Ayn's Multiple World

Ok, we kind of go on here ... but important post for the financial working over with the car and debt...

(From the most wonderful Deb Honey Bunny)

Good morning. It’s me. It’s about 4:20 am now and I think we’re finally waking up. We’ve been up for the kitties, but were nappin again at the keyboard. Don’t know why we’re doing that. But, we’re going to try making it through now. We just had a jolt … in that we stopped over at the bank, because we’ve been looking for some tax money and instead we found that we’d actually had written a check for $2000 while at the dealership and they cashed it. There was only about $1000 in the account. Why my bank didn’t bounce that baby, I don’t know, but they make money every time I’m overdrawn and that might have something to do with it … but, $1000 over? Then there was a $50 autopayment after that and they cashed that one too. I’m really not sure whose helping or not. We have to look seriously again now at the account, but not right now … too many cobwebs. I’m glad for one thing … my friend had taken out first $300 for me $100 was spent on medicine, and he gave me one more $50 for gas and parking and he’s held onto the other $150. We didn’t really do that on our own … he just suggested wouldn’t you feel better knowing it was there. We have to admit that he is right. At this point, we’re way overwhelmed with money.

Ok, that was a lot for the opening paragraph … Let’s slow down a minute here, maybe take a sip of coffee, ok?

Hmm, Saturday morning … good stuff, right? Ok, girl … come on don’t be scared. Just try it again.

Ok, what have we been doing. Hmm, lookin at our blog seems that we’ve been writing a series of short notes. Well this being Saturday, you know that isn’t going to happen. We feature LONG blogs on Saturday.

Ahh some morning radio … a nice long song we found on the Urge thing … It’s called, “Plush.” It promises to be “contemporary pop music, without the racket. Lush melodies, rich voice and thought expressions combine to create the ultimate in office friendly radio.” It’s played so far Jeffrey Osborne (On the Wings of Love), Elton John (The Bridge), R.E.M (Everybody Hurts), Journey (Faithfully), and Evan & Jaron (Crazy for this Girl). Ok, we won’t do a rundown all day, but wanted to give you the gist. Nice stuff.

So are we to the point of the morning (5 am) where we figure out where we’ve been this week? I think we’ve been for one at work all week, well except Monday. And, we went to Dr. Marvin’s. I think I want to start there … not sure how much we’ll remember but it was a pretty tough session … tiring because of the number of younger parts out.

We went in not such good shape. Our friend had given us that $50 and we figured we had to break it first because the parking garage didn’t take bills that big. One way or another we ended up eating very, very greasy food from Long John Silvers or something like that. I think we’ve only tried that place a handful of times in our lifetime … because it’s so greasy. It upsets our equilibrium … Every time I do something not so smart … it starts by the thinking that it won’t be too bad, then it’s terrible and I got nobody to blame, but me. The next thing that happened was that Dr. Marvin was in part hiding behind the door … that seemed to be a big problem. We were trying not to scream by biting our tongue.

Whoops … fell asleep again … anyone getting think its sounding like a ddddddddddddddddddd

Damn. There it goes again … we were going to say it’s a process of “denial.” Yah D you!

Ok, we’re up … we’re up … got some more coffee … better turn down the music some? Good, good … turned it down to 50%. I can function now right? Where were we? Ahh Dr. M. That was a very strange experience, but maybe it is every time the younger parts were out. Gracie was there and several other younger parts … Casey and KC for sure, but also Anna … not sure about Crystal, Probably Anniemi. Sarah, Ann, me.

When there is that much rapid switching there is for sure going to be some confusion. Dr. Marvin said we were having body memories. It’s where the body remembers something that had happened and the mind doesn’t know what the f)(& is going on. The bottom line was just that we ALL went through the process of doing something to gain a memory of a cloth sock monkey that was used to put in our mouth to keep us from screaming.

What that is supposed to mean to me … I’m not sure. Shoot happened again … this time we felt ourselves being pulled down hiding between two hands meeting to face double-palms ups from our foreghead. Ok, ok … stop. We’ll talk about something else, k? we’re getting nothing, but

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ACK!

