Financial Woes

This is kind of embarrassing, but I know that there are others out there going through it, who have gone through it and are at the other side, or who will go through it, so I'm sharing. Why oh why at almost 48 years old am I still struggling to make ends meet.  I know the logical answers, and I'm working on it, but it's pissing me off.  I hate to admit how much I need to work on my finances, but I figure if I put it out there, I have to become more accountable.  Now, the main reason that I'm having the problems that I am is because I was the sole bread winner for 25 years and at the end of that, ESD kept the money that was owed to me.  So, I was already struggling and that money that I had earmarked to pay certain things is no longer available for me.  I had to create a new game plan.  And I did, and it's working . . . Slowly.  You know I got a raise recently, and I make really good money, so it's even more embarrassing to admit all of this.

Over the years, I've let credit cards lapse and go into collections, so the ones I currently have, I am doing everything I can to maintain properly.  I got behind for awhile, but now they are all current and I'm paying them down.  The point of having them is for emergencies and work stuff (that I get reimbursed and immediately pay the bill).  Unfortunately, I had a lot of emergency funding needed and they were all maxed.  Almost paid down now.  I refuse to use them until they are zero balance and then, back to paying in full monthly.  If I can't pay it in full or if it's not reimbursed by the company, I don't need it.

Another thing that I had problems with was taxes from 2012.  I was nice aka stupid and filed separately in 2013 for the 2012 taxes.  That gave him a break, but again, cost me a lot of money.  One of the things I had to do was allow my state taxes go into garnishment status.  Now this may seem crazy, but it actually works out better.   See, I had an automatic payment plan for them and one of the payments didn't go through.  Why didn't it go through?  Because another automated payment that I didn't know was scheduled screwed it up.  Once the payment doesn't go through once, you're off the payment plan.  I begged and even offered to up my payments.  The answer was no.  They said pay in full by X date.  I could make payments, but once X date rolled around, they would garnish.  Now, I've had experience with them in the past.  If you pay them prior to the garnishment, they still garnish the full amount, essentially making you over pay them.  It takes forever to get a refund on the over payment and, of course, they don't pay you interest.  Also, once they garnish, the amount is set -- no more interest.   So, I took the money that they would have been getting monthly and put it to work elsewhere, catching up on other bills.  Now the garnishment is in place and for the month of March, the State of California is getting 25% of my "disposable" income.  Note: their idea of disposable is way different than mine, but whatevs.  It'll be paid by the end of the month.  Just gotta hold on a little longer.

I'm almost over the hump, and honestly, I've been in worse positions.  Back in the old days, I would be up to my eyeballs in past due, overdue, and unpaid bills.  Now, I'm actually fine for the most part, just paying some back bills that would been done if ESD hadn't been an ass.  I will say though that this is my final (I hope) financial lesson learned.  I've had 2 other financial lessons before that opened my eyes and changed the way I handled my money-for the better, and this one has made me think and plan even better.  So, even from the crappiness, comes a good lesson.  I still have the urge to spend spend spend, but I'm curbing it and doing pretty well.  I still need to cut some lazy spending, e.g., fast food restaurants instead of cooking, but I've come a long way even from a few months ago.  So, I'll keep at it.

All of this is not to get sympathy or even empathy, but to put myself on notice that I will never let anyone control me again, especially financially.  And also, for anyone who may be going through worse, to say, "it gets better"  . . . Hang in there and have patience . . . Lots and lots of patience.

Until next time, much peace and love.

New Look . . . so far . . .

You may have noticed . . . or not . . . that I've started changing the look of my blog.  I've started with changing the pictures I had up.  I read too many scary stories of people (just regular folks like me) using pix that they found on the internet, only to be sued because they didn't have the right to use them.  Now personally, I think that's crap.  If you didn't know you can't use it and when you're advised to stop using it, and you stop using it, all should be well.  Especially, if you apologize and even give credit to the owner of the picture.  Hell the owner of the picture should be thrilled that you've used the picture and it's getting out there.  But, whatevs.  I didn't want that to happen, so I'm only using my own pix now.

I added a photo of yours truly a couple of weeks ago.  I didn't really want to have my picture on the blog, but after perusing several of my favorite blogs, I realized that most folks do use their own photo.  So . . . I did.

Tonight, I finally added a photo at the top of the blog.  I've been searching through all my digital pix and couldn't find anything.  Then, low and behold, the Boy had to create a mask representing a character from Romeo and Juliet.  The picture on here is what he came up with.  The mask was originally all white.  He painted and decorated all on his own, no tracing, all freehand.  I think it is beautiful. And I asked if I could use it on my blog.  He was thrilled that I wanted to do so.  Yay!

