Tag Archives: money

are you SERIOUS

July 25, 2012 By in Me Tags: , , , , , 19 Comments

So, it’s just one of those days I guess. Or weeks. Or years. Like, you finally think things are looking up. You pay off all your credit card debt, you get a new company car, your job doesn’t suck . . . sure, your entire department was eliminated from that website you used to write for, so there’s a couple extra hundred bucks a paycheck you don’t have anymore. But hey! You don’t have credit card payments anymore, and sure you don’t actually own a car, but obvious plus side! You don’t have to make car payments on a car you don’t own!  Like I said, things are looking up. And yeah, not having a roommate anymore is going to be a little more expensive, but remember the plus side? No car payments! No credit card debt!

And then, AND THEN.

Okay, I’m being dramatic, but seriously, SERIOUSLY. The universe is being a complete asshole to me this week. First I had to have this thing carved off my leg and biopsied (it’s probably nothing . . . probably) and now I have stitches in my leg and it hurts a lot and I’m being a huge baby about it. So I’ve got this new financial situation going on that I haven’t quite figured out, and I’m moving this weekend, and I’m gravely wounded . . . and then today happened. Again, it’s not that bad so don’t freak out or anything, but it FEELS that bad. Maybe that makes me an asshole, because so many people in this country and not in this country have it so much worse off than I do, and if so, THEN I AM AN ASSHOLE. But I actually felt like writing this out, which meant I felt like writing*, which meant I actually had something to say, which would be an improvement over the last month and a half of my life. So I’m going with it.

*Not feeling like writing is a side effect of something that has happened to me, but I’m not entirely sure which thing that was.

So I was all excited because I was picking up the keys to my new apartment today, but when I actually got there, the situation, as they say, deteriorated.** Due to a lot of boring but anxiety-causing details that I’m not going to go into, I basically have to double pay August’s rent on my new apartment, which was something I very much wanted to avoid. On top of that, once I got into the actual apartment, it smelled like smoke, and the configuration of the bathroom means that I am either going to have to put the litter-box on my bathroom counter, or in an extra closet in my bedroom. Either option is not going to be pleasant. So I was distracted, and aggravated, and I forgot to take a gate key with me on my way out. There was a large rock propping up the gate, and I went out of my way to kick the rock and close the gate. Approximately one second after I committed these actions, I realized that I was now effectively locked out of my apartment. That last part is my favorite part of this story, by the way.

**I may or may not have picked this phrase up into my vocabulary due to re-watching five seasons of Stargate SG-1*** in less than a week and a half. I never said I made good decisions all the time.

***Remember what I said above about not feeling like writing? What I meant was that I don’t feel like writing anything that isn’t Stargate SG-1 fanfiction, which is all my brain wants to do now. I say to that: Brain, you do what makes you happy, but the consequence of this is that I spent eight hours last Saturday writing something that I will show nobody and that will not help me further my writing career IN THE SLIGHTEST.

This is the state of mind I was in when I backed my two week old car into a pole and it went CRUNCH.

Now, I acknowledge this was 99% my fault, but I would also like to lodge a complaint with the universe and whatever fuckwit decided it was a good idea to put a tiny little pole in my blind spot. I mean, who puts a pole near the passenger side back door? It should be in the middle or up front so people can see it. This is how things would be in a logical universe. And did I mention before about how it’s not even technically my car? And about how my boss’s face went white when I told him what happened, and how I honest to God thought he was going to have a stress-induced aneurysm while standing in front of me because I, his idiot employee, sideswiped her brand new car INTO A MOTHERFUCKING POLE? DID I MENTION THAT PART YET.

To sum up: 1) I have stitches in my leg and it’s going to escalate and I’m probably going to die tomorrow from who knows what, maybe some flesh eating bacteria or gangrene; 2) I am moving this week, which means dishing out lots of money, and packing; 3) I HAVE TO PACK UP ALL MY THINGS AND MOVE THEM AND THEN UNPACK THEM AGAIN; 4) I am locked out of my new apartment; 5) Smoke and litter box in the closet; 6) I smashed up my two week old car that isn’t even mine and now I have to pay even more things and I hate everybody.

It’s like that wise philosopher Rachel Karen Green once said of life, the universe, whatever: ”I mean, isn’t that just kick-you-in-the-crotch spit on your neck fantastic?”

