Moolah Monday - Weekend Catch-up and a Stolen Identity

Welcome new friends!  I love guest blogging from time-to-time so I can say hello to new friends. 

I’m going to rant a bit today.  Is that ok?  Do you all want to hear my tales of the weekend? 

Yes? 

(That’s what I heard you say…)

Alrighty – so this weekend I worked hard.  I was rudely apologetically awakened from a blissful sleep by my hubby letting mie know our schedule for the day was now changed and now, in addition to what I had planned for the morning routine I had to add driving 40 minutes round-trip to get my son’s baseball gear from hubby’s car because somehow it ended up there instead of with mie in my car, so I better get up now.  He was right – I now had 2 ½ hours to:

• Wake-up & get myself ready
• Get the 3 littles up and ready (remember they are 1, 2, and 3); Logan was with his auntie for cousin time.
• Get the littles & 2 dogs in the mini-van
• Drive to drop the dogs off at the new groomer – which means I also had to bring their shot records and fill out all the paperwork

Pause – have you ever tried to bring a 1, 2, & 3 year old into the groomer with 2 60lb dogs?  About that – pet stores don’t seem to have multi-kid carts and even if they did pushing a full one AND holding the leash for 120 pounds worth of excitable dog is a bit much.  But I survived.

• Drive for 20-25 minutes to get baseball gear out of hubby’s car.
• Drive for 20-25 minutes back to the hometown baseball park for Logan’s game.  Auntie was taking care of making sure he’d get there on time – but I had his glove, helmet, and bat, and he’s a lefty, so it didn’t really help much to have him there without that stuff.

Did you see breakfast in there?  No?  Yeah that’s because I forgot breakfast.  Kids don’t really let you forget breakfast.  So I stopped at Chick-Fil-A on the way back from hubby’s car.

When I got to the window to pay I had about 13 minutes before Logan’s game started.  It was nearly 10 am and my 3 littles hadn’t had breakfast yet.  You could imagine the chaos, though at least the dogs were out of the car by now.  Anyway – the nice lady swiped the card several times and then told mie “I’m sorry, you’re card isn’t working – it’s not that you don’t have any money in there it just isn’t reading the strip”.  Both my husband and sister are calling at the same time.  More chaos.  I said I don’t have any more money and asked my hubby, who’s now on the phone, if he can stop and pay for mie, since he would be passing by.  I already had half the food in my car and I told them I don’t have anything else to pay with.  Plus it was odd that the magnetic strip wasn’t working – the card is brand new – I just got it 2-3 weeks ago, the 4^th card since February.  Seeing my frustration another person comes up to type in the numbers and eventually he tells mie that didn’t work either.  Finally I say “what exactly is it saying?”.  He says – declined.  So, I ask him if my husband can stop and pay.  I ask my husband to stop and pay.  I leave with the food.  I now have like 6 minutes to get to my son’s game which is still several miles away.  And all the kids are screaming.  I’m not giving that food back.  Especially since I know my account still has a lot of money in it because I haven’t spent my bonus or tax refund yet.

I drive like the wind to the game and make it at 9:59 – literally just in time for my nephew to run my son’s stuff to him as he took the field. 

Guess who calls mie during the game?  The bank – twice.  I finally got to speak with them after the game.  They run through some transactions – “declined at chick-fil-a in (nearby city) at about 10am”.  Approved at rite aid drug store in santa clarita, CA at about 10am. 

Hold up.  First, we don’t have rite-aid near us.  Second, I no longer live in CA, never lived in Santa Clarita but no where it is, and it is at least 1500 miles away from where I am now.  Third, no matter your mode of transportation there is no way to simultaneously swipe your card at Chick-Fil-A in nearby city and Rite-Aid in Santa Clarita.  And there lies the problem with the card.

You heard mie say I just got this card 2-3 weeks ago?  And that it’s the 4^th one since February?  Yep.  That’s right.  Lucky mie!  #1 was the original, #2 was the replacement after #1 was compromised somehow so says the bank, #3 was the temporary card I received after misplacing #2 only days after it arrived, and #4 was the ‘permanent’ replacement for #2 which as it turns out wasn’t so permanent.  Thankfully I still have #3 (and #2 for that matter – because it hasn’t been long enough for mie to properly dispose of it!) so I have debit (but not credit) access to my account.  I asked the fraud lady what the heck is going on since this will now be card #5 in 3 months.  We’re not irresponsible with our cards and the problems have appeared to have been on the bank’s end with breached security, nevertheless the lady tells mie “maybe it could be one of the places you are frequenting”.  Um no.  So then she says that earlier in the week they had a security breach and that could be the cause.  I actually had read that in an online news article and though “there’s NO WAY I’d be so lucky to go through this again”.  Turns out I’m wrong and I am, actually, that fortunate.

They only got $8 and that will be refunded.  It could have been much, much worse if it weren’t for the fact that I was simultaneously using my card in two places 1500 miles apart (except actually I was only using my card in one place). 

The most annoying part about it all is that I won’t have access to my funds, which leaves mie at drive through windows without cash (because I never have any) and without a way to pay for my food and more importantly having to deal with changing all my auto-pay accounts to the new number.  This is seriously irritating.  I have to go through all of them and re-sign up for the 3^rd or 4^th time with the new card in as many months, except I can’t actually do that yet because I don’t have the new number.  So then I have to make a one-time payment to the various places with pay-pal, my hubby’s card, or *gasp* a check.  Inevitably I will miss something and I will get a late notice or an “oops” notice.  I can tell you Netflix is pretty creative with their “oops” notice.  I know – I’ve been lucky enough to see it for each of the last 3 payments. 

I’m beginning to think that the people I am paying are going to think that I am the one using a stolen card and that’s why I’m changing the numbers so frequently.  I don’t know if they’re that savvy but it wouldn’t surprise mie to see a fraud investigator show up to my house wondering what the hayride is going on with my cards.  Thankfully I should get a new “permanent” card in about 5 days.  I will be putting the temporary card (#3) in safekeeping, just-in-case.

So this all happens by 10am.  Before the day was done I also:

• Walked with the kids to a baby shower (without a gift, of course)
• Watched 2 kids (1 and 2 years old)
• Went to the bank to get some cash
• Went to McD’s for chicken nuggets to feed the 1, 1, 2, 2, and 3 year olds I was toting.
• Took all 5 littles to Home Depot for front-yard landscaping materials.  Yes I did!  And I got plenty of stares.
• Gave the littles a nap
• Re-landscaped my front yard planting areas.  This included pruning all the overgrown bushes, clearing out the bedding which was overgrown with grass, and planting about 30 new plants
• Let the kids play in the front yard (twice)
• Dressed the kids in bathing suits and let them play in the water (as I watered the new plants) – they also had the option to play in the dirt, which the littlest ones did happily.
• Picked-up the dogs from the groomer
• Did 2 or 3 loads of laundry
• Vacuumed my bedroom
• And a few other things…

I was physically exhausted. 

So how was your weekend?