It's been a while, and I'm sorry, but my life has been non stop for the last month or so. Wake, Class, Work, Home, Sleep, Repeat has been my entire existence for too long. I'm feeling, very acutely now, some of the more sublime aspects of Marx's theories of worker alienation

I finally did get the apartment, I'm writing this offline so I can't check to see if I've mentioned this or nor not, and it's been nothing but trouble since. First off, my own management company towed my van. You see, no one bothered to mention that there was assigned parking and someone was upset that I was in their spot. Once I explained this to the manager, she was remarkably indifferent to the whole affair. I had to go over her head to get the towing fee refunded.

Next, I tried to get my phone hooked up. I called Qwest out to set it up. They left me a note saying the box is locked up and I would need to set up a time with the management to have it unlocked. Something else they forgot to tell me. I get that hooked up, Qwest says there's a dial tone at the box, and that all the wiring after that is my problem. There's no dial tone actually in the apartment (another reason I haven't updated), so I call Qwest to set up an appointment, and they say that my management company should take care of it. I call them, from a pay phone, and she says, "I'll look into it," which is Parklane Co. code for "Fuck off and quit bothering me." I say screw it, I'll bite the bullet and just pay to have Qwest fix things. I'm on the phone with the repair people, after entering my semi-nonexistant phone number twice and listening to three separate canned ads for Qwest long distance, "Now available in Idaho with very attractive rates!" and I ask the guy how much it might cost. "Err, depends... it's uh a $25 house call fee, $35 service fee, $25 for the first half hour and $20 and hour after that."

!!!!!!!!

Eighty five dollars! Minimum! And that's assuming they fix it in a half hour. I said no, thank you, and invited my father, who has quite a bit of electrical experience though mot much with phones in particular, out to have a look.

We poked around in my apartment, then poked around in the creepy-in-a-horror-movie-caliber-kind-of-way basement. We never did find my phone line, but we did find a disused meth lab in a cardboard box tucked away in one corner, which was nice. I called the cops.

So here it is, February (when spelling "February" in you head, how many of you say to yourself "Fe-bru-ary?") and I still have no phone. To top it all off, I just got a $60 bill from Qwest for a line I'm never going to use. Tomorrow, I call to cancel it. By the way, if any Qwest people are reading this, you guys are at the very bottom of a long list of people I owe money to. If you see a check from me this year, consider yourself lucky.

Next I try to move in a friend. She is planning to try to attach herself to my lease, but her parents are kicking her to the curb and needs a place to stay. No problem, she can stay with me, get on the lease and we're golden. Even if she doesn't get on the lease, I can have a guest for thirty days, according to my lease, just please let us know. So I call to mention this, out of courtesy. The guy on the phone says, "You've got seven days."

"The lease I signed says 30."

"Well, yes, but because it's section 42 housing [Partially subsidized. Like section 8 lite.] you're subject to state housing laws, and state housing laws say seven days."

THEN WHY THE FUCK DID YOU HAVE ME SIGN A PIECE OF PAPER THAT SAYS 30!!!! (Note: That's what was in my head, I didn't exactly put it that way. Also, it's something else they forgot to tell me.)

"Well, we don't go into all the section 42 detail on the lease. The lease would be three hundred pages long if we did."

I'm thinking they could have had a paragraph stating that the terms of this lease may superseded by state law, see you manager for details, or maybe included some of the more salient points, like occupancy rules, or at the very minimum excluded things that are directly contrary to they way they actually are. I realized at this point there is no arguing with this man, or indeed this company, so I just mention that the key I was given does not fit the back door. I wrote this on my move in form and was told it would be re-keyed.

"If it can be re-keyed."

"What?"

"Some of the doors are very old and not all of them can be re-keyed. [Something else they didn't tell me.] I'll make a note of it and look into it." This, of course, being Parklane Co. code for, "Fuck off, motherfucker, and quit bothering me."

