I decided at the last minute to take Marazzano and my mom on a road trip at the last minute (before school starts the day after labor day). Mo had made it known earlier this summer that he wanted to road trip and my mom had told me in the last year (or two or three) some of her bucket list destinations. So I said to myself "Hey. I can kill two birds with one stone". Afterall, Mo will be 13 next August and if he's anything like I was as a teenager, he will be sullen and moody and only want to hang out with his friends until he's about 25. So now is the time. There have been some setbacks so I can see that the devil is not through with me yet. I must be next in line for some kind of huge financial or spiritual breakthrough cause this has been going on for months. Me and Gigi (mom) went to pick up Mo in Chicago. I grappled with renting a car (cause the total miles for this trip was supposed to be 3748 miles) and at Shunte's urging, I did. But since I waited until 12 am to make a reservation to pick up the car at 12:30 am from the airport (the only place still renting cars at this ungodly hour), I decided that it would be better to make my last destination (utah) first and my first destination (south dakota) last. All I had to do was print another Trip Tik from AAA.com. That was all. Simple right? Well.... Shuntes building has a computer room and a printer and no one was in there using it so it should have been cut and dry but the computer was stuck in some kind of loop. It kept "configuring" and then it would shut down and then it would restart and then it would configure again and then it would shut down again and then it would restart again and well you get the picture. I called Mo and asked him to come take a look. He unplugged and replugged and it just went back to the loop. So I left him and went back to see how he was doing in an hour. By then, he got the computer to come out of the loop. Cool. Then I just have to redo my trip tik and then print it. Not. Now the printer sitting next to the computer isn't showing up as one of the options for printing. I tried to add the printer and I tried to install the printer but that printer's model number just was not showing up in the dropdown menu. Shunte and Mo tried but they couldn't fix it either. Shunte said she had to go back to her office for some paperwork for court the next morning. I think we must've already spent an hour and a half trying to get the computer up and then trying to get it to print so I was already frustrated. So I went back to the office with her and redid my trip tik on her front room computer. Did all that and guess what? It wouldn't print. The printers name was not in the drop down. I was having a bad case of deja vu. By now it's after 11pm. Shunte then mentions that she just got the printer and maybe it's not hooked up yet and that I should use the rear computer room. So I redo my trip tik (again) and this time it prints. Now time to book the car. I had already priced the difference between a neighborhood rental place and the airport. Airport taxes are high so I thought a local neighborhood would be better but a neighborhood rental actually has a higher weekly rate by about $80 so it was $80 cheaper to rent at the airport even with taxes. I am satisfied with checking two or three sites to make sure I have a comparable price but Shunte doesn't like to take my word for it. She had to recheck everything I already did to satisfy herself and then she did Hotwire and Priceline. Priceline agreed to a midsize rental for $12 a day before taxes. So it was gonna be $208 for about 9 days including taxes. By now it's midnight. This was the same day I had finished driving from the Spa City so I was tired and cranky by then. So at midnight, we go to the airport to pick up the car. We're riding along la di da and suddenly all the lights on the dash and headlights go out and the car comes to ta stop in the middle of the street. Fortunately, it was not much traffic at this time. Shunte says The cable thingy on the battery is not tight and it gets loose after we hit so many potholes. So I have to unlatch the hood while she lifts and then hold the hood open while she bangs down with one of those small plastic antibacterial bottles from bath and body works. The car starts up again. I am beginning to feel like maybe God is trying to send me a message. First it takes 3 hours to print something that should've taken 10 minutes and now this. Well, that's not all. I go inside to the rental counter with my Priceline.com reservation that I made 30 minutes ago and the desk clerk (who we'll call Jacinda) informs me I can't use my debit card for a rental unless I have a return flight or boat ticket when renting from an airport for Alamo and Enterprise. I have never in life heard of such a thing. I have about 2 grand on the debit card and that should've done it for whatever authorization or holds they needed. Well of course I have no return ticket since I didn't fly. You have to prepay when using priceline.com and so the car had already been paid for and it was nonrefundable. I had read all the small print and remembered seeing something about having a return flight number but they didn't require it when I made the reservation and it made it sound like some kind of fancy option instead of a mandatory requirement. The same soft wording was on a sign at the rental desk. It's like they don't want to hurt your feelings or something. The sign and website NEED to say. You CANNOT use a debit card unless you are flying or cruising. Jacinda is sympathetic and she tries to enter everything without it but it won't take so she used a flight number on some papers she had from earlier that day. Shhh. Don't tell anyone. I thank God and go out to get my car. The shuttle driver tells us we can take any car that is parked in our size category. Wasn't much choice for me cause there was only 1 car for me to choose from. We go home and get back about 1am. The next morning, Shunte loses her phone and we delay our departure to help her look for it. Since she had helped up take everything out of my car and put it in the rental, we thought maybe she had sat it down in the rental and we didn't want to be gone for 9 days with it in our car. She went back to court to see if she had left it there and we finally left around 11:30 am. The first 2 days were pretty uneventful. It is a 20 hour drive to Utah and so I did 12 one day and 8 the next. Plus about 3 hours in stops for my mom who had to pee 45 minutes after we left Chicago. And yes I snapped because she could have went at Shuntes before we left like me and Mo had done. I then made the declaration that when I stop, EVERYONE will get out to use the bathroom and if you don't have to go, then "go anyway". Oh and did I mention that the air conditioning did not work. Just blowing hot ass air in hot ass Utah. While in Utah, we went to see the Arches National Park in Moab (which was beautiful and worth the trip) and Canyonland which is also in Moab (less impressive though me and mom did climb a 1/2 mile uphill trail to an overlook which was an achievement in itself). On my way to Arches though, there was a light flashing "VSC OFF" and