- First I'd like to encourage you to read Tom S's Blog - the last two posts are political in nature and have some really great content (and are non-partisan written).
- Friday night we headed to my parents again for the evening. With the power outage Nicole has seen her grandparents nearly every night this week – Tuesday for lunch, Wednesday for dinner, Thursday at the softball game, Friday for dinner, Saturday for computer access and then Sunday for babysitting. That’s a lot of grandma.
- Saturday morning I lobbed off about 5 inches of my hair. I did take a before picture but I was too busy with my final ice skating lesson, a 2 year-old birthday party, and then a housewarming party that the “after” picture was never gotten to. Of course it’ll never look as good as it did on Saturday again…. I’ll work on a pic tonight. When I told Jim I was going to cut a lot off his reply was "Why would you want to do something like that?". So male. I had to laugh at Dave P's response when he noticed - his opinion was written all over his face which got him chided by Carole. I don't mind though. :) As you can expect, I got a lot of positive feedback from the women I saw (comes with the territory).
- We got power on as of about 8:00pm when we came home from bowling last night. In general, the outage was about a 10% inconvenience to our life but for the most part no big deal. Not that we weren’t thrilled to have it on and immediately do 2 loads of laundry and run the dishwasher…. Going grocery shopping will be FUN tonight as we basically completely wiped out our refrigerator and freezer of all but some unopened Parmesan cheese and baking soda. We’re checking with the insurance to see if we have any food spoilage coverage.
- I have all but 4 midterm exams graded and the others will be a snap tonight.
- Over the last 2 weeks Nicole has increasingly started putting 2-word sentences together. “Hi Dada”, “Hi Doggy”, and “Bye Mama” are pretty frequent. I'm pleased though as she gets that they go together, correctly uses them, and only knows how to say about 8 total words, so putting 2 together seems pretty good to me (then again, what parent doesn’t say their kid is “so smart”). The sitters claims she said “mama here” on Friday right before I walked in the door (she saw me out of the glass storm door) but I’ve never heard her say “here” before so that seems like a bit of a stretch….
2023 Year in Review: Tough breaks, but it’s all right
11 months ago
15 comments:
Glad to hear you got your power back on!! Now Nic will have clothes to wear again.
You forgot to mention that you have an amazing new member of your bowling team. LOL
According to a previous post, you lost about $60 in food; now you want someone else (insurance) to cover your costs? Why is it so many people expect other people to pay for NATURAL disasters?
I don't get it. It's $60, and, you've said it before, you're not hurting financially. You've even said you're well off and don't even feel the economic burden that so many others are struggling through. And you're annoyed at the number of truly poor people getting assistance.
But on a positive note, I am glad you have your power back! A week without - I'm interested to hear how that affects your energy costs for the month.
1) we called, insurance won't cover it
2) with 8 days of no power we had to completely purge the fridge - our damage is now closer to $100.
3) this is why i PAY for insurance - to cover hardships (regardless of size) when they happen. Floods are natural disasters but you have flood insurance to cover it.
Also, to clarify, i have NO problem with poor people getting assistance. I donate a four digit amount of money and items to charity yearly myself, not to mention what my taxes go toward.
I DO have a problem with people (poor or not) who EXPECT assistance without making ANY EFFORT to give back (aka find a job, get an education, etc.). I have a BIGGER problem with people who put effort into cheating the system instead of doing the right thing (like the chick at my mom's bank who deliberately got pregnant to get more welfare).
Glad your power is back on...
Even if your insurance did cover it - how worth it would it be to put in a claim for $100?
I think I can vouch for all of us when I say that those who try to cheat the system should not get help, nor should those who don't make an effort. Unfortunately, most people who have the means to help automatically put those who are less fortunate into such categories without thinking twice.
a lot of people we know are getting food spoilage covered on their policies. We would too but have a deductible to pay ($500). If we had, say a roof to replace, that the $500 was going toward already we would have just added this to it.