Other than that, there's been a lack of things on my mind. Mostly a lack of money and a lack of food, as one follows the other. I had a small episode of fiscal mismanagement. A few unexpected expenses, missing a few days of work, and not keeping right on top of balancing my checkbook contributed to a financial climate that might be described as "tense." I truly thought I was screwed, big time. The budget I had worked out has, as yet, failed to gel, and my outgo exceeded my income by a fair margin. I tried to get a line of credit at the bank, but was denied. I refuse to go to any sort of payday or title loan place; I've had far too many friends and acquaintances get in over their heads with those things. I see those places as just hairs above loansharking. My father just got laid off, so the First National Bank of Dad is not lending right now, either.

I was at an absolute loss of what to do, when I came home and saw my salvation lying in a pile of mail I'd dumped on the table weeks ago: my taxes. Lets ignore, for a moment, that the federal tax withholding system may, in fact, be unconstitutional, or at the very least dishonest, and just be happy that I'm getting about $367 back in a few days.

Before I go on, a couple of points about taxes.

1. It is NOT a refund. The check you receive from the federal and/or state governments is money that they took out of your paycheck that you did not owe them. You have, in a very literal way, provided the government with a short term, no interest loan out your own pocket. If they had not taken that money from you, you may have been able to buy something with it, or at least stuck it in a savings account and gotten a little interest on it. Next year, try asking the feds for $367, interest free for one year, and see what kind of response you get.

What's more, unless you point out to them that you do not owe them this money, they will not give it back. As analogy: I take $367 out of you bank account. You say, "Hey, that's mine! Give it back!" I say, "Prove to me that you don't owe me this money."

2. I encourage everyone who's tax situation moves even a little beyond 1040EZ filing to look into TurboTax, by Intuit Software. It's a fabulous program, and available everywhere, even for Macs. It'll run you $20 to $50, but it's updated every year with all the new tax info, will roll over your old tax stuff automatically when you use it for a second time, checks the returns for errors, supports electronically downloading W2s, looks for deductions and credits you haven't even heard of but qualify for, uploading financial information from Quicken (also by Intuit, also highly recommended), electronically filing your taxes, and they have versions for all fifty states. You can even have your return direct deposited to your account. As my father put it: "You could be drunk and half stoned and still come out with a decent return.

3. Every college student should know about the Hope Credit and the Lifetime Learning Credit, two new tax breaks this year for higher education. Under the right circumstances, it could mean a $1,000 credit on your takes.

Back to the main point of things.

Who would have ever guessed that my personal financial savior would be the IRS? Weird. So they money is winging is electronic way to my checking account, but may not be here for several more days, but there are bills due last week. In the interim, I'm going to go to the First National Bank of Grandpa, the parent company of FNBoD, to get a short term loan.

I really don't want to do this.

Asking for money for money from family members is always embarrassing, but for some reason, the idea of going to my grandparents is doubly so. Hopefully though, I will only need there money for a week or two before I'm able to pay them back.

Even better, by this time next week, I should be able to buy groceries! Now, I'm not facing malnutrition, I have my parents to thank for that, but I'm closer to starving than I ever wanted to be. My food supply, as of today, consists of:

1 box white cake mix
1 box yellow cake mix
1 can baked beans
1 can tomato paste
1 packet alfredo sauce mix
3 cans of tuna
2 cups rice
5 sleeves if saltines
2 cups pancake mix
2 cups corn flakes
1 pound white sugar
3 pound brown sugar
various condiments and spices
2 pounds ground beef
And my ace in the hole: 1 case of creamy chicken ramen.

Don't get me wrong, this is not some "I'm so destitute, please come and pity me!" I'm very aware that this is a temporary problem, but being this close to the edge is uncomfortable; it give you a new perspective. I have no idea how people live with this problem for months and years at a time, and have a lot more respect for those who can hack it than I did two months ago. It's scary to realize how quickly you can go from no worries to begrudging every penny you spend, every bite you eat.

I'm going to make it a point to donate to the food bank, when I can.