the malfunction indicator light was on. It was only 7:30 in the morning so my day was not getting off to a good start. I had to look these up in the car manual. The VSC thing has something to do with skidding. I wasn't worried about skidding in the summertime and the book said that if you can't turn off the flashing light (cause there is a button on the dash to do so), then there is a malfunction. I kept mashing the thingy on the dash and eventually both lights went off only to return later in the day. I was a little nervous about it cause we kept passing signs on the highway that say NO SERVICES. No food. No gas. No cell. No lights. No moon. No nothing. If you get caught out there, you. will. be. fucked...! We checked into the "Knight Inn" . After previously paying $100 the night before for the Comfort Inn, things needed to be averaged out. It was a decent inn. The carpets were ugly but newer and clean. It would do for $50. Well, when we walked in the door, there was one of the plastic plungers under the dresser. The kind of plunger that looks like an accordian. Looking back, I guess that should have been a clue. Mom went to the bathroom before she went to bed. I got up at 12:30 to go and there was something in there already. I just thought she had forgotten to flush. So I flushed. And it flooded. Water splashed on the floor. The plunger didn't work. I think it had a hole in it so it wasn't suctioning properly. I went to the front desk to ask for another room. The young girl who rented me the room wasn't there anymore and the new clerk told me the young girl had forgotten that she wasn't supposed to rent that room. So the new clerk apologizes and gives me a key to a different room. I go there and stick in the key. The light turns green but someone from inside shouts "Move on!" so I take that key back and she gives me another key. Apparently the youngster doesn't record the rooms that she rents either. I think she needs some addtl training. The 3rd time is the charm and I have a fresh toilet. Both Mom and Mo are sleep so I work to move all of our stuff without waking them. There are 7 rooms between the old room and new room and it's 1am. By the time I'm done, my heartrate is up like I just did a 20 minute workout and I'm up for a bit. Anyhow, left the next morning heading out for Craters of the Moon, Idaho and there are some lonnnnng roads with no cars as long as the eye can see so after 2 hours we finally hit a booming metropolis that has a kmart. I make a beeline for these "services" and let my mom out so she can get a case of water and pop. I was sitting there for about 20 minutes wondering what is taking her so long (and I found out it was because she took the time to read through and buy a birthday card) and guess what? The car cuts off. WTF!!! We're right in the middle of Buttfuck, Utah in a busted ass rental car. These things are not supposed to happen. I rented a car cause I didn't want to chance that my own reliable car would have issues. Sigh. I was thoroughly disgusted. I was done and cooked and fried. I called the Roadside assistance and got the ball rolling and we continued on to East Buttfuck, Idaho for our next park. We are so fortunate that our car stopped at this place because it was a town and we had a cell phone signal. We didn't have a signal (all 3 of us) for most of the trip because most of the time we were in the middle of nowhere. Some of the roads we were on were so quiet, that any movement at all broke the sound barrier. Pray for me cause I don't know if the devil is through with me yet.Monday, August 29, 2011
National Lampoons Western Vacation
I decided at the last minute to take Marazzano and my mom on a road trip at the last minute (before school starts the day after labor day). Mo had made it known earlier this summer that he wanted to road trip and my mom had told me in the last year (or two or three) some of her bucket list destinations. So I said to myself "Hey. I can kill two birds with one stone". Afterall, Mo will be 13 next August and if he's anything like I was as a teenager, he will be sullen and moody and only want to hang out with his friends until he's about 25. So now is the time. There have been some setbacks so I can see that the devil is not through with me yet. I must be next in line for some kind of huge financial or spiritual breakthrough cause this has been going on for months. Me and Gigi (mom) went to pick up Mo in Chicago. I grappled with renting a car (cause the total miles for this trip was supposed to be 3748 miles) and at Shunte's urging, I did. But since I waited until 12 am to make a reservation to pick up the car at 12:30 am from the airport (the only place still renting cars at this ungodly hour), I decided that it would be better to make my last destination (utah) first and my first destination (south dakota) last. All I had to do was print another Trip Tik from AAA.com. That was all. Simple right? Well.... Shuntes building has a computer room and a printer and no one was in there using it so it should have been cut and dry but the computer was stuck in some kind of loop. It kept "configuring" and then it would shut down and then it would restart and then it would configure again and then it would shut down again and then it would restart again and well you get the picture. I called Mo and asked him to come take a look. He unplugged and replugged and it just went back to the loop. So I left him and went back to see how he was doing in an hour. By then, he got the computer to come out of the loop. Cool. Then I just have to redo my trip tik and then print it. Not. Now the printer sitting next to the computer isn't showing up as one of the options for printing. I tried to add the printer and I tried to install the printer but that printer's model number just was not showing up in the dropdown menu. Shunte and Mo tried but they couldn't fix it either. Shunte said she had to go back to her office for some paperwork for court the next morning. I think we must've already spent an hour and a half trying to get the computer up and then trying to get it to print so I was already frustrated. So I went back to the office with her and redid my trip tik on her front room computer. Did all that and guess what? It wouldn't print. The printers name was not in the drop down. I was having a bad case of deja vu. By now it's after 11pm. Shunte then mentions that she just got the printer and maybe it's not hooked up yet and that I should use the rear computer room. So I redo my trip tik (again) and this time it prints. Now time to book the car. I had already priced the difference between a neighborhood rental place and the airport. Airport taxes are high so I thought a local neighborhood would be better but a neighborhood rental actually has a higher weekly rate by about $80 so it was $80 cheaper to rent at the airport even with taxes. I am satisfied with checking two or three sites to make sure I have a comparable price but Shunte doesn't like to take my word for it. She had to recheck everything I already did to satisfy herself and then she did Hotwire and Priceline. Priceline agreed to a midsize rental for $12 a day before taxes. So it was