Another 15 minutes. Ok work. We’re going to talk about work. Hmm … good? Safe? We can do that right? It’s kinda strange because between the nappin we’re not feeling tired. Hmm two pages in just short of a couple hours. Ok, shhhhhhhh let’s not be crabby.

Ok, done that … next.

I think this coffee is gradually getting drank. Oh yeah work. I remember …
Hmm, well we did pretty good without the last Q, all considering. We never made it to CARF though. Well about 15 minutes, but then we were interrupted, so I don’t think that counts. We had started off the week on Tuesday with that staff that got fired. And, then what happened on Wed.? I think that was the day of the Behavior meeting? No, that was Tuesday. I think I remember taking all day and just finally getting the behavior meeting notes typed up, but I don’t remember that day. Oh yeah … we went through the stuff over at the last Q’s desk … going through drawers and computer and such. That was a little something … she was pretty organized. She really hadn’t been exposed to as much as I considered, but it had been enough. I don’t remember a lot of that day either.

I do remember more of Thursday … cuz we had to do the clients goals in the morning.

I don’t think Sister is real happy about that, but she has to live with her decision. She’s like well, does it have to take so much time … yes sister … it does. I said we are only doing 10 minutes per goal, but between the clients there are 15 goals … so it takes the majority of the morning … and there was a little trickyness in figuring them all out again and how to record them. I think for the most part it went ok, I might have to change one or two of the goals, but I remembered how to do goals as soon as we were with the clients. Like, ok this is too hard, this is too hard, let’s work on this element. Maybe it is just me though, I’m going to need doing some figuring out to understand the coding system. I’m thinking she was following our instruction. So, be more of getting back into where we were. We seemed to do ok with giving percents for things, but, I don’t think that’s what was happening … it just helped us make use of the changes we were making to adapt to the client’s needs.

I was glad it was over by lunchtime though, because it is hard for us to be around people for those periods of time that were that long. It’s like I have to be nice, but we barely have that much nice in us. I’m pretty sure that’s it. After that we ate did lunch room duty, lunch, preparation, and then there was staff training.

I thought staff training went pretty well this time. We were going over OSHA regulations 1910.1030 Bloodborne pathogens. That basically is like 36 pages of stuff after it’s printed out. Pshwoo. We only went through the first 1/3 of it though. I was surprised by the amount of talking about stuff the ladies wanted to be doing. It was very good actually … and there were several notes of things that we wanted to bring to sister’s attention (from the group). That was cool, I forgot to type up the list though on Friday – so that will have to be right away next week, so it can get on the agenda of the staff meeting on Friday. Most likely the Administration meeting too. The group was very involved in the discussion from the first part to the last … though we felt a little overwhelmed at one point in realizing that we’d gotten through only so many pages and knowing how many of them there were to go. I read the material three times in total before the meeting, so I was familiar with it enough to be able to forecast answers, but things would be discussed such as women’s personal things and elimination needs, and everything else that’s kinda gross. This group is tough. They know what universal means as far as that we are to train for the extreme situation so that we are prepared for the least. I was glad that someone had brought up at the last meeting the red bags, but now we’ll have to figure out whether or not we need another container. I know that it is supposed to be marked, but I wasn’t sure if our regular garbage truck picked it up or someone different. We discussed protective gear and other stuff like hepatitis shots … all the details of stuff were getting discussed, such as determination of exposure and not applying lip balm while in the rooms. Gazillion stuff, but it was a good meeting. We were getting things accomplished and I think everyone was learning.

There were some other training materials that the center has used in the past, but nothing prepared us as much as this set of materials. I had sat down ahead of time and was going to highlight only the important paragraphs, but it was like EVERYthing was getting highlighted hehehe. Its ok, it’s ok. Good discussion. I am always like so amazed the depths this group will take things. Hmm, and it was pretty good because the other meetings had been four people more. The leaving Q wasn’t there of course, or the one that was fired, but as well two DSPs were out – the mother and the one that we’ve had problems with lately. She usually is an asset to these meetings, because she has a nursing background and so then has lots of experiences.

