Believe it or not, I've been busy sorting out what I'm HOPING are the last little bit of 'messes' from the storm. The power company was trying to bill us for two weeks of power usage AFTER the storm!! (never mind that ALL of Huntsville was out of power for five of those 14 days!!!) I told them that there were no wires attatched to our house, and they said that without the meter they had no way to know that. I told them I had witnesses, that the neighbors' house was totally gone, so we could just pretend that ours was too, that they had no way to prove we HAD used any power, that if they wanted the meter, they should have gone and gotten it in the six weeks between the time that I told them we were no longer needing their services and when the house got knocked down... etc. It was like talking to a wall. Finally he said he was going to do some checking and get back to me in the morning. After I hung up I realized that the meter was probably under the trailer that hit the side of the house!! So I called the neighbor that was helping the homeowners do the demolition work, and asked, and he said, "Hell, no, the meter was totally smashed, there is no way they could have recovered it." He also mentioned that they were trying to bill him too - for what they call 'service availability'" I TOTALLY could not BELIEVE that one - I was really hoping they would try that line with me, the next day when they called back. I was going to offer to send them a bill for the service availability that I provided for them, tutoring their children at $25 and hour, oh, say 4-6 hours a day, oh, say, 6 days a week!!!
Never did hear back from them, but did receive a check for $8.04 (the remainder of our deposit, after they billed out for the power we DID use, before the storm) (now that I think about it, how did they know how to bill us for THAT power if the meter was gone!?!?!) and an adjusted bill also arrived several days later, indicating what the $8.04 was for (as if I didn't know).
It might seem like a minor problem to have to work through, but when you realize it's the umpteenth problem, and each one takes HOURS of time (I was on hold for nearly half an hour, and then spoke to the 'human brick wall' for another half an hour, plus the fact that I had had to DRIVE down there two weeks after the storm because I couldn't get through on the phone, after repeated times of waiting on hold just to be disconnected...etc etc etc...) but in the end it just starts to wear you out.
I think that is what people are facing now, just being VERY tired of the whole process. Any of the old neighbors that I talk to, especially those who have not started re-building again, are JUST TIRED. I can only imagine that the thought of facing a building project would be enough to completely knock them out. I know I could not face that right now.
We did get school started last week. Such as it was. Emma's guinea pig (one of the two) died on Tuesday morning, so that put a major crimp in the plans for that day. And there were other interruptions too, all through the week. I WAS looking forward to the routine!! But all it really seemed to add to my day was more stuff that needed to get done and didn't. Hopefully, as we get further into the year, it will settle into more of a routine.
I've also been busy with being a sounding board for my brother as he works through some CRAZY stuff going on between him and my folks. In the end he had to just ask them not to come around his place any more. It got that bad. It's really sad, because my dad has Parkinson's and they moved, last year, to a new home, not far from my brother, so that my dad and brother could do stuff together. But that isn't happening. It's so sad. And it saps a lot of my time.
So, I guess I dont' really have anything inspiring to say today, just sort of checking in, and letting you all know that life is going on, and I guess in a strange, twisted sort of way, is 'back to normal'. : P
No comments:
Post a Comment