Three weeks ago Frinklin was hired by Gideon, owner of American Healthcare Services, Inc. , a Seattle DME business. And IÂ’ve been on edge. Of course I was pleased that he was able to find work after more than a year of unemployment, but the details about the job and his boss were frustrating. He went in knowing that the pay sucked and there would no sick or holiday time, or benefits. All the crappy working conditions were agreed to, just to ensure a regular paycheck.

The job sounded interesting. He would be the Director of Marketing and Client Services. His responsibilities included rewriting their (shitty) website and the (terrible) marketing materials and using these items to bolster outside sales. In addition he would staff the retail storefront and assist with billing.

Things started to go downhill on the first day. No one knew Frinklin was starting. He waited outside for an hour for someone to let him in. He was told he would work 40 hours a week which was immediately slashed to 32. Despite asking for time to focus on marketing and sales he was told there were other priorities. There were multiple projects (inventory, revamp the filing system, rework the catalog) randomly assigned by Gideon, forcing Frinklin to jump from one thing to another without being able to complete anything fully. A temp was brought in and undid all the work he had done on a billing project. Frinklin was left alone for hours to run the store, without breaks or time for lunch.

We both knew things were weird and Gideon was a terrible business owner and boss.

And then today.

Gideon showed up early and asked to speak with Frinklin in his office. Within 10 minutes Frinklin was fired and told to leave, “or I will have the authorities escort you out.” Exactly why was he fired? Apparently all that time spent on Gideon’s projects was taking time away from what Frinklin should have been working on – outside sales. What he didn’t explain is when exactly Frinklin should have been making those sales. While he was organizing billing? While he was alone, staffing the store for hours on end? In the middle of inventory?

There had been no indication that Frinklin was doing a poor job. In fact, Frinklin was doing a kick-ass job as far as I could tell. He was keeping detailed notes of what he was being asked to do, what the priorities should be, and learning the business. While I understand GideonÂ’s need for sales (I was in outside sales for several years), you have to allow time for that to happen, especially when you are telling your employee that his priorities lie elsewhere at the moment.

I suppose all of this could be answered by the fact that Gideon threatened to have Frinkin removed from the building by the police. My husband is extremely laid-back and spent most of their 5-minute morning meeting in shock, asking why he was being fired for something completely out of his control.

So thank you Gideon, you asshat. Not only did you assist in shattering my husbandÂ’s self esteem yet again, but you lied about his work performance. And you may have screwed over his chances to receive unemployment as he has now been terminated instead of laid-off. All for three weeks of work, paying barely more than UI.

At least now he's free to get a real job. And I'm free to distribute flyers (virtual and otherwise) telling everyone this guy is a total dickwad.

Posted by: Ensie at 02:54 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I have a long history of locking myself out of things. I'm really good at locking myself out of various vehicles. I went through a stretch where I did it weekly, sometimes twice a week. Twice I did it while the car was RUNNING. I'm pretty proud of that accomplishment.

I've been locked out of my computer more times that I can tell you. Or various websites that I swear I can remember the password for, but upon my three attempts suddenly find that I need to call customer service because I no longer have any type of access. I finally had to create a hidden secret "cheat sheet" that I use to get to the various portals around the internets.

I thought I'd really done it a couple of years ago when Frinklin and I locked our selves IN our house. Yes you read that correctly. IN the house.

The deadbolt to the front door broke due to shoddy workmanship of the previous owner (a reccurring theme) and since we don't own a key to the back door, and our back gates are padlocked shut (a detail that will become important later in this blog entry) we were trapped. A very kind locksmith came and removed the deadbolt, re-keyed the front door, and fixed the crappy job the last owner had done with the whole thing. I highly recommend Jack at Security Lock, Safe, and Alarm.

I really didn't think it would be possible to top locking myself IN my house. But yesterday I did it.

Yesterday I locked myself in my backyard.

Really, it was all the cats' fault. But lets back up.

Remember how I told you earlier that there is no key to the back door and the gates are padlocked shut? We've been having issues with the back door not shutting all the way unless the deadbolt is thrown. The wind will push it open and 4 of our 5 indoor only cats will sneak outside to frolic on the deck, eventually making their way under the house.