I think the newest staff can be a trouble maker at meetings, because it’s been shown, she can be overwhelmed, but she really is going to be an asset to the meetings too, because she’s not timid of being involved. I think she wants to be a leader though it’s kind of fast. She’s a little more upper class than most of us … I don’t think naturally as much as they’ve worked toward it. She has a newer house and last week was telling us about her home entertain room with theatre 72” screen and seats on platform and theatre popcorn and all. She had said that it’s what her husband wanted. 72”??? That’s like 6 feet. She said the chairs are each recliners … Like ok ok … I think I would want that. BUT, since we think movies aren’t as important as computers, unless it could be hooked up there wasn’t really a need. Be kinda cool though to sit back in a recliner with a platform type keyboard and type.

Maybe though our hands would get tired because they were being extended up. AND, we would then SURELY fall asleep! Eh, best we work at the table here.

Anyway … I think we got sidetracked. This is a suburb-type soccer mom. She has her 4-5 year old daughter in something every night after school and on Saturdays … That’s a lot of moving around. I say go for it, but there are some limits … Sometimes a kid has got to just hang-out!

Ok, ok anyway … so that was a good meeting, I told them we’d keep working on it til we got done, but we’re on schedule to finish in two more meetings. I feel good about that. We’ll feel like its been totally discussed. There were a few people that hung around afterward to discuss stuff and that’s kinda nice too though afterward all we want to do is crash some. We’re holding up. Then after that was Dr. M.’s meeting, but we’re not willing to go there quite yet. It’s been nice not falling asleep every 3 minutes.

On Friday we went in and for some reason we were a little confused and it got worse before it got better. We had to spend like an hour getting our big computer up to speed and then the small computer was iffy. Pshoot! We’re not going there!

Basically, it was a problem that everything was boggy and then it wanted not to open it went through a bunch of internal tests and finally kicked in, but not sure if it won’t happen again. We’ll have to see. When we finally got things working we were phased so we started an entry like this … All in all it was only 2 pages where so far we’re up to 5 pages on this one. But, we were like ok, what do we do next … ok, that’s done, what next? We walked ourselves through a few things until we got situated again. There were a few odd tasks like getting signatures for the staff meetings and making sure the other Q got in her set of universal precautions from the clients. But, basically, how we did things was to first go through the cards on our main desk and see if any of them needed follow through. It seemed a few could be thrown away, but each needed a little something. There were calls to be made.

And then, after that was done we went through our “todo” tray. That was like everything had to have something done too. Like we had to look at those behavior notes and make more calls, and check the psych schedule and make some calls. Well, you are getting the drift of it. One of the things I dislike most is making a bunch of calls. Well, I can do it just fine … just takes me a while to get there. AND, I find if I start calling people, they are going to want to call me back! YEEKS! Why would I want people calling and interrupting me in the middle of everything I am doing??!!

Yah liked that idea a lot. But, it got me connected to some of the families that were close to getting in their medicals and such … so that was pretty good. I actually got quite a few things done along that line and I didn’t stop … I then went to the cubby hole on the computer desk that has all those DSP chrononotes before they get filed. And, I filed them. I think we went all the way back until September. So you can see how much we like that job. I was glad in that the leaving Q had at least sorted most of them … there was a piece a paper for each client for each of those months … and its work. After that … we decided to go ahead and do a couple more cubbies and trays. You get the general drift. We were cleaning up. We got as far as to the Qnotes. We counted them and found that there were 17 of them done, which left 5-6 to do … that’s like being in pretty good shape. I need to sign some of them and finish ‘em up. I also had to get copies of everything for group 2 because the DSP wants to claim that the one leaving left everything irrepairable. She also told us that the DSP who had left had not done any Goal data sheets for the entire last month. Like shoot … going to need handling that somehow. Now the DSP taking over – who had been working in there part time … says she doesn’t remember how to do any of the goals so I am going to need teaching her all over again. I’ve taught and taught til I’m blue in the face … hehehe, well not really, but sorta. This is the DSP that plays umm non-remembering when she’s confused … but, I know if I don’t work with her, she too will skip doing any of the sheets. So, best get em going … we have a meeting on Tuesday at 2 pm.

