Originally Posted by quiltman (Post 11174939)

englishmaple,
Excuse me butting in but I've just spent an hour reading this thread 'cos I got hooked on it!
Bravo to you for taking the plunge, even if physically you end up worse off, your mental health has already improved as we can see from your postings.
For London hotels try using booking.com - I've just looked for April 4th - 7th for example and they have rooms within your price range. Sort it by Budget , Economy etc.Left hand side of home page "additional filters". I've used them for years with no problems. you can usually cancel at no charge and except for very cheap deals you only pay on leaving.
We've booked our hotel in Hawaii next week through them and it was cheaper than booking via the hotel website.
Regarding jobs. We left UK last July to come live in the Philippines and it was very difficult in the UK for anyone over 50 to get what might be called "career" jobs. Having said that however, with your qualifications you should be lucky finding something in Social Services as there is a shortage of Social workers all over the UK. Suggest you look on County Council websites - Hampshire, Wiltshire ? etc as they often post vacancies on there. you could well get a job providing maternity cover which gets you into the system.
you will have no problem finding part time work as you suggested and UK employers like mature people - they do tend to come to work on time without the "world owes me a living" baggage!
Seems you may be OK with accommodation and presumably the council tax of 70 pounds is 50% of your prospective landlords tax? If he is currently the only person shown to be living in the property then he currently gets a 25% reduction. This seems quite cheap to me as we lived in a market town in Lincolnshire and our council tax was 140 pounds a month. I would have thought Hampshire was more expensive. Again you can check it on the local (Alton) council website. also ask him if he will provide you with a "short term Tenancy" agreement as this gives you some protection against being asked to leave at short notice.
Mind you, you could rent a 3 bed semi where we lived for that rent!

good on you girl! hope it all works out for you. Feel free to PM me if you have any other questions.

Originally Posted by Englishmaple (Post 11175624)

BTW I've booked my hotel in London. Penn Club room was available but they lock up at 10.30pm and if I arrived later than that, I would be locked out. So have booked with another hotel as I didn't want to take a chance on being locked out if my plane was late/luggage was difficult to clear/taxi hit a hurdle driving from heathrow - but will keep the Penn Club for future reference as it looks really nice - so thanks for that Editha.

Originally Posted by Editha (Post 11175736)

My husband has used the Penn Club in the past. He is giving a paper at an academic conference in London in August, and I've been reminding him daily to book a room at the Penn if he wants to stay there. So far my prodding has had no effect, so it is good to hear they still have vacancies.

Originally Posted by Englishmaple (Post 11177004)

Booked the movers. Wondering whether to take out shipping insurance? It's 2% on the value of the cost of the goods - apparently some people do take out insurance and others don't.

If I do, I have to specify value for every item insured ... which is a ton of work.

Any thoughts?

Originally Posted by Englishmaple (Post 11225969)

I'm here! And I've just had a lovely meal with a complete stranger! I arrived at a restaurant at the same time as a man of my age did and he said do you want some company? So I said yes so long as you don't hit on me! So we had a great conversation, nice meal and we both made a new friend (emphasis on the friendship - not my type to date but nice to have conversation with). And then he insisted on paying for the meal which was incredibly kind of him before dashing off to catch a train up North to where he lives. This, my first evening in London (as I arrived late last night) - feels like a good start!

I've also put a post up in the Back Home thread but it's waiting to be moderated - so I won't post anymore here and will probably post another update on the Back Home thread at some point. But couldn't resist sharing this story!

Originally Posted by islandwoman120 (Post 11225972)

Wonderful news! Glad you arrived safely and are evidently in good spirits. :)

Originally Posted by Englishmaple (Post 11225969)

I'm here! And I've just had a lovely meal with a complete stranger! I arrived at a restaurant at the same time as a man of my age did and he said do you want some company? So I said yes so long as you don't hit on me! So we had a great conversation, nice meal and we both made a new friend (emphasis on the friendship - not my type to date but nice to have conversation with). And then he insisted on paying for the meal which was incredibly kind of him before dashing off to catch a train up North to where he lives. This, my first evening in London (as I arrived late last night) - feels like a good start!

I've also put a post up in the Back Home thread but it's waiting to be moderated - so I won't post anymore here and will probably post another update on the Back Home thread at some point. But couldn't resist sharing this story!