After 7 Months…

The car saga is finally coming to a close.

I’ll call it done when the check has cleared!

Back in November 2019 I had a little “boo boo” driving home form Orange County. At the time I thought it was just going to be an annoyance. If I’d only known…

Short story, car sits in repair shop for a month. I get tired of the fighting between the body shop and the insurance company and tell them, “Just FIX the damn thing, I’ll pay the difference.”

December 31 I pick up the car and drive it home. 1st week of Jan 2020 I call the insurance company to have a discussion with one of their adjusters and the adjuster agrees that they should have paid for all of the repairs not just the portion they did pay for. He says he’s sending a check. I think hurrah!

Check never comes. I call the insurance company and they tell me the check has been cashed. I ask by whom? I’m told by the shop…

I call the shop and ask them to send me the amount owed.. At the time I’m thinking, “No big deal.”

Here begins the saga.

The insurance company hasn’t paid everything the shop thinks they should have. So they’re holding onto the money. Eventually the shop stops returning my phone calls and emails and I think they’re just hoping I’ll go away.

They don’t know me very well.

I keep trying to be reasonable, and they keep blowing me off. This goes on for months, until I happen to need some things from the dealership.

While I’m there, I ask to speak with the General Manager of the Dealership and explain the situation. I’m polite, I’m reasonable, and I tell him that I, as a customer shouldn’t be embroiled in their insurance battles or their personnel issues. Those things are none of my concern.

He agrees and says he’ll look into it. Shortly thereafter I start getting notices from the insurance company that supplemental claims are being opened. Knowing what little I know fo the way the process works I figured that it’s just the shop and the insurance company’s way of dealing with the disputed amounts and ignore the notifications.

Again, that’s none of my concern.

Yesterday afternoon I get a call from the insurance company asking where my car is.

Hmmm. It’s in my garage last time I looked.

The very sweet lady is clearly confused. I explain what I believe to be the truth of the situation and direct her to scans of the final invoice, and email communications where I’d done the math and explained what I was expecting from them. She reviews the documents and says first, that it’s nice that I’d sent all the supporting documentation to them. Usually, it’s a situation of “he said / she said”.

I tell her that I’m all about keeping everyone in the loop and that this way the insurance company knows that I held up my end of the bargain, (paying my deductible and covering additional expenses that I’d authorized). I tell her that what I’m looking for is to extricate myself from the machinations of the insurance company and the shop.

She agrees and laughs when I tell her, “I just want to tap dance away from the mess.”

She thanks me for explaining it to her, and says that she’ll see what she can do.

I hang up the phone as I have many times thinking, “I appreciate her efforts, but doubt anything will come of it.”

About 20 minutes later I get a notification that I have another email from the insurance company. It says that a check has been issued. I’m thinking, “Huh, that’s neat but I’ve been here before.”

5 Minutes later the sweet young lady calls me back and verbally confirms that the check is being mailed and that I should see it in 5 to 7 days. I thank her profusely for her efforts.

10 minutes later there’s another email notification saying that another check is being sent to me. This one is for a lot less so I’ll have to see what the insurance company is sending and why.

Hopefully, this will put an end to the whole mess. I will go in for routine maintenance (It’s a different branch of the business) But I’m not going to be having any body work done by that shop in the future. As to additional cars… the jury is still out on that.

Next on the agenda is the donation of two dead trucks for a tax credit.

Trust me you don’t want to know that story!

Who knows? Maybe I’ll just find an old used pickup truck, pay cash for it and drive it into the ground. It would be a lot easier to “Mad Max” a pickup. The way things are going that might be the best option.

The moral of the story is: Be tenacious. Have the documentation. Be certain of what your goal is, and that you’re correct.

Funny, our politicians could learn from item 2 and 3 couldn’t they?

Ahhh, Finally a decent night’s sleep

GOPR0058.jpegIt’s been weeks since I went to bed and slept soundly through until morning.

The sleep application running on my phone shows the disruptions and restlessness much more clearly than I actually recall being awake.

It’s amazing how lack of sleep makes ya feel like crap. In my case I start to feel really stupid and have a hard time keeping any single thought in my head. I become scattered and then I get really quiet. 

But last night was bliss!

I went to bed, fell asleep immediately. I woke up to the pink blush of the sunrise across the mountain and actually felt ready to get up and start my day. 

I’ve been doing chores and enjoying them. (God, I must be sick!)

Thursday, Friday, and yesterday I felt poorly. I wondered if I’d caught the Covid Boogyman virus. I had no fever and I could still taste & smell and had no other symptoms. So I took it easy and kept a watchful eye on my stats. With all the media attention and masked up people, it was easy to wonder if I’d caught IT and was I gonna die.

My 80 something year old mother is panicking on the other side of the country for the same reasons. I’d spoken to her on Thursday and did my level best to hide that I wasn’t feeling well.

I did tell her that she should turn off the steady diet of CNN but she was having none of that. She told me that apparently some of my brother-in-laws relatives died of Covid.

