Fifth Night

I didn't get to sleep till 6am this morning and woke at 11am. Though I felt it was a better sleep than I've had yet. I'm still getting so many spam phone calls, it's like all the concentrated efforts of the industry are focused on my new phone number. I've already applied for the Do Not Call list, but it hasn't seemed to work yet.

Then I got a phone call from the Orthopedic office I went to in NH for my trigger thumb. They'd sent me a bill and it said that I owed another $50 on top of the $50 I paid for my first visit when I received a cortizone shot. It also said that I owed another $68 on top of the $15 I was charged for the second visit which was a 5 minute check up in which the doctor only said I should either live with the pain or get the surgery.

The woman explained that the cost of the shot I received was $100 and that I was only charged $50 because when I was being released they didn't know I had been given the shot. I told her that they had my chart, they knew I had no insurance and that the doctor told them I'd been given a shot. I heard him. She said she doesn't know what happened, I said I wasn't lying.

Then the lady said that for the second visit the doctor told them to only charge me $15 because he felt sorry for me and it was a quick visit. So they would reverse the $68. I said it was a bit like buying a pack of gum at the store for $1 and getting home to find you had to pay another $1. I asked her why I wasn't told the costs while I was there. She just said that they were being nice because I didn't have insurance and that if I wanted she could write up the full costs for the 2 visits and send me the full bill. I got so mad, I asked her if she thought it was right? That I get charged 2 times the amount I paid, 2 months after my first visit? How can I plan for costs that I'm never told to expect? She wouldn't answer, just kept saying how much of a favor they were doing for me.

As far as I could get with her was the reversal of the $68 for the second visit and told her to send me my records and a corrected bill for the $50. As soon as I hung up I burst out crying. I don't even know why. I was hysterical. I wasn't sad, I was angry and I shouldn't have been bawling my eyes out. I called my husband and once I could get the story out, he agreed that it was completely moronic and insane for them to do that. Still don't know why I couldn't stop crying, he thought it might be low blood pressure or sugars from dieting, I think it might have more to do with nicotine withdrawal, it could be both, it could be the depression.. who knows, but it's over.

My first two bills, Comcast & Car Insurance, are both due in 2 weeks. A total of $372.35 but the Car Insurance will be covered until January, and the Comcast was high for the installation fees. Still with no income yet in sight, I'm very protective of my stash.

I got caught up on True Blood yesterday. Season 2. Very good I must say, and damn Eric grew on me. I liked him in the books but I wasn't too fond of him in Season 1 of the show.

Fourth Night

Warning, this message may make some uncomfortable. I think the things I'm going through, everyone has been through at some point but it may be to much info for some.

The fear of an empty house is subsiding but I'm still not sleeping well. I had some crazy dreams last night and the night before. Still I double check all the doors a hundred times, pull the shades closed.

I've also not managed to get out job hunting yet either. I've done quite a lot online, and most big retail stores prefer you do it online and take their hour long questionnaires anyway. I'm keeping a list of ones I can think of that don't have online application processes. So far 2 corporations don't accept online apps for anything below store managers, and 2 others don't accept online applications unless you use windows & IE. Strange...

The cravings are getting better, but the loneliness is not. Sometimes it's overwhelming and I start to think irrationally. "Nobody Cares" or "Everyone's Happy, why can't I be?" Late at night, it's hard to break out of that pattern of thinking. During the day I know what it is, depression. I think I have every reason to be depressed, and I'm not ashamed. I'd be more ashamed if I was trying to hide it. Still it does chase people away typically, so it's really good at spiraling out of control. I just have to be careful, pay attention and try to find a way to break it.

Lastly, am caught up on Castle now. A new show starring Nathan Fillion who is just awesome in the role. I never saw any of the other shows he's been in since Firefly but this one is good. The mother and daughter are also well cast and written characters but I'm not sure about anyone else really. They seem overshadowed by those 3.

Second Night

BIG HUGE *HUGS* and CONGRATULATIONS to my sister & brother-in-law on their new baby. It's a girl! Happy Birthday little girl! I shall call this the year of the X chromosome :) 4 total this year so far and there's one more baby on the way! Though I don't think that baby is technically due this year. I still feel it will also be a girl :)

I've been sleeping like crap.. It's too quiet here. Even if I leave on music, it's not the same. I wanted to wake up early and get some errands done then go job hunting but I woke up late. Still I got the DMV done, 2 hours and $80 to get my license, car registration & title changed. I have to wait 2 weeks for the real copies of each but I got the new plates right away. I went home and tried to put the new plates on. The front one was easy and I got one of the screws off on the back but could not get the second no matter what I tried. I'd just taken the plates off in March to put on the NH ones and had no trouble, but somehow it was stuck. So I decided to take it in for the inspection today rather than tomorrow and get the guy to do it for me. He obliged me and everything for the car is done until next month when I have to renew the registration, but I can do that online. I had a coupon book for a free inspection but only $5 off on the emissions so I had to pay $25. Still it's done.

Then I drove to my new bank with my temporary drivers license and some bills to get my address changed with them. Also ordered my first set of checks. Thankfully all of that was free. I'm really reluctant to start digging into my bank account on my third day alone here.

I didn't get out to throw around my resume. By the time I was done with the bank it was 4pm. Rush hour around here so I decided to do it tomorrow as I had also not eaten at all.