gonna be $208 for about 9 days including taxes. By now it's midnight. This was the same day I had finished driving from the Spa City so I was tired and cranky by then. So at midnight, we go to the airport to pick up the car. We're riding along la di da and suddenly all the lights on the dash and headlights go out and the car comes to ta stop in the middle of the street. Fortunately, it was not much traffic at this time. Shunte says The cable thingy on the battery is not tight and it gets loose after we hit so many potholes. So I have to unlatch the hood while she lifts and then hold the hood open while she bangs down with one of those small plastic antibacterial bottles from bath and body works. The car starts up again. I am beginning to feel like maybe God is trying to send me a message. First it takes 3 hours to print something that should've taken 10 minutes and now this. Well, that's not all. I go inside to the rental counter with my Priceline.com reservation that I made 30 minutes ago and the desk clerk (who we'll call Jacinda) informs me I can't use my debit card for a rental unless I have a return flight or boat ticket when renting from an airport for Alamo and Enterprise. I have never in life heard of such a thing. I have about 2 grand on the debit card and that should've done it for whatever authorization or holds they needed. Well of course I have no return ticket since I didn't fly. You have to prepay when using priceline.com and so the car had already been paid for and it was nonrefundable. I had read all the small print and remembered seeing something about having a return flight number but they didn't require it when I made the reservation and it made it sound like some kind of fancy option instead of a mandatory requirement. The same soft wording was on a sign at the rental desk. It's like they don't want to hurt your feelings or something. The sign and website NEED to say. You CANNOT use a debit card unless you are flying or cruising. Jacinda is sympathetic and she tries to enter everything without it but it won't take so she used a flight number on some papers she had from earlier that day. Shhh. Don't tell anyone. I thank God and go out to get my car. The shuttle driver tells us we can take any car that is parked in our size category. Wasn't much choice for me cause there was only 1 car for me to choose from. We go home and get back about 1am. The next morning, Shunte loses her phone and we delay our departure to help her look for it. Since she had helped up take everything out of my car and put it in the rental, we thought maybe she had sat it down in the rental and we didn't want to be gone for 9 days with it in our car. She went back to court to see if she had left it there and we finally left around 11:30 am. The first 2 days were pretty uneventful. It is a 20 hour drive to Utah and so I did 12 one day and 8 the next. Plus about 3 hours in stops for my mom who had to pee 45 minutes after we left Chicago. And yes I snapped because she could have went at Shuntes before we left like me and Mo had done. I then made the declaration that when I stop, EVERYONE will get out to use the bathroom and if you don't have to go, then "go anyway". Oh and did I mention that the air conditioning did not work. Just blowing hot ass air in hot ass Utah. While in Utah, we went to see the Arches National Park in Moab (which was beautiful and worth the trip) and Canyonland which is also in Moab (less impressive though me and mom did climb a 1/2 mile uphill trail to an overlook which was an achievement in itself). On my way to Arches though, there was a light flashing "VSC OFF" and the malfunction indicator light was on. It was only 7:30 in the morning so my day was not getting off to a good start. I had to look these up in the car manual. The VSC thing has something to do with skidding. I wasn't worried about skidding in the summertime and the book said that if you can't turn off the flashing light (cause there is a button on the dash to do so), then there is a malfunction. I kept mashing the thingy on the dash and eventually both lights went off only to return later in the day. I was a little nervous about it cause we kept passing signs on the highway that say NO SERVICES. No food. No gas. No cell. No lights. No moon. No nothing. If you get caught out there, you. will. be. fucked...! We checked into the "Knight Inn" . After previously paying $100 the night before for the Comfort Inn, things needed to be averaged out. It was a decent inn. The carpets were ugly but newer and clean. It would do for $50. Well, when we walked in the door, there was one of the plastic plungers under the dresser. The kind of plunger that looks like an accordian. Looking back, I guess that should have been a clue. Mom went to the bathroom before she went to bed. I got up at 12:30 to go and there was something in there already. I just thought she had forgotten to flush. So I flushed. And it flooded. Water splashed on the floor. The plunger didn't work. I think it had a hole in it so it wasn't suctioning properly. I went to the front desk to ask for another room. The young girl who rented me the room wasn't there anymore and the new clerk told me the young girl had forgotten that she wasn't supposed to rent that room. So the new clerk apologizes and gives me a key to a different room. I go there and stick in the key. The light turns green but someone from inside shouts "Move on!" so I take that key back and she gives me another key. Apparently the youngster doesn't record the rooms that she rents either. I think she needs some addtl training. The 3rd time is the charm and I have a fresh toilet. Both Mom and Mo are sleep so I work to move all of our stuff without waking them. There are 7 rooms between the old room and new room and it's 1am. By the time I'm done, my heartrate is up like I just did a 20 minute workout and I'm up for a bit. Anyhow, left the next morning heading out for Craters of the Moon, Idaho and there are some lonnnnng roads with no cars as long as the eye can see so after 2 hours we finally hit a booming metropolis that has a kmart. I make a beeline for these "services" and let my mom out so she can get a case of water and pop. I was sitting there for about 20 minutes wondering what is taking her so long (and I found out it was because she took the time to read through and buy a birthday card) and guess what? The car cuts off. WTF!!! We're right in the middle of Buttfuck, Utah in a busted ass rental car. These things are not supposed to happen. I rented a car cause I didn't want to chance that my own reliable car would have issues. Sigh. I was thoroughly disgusted. I was done and cooked and fried. I called the Roadside assistance and got the ball rolling and we continued on to East Buttfuck, Idaho for our next park. We are so fortunate that our car stopped at this place because it was a town and we had a cell phone signal. We didn't have a signal (all 3 of us) for most of the trip because most of the time we were in the middle of nowhere. Some of the roads we were on were so quiet, that any movement at all broke the sound barrier. Pray for me cause I don't know if the devil is through with me yet.
