Clueless

In the continuing saga…

This afternoon, the wife and I (and the kids) went to the police station that the bank told the wife to go to in order to file a complaint against the people who wiped out our bank account. We were sent to the wrong place, so we had to get back in the car and drive a few miles away to the correct police station. Once there, the officer at the front desk started to ask questions and I left the wife to deal with all that while I was taking care of the kids.

The front-desk officer called someone who supposedly was going to help us out. First, he asked for the police report indicating that someone stole the purse in the car. Since she didn’t have that document, she had to call the police station so they could fax the report to the station where we were. When that came in, the officer asked to see the bank documents and the wife showed him the copies of the checks the crooks cashed. All of a sudden, we became strangers because he could not understand what we were telling him. He asked for more documents and the wife had to call the bank twice so they could fax new documents. When the documents were finally received, the officer still could not understand what the problem was because the checks used were written to the wife. But the thing is that the person whose name is on the check, we don’t know that person. So to the officer, he did not quite see what was wrong. Maybe the fact that the thieves were able to get over $2,300 from our account that did not have that much money to begin with and that the available money then is gone today. Which means that until the bank decides that we didn’t have anything to do with this mess and cancels the withdrawls and credits the account with the money we had in the first place, we 1) are facing some serious money problems and 2) will see our credit score take a serious hit.

So, the officer did not understand where the problem was, decided that we did not have anything to worry since the money is protected and was not going to file a complaint. By this time, I had to feed the baby and then change his diaper so I did not hear the end of the conversation. In the end, we wasted over 3 hours and everything else because a police officer could not understand a situation that is clear enough. I don’t know how this is going to affect the bank’s investigation but hopefully it will not. What worries me is that the end of the month is right around the corner and that means bills to be paid. We still don’t know which bank to choose and the house payments are going to be due soon. I have an account I might be able to use, depending on how the wife gets paid. I will have to ask payroll to get a live check again for this pay period. And what really upsets me is that the day before the thieves hit the account, I had deposited my paycheck in the new account in preparation to pay the bills. Once again, I did not listen to myself because I didn’t want to put the money in the account but I did it because the wife was nagging about it. At least with that money in my account, it would have been relatively safe.

Leaving the police station, the wife wanted to go to eat since nobody had lunch. I just wanted to go home, drop everybody and go out by myself but then all hell broke loose. She is accusing me of blaming her for what happen, which is true. Time and time again I told her not to leave her purse in the car. Another parent had her purse stolen in the same way in the same location and that did not serve any purpose because months after that happened, it was her turn. When we had the truck she would complain because there was no trunk. Now that she has a new car and a trunk, that was too much for her to put her purse in the trunk. So yes, I do blame her for all this. All the time spent and lost running here and there to do things that will not change much because nobody really seems to be really interested in doing anything. The fact that we don’t know what these people are capable of and all that because of simple laziness.

Tomorrow is Sunday, so we still have to wait probably until Monday to see what the bank says, if they have anything at all to say. In the meantime, I promised to have a good night’s sleep with many pleasant dreams. And I think I am on my way to do just that…

Till then…

Yay “Another Dumpsite”

2 silly milestones.

1. Last post was #100 (and this one will be #101) although there is a post I started a while ago and it’s saved until I decide to finish it or trash it.
2. I’ve had 1,700 hits since I first started this blog. Very insignificant numbers considering the number of blogs here at WordPress or at my previous place. It’s OK. I am pretty happy here.

Till then…

Yay! Weekend! Party time! Oops!…

So it is Friday and that means the weekend with hopes to relax and probably go out. No thanks to some people, this is an already a rotten weekend and nothing will really change that.

It all started this morning while I was at work. I hear the distinctive ring tone on my phone with my daughter’s voice. It was the wife and she asked me when was the last time I checked out our checking account. As she said that, I felt a blow to my stomach and I told her it had been a few days. She told me the thieves that stole her purse 2 weeks ago wiped our checking account. Over $2,300. My first thought was how did they get that money because I know for a fact we didn’t have that amount in the account!

So, it seems we are dealing with some serious people here. They hit the credit cards but did not get much. As I had said in my previous post, it seemed stupid to go and get $150 from a gas station instead of hitting Best Buy or Circuit City, get that 50″ plasma TV or whatever. But we certainly never expected to be facing this situation. The way these people were able to get that cash was by using stolen checks from another victim, making it look like the checks were made out to my wife and went to cash them using her driver’s license and her Permanent Resident Card.

