What's in your purse?

Have you ever considered what you would lose if you were to lose your purse? Consider all those phone calls you would have to make to cancel credit cards (do you even know what those numbers are?) and to put stops on checks. For that matter, what was the last check you wrote out since your register is also gone? After you've finished plugging the hole in your finances, you must address the issue of a new driver's license. And what do you do about that social security card? We've all heard about stolen identity problems. Then you must address the myriad of other cards like health insurance, movie rental, discount cards, student ID, etc.

This happened to me when I idiotically walked off and left my purse sitting outside Fletcher Hall. When I discovered my momentous blunder an hour later, I rushed outside to discovered that it was gone. The sick feeling in the pit of my stomach was beyond description as I thought of all those things I would have to go through. I had planned to go grocery shopping after class, but how was I going to manage this without a credit card or a checkbook? And how long would it take to replace those things?

Thankfully, my story had a good ending thanks to two very important factors. 1) I had an identification card with my phone number on it, and 2) an honest gentleman by the name of Jameson Miller found my purse and kept it safe for me until I could meet up with him to retrieve it. In a city where crime seems to abound, I was very impressed and very grateful to be on the receiving end of such integrity and honesty.

A Disasterous Day

How does a disasterous day start? Well, for me it started the night before. I allowed myself more computer time after coming home from work than I should have. So I didn't get to bed until 1:00. I had to be at a mandatory nursing conference the next morning. Registration started at 8:30 and lasted until 9:00 with the conference starting promptly at that time. Now I'm the type of person that needs to be there 15 minutes before the registration starts. Mostly because I really hate going somewhere strage by myself. This way I can sit in my car until I spot my friends then go in with them. Additionally, I set my alarm 2 hours before I need to be somewhere as a general rule of thumb.

So Wednesday night I stumbled to bed at 1:00 a.m., set my alarm for 6:30 and was asleep within minutes. I abruptly awoke to a ringing phone which always gives me a bad feeling. Feeling quite disoriented and in a fog, I answered the phone. It was the wife of a SEMMA rep wanting to know if she could send me a fax. As I chatted with her I fully came to my senses, realizing this was the morning of the conference. I glanced at my alarm clock and was horrified to see it was 8:16. I was supposed to be there in 14 minutes to register and was already a minute late by my personal standards. I'm really amazed I managed to carry on a lucid conversation amidst my panic. One thing was certain, I wasn't going to have time to wash my hair which for me is quite distasteful.

I'm quite proud of the fact that I managed to get to the conference by 8:55 even if my hair was flat as a pancake, in fact, flatter. Miraculously, I didn't get a speeding ticket either. But even though I attended to necessities such as brushing my teeth, I just felt like I didn't do them justice and spent the whole day feeling as though I had bad breath and kept checking to make sure that buttons were buttoned, etc. I wish there were such a thing as a bad breath detector because I haven't figured out how to smell my own breath.
To make matters worse, the conference was running just a little behind schedule. We were scheduled to dismiss at 2:30 and I had to clock in by 3:00. So the last session was adding to my distress since I HATE to be late anywhere. I certainly didn't want to get written up for being late to work. I managed to squeek into work at the last second.

So now could I relax? No, I was told that we were having system problems. They were currently ok and not experiencing any symptoms, but watch out! Just great. The last day I had run the system we were down from 3:30 until 9:30. I spent most of those 6 hours on the phone talking to all 19 of the plants we process for giving them multiple updates, answering their questions, reassuring them that we were working on the problem but weren't successful yet, handling psychotic managers, and instructing them on how they could run their machines in the meantime (even though I have no clue whereof I speak). After we came up, it was another 19 phone calls to let them know that we were up and then handling the blitzkrieg of volume for the rest of the night. Is it any wonder that I was cringing at the word that we were experiencing system problems again?

Thank the good Lord, I had no more system problems that night. The only thing I had to worry about was looking like a skin head and making sure nobody got close enough to smell my breath, just in case it was bad. And in retrospect, I thank God for Thelma waking me up at 8:16. But couldn't he have prompted her to send me that fax about an hour or two earlier?

My car

It seems I've been given another stressor to deal with. It isn't like I couldn't tell it was coming or anything, but my car gave up the ghost on my way home from work on Saturday night. I think it's the alternator which isn't the worst thing that could go wrong financially.

Sunday I rented a car for the week which turned out to cost me over $400. So I had to call home and moan to my family over my dilemma. They had great compassion on me and brought Sharon's car down for me to use. She's in the process of shopping for a new one, but knowing her it will take a few more weeks. It would take even longer than that if she wasn't minus a car now. Of course, she had a few instructions for me regarding her car...."If the transmission doesn't shift, just wait, it will"....."The tachometer doesn't work"...."You need to go to Wal Mart and get some new tires"....."Oh yes, I think the oil needs to be changed"....."The odometer doesn't work either"......"If the engine light comes on, just ignore it".....

At least I have a car and I only spent $73 on a rental instead of $400.

Lessons learned.....never, never, never leave your cell phone at home......your true friends will get up in the middle of the night and come pick you up.....not all police officers are friendly and helpful to damsels in distress, they just tell them where they can continue to walk for some real help....AAA is worth every penny you pay....AAA representatives who make you laugh are the best in moments of stress...it's really hard to study when you're worrying about transportation issues.