The Devil has been busy
Around May 8th or 9th, my computer started acting funny. Everytime I typed in an internet address, it would go to the site for a second and then immediately go to a popup of one of those windows telling me I have thousands of viruses. So I reached out to my cousin in law T and he gave me a website for a free malware scan and told me to run it and see if it helped. I went to the site and there were a bunch of things to click on so I clicked on what I thought was the right one but it wanted me to pay $ so I needed to contact T to see which one was the right one but I didn't have a lotta time to fool with it cause I had to pack and prepare to go out of town. In the meantime, I was afraid to type any of my passwords into my own computer so for paying bills and stuff, I had to go over to moms. I wanted to talk to T first but I was grudgingly contemplating buying a new computer or getting a new phone with web/email access but while I was doing that, it was May 11th and time to leave to go to Myrtle Beach for my 40th birthday. I told myself I would figure it out when I got back so I left my house at 8am to pick up my mom. She wasn't ready so I figured I'd get on the internet and print the directions and look up some stuff to do in Myrtle Beach. That took about 20 minutes. I went to harass her but she STILL was not ready. So I busied myself with ebay,mediatakeout, facebook, etc. and she STILL was not ready. She finally presented her plethora of belongings to me by the front door and I went to pack them in the car. It was 9:37 am !!! I was so hot that I didn't trust myself to speak. So I didn't. We rode in silence for 2 or 3 hours before I said a word. I got up EARLY so we could leave early since I have to do alllll the driving. This is the same person who would not drive the last 11 miles to the spa city (the last rest area is 11 miles away) because I couldn't keep my eyes during a previous trip. Anyway,I told her NEXT time, I need her stuff 2 days early or she can't go. She can pack her toiletries in a seperate overnight bag the morning of. I told her me waiting 1 hour and 37 minutes was unacceptable because I could have used that valuable time to sleep. 20 minutes is ok. 30 minutes is ok. But an hour and 37 minutes?? nuh uh. She started talking about how her cancer really made it hard this time cause her legs were hurting and this and that but I cut her off. She had more than 2 weeks to pack and enough clothes to compete with a retail clothing store. She could have put one outfit a day in her suitcase if that is what it took. After driving for about 6 hours, I ate a sandwhich she had made. It was sliced ribeye steak on brioche bread with her own homemade russian dressing. It was the bomb and by far the best sandwhich I've ever had. With each bite, I could feel the wrinkles loosening on my forehead. By the time I finished it, all was forgiven. While we were on the road, my aunt called to say she got a virus from an email I had sent her. I knew I hadn't sent any emails in quite some time by apparently my computer (which was off) was sending emails to everyone in my address book with tthe subject "no subject" and my aunt opened it and clicked on the link and got a virus from one of those emails and so I was beside myself. The computer continued sending messages for the duration of my trip.
So right before I went to Myrtle beach, my direct IRA rollover check for my pension (from my former job) arrived and it had the wrong payee on it. They used the payee from my 401k account which was different. For the pension payment, not only do they make you fill out, confirm the name/address of the payee and the a/c #, sign and send it back by a certain date but they make you wait 60 days to do so. They say in bold letters that what you input on the form is what they use to cut the check but obviously it is not. I had waited 60 days on this check so oops on their part. I called them and they apologized profusely, stopped payment on that check and reissued another with the correct payee and a/c#. I used my moms address for the check but I was going to be in Myrtle Beach when the check arrived. My mom had asked the Post Office to hold her mail for the duration of our trip so I thought it would be safe at the post office until I got back. But nooooo. While we were in Myrtle Beach my aunt calls to say a lady who knew her had recv'd a bunch of mail that didn't belong to her (the lady had just returned from vactaion and had a "hold" on her mail also). The lady had flipped through her mail and she didn't recognize my name or my moms name but she recognized my aunts name so she called my aunt and asked her did she know the other names and told her that the mail was at her house. WTF??? My check is floating around everywhere but where it should be. The check was for a substantial amount and if that check got in the wrong hands and got cashed, I'd be another 60 days waiting on them to sort it out and give me my money. I didn't know if the check was part of the mail the lady had received or had been delivered to another joe blow who also had a hold on their mail or what. Fortunately, it was toward the end of my trip so it didn't ruin the whole thing. At least that's what my mom said to cheer me up.
So we checked out of Myrtle Beach on May 20th and the plan was to drive until I got tired on the 20th, then stop and spend the nite at a hotel and then get up on the 21st and finish driving home. It's a total of 16 hr drive and since I figured I'd drive about 10 hours before I got tired, I lollyassed around Myrtle beach until about 1pm. Me, mom and Diana went to Broadway at the beach a second time, went to a military memorial park and ate at Rioz-the brazillian steakhouse. So I made it to Mississippi before I got tired. It was around midnight. I stopped at the Holiday Inn express and they were full. So I drove another 30 minutes and stopped. They were full. WTf? Then I started picking rinky dink no name hotels and they were full. The deeper I got into Mississippi, I didn't even have to get out. There were crude
no vacancy signs on the doors. This had never happened to me before.