Then we had a Thinking Group meeting. I liked that one too. I felt we were through talking about the questions CARF wanted the clients to answer, so we decided late moment to go into an explanation of the whole process. We started with folder #1 – Input. We taught them about their input, the personnel input and the stakeholder’s input. That was very good stuff. We did a little bit of how to recognize we were doing a good job, but in all many new things were learned. I think they held interest until the last 5 minutes, and at that time, enough had left so that the one’s who remain were thinking … it’s Friday and I wanna go home! LOL Um, we were thinking that too. I was proud of them for how long they stuck it out. Most of them were involved if for no other means to be raising their hands appropriately.

This isnt’ the same as in most groups. It’s usually done with a lot of cheering and applauding and such. Everything is a big deal. For example, I could say … how many people talk at their staff meeting!?? And, they’d be like yah yah .. that’s me!

You gotta love these guys … they don’t read or write so much so I think one way they have of going along is to be reminded of their experiences. Like we might say … how many remember last St. Patrick’s Day? WHOOOO HOOO Pizza! Oh yeah they all like that! And, for the one’s who don’t remember at first, or weren’t here, they get swept up in the excitement of those that do. I’ll ask, what do you remember about it? There was this one point when we were talking about their input to staff and I asked them what kinds of things might they bring up. One girl had talked about staff helping her with the bad feelings, and another had talked about staff helping with a problem from home, and the third individual stood up and was saying something I didn’t understand at first. He tends to drift so we were figuring is he on track, and then someone explained he was talking about washing the disease off his hands.

HEHEHE I just started laughing and laughing … I realized this was a consequence of the DSP meeting where we were talking about the universal precautions. I felt everything had gone full circle in that what we’d taught at one level had gone to another, and now that level was teaching me! Love it!

They are such excellent people … and of course there is the task at the end of the time where they help stack the chairs so the floors can be cleaned. God bless em! Usually, there are a few hanger oners and those are the people that get to turn off the light and straighten the place mats. Not a big deal, but a part of finalizing things. It’s a good program. I think the part that they showed a particular interest in was not how they or the other stakeholders, but the staff talked to one another. I found they had been curious as to what was going on during those meetings. They knew the meetings by when such and such people get together in one particular place or another. Like they knew the administrative team met in Sr’s office.

It’s my plan that we go through each of the standards. We figure that will give them such a different orientation and ownership of the center that … I don’t know just can’t be beat. They are so receptive … we’re very proud of them. There were minimal interruptions. Well, one girl was interrupting she kept asking or telling long-winded things, but we tried to work with it. I feel a little guilty now though cuz we were using our shhhhhhsy voice. Ok, Ok … that’s enough … we’re not going there, this meeting we’re going to stay on track. Shhhhhh, no, we’re going to talk about …” This girl has a tendency to want to talk about her personal friendships and this isn’t what this meeting is about. We do talk quite a bit about friendships and other relationships, but its important that they can follow along if they are expected to join other meetings outside the center. We talk about things as they apply to everyone. And, there is usually a topic at hand and I hold an expectation that people don’t veer. So, If we’re talking about a satisfaction survey, I do not necessarily want to hear about your sisters’ new car, although most likely I might say, Ohhh are you telling me that you and your sister are very satisfied with the new car? YES! Ok, ok that’s great, but right now we’re going to focus on the things at the center that make you feel satisfied. One question though … does she drive you to the center with the new car? YES! Ok, well that’s sorta on track then, Ok, whose next?

So, that’s the general gist of that. There are about 40 people at the start … so if divergent plans start unfolding then we do the normal thing in moving folks around or hehehe in one case yesterday … I said to the group in back that likes to talk more amongst themselves that they were on a different agenda. Obviously, we’ve talked enough because they know what an agenda is … and the smarty-panz one said … we want our own agenda … and then we told them fine! I’ll be back in a second cuz we’re all going to join yours! AHHHH that’s not what they bargained on they all start laughing and being silly thinking of everyone paying attention to their private business. It did though get their attention. Private business is for private time, not Thinking Group. Thinking Group we hang together. And, they are so used to the group that they will admonish themselves if someone isn’t listening to the speaker. Ok, let’s all listen to so and so … he’s got the floor. At one point one of the clients who doesn’t speak stood up and it was noticed that her coat was sorta on in that one arm was part way through. She obviously needed help cuz it was upside down. I teased that she was telling us that the meeting was long enough and it was time to go home. You barely have to ask before someone says, I will help her … and someone scoots over to rearrange the coat and struggle with the zipper.