Yesterday I happened to be walking past the back door and noticed it was waving gently in the afternoon breeze. Immediately panicking I jumped into action and ran outside. All four adventurous cats were outside. Making a grab for the one closest (Clyde), I felt fur and threw him in the house, slamming the door behind me. One down and three to go! An orange streak flew past my feet. Percy! I snatched him up and grabbed the door handle, leaning in to open the--ow! Open the--

Oh for fucks sake. I hadn't latched the deadbolt, but the small doorknob lock was thrown and it was good and closed this time. As Percy squirmed in my arms I grabbed for another orange kitty and picked up a clawing mass of Barney. As his talons sank into my body I thought, "this is bad." Turning to the right, I watched as Moby slipped under the house.

As I lost more and more blood from Barney's slashes I realized I was going to have to let the cats go, even if they did go under the house. I was either going to need to try to climb through a window (all locked), climb the fence (six feet high), or find a friendly neighbor with a cell phone to help. Fortunately, a friendly neighbor happened to be standing just on the other side of the fence.

"Excuse me?" I called, trying not to look insane with orange cats dangling from my limbs. "I have locked myself in my backyard and am in need of a phone. May I borrow yours?" Hopefully proper grammar and being the picture of politeness would help my cause.

"Uh, IN your backyard?" replied the kind neighbor.

"Yes. You see, my door is locked from the inside and I lack a key (Ow! Barney stop it!). And my gates are padlocked (Dammit! Ow!)." (Big smile)

"Sure." Kind neighbor tosses cell phone to me over fence. I should explain at this point that Frinklin was out assisting friends with their 72 Hour Films Festival (tickets on sale now!) submission. I called him. And called him. And called him. Angels be praised - on the third try he picked up. I make no apologies for the messages left that sound something like, "Iamtrappedinthegoddamnbackyardandyouarenotpickingupyourcellphonewherethefuck
areyourightnowIreallyneedyoutocomehomeandhelpme!" To his credit as soon as he did pick up the phone Kevin, Joe, and Frinklin did rush home to rescue me. I sulkily entered the house, sans cats.

Ah yes. The cats.

The next three hours of my life were devoted to cajoling two stubborn kitties out from the tiny (non) crawl space of the house. Percy decided he'd had enough of the great outdoors and came quietly, but Barney and Moby found a playground of smells, sights, and a possible doorway to a wonderland of adventure through that little gap in the concrete. I'd like to say that Frinklin and I tempted the cats by calling their names and offering them treats, but that did absolutely nothing for 2 hours and 45 minutes. Also ineffectual; lying on a towel to avoid dirt and other backyard debris while peering under the house with an industrial strength flashlight (although I got a close up look at one of our air vents). The best technique was to stand absolutely silent and still for 10 or 15 minutes, pretending to be a part of the house, then pounce when the cat came out to explore. Good to know for future reference.

I really need to get the back door re-keyed so that we can unlock it normally. And probably need to have the entire thing worked on so that it actually stays closed when the wind is blowing. Hopefully I'm working a good average and I won't lock myself back there again for another three years, minimum.

Bonus trapped in moment! Trapped IN my pants!

Posted by: Ensie at 12:50 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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1 Dang. What a crazy afternoon/evening. And you handled the situation much better than I would have. At the point I would've realized I'd locked myself in the backyard, my head would've just asploded.

Posted by: Cassioposa at May 04, 2008 04:54 PM (/fI+2)

2 damn. I would have.... um... I dunno. Uttered alot of curses. Many of them well-conjugated strings of cursewords. I can demonstrate that curse-conjugation skill for you someday, if you like, though I suspect you may have the skill within you.... Nice to know your peaceable kingdom is all well again

Posted by: JCBetty at May 04, 2008 09:46 PM (lvOTL)

3 This is something I would do. Glad you got all your various cats back inside.

Posted by: Jenyum/Tacomamama at May 06, 2008 03:58 PM (LMqvC)

4 JCBetty, Oh, I uttered A LOT of swear words. Don't worry. I may have even been speaking in tongues at one point. It was not pretty. I'm surprised I didn't scare away the Kind Neighbor. Fortunately I didn't though, and he stuck around long enough to lend his phone.