Yes, Rachel, YES IT IS.

plus some helpful advice for the ladies

March 6, 2012 By in Money Tags: , , , 5 Comments

Tonight was not the first night I’ve cried during a phone call to a 24 hour banker. It wasn’t even the second or third time.

Look, I’ll be the first to admit it: I’m bad with money. I’m bad with money, and I have no shame. A lot of people in this world think pride is bad and shame is good, but those people are idiots. It is the exact opposite. Pride is the thing that makes you feel like a lion, and shame is the thing that makes you feel like you just got squeezed out of a lion’s butthole. We like shame here in America. We have lots of shame, shame to spare. We feel shame about sex and about our bodies, we feel shame about farting and burping, the things we eat and the way we spend our money.

Now, don’t go confusing shame with guilt. Guilt is fine. Guilt is acceptable. Guilt means we are human beings with feelings and responsibilities towards other human beings, and not empty, scary robots. Guilt means we recognize the difference between right and wrong. The important thing to remember about guilt and shame is that guilt is something we put upon ourselves, but shame is something put upon us by other people.

Anyway, I’m pretty sure I don’t have any shame because otherwise I’d be feeling pretty bad about myself right now. Because I’m going to share a secret with you.

Did you guys know that if you call up the bank and ask them nicely and with logic to please oh please get rid of at least one of those three overdraft fees that is on your account, oh please pretty please, they will always always tell you no? Because they will always always tell you no. I bet at least some of you did know that, but maybe not. It takes a special kind of shameless person to call up a bank and ask them to refund an overdraft fee. I will freely admit that I’m that kind of person. I want my money back and I don’t care what the person on the other end of the phone thinks of me, and as my mama always told me, it doesn’t hurt to ask. So I ask and they say no, and I still have $105 in overdraft fees.

But that part isn’t the secret. The real secret is that you don’t stop there, if you’re me. You ask to speak to a manager. And because you’re desperate and you have no shame, you give your sob story for the second time that night, only this time instead of being angry and righteous and sort of annoyed at being a pawn in the system, you just flat out start crying because you’re sick of having no money, and yeah some of it is your fault because you’re stupid, but some of it isn’t, some of it is you still paying for old mistakes, and some of it is arbitrary rules and guidelines and dates and times and fees, and more fees on top of the fees that cause more fees that start breeding with one another until you’re drowning in fees and your only lifeline is some guy in a 24 hour bank call center who hates his life and his job and his only pleasure comes in telling people “no” . . . but this guy’s never dealt with you before. He’s so clearly flustered by what’s going on, your broken voice and incoherent words — it’s an ugly cry, this one — the documented evidence of a truly pathetic life is staring at him from the words and numbers in your bank account on the screen in front of him, and they’re screaming “FEEL SORRY FOR ME.” So he tells you, “Okay, just this once, as a special consideration . . .” just so you’ll stop crying.

I know I promised you some advice, but truthfully, I’m not exactly sure what we can learn from all of this. I’m just the writer. Show, not tell, remember? I showed, now you tell. And please don’t think that I’m condoning false tears here, or instructing the lady folk to use the biases against our gender in sneaky ways, in order to manipulate a system created by and for men. I’m not even telling you that you should call up your bank and cry on the phone. Because let me assure you, I didn’t plan on crying to the anonymous customer service man, or begging him for my $35 back, please. It just happened. That’s probably the real secret: you have to mean it.

Mean what, now? I don’t know, I’m just saying things. Figure it out yourself. I’m going to eat a cookie. And I’m not going to feel bad about it.

in which i eat the tardis

January 10, 2012 By in Me, Money, silly Tags: , , , , , 10 Comments

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Got a fun package in the mail today. I guess this is what happens when you introduce your friends — especially ones who enjoy giving gifts and baking things — to Doctor Who.

My friend Stephanie has been texting me for a little over a month now as she watches the show. I’ll get text messages in the middle of the night that say things like, ”My brain just broke. I can’t brain today . . . I have the dumb,” “Oh Frick. Oh balls. Oh fup!”, and “This show is breaking my soul.” I also get nifty presents in the mail, like this TARDIS cookie jar I got for Christmas, and today, these cookies I got to fill it:

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