So, a little about the mask.  It represents Juliet . . . it starts light, fresh, and naïve, and moves across to dark, rebellious, and death.  It represents love and loss, good girl and bad, life and death, darkness and light.  I thought it was great and I'm honored to be able to display it here.

Note:  he said he would do some more original artwork for this blog and my other one, so I'm psyched.

Until next time, much peace and love.

New Freedom Discovered and Old Friendships Renewed

This has been an interesting week thus far.  None of my pre-written blog fodder have been posted.  I'm having "moments" each day that I'm having fun sharing.

Today, I woke up today thankful that I didn't have to pretend, didn't have to give a gift that wouldn't be appreciated, didn't have to feel like a failure because it wasn't "good enough," didn't have to worry about what attitude I may have to come home to. Today is another milestone in the new me.

Of course this is about ESD, because today was his birthday.  Even though we weren't together last year at this time, it was still fresh, so I didn't have that sense of relief.  Every year around his birthday, he would get moodier than ever.  The reason?  Another year had gone by and he still hadn't done anything with his life.  That of course, translated into being pissed at me or at least taking it out on me.  He also would never say what he wanted for his birthday--mainly because he felt guilty that he wasn't contributing, so he felt like every day was his birthday.  It kind of was.  When I did try to buy something for his birthday, putting lots of thought into it, he didn't appreciate it.  If I gave him gift cards to buy his own, he didn't like the store and wanted cash.  If I gave him cash, it was never enough . . . he liked to buy a lot of weed.  So today, was a great relief not to deal with all that.

To top it off, today, I reconnected with an old friend, boyfriend, on Facebook.  That was pretty cool and interesting . . . he was actually my first "real" boyfriend when I was in junior high.  I had a couple of little boyfriends in elementary, but it was more of the whole, "by the way, you're my boyfriend today" kind of thing.  This guy was the first guy to ask me to be his girlfriend, the first guy to do things (not those kind of things) with me, the first guy to spend money on me, the first guy to really pay attention to me as a girl.  He even got me a little ring.  Of course, my mother made me give it back immediately.  I was not allowed to accept rings from boys.

I even remember how we got together.  I was in 7th grade, he was in 8th.  I was on the volleyball team and he was on the football team.  At our school, the football equipment was stored at the top of the bleachers in the fieldhouse. (Those of you from Muncie reading this are getting nostalgic right about now.)  So, it was early Fall, the boys were getting their uniforms, pads, etc. and the volleyball girls were running laps in the bleachers.  I remember that there was only one girl ahead of me and she had gotten all the way to the other side of the fieldhouse in front of me.  I saw the boys and wanted to show off, so I put on a burst of speed to (1) catch up with the other girl and (2) stay way ahead of the other girls.  Now, the bleachers were the concrete type of bleachers with an extra step in the middle of the aisles to go up and down the bleachers.  When you were running, every time you hit the aisles, you had to go up the step and back down.  Not a big deal, but some of us are klutzes.  So, I went up the step, but when I went down, my foot went one direction and my ankle went another.  Big, loud, snap and lots of pain.  I had broken my foot and my ankle.  I had to stop and get down the bleachers, get down another set of stairs to the gym floor, and then outside to wait for my mom to pick me up.  You know they called her immediately.

Getting down those bleachers was a bitch and I was trying to be stoic and not cry, but it wasn't working.  First Boyfriend came over and helped me hobble down and out and he waited with me while my mom was getting there and then when she was talking to the coach.  He helped me get in the car too.  This is how we met and he was sooooooo cute!  I spent the next few days on crutches and a few months in a cast.  He talked to me every day and we got close, and he became my boyfriend.

Sweet memories and catching up today was really nice.

Until next time, much peace and love.

Professional Jealousy Part 2 or Karma, Bitch!

I seriously wrote all my blogs for this week yesterday so that I can just post them each night, like I always do.  Today, though, I have to write a new post because more drama bullshit went down today and I'm having a good time laughing about it.

So, you may remember Butt Leach from a prior post--the former boss that hired me, but that I haven't worked for in 20 years and who is a total douche bag.  Today, I got a call from a client and was specifically instructed that they do not want her to be their underwriter.  They want the other underwriter, whom I had originally assigned to them . . . we'll call her Fairy Godmother. (BTW--she really is the Fairy Godmother to my son.)  The client said they don't know Butt Leach or Fairy Godmother, haven't ever worked with either, but that based upon my original recommendation, and the bullshit that they were put through a couple of weeks ago (where Butt Leach was involved), they don't want to deal with her.