Posted by: ensie at May 07, 2008 12:49 AM (0Y/90)

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There's been a lot going on and I've steadfastly refused to blog about it. I'm not exactly sure why. Maybe it's the fact that it has to do with money and the lack thereof. Or the fact that some of it's job related, or again, the lack thereof. I can tell you that I've felt overwhelmed and exhausted when it comes to dealing with life and have spent far too much time curled up in bed as of late. Then again - at least I'm not out spending any money.

Frinklin's job search is on it's eighth or ninth week now. He's sent out a couple of hundred resumes and has had something like four interviews, which s a little disheartening. It's not that his job skills are lacking or resume is poor, it's that for one reason or another he hasn't been a perfect fit for the jobs available (Interviewer: "I see you live in Tacoma, how do you plan to get to Seattle each day?" Frinklin: "Actually I worked in Seattle for two years previously and loved taking the commuter train. I also own a car, so commuting is no problem." Interviewer: "Interesting. We're still concerned about your ability to get to work each day." Frinklin: "??") or there have been a gazillion candidates. The Seattle/Tacoma job market is extremely tough at the moment. See Richard Florida's new book for confirmation.

On the upside, Frinklin picked up some freelance work this week (thank you company who smiled on us!) and the State of Washington concluded their investigation into his unemployment claim last week, so a check finally arrived. Yay!

I can say, it you've ever been in this position, it's all about having funds available to shift around. I'm having to move money from my 401K to other places, and was using a credit card to cover something for a time...until one of my credit card companies decided that they would be halving my available credit without any notice. Gee! Thanks! I completely understand that there is huge credit issue occurring currently, but freaking out and cutting off one of my liquid sources of monies - not cool.

In other news I went on a week-long Conference to the Homeland of Bob's Hogs and Weiner Pigs. It was great fun to hang out with all the fellow Bob's Hoggers. We had "pajama parties" each night hosted by my roomie and myself where we "networked" for a couple of hours with drinks. It was the best part of the entire week. Beet was in fine form. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that we spent an hour "learning" how to color code an Excel spreadsheet. Actually, I spent that hour chatting online with Cassioposa and Kevin while Beet droned on about color coding Excel cells.

The trip home from the coference was an adventure. I'll leave that to my next post, hopefully tomorrow, from my new laptop (hint, hint).

Posted by: Ensie at 09:24 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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When one thinks of gout, you don't picture it being a disease that waylays modern folks in this century. Sort of like scurvy, dropsy, or even consumption. While these conditions still exist, in the Western World we just don't worry about them as they did in say, the 19th Century.

But when Frinklin began feeling stabbing pains in his right toe so painful that he was almost in tears, I suggested that we head to the doctor. He had felt something similar every 6 - 8 months that lasted for a few days, but never anywhere near this level of pain.

The doctor was busy and so we headed to Ugent Care. With a few careful prods to Frinklin's toe the doctor proclaimed, "Gout!" and sent us out the door. Frinklin was provided with a couple of prescriptions for anti-inflammation and reduction of uric acid as well as instructions on changes in diet.

I left with a smirk on my face. Why? Because one of the major causes of gout is eating too much red meat. It causes a build-up of purines in the system, which leads to too much uric acid, which causes gout; a swelling of the joints as a response to a deposit of uric acid crystals. And I've been telling my husband to eat less red meat for a very long time.

I'm not the type to lord it over someone when I'm right. But honey? I'm so right on this one.

Posted by: Ensie at 10:52 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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1 Dude, Frinklin, lay off the venison. My grandpa had gout and he was a butcher for many many years. I'm with Ensie--before he got it I thought it was something like scurvy. Get better!

