown around all over the media the last couple of weeks and it is beginning to scare me a little.

There are no immediate signs of a recession for the everyday citizen but you will notice that it will become a lot harder to obtain credit and when you do get credit, it will have a ridiculous APR rate attached to it. Another sign is that every energy company will push up their price which is bad news, considering that the last two summers in the United Kingdom have been appalling.

The construction sector has already taken a knock with hundreds, could be thousands of people losing their jobs because of the bad housing market at the moment. Unfortunately there is no quick cure for a recession and some fear that it might last for 10 years. The only thing left to do is to come prepared and educate yourself with as much knowledge as possible to ease through this recession. People will have to become money savvy and start saving for the bleak years.

Britain is taking a knock now financially but that should not send you running with your tail between your legs but overcome it by giving yourself a budget makeover and start saving for your future. One that note, I hope you are looking into getting a mini cash ISA every year that you are in the United Kingdom and save some money in there tax free.

Take a look at these two websites, they are full of information about the financial gloom at the moment and they both have a lot of tips and hints to help beat that. Get familiar with the terms used in the United Kingdom.

I have come to realise that we’ve been living too cosy in London for the last three years, this hit home at about three in the morning on our way home from a night out at a friends house. This had been the second outing to a friend’s house instead of going to a pub or club to meet up. As usual we did not keep an eye on the clock and eventually realised that it was too late to catch a train back home and we were really not in the mood to use the night bus to get back home so we arranged for a cab to take us home.

Our friend phoned for a cab and they gave us a price then and there and we agreed. The cab arrived a few minutes later and we’re on our way home. Considering it was three in the morning, traffic was relatively busy in the area. The driver started to freak us out a little by driving like a maniac. That did not make me feel safe or comfortable at all being in that car then and there. We both luckily had our safety belts on as I kept on thinking the worst will happen. That’s how bad he was driving.

This definitely made me open my eyes. How many drunken people rely on cabs getting them home in one place when they drive like maniacs to make up time to get to their next call? This will definitely make you think before you get into a cab when you are drunk out of your brackets. So the moral of the story is, be aware of the little things around you… never just assume that the world is a safe place or uhmmm… that the cab driver will consider your safety!

I have been working like a dog for the last couple of weeks trying to squeeze in every bit of overtime I can get my hands on because I’m determined to build up a savings fund and eventually get on the property ladder. We want nothing more than our own place with a garden to decorate as we please and to start living. This matchbox living can get quite tiring at times and to be honest, I miss having a lawn and to mess about in the flowerbed.

I can officially say that I am knackered. Knackered you ask? A term everyone in London use freely to explain how damn tired and exhausted they are.  (Ok, ok…. nekkid is not the correct spelling but I was close….see, I was knackered!)

Other than that, we’re planning, wait, let me rephrase. I am looking at holiday spots close to the beach in the United Kingdom to spend a weekend at before we miss the sunshine again for the year and it is such a pitty that the prices are so damn expensive, it’s much cheaper to fly to spain for a week than to spend a weekend in the United Kingdom. Guess with the credit crunch and all, we’ll all be spending our holidays in a tent next to the beach or something.