The whole groups cheers for the helper as she works the complicated hat scarf combination in consideration the quiet client is half a foot taller than her and an eensy bit wider. HEhehe … Oh man it’s such a good group. I’m just so happy that they’ve turned out to be such good people. They really are cool. Nice way to end a Friday too.

Well there was a little more straightening up. One of the DSPs who isn’t in everyday had found her way back to our corner of the building after all the clients had left. She was working with her computer and always has something she can’t figure out, so on our way past her, we’ll help figure it out, but by then we’re baited and hooked. Best to pull up a chair. She’ll say something like I don’t know if this is the right time, but I just wanted to tell you about … so and so. And, then the conversation will go on and on because there is just never a little bit about any one client … staff can get into some pretty phenomenal figuring. Well today, such and such happenened and I was just wondering if such and such could be affecting, because usually such and such happens an so forth. The number of conversations we’ve had like this are countless … I usually find them fascinating though, because it is cool to listen to the events that are happening out there and how people are responding to them. We usually take the role of just pulling in the boundaries a little … sort of like the focusing work we just explained to concerning the clients. I will draw attention to the factors I consider most important to watch.

There is a little work that has to be done in helping them feel better too. This one for example wanted to call attention to the fact that things are different now that she’s only there 3 days instead of 5 days. She wanted to say the “sub” staff – she doesn’t like to refer to 2-day staff or 3-day staff … it’s that sense of ownership they all get into. It’s “their” group, but anyway she was saying how the client seemed pretty banged-up in care of the other staff. Yes, I know, I know … well, she’s gone now. We’ll get things back in order. Are you considering coming back more? That be cool, no no don’t rush it. Your decision. I had another few moments with another staff. I had just dropped by to tell her something small, but she kept adding to the conversation like this other one. You know … when you give the conversation a rest and start to edge out of the room, and then the other starts talking again. Ok, ok … we’ll do this what else? But, what we found from this 2nd staff was that she was actually looking for maybe was confirmation that she’d been doing a good job, and of course she was. I should have picked that up faster, but sometimes it takes a while. Duh. Ok, noooo your doing fine! Great job with the clients. So and so loves you and is so much better since …

I think only the staff that got fired complained about me this week. One of the reasons she had been offended by us was that we talked about things she had thought off limits. I had talked about abortion one meeting as to decisions that were being made into law in France concerning the abortion of people with mental retardation.

She found that pretty offensive … like, ok … so we can’t talk about controversial subjects? I never said one way or another, because I’ve never taken a position other than attentive bystander, but she was grasping at straws by this time. She had and some of the other staff also have talked to sister about being offended that I would bring up having multiple personalities. They are pretty horrified of that subject. Some of them apparently think having a mental illness is a secret thing.

It has never been disclosed to me, which ones have a problem. I wish they’d be more honest, but maybe there are other complications. Sometimes they complain about me being too smart. Or, sometimes they say I’m not friendly enough. It’s sort of a collective mood thing. If they are tired, they will say I was boring. If they are intimidated than I’m not friendly enough and if the material is tougher they’ll say we’re too smart. So, it becomes a general gauge. We know in general they externalize their attributions to us always being the one in the wrong.

It’s hard though because Sr. uses it to manipulate us. She’l say well the staff say … I know she does things like leading the witness. She’s say don’t you think Ann talks about things that are personal. And, they will say yes sister. ACK! Can’t win! Hehehe … the hardest part is not getting defensive. Instead of remembering things are being out of context you’ll think, “Nooooo, I’m not that!” Like now I ask … is this a staff whose disasatisfied with her position? Was she disgruntled?

Oh she just quit? Ok, yes that’s valuable information. I know now that people who quit think such and such and are vindictive … that’s better than thinking practically as if this person didn’t have a cross to burn. Right?

The lesson here with this one on Sr.s level was that there were 3 pages of bad feelings about sister … a couple sentences about us, and she even complained about the special program she was sent and out of all those negative things Sr. had thought it was me that better change. Because a quitting person said something!?? YEEKS Scream on brakes!!??

Hmm guess we’re a little upset about that this week? Eh … let it go. We didn’t think it was big enough to bring up at Dr. M’s how big could it be? Nothing new.

