Patience: A Lesson In Joy: money

Showing posts with label money. Show all posts

The Hole.

As many of you know, about 5 months ago, Tom was involved in a bike accident. He was biking north down Front street near the Cape Fear bridge (for those of you who know where that is). When biking over a storm grate, the grate fell through the road, about three feet into the ground, taking his bike with it (note that his bike did not get caught in the grate, the grate simply collapsed into the hole it was covering). He was thrown, face first, from the bike and landed on the road.

911 was called and offered to take him to Cape Fear Memorial Hospital. The EMTs also called the city to inform them of the accident. Tom asked to be taken to New Hanover Regional Medical Center, the one across the street from our house, which, for whatever reason, the EMTs could not do, so a kind stranger drove Tom to the hospital.

At the ER, he needed a CT to determine if he had broken any bones in his head, a dental x-ray to determine the damage to his teeth, and his lip sewn shut.

The following day, we went to our dentist who found that one front tooth was broken through the root and had to be removed. Additionally, the other front tooth was chipped and had to be repaired at a separate visit.

Tom will now need to have oral surgery to have an implant put in so the dentist can create a new front tooth. Even after my dental insurance pays out, we will still have out of pocket expenses of at least $7,000, for the dental work alone (given that Tom is only 29, we’d like a permanent fix) This does not include the expenses from the ER that we will have to pay for (another $3000+).

We contacted the city directly and Tom spoke with the city’s HR department and had his statement recorded. We then received a letter in the mail from the insurance company stating that this accident was not the fault of the City of Wilmington, despite the fact that the sewer grate was clearly laid incorrectly.

When Tom called to question this ruling, he was told that the city was not liable because they had not known the grate was laid incorrectly and therefore it is classified as an “accident.” This seems like an illogical defense to me. If a traffic light was hung incorrectly and fell from the sky into someone’s car, killing them, could the city simply say “Oh, well we didn’t know it was a problem, so it’s not our fault” and get away with it?

We followed up with a lawyer who actually confirmed, that yes, this IS a valid defense. In fact, the lawyer even sent us a previous case very similar to ours where again, the city was not held liable. So all those expenses and bills are just one great big “sucks to be you.”

It’s been a rough year.

So hey, if you are in the Wilmington area, and happen to know of any prior accidents involving road grates and/or accidents specific to the Front St/Cape Fear Memorial Bridge area, I’d love to hear about it!

The Famobile

After much trouble with our Lincoln, which has served us well in the last two years, but was definitely starting to show its age, we went car shopping. We found this 2004 Mercury Monterey. While I am sad it isn’t blue, like my last three cars, I was pleased to find a car on which we don’t have to make a single payment – we bought it outright!

And I couldn’t have been more proud as I sat down to do paper work and the salesman immediately set out credit applications. I looked at him, said “I don’t think we need these. We’ll be paying cash.” He looked at me, confused, and replied “For the whole thing?” When I confirmed, he stopped and paused. He didn’t know what to do next because I had thrown him off his grove.

Now don’t get me wrong – this isn’t a fancy car. It’s got a few cosmetic defects and we found out the following week at the key shop that the antenna doesn’t receive the signal needed to have door lock remotes (we haven’t seen how much/if it can be repaired) – both reasons we got a reasonable deal on the vehicle.

But I don’t mind. As Erin and I used to say “It’s defective, and that’s okay, because so am I.”

Kind of Useful…

So, if you are reading this at my actual blog site (www.hillidaa.blogspot.com) you may have noticed a little ad space down beneath the flickr pics. I thought I should explain myself. There is a site called www.swagbucks.com which rewards you in "Swag Bucks" for using their website as a search engine, instead of say, Google.com. What is nice is that you can redeem these internet dollars for real, tangible objects. Many of these prizes are useless (at least in my humble opinion – I no longer have an interest in stickers and movie posters) but they also offer gift cards to places like Amazon.com and will put money into your PayPal account. It can take up to a month to earn enough internet dollars for these things, but I figure it's money I didn't have before. (Family & friends – you may be receiving gifts from Amazon.com this year.)

The only catch that I've found so far is that when you do a search, the "Sponsored Results" that show up at the top in Yahoo and Google searches are scattered in with the real results on Swagbucks. This is okay when you are searching for something like "Best Buy" but annoying when you are looking for "leak in power steering line." There's a bunch of other stuff you can do for more internet monies, but the search is the easiest.

Anyways, all this to say that if you check it out and are considering signing up, use the link on the blog. I get extra internet monies for that and then I can buy you nicer things. If you aren't interested, well, um… I guess just don't click on the link. That seems pretty easy J

That Sweet Smell...

The sweet smell of debt-less-ness is wafting through the windows in my mind. I can almost taste it! Now, granted, we still have a chunk of student loans to pay off, but we are getting there. I've freed up 10% of our monthly budget that can now go to paying off other debts even faster. In addition, we have a decent savings fund set up now too!

I know money is a touchy subject for some people, but for me, the weight lifting off my shoulders as I learn how to appropriately manage our money is so exciting that I just can't help but share. I am so blessed! I am blessed that Mom gave us the Dave Ramsey kit that helped us get started towards this place, I am blessed that God has allowed me to be a steward of his gifts despite my mistakes in the past, I am blessed that Tom and I can have open, frank discussions about money and budgeting, I am blessed that Dad trusted me, and I am blessed that I have begun to figure out this whole finances thing while I am still young.

To all of you who've helped me get this far, I thank you.