Corner of Bourbon & Division

I am having a shitty month. So even though I don't post much as a rule, I will likely be posting even less for a while.

I have the completely unhelpful reaction of "Not dealing, can't make me," when it comes to outside stressors. Yes, the head-in-the-sand method that has worked so well for so many others is now serving as my guideline.

Yeah.

Anyway.

If anyone can figure out how to make money spontaneously drop from the sky into my lap, please drop me a line. Otherwise, I implore you to be patient until I have my head surgically removed from my posterior, where it appears to be lodged these days. *headdesk*

I don't get it. Twelve hours of sleep later, and I'm still tired. No, it's not the ick-I-slept-too-much kind of tired, either.

Is LJ going to keep the Valentine's Day banner up all week, or what?

I am entirely caught up on Bluebook. Yay!

Now, if only I could wrap my mind around writing fiction. One step at a time, I suppose. I really hate the last 2,000-odd words of Crisse, des zombies!, and that's proving to be a major stumbling block to getting the thing finished.

This is the Post Of A Thousand Paragraphs, because I honestly don't remember what I was going to say. Poor joane was talking to me yesterday on Y!M about conversations we had around New Year's, and I had NO idea what she was talking about. Once she reminded me (with explanations and examples and flow charts) then I finally got a vague notion that yes, maybe we might have discussed that at some point.

On the plus side, this whole memory thing seems to be restricted to short-term memory only. Anything that happened before September is okay. Otherwise, though, I'm sunk.

What I need, I suspect, is a month's vacation somewhere sunny and warm which includes a beach. I actually wouldn't mind going back to PEI for a week or two in the summer. That's obviously not going to happen this year, but maybe next year.

...

I forgot what I was going to say again. *sigh*

Welcome to another chapter in How Phnee's Finances are T3h Suck. There's a little bit of ranting in here, be warned.

I got a call from Bell, which I received late, of course, having not checked my messages since Monday or thereabouts. Turns out I owe them a metric assload of money. Now, let me explain something first: I am lousy with money. I am lousy with remembering to make regular payments on just about anything. I know myself well, and thus on ALL my bills I arrange to have automatic payments withdrawn from my account every month. It's simpler and prevents me from having to worry about it.

Apparently the automatic payments didn't work for Bell, for whatever reason. However, they didn't see fit to warn me about this until, oh, about two seconds before they threatened to disconnect my phone line. Okay, in theory I should be checking my invoices online every month to make sure things are going smoothly. However, I have mentioned that I use automated services precisely because I'm lousy at that sort of things. Touching, my naïve faith in the system. :P

So, mostly my fault, but kind of also partly theirs. None of which makes any difference, because it's ALL my problem.

*sigh*

I am going to the bank tomorrow to see if I can get a loan, or a credit card on short notice. I was very pleased about no longer being in Massive Amounts Of Debt, but apparently my smugness is now being thoroughly punished. Dramatic irony: gotta love it.

Still, I figure this will be an opportunity to consolidate all the BFO's (Big Financial Obligations) I still have into one neat package. I am still, thanks to the stupid paycheque snafu from last August, one month behind on rent. I owe Bell a ton of money, and I have a few SFO's (Small Financial Obligations) that would do well from getting handled all in one go.

Jesus H. Murphy.

The worst part is, is that I can't really rail about the Vast Unfairness Of It All™, because, really, if I had been more on the ball about this, I wouldn't be having these problems. Well, I'd be having them, but in reduced form. Part of me wishes very much that Bell had waited until August to get their panties in a bunch, because then The Car would no longer be a huge damn financial albatross hanging around my neck. Ooh, I like that expression much better than BFO. HDFA it is.

Okay. This is not the end of the world. This is not the end of the world. Remember to breathe, and repeat: This is not the end of the world. Lather, rinse, repeat. Aloof, unavailable elf princess. Aloof, unavailable elf princess. This is not the end of the world.

I shall endeavour to view this as an opportunity rather than a massive pain in the ass. I shall endeavour to find the silver lining in this very large and annoying storm cloud. If I consolidate all my HDFA's now, then I could potentially be entirely debt-free by this time next year. Potentially.

I think my credit rating is still okay. It can't be fabulous, but I don't think it should get in the way of a small loan. For one thing, I've never missed a car payment, and I know that goes a long way to keeping a good credit rating. Hopefully it will act as a counterweight to all the really crappy financial things that have happened in the past three years or so.

You'd think that two years of gainful employment would cancel out a year of unemployment, but you'd be wrong. Two years later (almost to the day, in fact), and I'm still fucking paying for the fact that I couldn't get a job and was ineligible for EI benefits (I quit Bell Mobility, since it was making me a psychological wreck, but because I quit then the government considers it All My Own Fault if I don't have money).

Did I mention that the Quebec government decided that I owe them money, in spite of all my taxes being taken off at source? I give them a quarter of my paycheque every week, and somehow I STILL end up owing them money. Someone explain to me how that's supposed to work. No, I'm not bitter at ALL. Bah.

Okay, enough whingeing. This is a blessing in disguise. A very, very cunning disguise, but nevertheless… Tomorrow I shall go to my bank and get their help to fix my problem. One day, I will have money. Today is not that day, but some day, mark my words, I will be worry-free.

So a closer look at the website reveals that they don't actually take faxed registration forms. It has to be done by mail.

So, I've filled out a clean form, and I'm going to write a nice cover letter begging them to let me join up. ("Jine up! Jine up! Line up and jine the cavalry!" Ahem.) Then I'm going to swing by the parental units' place this evening before going to my dance class, grab a copy of my degree (yes, we have spare photocopies of everything), shove that and a check in the envelope which I've just prepared, dump the whole thing in a mailbox and not think about it anymore.

:::ETA:::

Holy shit, but my flakedom knows no bounds! Either they've changed the dates on me (entirely possible), or else I massively misread the website (also entirely possible). There are two classes being given for emergency dispatch, but they're both in February.

I really, really hope there's still room...

*runs off to send in application form*

I am an idiot.

See, I stayed home last night in a bid to get rid of this cold. I was going to nuke it with the brand new bottle of NyQuil I bought yesterday morning.

Only, I couldn't find the box when I finally got ready to go to bed. I was mildly annoyed, figuring I'd left it at work.

Turns out I not only left it at work, but I left it in the washroom here. Two separate people saw it, but didn't think to pick it up. It's now gone. The front desk doesn't have it.

I can't afford another box.

So, I get to suffer through the cold by myself, as well as deal with the knowledge that I'm an idiot who's pretty much flushed $15 down the toilet. I may as well not have bought the NyQuil, suffered anyway, and used it to pay my share of Paradoxe this weekend.

Shit.