Posted by: Erik Hanberg at March 06, 2008 12:02 PM (9T8gB)

2 I'm not the type to lord it over someone when I'm right. Wha huh? You aren't? Have you met you?

Posted by: frinklin at March 06, 2008 04:32 PM (yNgp+)

3 OK, maybe I'm one to lord it over YOU when I'm right.

Posted by: ensie at March 06, 2008 06:01 PM (yNgp+)

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It's long been suspected that I am a bit of a shopaholic. My house would confess this sin with closets busting with too many clothes and and a large tower of shoe boxes. At one point in time I owned 37 pairs of pants of varying types, styles, and fabrics. In my defense, not all of them fit or were in wearable shape at the time. I am afraid to count the current number of pairs of pants that I own for fear I may eclipse the aforementioned number.

I grew up in a middle class family that didn't make a lot of money, but sacrificed to allow me to have a broken-down horse that was a gift from a family friend, eventually trading up to a nice horse that was moderately priced. As I grew up, my Father worked extremely hard and earned a much better income that allowed my younger teenaged sister to enjoy riding a horse that was imported from Europe. We hardly saw my workaholic Dad during the week but we reaped the monetary benefits. So I lived without money and with money.

I've held a job pretty consistently since I was 14 years old. My only unemployed periods were my first year of college and after a nervous breakdown my second year, second semester of college. In May I'll have worked for Bob's Hogs and Weiner Pigs for 11 years. I certainly haven't always made much money, but it's been enough. The really interesting thing is that whenever there has been a money crisis, money always shows up.

When The Jeffrey got terribly sick and we though his liver was having all sorts of issues but it turned out to be bladder stones that were ripping his insides apart my commission check was unexpectedly high.

When one of the cars unexpectedly needed the brakes done Frinklin had a random monetary bonus kick in. This has happened TWICE with two different employers who almost NEVER gave cash bonuses. Weird.

When I was 21 years old and had an ancient Ford Bronco II that insisted on breaking down every other day my Grandmother stepped up and gave me a cash infusion out of nowhere "because you need it." I was able to fix the car and take care of some other things that had been weighing heavily. She told me she had set aside the money for college or for a wedding, but at the time I wasn't in school and was a lesbian. Thanks Nana!

Anyway, back to the point.

Because I've had a fortuitous relationship with money, I've not been particularly careful with money. I've always been able to pay my bills on time, have good credit, and don't have any collection agencies stalking me. And I have a nasty habit of spending money I don't have. Even when my husband is out of a job.

Like yesterday. When I was at the new Nordstrom Rack in Southcenter after making a particularly successful sales call and meeting up with Frinklin after he had a particularly successful (cross fingers!) interview with what appears to be a great potential employer. I was looking for a Perlina purse that I had fallen in love with a few weeks earlier when we were a DINK household to celebrate our particularly successful (although potentially fictitious) fabulous day.

I found the Perlina bag, and it was cute. But then I turned a corner and There. It. Was. I heard a rushing in my ears. Frinklin spoke, but I heard nothing but the Angels singing. I walked forward, and touched It. The chorus intensified.

Finally, Frinklin's insistent voice broke through, "How much is it?"

"What?" I didn't look up. I was too busy opening pockets and noticing the cheetah print interior. So amazing!

"Ensie...how much? It's got an electronic tag on it. It's going to be a lot."

"Fuck," I said. Reality setting in, "I can't get this bag. It's going to be crazy expensive. It's Dolce and Gabbana." Searching out the tag I finally answer Frinklin, "Holy shit! It's four hundred dollars!" I got silence as an answer as I continued to fondle the bag. My heart raced.

"Honey. Buy it."

"What?"

"Buy it."

I thought my husband had lost his mind at this point. He's unemployed! We only have one income! I started to argue with him briefly, but then realized I was arguing my way out of a kick-ass Dolce and Gabbana bag that I didn't know how to quit. I quietly whispered, "OK!" as though we were getting away with some sort of crazy crime. An employee was flagged down, the bag was freed, and we were out the door with our loot a few minutes later.

The only down side was that I didn't know how much money I had saved on the bag. It didn't have an original price on it. I spent a good hour searching the interwebs for my bag (which is tan leather, oh so soft, with a cheetah print interior), only to find that it doesn't exist. There is only a mutant version currently available, priced at $2,195.00:

Perlina, I feel bad for cheating on you, but I love my new D&G bag. And if it makes me an uncontrollable shopaholic, so be it. I challenge anyone to step into the realm of really good handbags and/or shoes and then try to go back to crappy ones. If nothing else, I treat my quality items like gold so they last forever.