What I don’t understand is how the teller at the bank never took a look at the person handing hin/her the checks and ID. Yes, the signature looks very much like the wife’s but she is 5′9″ and she’s West Indian; not exactly the kind of woman you see every day. Then at one point, the bank said they would not refund the money because the signature looked a lot like the wife’s but they did come back on that. It would have been easy to prove that she was nowhere near the bank that day. The latest word is that nothing will be done in our favor until they finish their investigation. Yes, folks, with a police report stating the theft of a purse with a wallet full of cards and a checkbook among other things but the wife is under suspicion of trying to defraud the bank. Because going through all this aggravation with a 4-month old child is really what we are looking for for kicks. Yes, we’re absolutely looking forward keeping a 5-year old child home because well, we’re broke. And from what has already happened, it is not even guaranteed that we will see any of that money back. The other beauty of this whole story is that because our account has been breached twice, the bank has advised us to close the account and take our business elsewhere! We’ve been with this bank for over 7 years and I have nothing but praises for this institution but now I have to leave them? To go where? With all the banks closings, which one to choose?

And all this could have been so easily avoided. And it was not the first time I had warned her about leaving her purse in the car. And why walk around with a checkbook, especially since she had a handful of credit cards in her wallet. But it is done and now we have to deal with the consequences. And they are horrifying.

Once upon a time, something like this would have happened and we might have faced the same things we are facing now, but crooks are more and more savvy. Nowadays for $30 anybody can find anything about anybody. There are dozens of Internet sites ready to see all kinds of personal and sensitve information to those who want to pay for it. That means that with whatever little information these people have, they can reach far. It would be easy to get a Social Security number, or whatever information on me, although the wife did not have any of my documents with her. And with that information, it would be an absolute catastrophe since they would be able to open whatever account they want and pratically do any transaction they want, leaving us with all the mess to handle. These people have the name of our children, our home address, our cars and insurance information and I could go on and on. I have absolutely NO idea what their next move will be. We could wake up one morning and see the cars gone. We could come home one day from work and find the house empty. Everything is to be expected and I have to prepare myself to hear and discover the worst.

Happy weekend, everybody.

Till then…

The end of the dream

About 9 years ago, I was living in the Caribbean and I would watch the news and read the articles and be amazed by the way things were going here in the USA. The economy was strong, jobs were abundant and well paid. For my wife, earning the meager salary she was getting from her work with the government and my troubles getting a work permit, it came soon to the point where we’d be asking ourselves what were we still doing over there. Why not leave everything and move here? Being a citizen meant there was no problems to get here and start working. For the wife, I’d have to petition but it was deemed as a pretty easy task since we really qualified to get the procedure going. We got the ball rolling and started to prepare everything to move. After long debates on where we were going to settle down, we came to a mutual agreement that Miami was going to be our new city.

We arrived on a cloudy afternoon on March 31, 2000. It was horribly depressing to see how run down that part of Miami Beach was. I had expected to see lavish hotels and glamorous people at every corner. But I figured, “what the heck, I just landed here”.

The first days, we played tourists. The wife was there only on vacation, and since we did not really have a honeymoon, this was supposed to compensate. It was and felt totally crazy to have just picked up everything and moved. Starting a new life and promises of a better tomorrow for all.

We had to leave the hotel we were staying in because it was too taxing on our budget so we found something more affordable. We spent hours in cyber-cafes polishing our resumes and posting them to all the employment sites and applying to everything that was available out there. Unfortunately, we did not realize that the wind was turning and did not know that the dot-com bubble was about to burst. The wife had to go back home and we stayed very focused and upbeat that I would find a job soon.

A couple of months went by and the news were not good. The world discovered how all the money invested in those Internet companies was used for people to but the best, the craziest and most expensive junk out there. Pictures of whole computer server rooms auctioned for a fraction of their value. A big feeling of waste was what I felt. I ended up accepting a job that had nothing to do with my trade but I needed the money and it was supposed to be a 2-3 month stint. I figured I could do that and find something else quickly and move on. I ended staying there for 3 years but in the meantime, some events had already started and would definitely change the world as we knew it.

First came the 2000 election. Enough has been written and said about it, but let’s face it. If the winner of the election had been able to assume his job, I doubt we’d be in this situation today. The wife was able to get her papers and join me. Then came 9/11. And that was a devastating blow. The war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the sub-prime mortgages, the lost of our freedom and privacy and more and more and more.

I have to say that I consider myself somewhat lucky. We bought a house when it was still relatively affordable and was able to do it without getting sucked into a mortgage scheme. We did both end up getting jobs in our field and we have reached a point where we can live comfortably enough where we don’t have to worry too much on how to get the money to pay the next bill. Slowly but surely, we had made it. We had reached the American Dream. A house in the suburbs, 2 kids, 2 cars. And just when we think things should be smooth until our daughter goes to college, everything goes out the window…

Our house has lost all the value it had gained since we bought it. Our retirement plans are taking a beating. It’s a little funny because I was planning to see an AIG adviser since they offer their products to the employees of our institution. For once, procrastination did pay. But for thousands of people who have been losing their jobs, their savings and their sanity, what is there to say? Billions of dollars have been spent in 2 very unpopular wars. More money has been spent in who knows what for who knows what reason. I have never missed a mortgage payment in 5 years. I didn’t go looking for a half-million dollar house with a salary of $2,500. I made sure we could afford this house before signing any papers and now I am being told that I will have to foot the bill for all these senseless people who created this mess?