*Mope*

Ok, feel better … we just had some raw vegetables and reread the post. I guess we’re moving through things slowly. Hmm, someone left a picture of our car up … I wonder who that was. It’s not so bad … we’re getting used to her. She sure is fun to drive. Yeeks everytime I think that I think I better bite my tongue because our friend was pretty upset about us buying it. Now he is saying that he doesn’t want us to feel bad so its ok to like it, but we don’t so much trust that position … it’s the kind of thing that could come back to us if we made another unfrugal choice. That seems to be the kind of person we’re turning out to be.

In this particular interest though, we would like to say for the record that maybe it is exactly what God intended for me? Could you go that way for a few moments with us? Why don’t we think of it as God has a plan for everything  I think he wants to help us develop a new personality … we have to do something so that we think its ok, to get in and out of our new car and face down people looking strangely at us from their vehicles. Say … that sure is scary isn’t it? Do you look at people when you are driving? I try very hard not to. Most time I don’t even think of it. I look at the backs of vehicles and as soon as I figure I am pass them, I’m looking ahead to the next vehicle. Never like to look at people. They’re like messed up. All over the place. If I’m going to look at people I’m going to get paid for it. I don’t want to be driving down the street thinking of people and their problems. But, this week we peeked a couple of time … Damn that’s just scary stuff.

Anyway getting back … somehow this car and us are made for each other during this particular time of my life. I have to be sure of that because we know most likely for the next decade her and me are a team. We really do appreciate her spunk about that … she’s not as apt as others to get an inferiority complex. She’s gutsy … just sticks her chest out and keeps on moving. Really got to admire her for that. She’s a little bouncy over rough roads to. But we figure that’s ok too … sort of like a dog who’s a boxer. Just a little bouncy or my granddaughter for that matter. She’s bouncy too. Hehehe wouldn’t that be cool if this car made it that far down the road that it become my bouncy granddaughter’s first car? That’s what grandma’s do you know … they pass on cars! Ahh that’s a nice new thought!

Anyway, me and she are learning to keep things picked up, because she doesn’t like to be disordered. We need to go past one of our sons houses soon, because she needs another bath and out near their neighborhood they have a nice $3 car wash. Woo HOOO … short, but sweet! We finished cleaning out the stuff last weekend I think. Or maybe Monday? I think we talked about that already. But, she is such a beauty inside. Her seats are a sturdy cloth that are two toned straight black and black with a little pattern … here wait, I’ll show you.





Isn’t that so cool, can’t you tell why we think she is so pretty and the cloth is padded so that’s neat. The one thing we’re not so sure of now is the lack of metal between us and something going wrong. I figure if we’re in an accident where a normal person would be thrown, we’re not going to fit through the window so we’ll be stuck there where the car explodes because the gas is on the driver’s side. Yah we think of these things. And like we said the metal isn’t thick the doors are very thin and her front end is pretty short. But, of course this is nice in other ways, because I feel like I’m right up front while driving! We haven’t adjusted to the darker windows in back either in that we flash look to our rear to make sure there are no cars coming before we turn, and it is hard for us to separate there is a car on the other side of the black window. We spotted something neat this week in that Her back set of side windows has an automatic heater thing, that is pretty cool, and we haven’t figured it out yet, but we think the tires look bigger than 15”, but we’re not sure of that yet. We’ll see. Always have something in our hands that makes tipping over to read them difficult. We’ve run into some people having attitudes against her where they didn’t have with the grand am. People don’t mind being passed … most people by a grand am, but they don’t so much like being passed by a box. Hehehehe little trouble people trying to out run her and we get that determined look and just want to go … or we’ll go fast then slow and just let them pass innocently like. Uh huh that’s us innocent,  We still have to figure what we are going to carry in her … she certainly looks like she wants to carry something.

I think it would make her feel more important. AHA! Just thinking … she better trot herself over to somewhere over the next 3 days and get her city sticker before we get busted! Don’t want to forget that.