When going on a roadtrip, I never make reservations and I just pull off when I get tired and get a cheap hotel. Come to find out, there are a billion rescue workers in town for the flood they had a couple of
weeks before. So I had to keep driving. We must've stopped at 10 hotels. I didn't want to waste any more time stopping and driving 10 miles off the expressway only to turn around so I drove all
the way to Forrest City which is about 2 hours outside of Spa City. We got there about 3am. This is a huge rest area I have stopped to sleep at many times before. There are always lots of cars and truckers there. I slept for 2 hrs then drove on home. We got there about 7am. I showered the public washroom vapors off of me, brushed my teeth, ate and went to bed around 11am. I slept for the rest of the day.
So I came back from Myrtle Beach on the 21st and then I had 10 days (7 business days)
to decide either to register my car plates in Arkansas or reregister
in Chicago ($100 for plates and about $80 for a city sticker). So I went back and forth with the questions to get the requirements that I needed to switch to Arkansas and the cost analysis for which was cheapest. I went to the dmv and was in line and they told me that I had to raise my liablility requirements per state law to 25/50/25 which had not been mentioned to me when I was asking questions. The dmv called my insurance co on the spot, told them what they needed and let me stand at the counter for 30 minutes adjusting my policy (they would have NEVER let me do that in Chicago). We were all set to go, my quote was about $100 cheaper than in Illinois and I was doing okay. The rep's last sentence to me was a recap. By then,we were all done, documents had been faxed to the dmv, stickers had been placed on the plates, money had exchanged hands etc etc and then during the recap, he repeats the quote amount but said my premium would be $199 a month.
Screeeeeech. Stop, no and don't. I asked him how could my monthly payment be higher if my premium was lower than IL. Oops he said. That quote was for 6 months and my policy for IL is 12 months. So basically my insurance doubled. Since all was said and done and I had already registered my car for "personal property tax" in Arkansas (which was still gonna be cheaper than the Chicago sticker), I just let it go so I could get the plates cause mine were gonna expire the next day (May 31st). I did call the insurance co back later that day and I didn't cuss but I told them there was no way on God's green earth I was gonna pay $2400 a year for a 5 year old HONDA with 115k miles in a city with a population of 39k. Since I only have 5 payments left, they told me that when I paid it off, it would be about $900 less a year. Now they are talking some sense.
So on May 26th, I call my tax preparer/wells fargo advisor to ask him for the address to send the pension rollover check to and for a distribution form so I could take a little out for myself. Then since I had him on the line, I asked him did I end up owing taxes. He said No and that I
had a refund and that didn't I get his email.? Well I had a virus but I still checked my email from somewhere every week at least including junk mail and he had not send me anything. He usually sends a link to the tax return so I can check them over. He said he had finished my taxes a long time ago.
Mind you, I did not get all of my documents to him until about April 10th. Since the deadline was so close (April 18th) he said he'd do his best but if he didn't finish in time he'd file an extension for me. So he told me he'd resend the email and the link and then he said as an afterthought that he was suprised I hadn't
gotten my refund yet and he kinda said it funny (like in slow motion) but I didn't think anything of it at the time. It usually only takes two weeks to get your direct deposit after filing a tax return and it had been over a month. Of course, I'm seeing everyday on yahoo finance about how tax refunds are being hacked and this happened to a personal friend of mine two years in a row.Someone filed a return in his name and got a refund so when he went to file his own return, it was rejected. I had to help him file a form with the IRS
so that they would flag his return for closer scrutiny. So I'm like "Just great". Well exactly 2 weeks after my conversation with my tax preparer on May 27th, I was on the irs website using the "wheres my refund" feature but I needed the exact refund amount and that was more than I had at the moment so I decided to call and check my bank balance one more time and this time it was much higher. My tax return had finally hit my a/c. He had prepared the return but I believe he forgot to actually file it and it must have occured to him when he was telling me that he was suprised I hadn't gotten it yet. If I hadn't called. I STILL wouldn't have my refund. But I thought I was gonna owe so it was a pleasant suprise.
So the devil was busy during the month of May. I'm not sure what he was trying to keep me from doing.
The good news is that Shunte gave me a check for $127 (the cost of that tire I had to buy in Feb/March) and so I am officially off of the 90 day self exile.