The insurance claim on just a small amount may have been (like it is for my co-worker) like a rider policy. For example, Jim and I use this when we need the car towed - we upfront pay $60 for the towing, submit the claim and get reimbursed $60 since it's a covered element on our car insurance. No big deal.
I HATE the welfare system with the loopholes like that, as well. However, it is great for the people who need it and don't take advantage of it like that. Unfortunately I'm sure we've all read the reports that someone one welfare fairs better than an honest person working "minimum" wage, full time job. How crappy is it that you can sit at home and "earn" a better quality of life than someone trying to make it on their own? And those people with that full time job? They earn to much to qualify for significant supplemental assistance. But in order to get rid of those taking advantage for it, it usually punishes those legitimately needing the assistance.
You're gonna get me started on insurance - insurance is crap. I just found out that for my accident last March, if I had CAUSED it, I would actually be paying less than being the innocent victim of it.
Insurance needs to change. I have issues with it being for profit. I know they're companies - and usually public companies, but when you're dealing with lives (health insurance, literally, all of them to some extent, though), it is unethical to let bottom line affect payouts. Also, I am not for govt control of insurance, or more govt control of, well, anything. But people/companies should not profit on the suffering of others! How do those people sleep at night?
That being said, I can't speak with my wallet and afford NOT having insurance. I.e. take my ankle surgery. Had I not had insurance, it would have cost easily $15,000. But with insurance, it's costing both my insurance and me combined about $8,000 (when reading some of the statements I'm shocked how much cheaper it is just for having insurance, then the insurance pays the much much lower amount. The surgery itself went from $9500 to $3000).
Homeowners policies also have a deductible. I highly highly doubt yours - or anyone's - would be less than $100. So why make a claim? Mine is $500. Shitty when I have to make a $1500 claim (so they'll pay approx $1000) so my "claim free" discount will disappear.
We need to work on Nicole saying Jen!!!
I think Aunt Lindsay is a good one to work on next! Since Jen is short and easy you can work on that before Aunt Lindsay :-)
Linds - I've learned sometimes it's best for simpler things for kids to say. With my first nephews, I started with "say Aunt Martha". That quickly got changed to just "Marti" - they can say it easier, and were more likely to TRY to say it, rather than "Aunt Martha". I become "Aunt Marti" once they're older.
Plus, with my brother's son, they have been using sign language, so my sister in law created a sign for "Aunt Marti". And within one week he had it down. That was just as good as the others saying "Marti", esp b/c he did it at a younger age than the ones speaking it...
:) Good luck!
Oh, and Linds, more advice:
Instead of trying for Lindsey, you could go for: Lindsey The Best Aunt, or The Best Aunt, for short. Sure, it'll take much longer for kids to say it, however, once they do, that'll forever be your name. And you have a headstart already before Greg gets married. :)
Wow,
Martha, you seem pretty upset with insurance companies. I have to tell you that I agree with Karen on this issue. I have had homeowners insurance for 29 years now on 4 different houses and 2 apartments. I have never really ever had to use it. I believe back in 1980, I filed a claim with wind conditions for damaged shingles back then. I had at that time a $250.00 deductable, and a $550.00 bill of which I was appreciative for the $300.00 I did not have to pay. Since I have really had no other experiances over the years, I elected to raise my deductable amount to $1000.00, just because like you say, most claims would not match the deductable, and I am rather handy and fix a lot of stuff myself anyway. Raising the deductable made my house payment come down a bit, which I needed at the time. Now all of sudden, I get 84 mph winds blowing over my home, and for the first time in recored history, Cincinnati has a Catagory 1 Hurricane, and I lost over 50 shingles off of my roof, and we lost our beautiful 30 foot pear tree. We too, lost power and everything in the fridge and freezer. My 27 year old daughter had her car parked in the driveway and it was hit by wind blown debris from down the street. I now have $11,700.00 in damage to my roof, and I don't know what it will cost to fix the car, but I know I will not have to pay for it up front. Good thing I had insurance that I "paid" for. Acording to my policy, I will get remimbursed for the food damgages, ($150.00) and I will get reimbursed $500.00 to remove the tree out of my yard, (which I will do myself because they said I could do that if I wish) and now I only have to pay $350.00 out of pocket to get my roof replaced and my daughters car repaired. Like Karen said, I "paid" for the insurance, and I "expect" them to take care of me. After all, it was still a great deal for me....I figure I have paid the insurance company well over $10.000.00 in the last 29years, and now I get pay back. Amen sister....