When I moved here, I did it not only for us, but for the children we were going to have. I wanted to make sure I could give them the opportunity to have something when the time was going to come so they could do something with their lives. Education and manners, they will get but what about the scars of all these events happening right now? As I get closer to retirement, will I ever see a red cent of any of the deductions from my paycheck?

And yet with all the turmoil in this country, it still remains the best place to live. As much as I love Europe, things are not much better over there. And the new economies? China? India? Let’s be realistic.

So, it does seem like the end of the dream. No matter who wins the election in November, it will not be an easy task. He (or she) might win or might lose this war and in the end, it’s our dreams and hopes for a better tomorrow that are at stake.

Till then…

Cross-posting

I am also posting this here:

I have the best cyber-friends. Evah.

Till then…

O RLY?

I just finished posting my previous post and instead of going to the main menu or somewhere else, a new editor window popped up. I do feel somewhat chatty tonight but I think if I keep on writing, it will just some rambling.

I think I better go chat with my niece. She seems to be even more depressed than I am…

Till then…

No title because I can’t find one

I was going through my Facebook friends pages and one friend has pictures of a soldier. Various candid pictures with kids, pictures of training and a picture of him in uniform. One of my friend’s friends was inquiring about the soldier and my friend just said “He passed away 3.16.06″.

Now, I know this has happened thousands of times where young men and women went away never to come back to their spouses, children, sibilings and friends but this is the closest it has touched me. I don’t have any friends or relatives who were called to fight in Iraq or Afghanistan but I sure know the pain of losing a close one and that’s why I think it is affecting me. My friend and I never talked about this but it is also true that as time has passed by, the only real contact that we have is through Facebook.

Yeah, I think I am depressed enough. I’m getting out of here.

Till then…

Is it ever going to get better?

A couple of things from this week.

Yesterday, I finally met with guys from where I used to work at and we had a great time. While we were reminiscing about good times and old friends, I learned that a techie from a remote site lost his house. We all hear stories about people in financial trouble and it’s always someone else but it does hit hard when it’s someone you know. I have to admit I was quite surprised because although we don’t make mega bucks, I want to think we make enough to live relatively comfortably. I don’t know what happened but I guess you don’t really know what’s going on with some people in the end.

Thursday morning around 8:45am, my phone rings. I look at the caller ID and I see it’s my son’s day care center. I am expecting to hear the worse and I feel weak when I hear my wife’s voice. Nothing was wrong with the baby, but while she was dropping him someone broke the car window and stole her purse. Of course she had all the credit/debit cards, papers and more so we’re facing major inconvenience to cancel everything and get replacement cards and accounts.

About half an hour later, our credit card fraud department is calling and they are informing us that there has been some suspicious activity going on. I explain what happened and they ask me if we used the card to pay for gas. I say no, not knowing if this is true or not, but protecting us in any case. So, instead of going to Best Buy or Circuit City to get a 52″ flat screen TV or a Wii, these thieves stop at a gas station to get gas! I mean I know times are hard but thieves don’t even have money to put gas in their getaway cars anymore? And if they were looking for cash, they must have been extremely disappointed because my wife had $2 in cash in her wallet. But still, it’s the fact that their first stop was to a gas station that surprises me the most.

As I asked before, is it ever going to get better? It is scary for sure, especially having two young children. Hopefully by the time they grow older, things would have drastically improved…

Till then…

Bye Fay!

It is still a little early to bid Fay adieu, but she came and went and nothing happened to us. I am very grateful for that and also for the rain since our state desperately needed to get some rain.

Let’s see what the next one will bring us…

Till then…

‘Tis the time again

No, it is not Christmas yet but hurricane season. Ok, it started a couple of months ago but we did not see anything major disrupting our lives until now. Fay is about 155 miles from the Florida Keys and should be in my back yard sometime tomorrow. Actually, it seems we will be spared except for some heavy rain and winds.

I was called in at work early today and everything is ready for the folks in the center who will be following the events. I have been “lucky” to be assigned to team B, just because of my baby boy, so I get to stay home during the storm but will be doing the cleaning and repairing afterwards. Hopefully, nothing bad will happen and hoping that Lake Okeechobee will be able to fill up a little finally.

My daughter was supposed to start school today. First day of Kindergarten. It will not haapen today but hopefully tomorrow. I am eager to see how it will go for her.

Anyway, we’ll see what happens. In the meantime, I am going to get some breakfast. I was really hoping to find coffee and bagels here but there is absolutely nothing…

Till then…