In June, Mo came ot visit from June 18th through June 26. He loves him some Arkansas. I drove him home on the 26th and since I'm free, I stayed until July 3rd. On July 2nd, I took my car in to my favorite dealership for some service we had talked about previously. Had to have the water pump replaced and new filters. The water pump usually only needs to be replaced once but Imma try to keep this car as lonnggg as I can so I may need to get another one a few years from now. Anyhow, my service came to $970. I was gonna wait with the car. I had a brand new book and everything and they said it would take about 5 to 6 hours. They insisted on renting me a car cause they didn't want me to sit idle for that long even though I thought it was gonna be more trouble than it was worth since anything and everything I wanted to do still (buy aunt bab's fried rice, hot links from food 4 less, 6 packages of fresh uncured bacon for mom, parker house sagey souse from Jewel, homemade tamales, lunch with aunt Totsie and possibly a visit with my sociopath ex friend G and my a visit with my cousins in country club hills on my way out) was on the other side of town about 40 min to an hour away. Oh and did I mention it was a Saturday with Taste of Chicago traffic? Anyhow, even though Honda pays for the car, I had to use my credit card and then the rental agency will credit me back when it's returned. Honda time stamps it for me when I return it to prove that I only had it for a day because enterprise was closed on Sundays and closed on Monday for the 4th of July. So I'm having lunch with Aunt Totsie when Honda calls a mere 4 1/2 hours later to tell me I can come pick it up. On my way to Honda that morning, I had bought gas for my own car using my Bank of America card wayyy on the other side of town. Then when picking my car up, I stopped a block away from Honda to fill up the rental car using my bank of america card. I only had to refill it half a tank. So I guestimated and I was a little short so I had to swipe my card again to buy another gallon. When I get to Honda, I used my Northern debit card to pay and the cashier tells me it's denied. WTF (or "what tha?" as Mo would say). I have way more than enough to cover it. I made sure of it before I went. Then she says she thinks the limit is $500. Now I knew there was a $500 limit on the ATM but for charges? I had just used the card on July 31 to pay off my car and it was well over $970 so I couldn't understand why I was having problems. So since my Northern card wasn't working, I decide to call and see the balance on my Bank of America card. I had money on the card but I hadn't planned on paying with it so I did not conciously keep enough to pay in that a/c. The automated system said I had $540 or something like that. So the cashier had already taken the $500 she was allowed off my Northern card so I owed $470. So I told her to run the Bank of America for the diff. Denied. I tell her to try $400 and I have about $80 in my purse in cash. Denied. WTF? So now I'm getting nervous. Cause I can call my sister or Shunte and ask them to bring me $100 or maybe $200 but $470?? Probably not. Who has that kinda cash on hand? I need my car TODAY so I can go back to Spa City in time for Angel and Kendall's arrival and it's a holiday weekend and the bank closes early on Saturday so it is already closed. So I ask her can I go to Walgreens to see if they have an ATM. I'll try my Northern card there and see if it lets me get money on a seperate transaction through the ATM. She said sure. I don't think she understood that I had given THEM the extra key (the valet key) and had kept the other key for myself. She probably thought I was gonna walk. But I got in my car and DROVE over to Walgreens and thank GOD I was able to get $500 out of the ATM. So I go back over to pay her and all is well. She then gives me my key valet key back. On the way home, Bank of America's automated system calls me to tell me there is suspicous activity on my a/c. It gives me a multiple choice for where my last gas purchase was. Well hell, I bought gas twice today and I don't remember the name of the gas stations so I got it wrong. So now I had to talk to a person. Apparently all this gas buying (my first purchase on the other side of town, my first gas purchase for the rental and then the addt'l gallon I bought for the rental) put me on some kind of "do not fly" list:) I explained and the guy unlocked my a/c. I left Chi around 4 of 5, got back to Spa City around 7am and took my shower to remove public bathroom vapors and slept until Angel came in at which time we had a little birthday party for her.
When I got back, or maybe it was right before, my computer was doing ok. I had gotten around the little virus thingy and even had run the malware for Willa and got her computer up and running too. I kept seeing little messages pop up regarding RAM. Well I guess I didn't really SEE them cause I dropped my computer in January and all the stuff in the bottom right hand corner can no longer be seen. So all I could see is the word RAM and nothing else. Come to find out there is a hard drive failure. How did I find out? One minute the computer was fine and then next time I turned it on, it said "hard drive failure" on a simple black screen. The 50 programs I had in my program menu? Gone. It's just blank. Internet exploreer? Gone. Everything is gone. I had to accept the my 6 year old computer had bitten the dust which means I had to buy a new one. Mo' money, mo' money, mo' money. The cheapest one I could find was $299 so ding ding ding we have a winner.
Towards the end of July we were supposed to go to Disney for a family trip. I of course, fell hard down Willa's back steps about 4 days before. It had been raining and it was just more slippery than usual. I didn't know if I was gonna be able to go. Willa was in Texas and I sat there about 30 minutes thinking about that commercial "I've fallen and I can't get up". It's not as funny as it used to be. My cell was in the house so I was on my own. I uncurled my leg from under me and made an excrutiating trek across the yard home. I did a constant routine of Ice, heat pad, aleve and aspercreme. And I did that all day everyday (mostly) until I could walk without feeling like a bone was sticking out. After the 4th day, I knew I could make it. The van had two running boards so I didn' t have to take any huge steps up. We have not been on a family trip in a long long long time. And we probably will not ever try to do this again for a long long long time but that is a whole 'nother story.
***Due to my computer issues, I had like a billion messages piled up. I tried to get rid of the garbage first and I still working my way through the "real" messages. So I'm not ignoring anyone but it's a lot to get through.
So right before I went to Myrtle beach, my direct IRA rollover check for my pension (from my former job) arrived and it had the wrong payee on it. They used the payee from my 401k account which was different. For the pension payment, not only do they make you fill out, confirm the name/address of the payee and the a/c #, sign and send it back by a certain date but they make you wait 60 days to do so. They say in bold letters that what you input on the form is what they use to cut the check but obviously it is not. I had waited 60 days on this check so oops on their part. I called them and they apologized profusely, stopped payment on that check and reissued another with the correct payee and a/c#. I used my moms address for the check but I was going to be in Myrtle Beach when the check arrived. My mom had asked the Post Office to hold her mail for the duration of our trip so I thought it would be safe at the post office until I got back. But nooooo. While we were in Myrtle Beach my aunt calls to say a lady who knew her had recv'd a bunch of mail that didn't belong to her (the lady had just returned from vactaion and had a "hold" on her mail also). The lady had flipped through her mail and she didn't recognize my name or my moms name but she recognized my aunts name so she called my aunt and asked her did she know the other names and told her that the mail was at her house. WTF??? My check is floating around everywhere but where it should be. The check was for a substantial amount and if that check got in the wrong hands and got cashed, I'd be another 60 days waiting on them to sort it out and give me my money. I didn't know if the check was part of the mail the lady had received or had been delivered to another joe blow who also had a hold on their mail or what. Fortunately, it was toward the end of my trip so it didn't ruin the whole thing. At least that's what my mom said to cheer me up.