I was thinking shed’ look good with the leather suitcase, but since I’m not going anywhere that’s not such a good idea. I think we should take sister out for a ride, or let the leaving Q’s mom drive it. Think she’d like it a lot. Bet she’d want to buy one … nice handy car. Good to park, too! We had some fun with her in that regard this week. The game was just how small a spot might she take. We were real proud of her … she’s a real tight spot worker! And when she gets to a normal parking spot she pulls up graciously within the yellow lines. I think that’s a nice thing. We don’t worry about her getting clipped. We’ve taken a real attitude this week. We found ourselves driving home from Dr. M.’s Thursday thinking … HAH! Look at you all with those big wasted vehicles. Bet you are paying a pretty penny for that at the gas station! Ha!

I know, I know … it’s terrible, but like I said an attitude none the less. Sr. might like this car too, but she has like 3 and that’s enough for anyone .. don’t you think? Especially if that person doesn’t even drive! She would like the back seat ease of getting in and out and that you can put the seats down for groceries. See that’s what we mean … we don’t have anything to bring in our car. I think we’ve come to the point of knowing that if we did put something in her it have to be in the back seat or with the seat down, because that space between the seats and the back has got car care stuff in it. Hmm, that’s something we need to tell our friend when we get money again is that we want to get a couple of those milk crates
Whew … that was a tough spot. I had talked to my friend in IM for just a moment or two … I told him right away about the check being cashed. I hadn’t been able to think that through, because I hadn’t remembered that a check had been written, I thought somehow that they were going to hold until I was ready with the tax money.

I just hadn’t remembered. But, of course they would do that. Anyway our friend gave us a couple of recommendations. So we followed through on that and made one more call.

Basically, we had to call the bank and do something with the overdrawn amount. They only gave me one option, they said I should put a voluntary hold on the account so that I wouldn’t get myself in more trouble. They said it a lot nicer than that … but, we’re feeling pretty down again. What’s happened is that we can put money into the account, but we can’t get money out of it from check, credit card, auto payment or auto withdrawal. That’s pretty good thinking … need to put $1088 back in just to get even. That means I’ll be able to keep about $125 of my next check. That takes care of the first problem.

The next problem is that I won’t be able to pay for rent until March 15 and its due on the 3rd. And, I don’t know how close we are to them closing down some of my services, and I still owe 395 for the first payment on March 3rd. Hopefully, we’ll have 546 for the auto payment by the 1rst … we had to call the tax place and the IRS to figure that out. H & R Block says 7-10 days, but the government says 3 weeks.

And, that’s only for the first 1/3. I think we can safely guess the other payment maybe more toward 6 weeks, if we’re lucky that will put it at the end of March. My music service is going to be canceled and my cable is at risk along with electric. I’m safe on the medicine until the 20th. By the end of April, I should get some relief from the school money, but that is a long time to carry a debt.

This is the money part again … you can skip it if you want …

Ok, let’s work this through slow. I put this on a ledger too ... takes about 1 1/2 pages. If you skim down toward the bottom toward - I think April 15th, I can pay our friend $265, and two weeks later (May 1rst) I think I can pay you $1865. This is a poor excuse to make him wait this long. I'm very embarrassed and apologetic.

The big turning point at that point is that I expect $2200 school loan and the second part of taxes by the end of April. The other critical point here is that I ask the apartment people if I can turn in the next rent on March 15th instead of the 3rd, and on April 1rst I pay a second rent right away getting me back on track.

That way our friend won't need to come up with any big money just maybe float me a $10 periodically. Hopefully by May 1rst he is totally paid off and I'm on track again. I'll give him a chance to think about this and help me make sure we're on track. And, again we have this on ledger paper too. How exactly these things get paid with a frozen account I can't be sure ... Need more advise there. And, now thinking of it doesn't include the C-pap machine of $43 initially and $11 thereafter for 13 months until we paid it off (with 90% insurance). We've got a week to consider if that appointment shouldn't be canceled for a couple of months. That be ok, we've gotten this far without it. Ok, we're going to try focusing off money again ... we've had enough of this for now. We'll be going to pick up the extra keys/remote at the dealership within a half hour or so. We'll be back after that.

Thank you for being patient with us.

Mi

March 1rst - Deposit 1217, Payoff 1088, Deposit 546, Car 395, Cable 125, Electric 18, Surgeon 52, Gym 23, Audio blog 5, Music 10, Parking 13, Gas 25, Balance 9

[Hold groceries 665, Rich further debt 1000, government 100, AT & T 144, UIC 64, MSRI 50, dentist 150, rent 870, car insurance 70, medical 25].

