The Bank Job--Overdraft Charges Suck Part II

Wow, it's been so long between posts, I forgot to give you an update on my little overdraft situation with El Banco. After giving the manager my biggest puppy dog eyes (which doens't work for me, by the way, since the rest of my face is like a full grown dog) she agreed to knock off about $100 bucks, which was all she could do. I understood, and I didn't give her a hard time about it. She's just another working slob, like me. She doesn't make the rules. Hell, if I had dollar for every customer who complained to me about the unfair practices of the business I worked for, as if I had any power at all to change it, I'd have at least $600 to pay for my overdraft fees.

I did let her know, however, that usury was biblicaly unlawful, to which she just stared blankly at me.

I gave her my entire paycheck, all $287 worth of shelving, stacking, arranging, selling, suggesting, recovering, and discarding some of cinema's finest, and plenty of its most medicore. J came in to recover the rest. He wasn't happy about it (who would be), but he didn't complain. Not once did he complain. He just wanted me in the black again, which couldn't have been done without his help.

Good ol' J. Always coming to my rescue. *sigh*

Burning Man vs. Burning Mouth

Eager Beaver isn't such a bad guy after all. Just when I thought I had escaped the drudgery of a slave wage job by working it as less as I possibly could, disaster striked.

It all began at the beginning of this year when a friend of mine urged me to go to Burning Man with him. He's been trying to get me to go for years. This year I finally got the chance, and at a discount since I'm so pathetically low on funds.

In case you haven't heard of Burning Man, it's a week long love fest at the end of August, out in the searing Nevada desert, just you and thousands of other like-minded extreme camping comrades, living it up under scorching sun. It's like this intense communal experience of artists, hippies, and free-spirits. I've always wanted to go, but something always got in the way, either a lack of cash (tickets can reach up to $300) or a lack of time. I had decided that this would be the year I go to Burning Man, come Hell or high water. The only problem was J, who was strongly against my going. You see, J would never go to such an event. "It's too dangerous." "Who wants to hang out with a bunch of burn out hippies?" "What if you die out there?" Yadda, yadda, yadda. And since J would never go to Burning Man, it was assumed that I wouldn't go either, although I don't know how he got that in his head.

After much fighting, begging, insult tossing, and threats of breaking up, J finally let go of his opposition. He accepted the fact that he had no control over my life, even though he has always been the one to pull me out of a jam. Point taken. I know that I lean on him too much, and I don't feel good about that either. No matter how badly I wanted to go on this trip I wouldn't ask him for a cent to help fund it. I paid for my ticket with my own money, and saved up for expenses after going through a list of needs with my Burning Man buddy. With J's hard won blessing I was finally on my way to the event of the year...until...

Until, I, at last, went to see my dentist about a dental abcess that had been bugging me for the last couple of months. It never hurt, so I took it for a sign that it was nothing serious. But then the thing grew. And though it still didn't hurt, the pus leaking out of it started to worry me. My dentist put me on antibiotics and set up an appointment with an oral surgeon. Not good. Not good at all.

I just came back from Dr. Surgeon today. It turned out that he doesn't know what's really wrong, except maybe that the scar tissue from my last surgery with him three years ago got infected and needed some cleaning out. In the end, this means another apico. Apico surgery is bucks, about $1600 worth of bucks. I make about a quarter of that per month.

I walked out of the office feeling stunned. By the time I reached the end of the block, I was in tears. No Burning Man for me. Sure I could always ask J for the cash, which he would shell out for me, no problem--at least, it wouldn't be a problem for him. It's a major problem for me, however. I can't take anymore charity, especially from J, knowing how he feels about the trip in the first place.

So I plan to pay for the surgery myself. Eager Beaver was really sympathetic to my situation, and agreed to give me more hours at the store. I worked out a payment plan with the Dr. Surgeon's office--$600 down payment, and $100 per month until I'm all paid up. As for J, he knows about my tooth problem, but he doesn't know about the surgery I need. I don't plan on telling him either. I want to handle this myself, which means I have to make a choice: the oassis or the operation. It's not a tough choice if you're being adult about it. But I can't deny the devestation I feel. I'm sure I'll get over it. There's always next year, and by that time I will have deserved it.