So we checked out of Myrtle Beach on May 20th and the plan was to drive until I got tired on the 20th, then stop and spend the nite at a hotel and then get up on the 21st and finish driving home. It's a total of 16 hr drive and since I figured I'd drive about 10 hours before I got tired, I lollyassed around Myrtle beach until about 1pm. Me, mom and Diana went to Broadway at the beach a second time, went to a military memorial park and ate at Rioz-the brazillian steakhouse. So I made it to Mississippi before I got tired. It was around midnight. I stopped at the Holiday Inn express and they were full. So I drove another 30 minutes and stopped. They were full. WTf? Then I started picking rinky dink no name hotels and they were full. The deeper I got into Mississippi, I didn't even have to get out. There were crude
no vacancy signs on the doors. This had never happened to me before.
When going on a roadtrip, I never make reservations and I just pull off when I get tired and get a cheap hotel. Come to find out, there are a billion rescue workers in town for the flood they had a couple of
weeks before. So I had to keep driving. We must've stopped at 10 hotels. I didn't want to waste any more time stopping and driving 10 miles off the expressway only to turn around so I drove all
the way to Forrest City which is about 2 hours outside of Spa City. We got there about 3am. This is a huge rest area I have stopped to sleep at many times before. There are always lots of cars and truckers there. I slept for 2 hrs then drove on home. We got there about 7am. I showered the public washroom vapors off of me, brushed my teeth, ate and went to bed around 11am. I slept for the rest of the day.
So I came back from Myrtle Beach on the 21st and then I had 10 days (7 business days)
to decide either to register my car plates in Arkansas or reregister
in Chicago ($100 for plates and about $80 for a city sticker). So I went back and forth with the questions to get the requirements that I needed to switch to Arkansas and the cost analysis for which was cheapest. I went to the dmv and was in line and they told me that I had to raise my liablility requirements per state law to 25/50/25 which had not been mentioned to me when I was asking questions. The dmv called my insurance co on the spot, told them what they needed and let me stand at the counter for 30 minutes adjusting my policy (they would have NEVER let me do that in Chicago). We were all set to go, my quote was about $100 cheaper than in Illinois and I was doing okay. The rep's last sentence to me was a recap. By then,we were all done, documents had been faxed to the dmv, stickers had been placed on the plates, money had exchanged hands etc etc and then during the recap, he repeats the quote amount but said my premium would be $199 a month.
Screeeeeech. Stop, no and don't. I asked him how could my monthly payment be higher if my premium was lower than IL. Oops he said. That quote was for 6 months and my policy for IL is 12 months. So basically my insurance doubled. Since all was said and done and I had already registered my car for "personal property tax" in Arkansas (which was still gonna be cheaper than the Chicago sticker), I just let it go so I could get the plates cause mine were gonna expire the next day (May 31st). I did call the insurance co back later that day and I didn't cuss but I told them there was no way on God's green earth I was gonna pay $2400 a year for a 5 year old HONDA with 115k miles in a city with a population of 39k. Since I only have 5 payments left, they told me that when I paid it off, it would be about $900 less a year. Now they are talking some sense.
So on May 26th, I call my tax preparer/wells fargo advisor to ask him for the address to send the pension rollover check to and for a distribution form so I could take a little out for myself. Then since I had him on the line, I asked him did I end up owing taxes. He said No and that I
had a refund and that didn't I get his email.? Well I had a virus but I still checked my email from somewhere every week at least including junk mail and he had not send me anything. He usually sends a link to the tax return so I can check them over. He said he had finished my taxes a long time ago.
Mind you, I did not get all of my documents to him until about April 10th. Since the deadline was so close (April 18th) he said he'd do his best but if he didn't finish in time he'd file an extension for me. So he told me he'd resend the email and the link and then he said as an afterthought that he was suprised I hadn't
gotten my refund yet and he kinda said it funny (like in slow motion) but I didn't think anything of it at the time. It usually only takes two weeks to get your direct deposit after filing a tax return and it had been over a month. Of course, I'm seeing everyday on yahoo finance about how tax refunds are being hacked and this happened to a personal friend of mine two years in a row.Someone filed a return in his name and got a refund so when he went to file his own return, it was rejected. I had to help him file a form with the IRS
so that they would flag his return for closer scrutiny. So I'm like "Just great". Well exactly 2 weeks after my conversation with my tax preparer on May 27th, I was on the irs website using the "wheres my refund" feature but I needed the exact refund amount and that was more than I had at the moment so I decided to call and check my bank balance one more time and this time it was much higher. My tax return had finally hit my a/c. He had prepared the return but I believe he forgot to actually file it and it must have occured to him when he was telling me that he was suprised I hadn't gotten it yet. If I hadn't called. I STILL wouldn't have my refund. But I thought I was gonna owe so it was a pleasant suprise.
So the devil was busy during the month of May. I'm not sure what he was trying to keep me from doing.
The good news is that Shunte gave me a check for $127 (the cost of that tire I had to buy in Feb/March) and so I am officially off of the 90 day self exile.
