Thursday, August 18, 2005

The fun just never ends

First the poison oak. Then I started feeling fairly rotten Tuesday afternoon. The feeling got worse, so bad that I had to stop twice on the way home thinking I was going to throw up. I called K, and he picked J up from daycare and stopped to pick up dinner for the two of them, figuring (rightly) that I wouldn't be even remotely interested in food. (In fact, the smell of takeout when I walked in the door that night nearly did me in.) He helped get J to bed, then stayed over here that night in case J woke up, figuring (again rightly) that I might not feel much like being up with J during the wee hours. I was glad K was here to help. I started running fever of about 100 before I went to sleep, and I woke up around 2:30, threw up and started feeling better. Still, given the almost 24 hours of stomach upset (throwing up and otherwise), and the fact that I now had a pink rash all up my neck that didn't look or feel like the poison oak, I went to the doctor Wednesday morning. She couldn't tell me much - only that the new rash on my neck was likely an allergic reaction to something (couldn't tell what without blood tests) - but she gave me meds for the nausea and stomach upset, and some Zyrtec to help with the itching (by that point I was just about ready to scratch my neck until my head fell off). So at least the meds helped. The committee that plans special events (which I'm on) had a tasting on Tuesday - the people who will be providing the barbecue brought samples for us. Hmm, I got sick that afternoon/evening - coincidence? I think not. I'll be bringing my own lunch to the fall picnic, thanks.

Let's see, what else has been going on? Not much, really. Same old, same old - I'm tired of worrying about money. Along those lines, let me just say how much I HATE Cingular Wireless. K and I used to have our cell service with them. We had some problems - on more than one occasion, K would check his call timers, and would find that the timer showing the length of the last call he made had run up some insane amount of time, like six or eight hours (this on days when he was at work, and had been on and off the phone with me several times, for a few minutes each time). Of course, Cingular couldn't find a call with that length of time, and so wouldn't do anything about the horrendous bill that resulted. They said we owed over $2,000. I was filing bankruptcy right about then to clear out my debt, so I said, hey, the phones are in my name, guess what - screw you, Cingular, it's going in the bankruptcy. My attorney said the contract would be terminated when the bankruptcy was filed, and the $2,000 was what I allegedly owed at the time of filing. Well, that was all finalized a little over a year ago, and Cingular pestered me once, saying I owed for charges accrued since the $2,000 debt was discharged - my attorney told them to back off, that the contract had terminated as a result of the bankruptcy being filed, there should have been no charges over the amount discharged in bankruptcy, and I didn't owe anything. Well, now they're back AGAIN, now saying I owe the $400-something they tried to get from me before, plus fees and interest, etc., for a total of $535.76. Bastards. I'm faxing the bill to my attorney tomorrow and letting her know they've called and left messages on my phone (and correct me if I'm wrong, but if you're trying to collect a debt, aren't you supposed to *say* that in your message? Not so with this one - just an ominous-sounding message to call so-and-so immediately upon receipt of this message, it's in regard to an urgent matter, blah blah blah). I hope she tells them to go poke sticks in their eyes. I wouldn't have my cell phone service with Cingular again if they were the only wireless company around. K and I both have T-Mobile now, and gee, our bills are consistent every month, no surprises from one month to the next. What a concept. But anyway, all that to say, I am beyond sick of financial crap. I'm 12 years out of law school, I should be better established than this. When do I stop living paycheck to paycheck?!?!? At the rate I'm going, I'll be working when I'm 85 just to put food on the table. I'll get to stop working when they carry my cold, dead body out of my cubicle.

And on that note - I did a little checking online, just for grins, and found out that my company pays way below the median salary in this area for what I do. That SUCKS. And since I have my law degree, I probably make more than some of my co-workers, which means their paychecks are even farther below the median. That REALLY sucks.

I've got to go pack J's bag - he'll be with K tomorrow. Not sure what to do with my free time. One of my girlfriends left a message saying that a friend of hers is having a pool party on Saturday. I haven't decided if I'll go yet or not. On the one hand, it might be fun, and I guess it would be nice just to get out of the house and have a drink or two. On the other hand, I'm not sure how social I'm feeling - I might prefer to hibernate at home. We'll see.

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