Saturday night I got caught up on one of my favorite shows, Bones. There was quite a few episodes but I was bored and lonely anyway. I didn't really take to Bones right away, I didn't take to David Boreanaz as an FBI agent. Eventually though I grew to like the relationship between him and Emily Deschanel and the rest of the cast.

Sunday night I got caught up on The Mentalist. Another favorite show. Simon Baker is very good, though I still am not quite sure about Robin Tunney. She seems quite out of place for me but the character is good. <3 <3 Cho (Tim Kang) especially in the season finale when he's refusing the offer of the mailbox lady's niece.

Tonight I'm catching up on Lie To Me. Originally it bothered me that the reactions were over-pronounced in the acting. It's gotten better in the later episodes and I adore how they compare it to real world photos. I've always been fascinated by facial & body language reading.

Trying to stay sane.. will update any changes.

First Night

I'm in the new place, mostly settled. I still have some boxes that I haven't really unpacked yet, just sort of glanced through. Things like books, movies, music and most of my collectibles will have to wait until I have more storage & shelves. I've got most of my jewelry gear out though.

Still trying to get used to the quiet. I wanted to get to sleep at midnight last night, my first night here alone, and I couldn't. I ended up catching up on last season of Bones and sorting a bit more of my stuff.

Tomorrow I'll be heading to the DMV to change over my license, car registration & title. Then hopefully going job hunting at the shopping centers down the road. *cross my fingers* I'm hoping for something full time but often full time retail turns out to be 39.5 hours or something so they don't have to pay full benefits. Maybe I'll get a weekend part-time job too, I don't have anything else to do and being home is depressing.

Stuff

It's very hard for me to accept financial help from others. This likely stems from how I grew up with money being a weapon of control & manipulation. Having nothing for the last 2 months has made me really face the issue since I have to not only accept the help, but ask for it as well. It's not any easier though and I find myself rebelling for no good reason against things that would make my life easier but would make me feel worse for taking.

In general I think it's good that I have issue with it, it will drive me to support myself as soon as I can. Right now, it's a constant battle between feeling greedy, burdensome, undeserving and weak and having the things I need.

32 Hours

32 hours to go before we make the trek to Virginia. Tomorrow will be a crazy day of getting the trailer, finishing up last minute tasks & phone calls, and double checking that everything is packed and loaded. I've been crunching numbers and it looks like if I can find a decent job ($12+ per hour/40 hours a week) I should be ok.

I also plan to get more serious about selling my jewelry. I've had no bites so far at all. I have yet to decide if I'll continue through etsy.com which has a $0.20 listing fee and 3.5% sales fee, or if I'll switch to artfire.com which offers a basic account for free, no listing or sales fees. You can pay $12 per month to get a premium account You can see the difference here: I don't think it's wise to list the same jewelry on different sites though so I'll have to choose.

I'll miss the gorgeous scenery and lack of traffic here in NH but I need income options. Never got a chance to go check out the walking trails near here or the waterfall, or take photos of the river.

4 little monkeys jumping on the bed..

4 days to go, 4 very busy days..

Things to do as time allows:
1. Find other inflatable mattress
2. Hang mom's instruments
3. Finish stacking the wood, about 4-5 loads left
4. Finish building the new pantry, waiting on a replacement piece
5. Call and transfer mom's last retirement money
6. Call and order Internet & Phone for Virginia (tried 4 times already but the tenant there now hasn't called to cancel his and they can't make my account until he does or we fax in the house deed and stuff. I spoke to the tenant at his work today and he said he was going to call as soon as we hung up but he didn't)
7. Paint mom's wall that was ripped out to fix the wiring
8. Clean out the jeep
9. confirm trailer location
10. set up the dvd player in the living room
11. change water filters

None of those are especially hard, except the wood, I've finished 17 other things from the list in the last 2 weeks. Finding the time in between long days out for mom's doctor appointments, grocery shopping, getting my new glasses, meetings with both the old and new contractor, going out for lunch, making dinner, cleaning up the house (has to be vacuumed at least every other day with all of Woofie's fur), trips to the dump, pharmacy and post-office, mowing and weedwhacking the yard (much of the yard has giant rocks and hills you can't mow around), packing up my stuff and the stuff mom is letting me take, internet going down every time it rains (which it's done very often for the last 2 months), helping mom when she has trouble or gets frustrated with what she's doing.. there's more but I think you get the idea.

Tomorrow, my brother has an appointment with the local college to talk about enrolling options. We're also going to lunch so it'll be a good 4 hours at least, then we might run some errands but basically most of the day will be used, but I'll be calling comcast again, and a few other places about orders. Then dinner will probably take awhile to make, I swear mom and G are trying to get me to cook all the complicated dinners before I go.

Wednesday we're meeting with the new contractor to discuss his rough estimates and plans. Eve though we're not fully sure his prices will be within range, at least he's keeping us fully informed of what he's doing and seems reliable. ++ Then we're probably going out to Home Depot to pick up the generator depending on what the contractor says about installing it, and likely grabbing dinner out. Again, at least 4-5 hours for all of that. Need to make a trip to the dump as well.

Thursday we're meeting with the aide from the home care company that may be working with mom. Then crossing my fingers about calling U-Haul about the trailer, and making arrangements. Final packing check.

Friday, we're driving the jeep to the airport to leave it there for when mom and G fly home from Virginia, then hopefully picking up the trailer and packing it.

Saturday, dropping off the puppies at 8am and heading down to Virginia.

Doesn't really look like a lot of stuff but there's so much checking, rechecking, calling, recalling, mini-errands stack up whenever there's any free time.