The Perfect Storm

New Years day I receive a call and a text and a voicemail from my father (yes, I know Dad... thank you for your vigilance). I was getting dressed to spend the first morning of 2010 (ok afternoon) on the golden gate bridge in obnoxious/exhilirating? mist. Anyhoos - Turns out someone has been using my debit card in Valencia CA. Their first stop - McDonalds. I mean, they need sustenance before they head out on a spending spree. And where better to fuel yourself than at the local MickeyD's? I don't fault them for that one. Smart move stealers of my debit card, the debit card sitting to this day in my wallet on the floor of my room.

The troubling bit is their next move: Straight to the CVS pharmacy where they managed to spend over a hundred dollars. I'm bitching about a cancer patient who lost their insurance and needs to swipe my card info in order to pay for prescriptions aren't I? I am such a bitch. But then! They did it again. Really? Do you not know the wonderful art of theivery? Don't stay in one place possible cancer patient! Move around, do your thing, but it looks shady spending almost $300 dollars at a walgreens wannbe. I mean, Pullease. Don't make me do your job for you.

Well, by the third transaction, the bank got wise and was all, no you didn't... and denied the card. And put a stop on any further transaction. Hooray! Here is the shady bit. I verified with the bank that I have never been to Valencia, also haven't been to a Mcdonalds or a CVS in years. Yet! Before I can even make a claim to get my moneys back, the payments have to go through. So instead of simply preventing me from losing money, I have to have it disappear from my bank account and then file paperwork to have it reimbursed. No biggy if I had an extra 300 dollars lying around. Right after the holidays too, so not exactly the case. Also - rent was due post haste, and i had a paycheck to deposit. All of this landing on New Years Day, a friday, a day the banks are closed. On saturday they are open for a short period of time. So before running around doing errands I head to a Chase downtown. That said chase is CLOSED on weekends altogether. So no money deposited, no temp debit card, the next day is sunday and I have 15 dollars in cash. LAME. Indeed the perfect storm of financial crisis. I am a walking recession.

So then on monday at work everything is going along swimmingly, except when a coworker chops off the tip of his finger. Owe. Gross. Insert shivers here. And then when I go to the bathroom, pull down my jeans, and my phone flies out of the pocket landing right in the toilet. I did not even HESITATE to spin around, thrust my hand in the toilet water and yank out that phone. Not even a moment for "ew". I was mostly swearing loudly until my nubbin coworker knocked on the door and asked if everything was alright. It so was NOT alright. The phone was still on which was promising and after I undid everything, dried it off over and over again as water was still leaking everywhere, and stuck it in a tupperware full of rice, the phone was still acting possessed; flipping between applications, locking and unlocking and locking and unlocking and basically giving me a full blown seizure with all the flashing between screens. So reluctantly I decided to get a new phone.

To my benefit I had just received an email from verizon saying my 1 year discounted new phone whatsit was due and yay! come in and get a new phone on discount! Well, I was worried verizon would close by 6. So at 530 I close up shop at work and run over to the store. Where they tell me I don't get full discount, but actually a discount off the retail price of phones which means they are all motherfucking expensive. Plus my beloved phone has been discontinued. Because it's just TOO awesome. That's why. I finally settle on one that's similar and comes with a 100 dollar mail in rebate so I'm sold.

In the past verizon has billed me whatever the cost is and I pay for it on my next phone bill. Shazaam. And since I have no money because I have no debit card, etc etc, this is my only option. But oops! The lady tells me Verizon changed their policy over the summer and all purchases have to be made upfront.

BAH! Broken phone, I say. Fraud, I say. NO MONEY, I say. She says nothing. I leave, I go back and finish working at the store minus 15 min on my time sheet because I am a good employee and watch the clock. Grumble grumble.

I take the phone home, I plug it in. Maybe it will hold a charge? The texting works if I can ignore the spazz outs, and the only other real problem is I can't hear anything through the ruined speakers when I call out. Turns out - it holds a charge. Hooray! I think I will be alright for a day or so until I can get this all sorted out, surviving by text alone. Sigh.

But then this morning - a new years miracle!! Everything works. Everything. No more twitches, and the speaker works fantastically. Like normal. I have been granted an appeal. YAY! My phone is fine, I won't be out an extra 100 plus dollars, I'm still broke and the theives will probably get away with it but what if they were actually cancer patient thieves and then I can feel a little less annoyed about the whole thing. AND what if my new debit card is pretty? I never really liked the whole mustardy gold bit anyways.