A little flattery goes a long way.

Need a pick-me-up? Go here.

(Thanks for sharing this link, Kerri!)

Happy Halloween!

It Won't Get Any Better Than This

This is how Sophia, Evelyn, and I spent this afternoon, probably the last nice afternoon of the year.

First, a windy stroll at the beach.


The scenery:


I'd like to pretend this is a sweet picture of the girls holding hands, but I know Sophia was fast asleep and had no idea where her hand had randomly landed.

Next, a visit to Chipotle, my favorite lunch spot.

Even though the staff there loves to admire the Sophie and Evie, the girls were unmoved. Sophie didn't even bother to wake up.

Homeward bound:

Tomorrow promises to be cold and blustery. I fear winter will have us in its grip before long.

Ouch

While I'm sure Evelyn's recent surgery was more painful for her physically than it was for us financially (or emotionally), I'm still a little shocked by just how much of it our insurance company decided was our fair share. If this were an elective surgery, I can see them sticking us with a huge portion of the bill just to make us think twice about it. But expecting an average American family with one income and two kids to come up with $750 for a necessary, if minor, surgery -- that seems just a touch unreasonable to me. Hell, I could have spent that money at Sears.

I've been railing against the insurance company lately, but I need to remind myself of this recent bill, also shocking: The twins' last routine visit to the pediatrician (just a standard check-up with a few vaccine shots) ran a whopping $800. Our share of that: $40. And, to be fair, they did pay 99.76% of the twins' $500,000 NICU stay. So maybe I should shut my pie-hole.

Why on earth does it cost $400 per kid for a routine check-up? What do families without insurance do? Why can't this country get it together and create an affordable national health-care system?

For centuries, people got by with leeches and trips to the seaside to keep their humours in balance. High percentages of them survived. Maybe we should just give that a try. Next time I have a headache, I'm reaching for the laudanum.

(Thanks for all your good thoughts for us regarding Evelyn's surgery! It was quite minor and, despite my consuming fears, it was as quick and easy as a surgery could be. She's recovering quite nicely and should be completely back to normal in time for Halloween.)

Mall-Walking (a.k.a. Shopping)

The girls and I went mall-walking with Kerri and Libby yesterday. Good times, good times. Evelyn is a little bit obsessed with Libby, so we had to keep an eye on her -- I think she'd kidnap Libby given half the chance. (Sophia is far more interested in puppies.)

Shopping -- that's exactly what I need to be doing while our checking account is in disarray, right? Despite that, I picked up this shirt while we were out:
You can't really tell from that picture that it's covered with sparkly bits, so here's a close-up:
I think this is the first time in my life I've ever owned a piece of clothing that sparkles. I'm pretty sure I'll look like a harlot in it. Next thing you know, I'll be wearing lipstick! The horror!

While I'm blathering, I'll take this opportunity to mention that Evelyn is scheduled for some minor surgery tomorrow morning. I'm pretty freaked out about it, even though there's little risk of something going wrong. I just keep thinking about that poor girl who died in the dentist's chair last month. What did that quack do wrong? How can I be sure that won't happen to Evelyn?? I'm trying to be calm. Think good thoughts for us, would you?

More Money for Nothing

I think it's perfectly reasonable of me to be a little bit frustrated with my bank right now. It could be worse -- they could refuse to believe me when I say I didn't spend $732.63 at Sears on Monday. They could tell me to suck it and deal with the charges on my own. They're not doing that. So I should be grateful, right?

Now that the charges have cleared and have been deducted from my checking account, I have to jump through the bank's hoops and do a little song and dance for them, and it will still take them 24 to 48 hours to refund my money and remove the overdraft charges. I can understand that the bank needs to protect itself. If it were easy to get the bank to give you refunds every time you say a charge is fraudulent, people would be going out and buying huge plasma TVs and calling the bank the next day to say they've never stepped foot in an electronics store in their life.

But I've had more than $700 missing from my account since Monday, and it's still going to take another day or two to get it back -- maybe the bank has lots of customers for whom that's no big deal, but I'm not one of them!

I seem to remember seeing ads for a bank that refunds your money immediately if your card number has been violated. I need to find out which bank that was. Anyone know?

Money for Nothing

Oh. My. God. My debit card has been compromised. I logged in to check my online bank statement today and found that someone has been making unauthorized charges at Sears and Marathon. Large unauthorized charges.

Panic sets in.

So I do the first thing you do in such a situation -- I call the bank. Sensible, no? And I tell the friendly and helpful operator about the situation. Three charges. One of them quite large. I made none of them. Please, please, get rid of them!

So Friendly, Helpful Operator tells me, "Hmm. These charges are still pending. They haven't cleared yet. I'm afraid we can't do anything about this until the charges clear." Um, what? When these charges clear, my checking account will go into the red and my overdraft protection and its associated fees will kick in, which will make the problem even bigger. Right? So don't we want to prevent that? Nip this problem in the bud? Am I missing something?

Maybe I'm stupid. I don't understand why I have to spend the next few days with no money, waiting for the charges to clear, before the bank will do anything about it. And on top of that, I have to wait five to seven days for my new debit card, so even if I had money to spend, I can't spend it.

I'm not blaming the bank, mind you. I'm blaming the jerks who got their hands on my debit card number and caused this problem. Possible suspects:

1) My brother David. Sears has lots of tools, and David loves tools. I can see him spending $700 on a new Craftsman set. However, I don't think he was in Ohio fueling up his car yesterday.

2) Airan. Perhaps he stole my card, went to Sears, bought me a fabulous present (that we can't afford), and slipped the card back in my wallet with me none the wiser. Now he refuses to confess because he doesn't want to explain what he was doing at a Marathon in Ohio yesterday.

3) Me. I was sleepwalking and decided I needed to a) buy a new washing machine and b) see the Midwest.

Further investigation is necessary. I'll keep you posted.

Cheese, Glorious Cheese

The choir in which I sing had an open rehearsal tonight -- anyone was welcome to sit in and listen to our preparations for the swiftly approaching concert series next month. After rehearsal, the choir hosted a wine-and-cheese reception for our visitors. Luckily for us choristers, none of our guests stayed until the end of the rehearsal, so the wine and cheese, etc., were all ours.

So I'm stuffing my face with some fantastic cheese because, like usual, I didn't have time to eat dinner before rehearsal. And a fellow singer, also enjoying the fromage, says "Cheese is great for when you need to gain weight quickly."

And I'm thinking to myself, "Funny, I don't have a problem with that. It comes to me naturally."

Finally, I'm getting the fashion help I've needed all these years.

Check out the latest post over at Friday Playdate, in which Susan is kind enough to tackle my fashion woes. (So many fashion woes, so little time -- be sure to check out the rest of Susan's Fashion Friday posts while you're there.)

If this is a 12-step program, I think I'm on step 2

Today, I stopped by the vet's office for the first time since June 24. As I was driving there, I realized that it would in fact be my first time back, so of course I spent the rest of the drive thinking about it. And when I got there, I stood at the counter with Pepper's pee sample in my hands and tears in my eyes, feeling both silly and wretched, dying to get out as fast as possible, preferably before the waterworks started. I guess I'm constantly surprised that the wound is still so raw. I avoid talking about it and thinking about it. I prefer not to use or hear his name. But, every now and then, I'm confronted with something that I can't ignore or shove away -- a picture, his quilt, an unmistakably Puckish hair on the couch or in my cereal -- and I find myself overcome all over again.