I walked down to her office a couple of times and she was not around, so after trying for a third time, I sent her an email telling her that when she gets a moment, I need to talk to her about the discussion with the client.  I sent her that email at 10:30 am.  She didn't respond until 2:30 pm and called me.  I had planned to tell her face-to-face, but since she's a coward, I just told her then and there on the phone.  Now mind you, I would never just go to Butt Leach and say, "Hey, the client says you suck and they don't want you."  No--I said, "The client wishes to keep the underwriter we discussed while I was out there.  They trust my recommendation and have no reason to change.  It's not personal.  I spoke with my boss (Dorothy) and he said that the client gets what the client wants."

She seemed to accept it, but I was wrong.  She was in my office about 5 minutes later, huffing and puffing, red in the face, and just angry and upset.  She didn't know why she wasn't getting the chance to set things right.  I told her there was nothing for her to set right.  Again, it's not personal.  Part of the drama was the broker for the group and the client was having a talk with him about his conduct.  The client never specifically said anything about Butt Leach, just that they wanted Fairy Godmother.

Butt Leach had the nerve to tell me that she hopes I have her back and wouldn't talk about her to the client, and that she had talked so well about me to the broker.  She hopes that I would talk about her the same way she talks about me to the client/broker.  I assured her that "yes--I do."  She's so damn stupid though that she didn't realize she put her foot in it.

Then the coup de gras . . . she asked why the client was so mad at the broker.  I said that the client felt like there had been a lot of drama and one of the things the broker said to the client was, "I don't know why you're talking to Queendivakat; Butt Leach is her boss."  The look on her face was priceless.  It basically said, "Oh shit, busted!"  Of course she denied it and has no idea why the broker would say that.  I shrugged it off and said that I just laughed it off with the client, because I know that Butt Leach would never say something like that.  Yeah . . . right!

Anyway, after all of this--about 30 minutes in my office--she sent an email to her boss and cc'd me, talking about all of this and she didn't think it's right, etc., etc., etc.  She mentioned my boss by name in the email, but didn't have the courtesy to cc him.  So . . . I forwarded it.  We had a good laugh.

Then I found out that this BITCH had the nerve to go to HR last week about another email.  She told the HR VP that I was mean and unprofessional in an email to her.  Now mind you, I don't know which email she is talking about, but I assure you it was totally professional and to the point.  She has a problem with that.  Funny thing though . . . the HR VP told her to grow up and if she has an issue with me to deal with me directly.  Score!  I told Dorothy about this and he's livid.  Tee hee hee !!!!

Bottom line ends up being a teaching experience for my son.  I explained to him why I'm always telling him to behave in a certain way and react in a certain way, and to always take the high road.  This way when he's almost 60  . . . yes that's correct . . . she's almost 60!!!! . . . he wouldn't act like a dumbass teenager.

That's all for now . . . Karma is kicking ass this week.  Until next time, much peace and love.

Professional Jealousy

So I talked previously about the nasty former bosses.  I have a few more things to say about their bullshit, because they are causing problems . . . Or I should say, they are trying to cause problems.  Because, like I said, I DON'T FRIGGING WORK FOR THEM.  And, I haven't for almost 7 frigging years.  So, what the hell is the problem?  Dorothy has weighed in on this and we think it just might be professional jealousy.

You see, as I've moved up through the ranks, I've gained respect from other employees, management, and even board members.  My clients love me and have come to expect the best from me.  They, on the other hand, receive no respect or professional courtesy from anyone.  They make mistakes and they try to cover them up.  This happened recently, where Butt Leach just plain messed up.  Instead of owning up to her mistake, she tried to cover it up and she enlisted the help of Fart Face to do so.  This is really unacceptable, especially from a member of management.  So, when Dorothy called them on the carpet, because they were trying to pull me into their drama, they were pissed.  Now, they have started going through files and are trying to find some kind of dirt on me.  They think they can get me in trouble.  However, they don't seem to realize that they just make themselves look bad in the process.  Yes, there have been some errors found--after all, I'm human, I make mistakes. The deal is though . . . I acknowledge, apologize, and fix it.  That's all anyone can do.

So, I just keep doing my gig and excelling, while they continue to crumble. It was just brought to my attention that our Big Boss, who is fairly new to the company, has called them on the carpet and that he is tremendously pleased with me and my work ethic.  That's all I care about.  I can't control what other people say, think, or do.  I can only control my reactions to the same.  So, I'm looking past it all and doing what I need to do to get my job done and serve my clients well.

Until next time, much peace and love.