March 15 - Deposit 1217, Rent 870, Medicine 100, Car Insurance 70, Parking 13, Gas 25, Balance 148

April 1 - Deposit 1217, Rent 870, Car 395, Parking 13, Gas 25, Audio blog 5, Balance 54

[Hold groceries 865, Rich further debt 1000, government 100, AT & T 144, UIC 64, dentist 150, medical 50, MSRI 50, doctor 100, car insurance 70, gym 23, electric 40, cable 100, SS 150, ].

April 15 - Deposit 1217, Groceries 265, Government 100, AT & T 144, UIC 64, Dentist 50, Medical 50, Medical 50, MSRI 50, Medical 50, Car insurance 70, Gym 23, Electric 40, Cable 100, Balance 165

[Hold groceries 865, Rich further debt 1000, government 100, AT & T 144, UIC 64, dentist 150, medical 50, MSRI 50, doctor 100, car insurance 70, gym 23, electric 40, cable 100, SS 150, ].

May 1 - Deposit 1217, Deposit 900, Deposit 2200, Friend 1865, Rent 870, Car 395, Government 100, Dentist 100, Medical 225, Parking/Gas 40, Car insurance 70, Gym 23, Audio blog 5, Cable 200, Electric 100, Balance 489

May 15 - Deposit 1217, Rent 870, Car 395, Parking/Car 40, Medicine 100, Music 10, Balance 291

This is the end of the money part … continue here…

Pshwoo … ok, there that is figured out again. The worst part is that our friend is carrying us in that we’ve got about $2000 that we’re going to owe him by the end of

April/beginning of May. I feel very bad about that. Ok, we’re done … stop … let it go.

We’re out of the shower now … Along with talking to the bank, tax place, and IRS, we had also put in a call to our car dealership and had talked to the salesman. He’s expecting us in about an hour, but its only supposed to take about a half an hour. I’ll leave about quarter after and its 12:52 now. Give me a chance to finish up. We checked out the directions and its pretty easy … but its about 10 miles on a busy street. I think we’re up to it though and it’ll be nice to get out in the car again. We’re going to see if we can do the full trip without filling up, but it will be close. Need to figure out the gauge. She’s pretty small so not easy to read. We’ll go by the red light … think that tells us we’re about 9 gallons down on a 11 gallon tank. Don’t mean to test that out further. Though in an emergency we’re thinking 60 miles more after the red light. Again, just needs to be checked out.

I don’t think we have anything else to do … maybe remember to empty the garbage and bring down a new bag. We still haven’t settled where we want to keep the garbage … I’d prefer back seat, but much easier access from the front. Getting it to the back is a tricky arm maneuver. We’ll figure it out … Want to make sure the nice seats don’t get messed up. Maybe the easier way to think of it with our friend is that we give him the next school loan check and then we’ll be even. So that is going to mean we really need to focus on school after we get back. Morning has gone to writing and figuring out car and money. I guess that was pretty important stuff though. I wasn’t sure how we were going to do it. I think we’re going to do it that is the point. Few odds and ends, but pretty close. SHHHHHH let’s stop worrying now ok. Just something we have to do. And, if we make it we should actually feel proud of ourselves, because it means that we’ll be doing school.

Doing work. Going to therapy. Getting our friend paid back a couple thousand dollars, Paying all our bills including rent. AND, having put down a couple thousand dollars and payments on a new car. That’s all actually quite a bit of financial finagling. I think it means we’ve done pretty good. Before we hadn’t the faintest how to do it. If it weren’t for holding back on money owed to our friend I would feel pretty good about it. But, we’re getting there, right? What’s done is done … we’ll have to handle our guilt and not put it off on someone else. And, then maybe somehow we can forgive ourselves for having the new car and for the car being what it is. We need to get to the point we just accept where we are … OK????? It’s going to be ok … We’ve just made a life style change. It’s going to be ok. Shhh…

Ok, you go! Drive safe!

posted by Ann Marie @ 2/24/2007 01:07:00 PM Comments: 1