You've Been Served

I haven't been feeling 100% for quite some time now. My cold turned into a sinus infection which turned into bronchitis. I've been fighting it for about 5 weeks now, and just this last weekend have I been able to walk the dogs and/or take them for 30 minutes of bike rides. Believe me they needed it. I took all of last week off from work. I was forced to take 3 days off due to a medicine change, then I felt better on Wednesday so I overdid it, and had a slight fever and nausea on Thursday. So, I called work Thursday night and asked for both Friday and Saturday off. It seems to have worked. I think I've finally beaten this thing into submission. Still the occasional lung hacking cough, but I can breathe!

I bought a faster wireless internet connection for Y a few weeks back, but I only bought one. I thought my slower wireless connections would work, but alas it is not to be. They won't talk to one another. So, I haven't been online but maybe twice in the past week. And once was only for a few minutes just to figure out why I had no money left in my checking account. Luckily I had already bought all the trimmings for Thanksgiving dinner (and food for the week), but I had no cash left in my pocket. So, I scrounged up around the house all the things I had been meaning to return to various stores, but just hadn't gotten around to it yet. (God must be watching over me, making me procrastinate such things for times as this.) In total I returned about $300 worth of stuff. I got about $200 in cash back and the other hundred or so in store credit. One store credit was given at Kroger, so now I have money to buy gas at the end of the week; another store credit was given at Petsmart, so now I have about half the money I need for more cat/dog food and cat litter until my next paycheck. Thank goodness I get three paychecks in December. Even then, Y may not get the Christmas gift he is expecting, or any significant birthday gift (1/1 is his bday). You'll have to read my other blog: debtreductionact2.com for why that is so.

But, the big reason I was overdrawn this paycheck was because I forgot about some automatic deductions coming out at the end of the month, and I gave Bill about $650 ($300 for a lawyer, $300 for food/gas and $50 to get the locks re-keyed at the other house since his roommate lost his key) from this paycheck. I should've just stuck to my guns and made him visit the food bank. Next week I'll make sure to tell him no, because if I give him any money, Y and I will be the one's stopping at a food bank. I love the time off, but this no overtime stuff really kills my paychecks.

About the title, well, I got a call from my lawyer early last week to tell me that they were finally ready to serve paperwork on Bill. He called me Wednesday morning to tell me that he just got served. He said, "I thought we were going to hold off on this?" I told him that I had decided to go ahead because in the past 7+ weeks he had not made one attempt to do anything with Y, and the tension level in the house had decreased over 50%. He wasn't very pleased with that answer, but surprisingly after a few days he seemed okay with it. He wants me to give him all the info about the other house and his car (I pay all the bills). This is the first time in 13+ years that he's really been interested in how much anything he uses each month costs.

We'll see what happens next. Just because I filed paperwork, doesn't mean it's the end. No fat lady has sung, yet.

Other than that, not much to report here. Got a call from the school today. Those are never good. It seems that Y has been giving the gym teacher arguments about how his leg/knee/ankle hurts and he can't do any stretches or warm-ups, but when it comes time to play the game he's a-okay. He does it so much, she gave him a lunch detention last Friday, but he didn't show up for it. So, the asst principal said today he will find him at lunch and make sure he goes to detention. He wanted to know if there was any physical reason for Y to be complaining. I told them if he was okay to play the game, he was okay to stretch, too. He doesn't like to do that, but she needs to figure out a way to get him motivated to do it. He does the same stuff with the coaches at acrobatics, but they just tell him to stretch first or he won't be allowed to do any jumps. Maybe she just needs to tell him that if he doesn't stretch then he can't participate for the day and he will get a failing grade for that day. I just hope the asst principal doesn't say anything about the length of his hair. Boy, will that be fun when they try to get him to cut it.

Gotta go finish the pies for Thanksgiving. It's really annoying when you have to bake everything a day or two ahead of time because you have to work a 4-midnight shift on Tuesday, a 1:30-9:30pm shift on Wednesday and a 7am-3pm shift on Thanksgiving Day. If we have any hopes of eating before 6pm, then I have to make all of the side dishes today and cook the turkey tomorrow before work. A mother's work is never done.

Natalie

TX