Karen,
I think your hair was beautiful just the way it was, however I "do not" have to take care of it every day like yourself, and I believe that you mentioned that with no power at your home, it was becoming a hassle to maintain. I respect that. If I looked like I swallowed a fly or something, I will admit that it suprised me, but do understand, you are a beautiful person whether your hair is long of short. As a matter of fact, when you get the opportunity, I am sure you will be able to do something very special with the new style and look more "sexy amd mature" than you did when you had 5 more inches of hair. I see a "new woman" on the horizon, and when Jim sees you all made up, I know he will really appreciate it. By the way, I fell for Carole when she had really short hair. You ought to see some of those pictures.......
Martha-
Those are some good suggestions! My nephew (5.5 yrs.) has always called me Sissy so I'm sure it will stay that way on my side of the family. As for Mike's side though I could really get used to The Best Aunt or even the Bestest would work :-)
David - yes, I am bitter at insurance companies. I think that because I pay premiums (or in certain cases, the other people do) full recovery should be payed. Where does that get me?
I got rear ended in March. Somehow I have to spend $570 for my car repairs. Nevermind had I been the one who caused said accident that totalled one car and put $8500 in damages to the other (my) car, I would have only paid $500. The other driver has insurance. Why is it not covered in full for the damages he caused?
Then there is health insurance. I broke my ankle in April. Surgery and rehab is costing me almost $3000. Insurance is paying approx $5000. If I did not have insurance, rather than the $8000 bill I did incur, the bill would have been $15,000! I think that is beyond shitty for those who don't have insurance coverage period.
Then, this August, I had some items stolen from me on vacation (yea. Crappy year for me). If I want insurance to cover it (and after the rest of my year, I kinda have to), I have to pay my $500 deductible, of course, and then they will have about $1000 to pay. And, I've had multiple insurances (auto, life, renters then home owners) with this company for 13 years. And I have already been told my premium will raise - FOR MY FIRST CLAIM EVER ON EITHER INSURANCE POLICY. All for approx $1500 that was stolen from me? Yea, I'm upset at all 3 of situations with the way insurance is panning out b/c, like you, I pay for insurance in case something happens. And I have yet for it to actually be: ok, here's your claim, here's your money, done. Instead, it's: here's your claim, here's your money, now give us more money. I have also learned from my many conversations with various insurances that those little claims - $5000 here, $2000 there, are the ones that hurt your coverage more than the large "my house and all belongings burnt down" claims. According to them, one large claim is less likely to get someone dropped in coverage than multiple smaller claims. Which is also why I advise against small claims when possible.
Martha, I am so sorry you are haveing so much trouble. I do not know who you have insurance with, but I can see that you are not being taking care of properly. I have been with Nationwide insurance since 1977. And indeed you are right about the small claims situation. That is why I raised my deductable to $1000.00 on my home, and when it comes to my cars, I have used the comprenhensive portion a few times over the years. I have had a few cracked windshields from thrown rocks from trucks on the expressway and they just came to work and put in the new windshield. Everything else, I took care of. Small dents ect.. I do not know why you had to pay anything if this accident was not your fault. I believe you may need a lawyer for this situation. I have a "great" lawyer who could help you with this situation if you wanted to pursue it. I believe it would cost you nothing. It would not hurt you to at least ask about it. That would cost you nothing too...
God Bless..!
David
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