They were in their 80s and honestly I question if it was Covid or just old age. I did my best to calm her down. Thankfully, the conversation was short. Between the strain of creating the illusion that I was fine and her going on & on about Covid I was pretty short on patience.

This morning I feel pretty much normal. I’m a little stiff from the lack of activity over the past few days, but my head is clear. (I can add 2+2 without a calculator so that’s a plus.)

Been going through the accumulated email catching up. More properly, I’ve been going through the email and deleting the ton of junk mail that the filters missed. It’s funny, only about 1 in 10 emails actually has anything important in it.

It’s hard to believe that we’ve already gotten through almost all of July. 

Time feels like it’s stopped, but the days on the calendar have flown by. I guess that’s a function of the news not really changing. I mean there really hasn’t been much different since about April. I’m finding it easy to lose days and entire weeks.

Ah well, off to complete some more chores that have backed up.

Hope you’re all having a great Sunday.

Practically overnight my cucumbers sprouted.

IMG 1420Yippee!

I was getting worried.

So now I have lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, and squash. All working toward harvest day.

Now if only I can get the carrots and bell peppers to make an appearance. The carrots are in fact sprouted, but they’re developing at a slow pace. just a few little green threads at this point. The peas have also sprouted another week or so and I’m going to have to come up with some kind of trellis for them.

It’s nice that amidst all the insanity that some things are constants. Gardens still grow and puttering around in the yard in the early morning brings me a great deal of calm and pleasure.

Next on the agenda is the front yard. Over the past few winters, a lot of the landscaping has taken a big beating and I’ve lost a lot of the plants that brightened up the yard at this time of year.

I’m hesitant to put in too much because who knows what the county will decide is “BAD” to have in the yard this fire season. I don’t want to invest a ton of money, time and water only to have some asshole tell me that X,Y, or Z is a fire hazard. 

But I’m thinking about cheap color at least until the fall. It would give me some pleasure and brighten the place up a bit.

It’s nice to be in my home state

IMG 1244My Brother’s place feels like home. It’s spartan. very little junk, and everything that’s here is something that my brother loves or which has obvious significance.

It’s strange that I feel so at home here, and did so instantly.

My sinuses lost their minds in the hours after landing here. They’ve calmed down considerably and now my skin is relaxing too, it’s the humidity here. 

Ibrothers.jpg.jpeg slept soundly once I fell asleep it took some time for my head to quite due to the  rigors of traveling. Once I went to sleep I slept well and deeply.

My memories of this area are surprisingly good. My brain automatically pointed out poison ivy. I wasn’t even aware that I was avoiding it until I went to reach for some of the berries, then I remembered and thought, “Huh” 

I’m in my home environment the world is right and I’m comfortable.

I’ve had a bit to drink after a day with my brother. Brother(s) actually, I got to spend time wIMG 1249ith the eldest sibling from my Father’s second marriage. he’s only 4 years older than me and looks very good.

I’m smiling a lot for no reason, and it’s not just from the booze. 

Okay, I’ve had too much to drink over the course of the day. But I don’t care.

Spending time with family is like the warmth of a fire on a cold night.

It’s comfortable and good. No-one is trying to outdo the others, we’re just laughing and enjoying being in each other’s presence.

I’ll admit that I was tense about this trip, but that tension was only about the flight and having to deal with the bullshit of security and close confines.

There’s joy in being here and in the company of people who generally think like I do, meaning in my family.

There’s also joy in faith in people generally who might disagree, or potentially take you to task about your beliefs but if it comes to that. Southern politeness and decorum will be followed.

It’s nice to feel that I have freedom of speech again.

I suppose all of this is to say that it’s nice to feel like I belong.

Social rules are those that I remember. I know, perhaps this place isn’t as diverse as other places, but I have to ask… 

Is that so wrong?

I slept like a baby last night

I guess the message was received and my unquiet mind decided to let me rest.

I’m in Big Bear for a couple of days. Lat night  I was warm and the town was pretty quiet traffic noise aside. 

Having a lovely cup of coffee after sleeping for 9 hours, then lounging under the covers for an hour.

All is good with the world regardless of what the news says.

Will be cleaning the B&B unit later today and hopefully there will not be any hiccups.

I haven’t bothered with a shower since I’m only going to be working up a sweat with the cleaning. 

Once I’m done with that and the new folks are in place, I’ll have a shower then take a walk into the village. It’s cold but that’s Winter. 31F last night as a low, that’s a lot warmer than it was the first weekend I was here.

I’m planning the week ahead and I’ve got to get the car washed. I should’ve done that last week but honestly it was too damn cold to be playing in the water even in the small desert town I usually do the car was in.

Still looking for a job and still trying to write. It’s been tough sitting down and actually just writing lately. I’ve been too easily distracted and the internet is a large part of that distraction.

Hopefully after I’ve finished the cleaning, I’ll hap time to just re-read and continue writing. That’s going to depend a lot on how tired I am but I’ve got hope.

I hope your Sunday is as peaceful.