In June, Mo came ot visit from June 18th through June 26. He loves him some Arkansas. I drove him home on the 26th and since I'm free, I stayed until July 3rd. On July 2nd, I took my car in to my favorite dealership for some service we had talked about previously. Had to have the water pump replaced and new filters. The water pump usually only needs to be replaced once but Imma try to keep this car as lonnggg as I can so I may need to get another one a few years from now. Anyhow, my service came to $970. I was gonna wait with the car. I had a brand new book and everything and they said it would take about 5 to 6 hours. They insisted on renting me a car cause they didn't want me to sit idle for that long even though I thought it was gonna be more trouble than it was worth since anything and everything I wanted to do still (buy aunt bab's fried rice, hot links from food 4 less, 6 packages of fresh uncured bacon for mom, parker house sagey souse from Jewel, homemade tamales, lunch with aunt Totsie and possibly a visit with my sociopath ex friend G and my a visit with my cousins in country club hills on my way out) was on the other side of town about 40 min to an hour away. Oh and did I mention it was a Saturday with Taste of Chicago traffic? Anyhow, even though Honda pays for the car, I had to use my credit card and then the rental agency will credit me back when it's returned. Honda time stamps it for me when I return it to prove that I only had it for a day because enterprise was closed on Sundays and closed on Monday for the 4th of July. So I'm having lunch with Aunt Totsie when Honda calls a mere 4 1/2 hours later to tell me I can come pick it up. On my way to Honda that morning, I had bought gas for my own car using my Bank of America card wayyy on the other side of town. Then when picking my car up, I stopped a block away from Honda to fill up the rental car using my bank of america card. I only had to refill it half a tank. So I guestimated and I was a little short so I had to swipe my card again to buy another gallon. When I get to Honda, I used my Northern debit card to pay and the cashier tells me it's denied. WTF (or "what tha?" as Mo would say). I have way more than enough to cover it. I made sure of it before I went. Then she says she thinks the limit is $500. Now I knew there was a $500 limit on the ATM but for charges? I had just used the card on July 31 to pay off my car and it was well over $970 so I couldn't understand why I was having problems. So since my Northern card wasn't working, I decide to call and see the balance on my Bank of America card. I had money on the card but I hadn't planned on paying with it so I did not conciously keep enough to pay in that a/c. The automated system said I had $540 or something like that. So the cashier had already taken the $500 she was allowed off my Northern card so I owed $470. So I told her to run the Bank of America for the diff. Denied. I tell her to try $400 and I have about $80 in my purse in cash. Denied. WTF? So now I'm getting nervous. Cause I can call my sister or Shunte and ask them to bring me $100 or maybe $200 but $470?? Probably not. Who has that kinda cash on hand? I need my car TODAY so I can go back to Spa City in time for Angel and Kendall's arrival and it's a holiday weekend and the bank closes early on Saturday so it is already closed. So I ask her can I go to Walgreens to see if they have an ATM. I'll try my Northern card there and see if it lets me get money on a seperate transaction through the ATM. She said sure. I don't think she understood that I had given THEM the extra key (the valet key) and had kept the other key for myself. She probably thought I was gonna walk. But I got in my car and DROVE over to Walgreens and thank GOD I was able to get $500 out of the ATM. So I go back over to pay her and all is well. She then gives me my key valet key back. On the way home, Bank of America's automated system calls me to tell me there is suspicous activity on my a/c. It gives me a multiple choice for where my last gas purchase was. Well hell, I bought gas twice today and I don't remember the name of the gas stations so I got it wrong. So now I had to talk to a person. Apparently all this gas buying (my first purchase on the other side of town, my first gas purchase for the rental and then the addt'l gallon I bought for the rental) put me on some kind of "do not fly" list:) I explained and the guy unlocked my a/c. I left Chi around 4 of 5, got back to Spa City around 7am and took my shower to remove public bathroom vapors and slept until Angel came in at which time we had a little birthday party for her.
When I got back, or maybe it was right before, my computer was doing ok. I had gotten around the little virus thingy and even had run the malware for Willa and got her computer up and running too. I kept seeing little messages pop up regarding RAM. Well I guess I didn't really SEE them cause I dropped my computer in January and all the stuff in the bottom right hand corner can no longer be seen. So all I could see is the word RAM and nothing else. Come to find out there is a hard drive failure. How did I find out? One minute the computer was fine and then next time I turned it on, it said "hard drive failure" on a simple black screen. The 50 programs I had in my program menu? Gone. It's just blank. Internet exploreer? Gone. Everything is gone. I had to accept the my 6 year old computer had bitten the dust which means I had to buy a new one. Mo' money, mo' money, mo' money. The cheapest one I could find was $299 so ding ding ding we have a winner.
Towards the end of July we were supposed to go to Disney for a family trip. I of course, fell hard down Willa's back steps about 4 days before. It had been raining and it was just more slippery than usual. I didn't know if I was gonna be able to go. Willa was in Texas and I sat there about 30 minutes thinking about that commercial "I've fallen and I can't get up". It's not as funny as it used to be. My cell was in the house so I was on my own. I uncurled my leg from under me and made an excrutiating trek across the yard home. I did a constant routine of Ice, heat pad, aleve and aspercreme. And I did that all day everyday (mostly) until I could walk without feeling like a bone was sticking out. After the 4th day, I knew I could make it. The van had two running boards so I didn' t have to take any huge steps up. We have not been on a family trip in a long long long time. And we probably will not ever try to do this again for a long long long time but that is a whole 'nother story.
***Due to my computer issues, I had like a billion messages piled up. I tried to get rid of the garbage first and I still working my way through the "real" messages. So I'm not ignoring anyone but it's a lot to get through.
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