Sub-human vermin...

You know that nasty ring you sometimes get around the basin of your toilet bowl when you’ve neglected to clean it in a timely manner? Well, bill collectors rank even lower than that in my book. Yes, dear readers – I must beg you to indulged me with a rant today. National City Bank has hired ruthless, heartless, soulless beings formerly known as human to man/woman their phones. You see despite our best intentions, we have fallen behind on our bills.

With the expense of the fall season (school supplies, fees, clothes) and the untimely seasonal holidays to prepare for ($20 a pop for a Halloween costume these days), we always seem to flounder at this time of the year. It hasn’t helped that we just moved and our rent is now slightly higher, that Brandon was diagnosed with a very expensive disease and that we have 3 birthdays in three consecutive months to deal with either. At any rate, we have been stretching every last penny just to make it to the next check (sometimes we make it, other times not so much) and then we start over again. As soon as we get paid, we are broke again from paying our bills. Often it comes down to pay a bill or feed the kids – sorry AT&T.

It is a vicious cycle that makes me want to cry. So it doesn’t help matters when one of our creditors calls us 3-5 times a day. Yes, you read that right. They call this house 3-5 times a day! What do they think? That between 9 AM and 10:30 AM, I’ve managed to win the lottery and NOW I’ll pay up! Or that it is a good thing that they decided to phone me that 5th time because I was just lying about not having the money those other 4 times. Fucking bastards call us as early as 8 AM and as late as 8 PM. I cringe every time the phone rings. What part of we don’t get paid again until Oct. 2nd do they not comprehend? Short of selling body fluids or strapping a mattress to my back, we just can’t pay this bill until then (and honestly we can’t afford to pay it then either because of rent…but that is another story and another headache to deal with next week). Argh!!!!!!!!!!

OK…I’m sorry. I know there are people with worst problems. I am trying to keep things in perspective. It just makes me really mad. I’m a good person who doesn’t live beyond my means. I put off a lot when it comes to what I want – like haircuts, new shoes and even new socks! When I get to go out – you know, that one blue moon – it is usually to a free event or one that I’ve managed to win free tickets too. So why can’t I get out of this nightmare?

You know, the truth is that something good happened to me this week. My mother surprised me by buying us a “new” car (a teal/blue Chevy Cavalier). Now don’t get too excited…it was a $300 car that is 14 years old. But, it is MY $300 car and it runs. That is all I need to really know. The inside of thing was really gross. The owner before me must have never cleaned it. Judging by the amount of leaves and debris in the back seat, I wonder if they often forgot to roll up the windows too. The previous owner had a huge white husky and there were HANDFULS of dog hair everywhere. Eeek! It took forever but yesterday I scrubbed it out and vacuumed it 4 times. I bought an air freshener at Target, which helped too. I finally ran the thing through a car wash and slapped on some bumper stickers to make it feel more like me. I’m actually happy with the end results. It looks pretty good now and it has a CD player. Sweet! :o)

So now I am no longer homebound. That alone is enough to celebrate. It took my Mom all of 12 hours to mention that Wal-mart was hiring in my area - subtle. Yes, I’ll be looking for part-time work now.

Well, enough of me. I’ll write again soon. Take care everyone!