Parenting Fail or Just Life

There are times when I just don't get it.  I love my son, but there are times that he just frigging drives me nuts.  I would give my life for him and won't let anyone else talk shit about him, but seriously . . . There are times that I want to just wring his neck.  So last week, we had an incident.  It's not something I want to go into . . . Just suffice to say that I was crushed and sad.  I still have hurt feelings, but I know that my son loves me and we're going to be ok.

Part of what got me past the incident is that I got some stories from other parents that makes this look so damn tame and that he even told me that we're good.  Part of getting past it too, is because I know that I'm doing everything I can for him, even if he sometimes acts as if I'm not.  I know that his sperm donor doesn't do a damn thing for him and that he doesn't even really want to be with his sperm donor.

I'm not trying to compare or compete with ESD or any other parent; I'm just trying to do the best I can.  I'm also not trying to pass judgement on any other parent, including ESD, because we just never know what anyone is going through.  All any of us can do is our best and pray.

Until next time, peace and love.

I Love My Job

 I love my job. I've been there almost 24 years (half my life) and I actually look forward to going to work every day. This wasn't always the case. While I've always liked my job and the company I work for, I haven't always liked my boss. I had two different bosses prior to my current one and it's such a difference. 

My first boss (let's call her Butt Leach) hired me as an entry level secretary. It was clear early on that she was incompetent and didn't deserve the job she had . . . Notice I didn't say the job she was doing, because she never actually did her job. When I took a temporary break from the company, I made it clear that the main reason was because of her. She sucked. 

When I came back to the company after my temporary break, I started working for boss number two (let's call her Fart Face). She was better; however, Butt Leach is her best friend. So, she wasn't the best. The problems with her didn't really start though until she was out on leave a few times. She was a Director at that time and I was her assistant. When she went on leave (3 different times for multiple months), I did her job. I didn't make decisions--her boss did (Big Boss). So, I worked directly with the Big Boss. He gave me the opportunity to advise him and give my two cents on topics. (This was great because it led directly to promotions.) The problem came when Fart Face came back to work. At first, she would be so thankful that I did everything and she didn't come back to chaos. After a month or so, she'd start questioning why I did certain things. I would explain that Big Boss made that decision or this decision. After another month or so, she would just be pissed and attack me, telling me I did everything wrong in her absence and she had to "fix" things. I believe she acted this way because she realized that her secretary was doing the job of the director and doing it better than she did. She was worried that I was gunning for her job. As if.

Like I said, working directly with Big Boss led to promotions. But let me back up. During this time, Butt Leach's job was eliminated. She was a manager of the clerical staff. So, instead of laying her off, they promoted her to a representative in the department. A couple of years later, there was an opening for another representative position. I applied for it, based upon all my experience with the company and the department. I didn't get the job and boy was I pissed. They hired someone from outside (whom I actually love, BTW). It so happens that I got a horrible review that year as well. It was a bunch of hearsay and lies. . .most of the lies came from Butt Leach. I had to dispute it. In spite of these things, I did get a promotion that year, just not the one I wanted. That's ok--I got it the next year, and got two more within the next three years.

The last few years in that department though were hell. I'm kind of an expert in one area of that department and was doing everything myself. They finally hired another rep (we'll call her Snooty Bitch) to do the same thing and I started training her. She was an attorney who wasn't practicing as an attorney and had moved over from another department. She thought she knew more than I did and refused my training. She wanted Fart Face to train her. The problem was, she walked all over Fart Face and convinced her that everything I had been doing was wrong. At this point, I was truly done. I was actively looking for another job; I went to the head of the other department (Ideal Boss) and begged her to hire me for the next opening . There was no way I could stay there much longer, even though I loved the job and the company. Fart Face, Butt Leach, and Snooty Bitch were making my life hell. I seriously couldn’t stand it.

And then, changes were made. Big Boss retired, Ideal Boss was promoted to that position and they were hiring for her old position. I applied for it just for shits and giggles. No, I didn't get it--they hired from outside again (we'll call him Dorothy). I didn't expect to get that job, but I made it known I didn't want to stay where I was. I got moved over to Dorothy's department. The first two years were not pretty. He didn't understand why I was so defensive about everything and I didn't understand that I could trust him. It finally became clear though that he was trustworthy. He backed up everything he said and he didn't make false promises. He also didn't accuse, blame, or take credit where it wasn't his. He also finally understood the hell that I had gone through. It's been almost seven years since Dorothy started and I have changed so much with his guidance.

I just had my annual review and it was fantastic . . . One of the best year's I've ever had. All of this while undergoing so many changes in my personal life, including my divorce. I don't know how my life would have been at this point if I hadn't had Dorothy's guidance through the whole thing. All of this just to say, I love my job.

Until next time, much peace and love.