I'd like to give a huge thank you to my husband, who gave me the OK to buy something I love and really wanted. I told him that he doesn't have to buy me anything for my birthday or Christmas this year. I love you honey!

Posted by: Ensie at 05:30 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Sometimes right in the middle of living your life, the road will shift and you find yourself falling. It happens to everyone. Often more than once. It happened to me in college. I can remember the exact moment I stepped off the path -whoosh!- to graduation and a degree and instead ended up at a series of junior colleges and never quite found my way back again. My feet are once again on solid ground, but it took a long time to get there. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing, although I do wonder how my life might have turned out differently sometimes, but I don't regret the decisions I've made and the life I have now.

Last week the ground swelled and bucked and tossed Frinklin into limbo. The company formally known as The Corporate Behemoth now known as Those Fuckwads Aetna fired Frinklin without warning. Without any warning at all and definitely without a severance package. Official reason, "failure to improve performance statistics." Unofficial reason, "It's just not working out." After three fucking years of stellar performance reviews and busting his ass. My suspicion is that they are getting rid of him because they announced that they will be outsourcing his position within the next year. They offered to have he and other people in his position train folks in the Philippines just a couple of months ago.

On the one hand this isn't the worst news. When my husband came downstairs to tell me I looked him square in the eye and said, "Thank God you never need to go to that crap job again," and gave him a huge hug. Frinklin's been half-heartedly looking for another job for a while. He hated being tied to his desk (granted, at home) in an hourly position, listening to people scream at him for problems that weren't his fault. It left him grouchy at the end of the day and dreading the work week. And they never gave bonuses, but a steady supply of branded alarm clocks, laminated certificates, and once a crappy canvas folding chair that one of our cats peed on. Thanks asshats!

The bad part is the money end of things. It's not good when one half of the household income disappears. There is, thankfully, unemployment which will bring in a portion of what's been lost. And I started making calls to see what we could do. That did not go well.

Our mortgage company always gives you a happy little message that if you anticipate having trouble paying your mortgage you should contact them. I let them know that I don't think we'll have trouble, but wanted to know what their potential solutions would be. Their "solution" is to make a double mortgage payment now, allowing us to skip a payment in the future.

"See how that helps?" the representative chirped to me.

"Not exactly." When I explained that I don't have the funds to make a double payment now, allowing us to skip a payment in the future she told me that she couldn't really help me further. That our payments would need to be made on time as usual, or if made late that our credit would be affected. How exactly is this helpful? I'm not sure. She couldn't tell me either.

My next call was to the folks that manage my 401K. I have a significant amount in my 401K as I've been paying into it for 8 years. I did take out a loan about 3 years ago that I've been paying back steadily. The 401K folks did tell me that I can take out a "Hardship Withdrawal." Fantastic! Send me the forms! The forms arrived and I found that I don't qualify for a Hardship Withdrawal as there are only four reasons one may make said withdrawal:

1. Payment of tuition for post secondary education for me, spouse, dependents.
2. Payment of unreimbursed medical expenses for me, spouse, dependents.
3. Payment to prevent loss of primary residence through eviction or foreclosure.
4. Purchase of primary residence, excluding mortgage payments.

So you see, I must stop making payments immediately on our mortgage, allow our credit to fall to shit, and hope that the bank begins foreclosure proceedings on our home post-haste in order to withdraw the money. It's a perfect plan! What about those of us that want to make our payments on time and keep our credit scores good?! The logic of this whole thing escapes me. Plus it's my Goddamn money!

We do have credit cards that we can live off of. It's just that we already have credit card payments and I don't want to be a slave to debt for the next 20 years. I don't want to have to go to the Bank of Parents to solve this (they have money, but not tons of it to give me).

To top it all off, Frinklin's last paycheck wasn't direct deposited as usual, the Fuckwads are mailing it to us to arrive who-knows-when. They haven't officially reported Frinklin as terminated, so his 401K can't release any funds to him. And his ex-boss won't call him back about anything (four messages and counting).

We're holding their fucking computer hostage until I get some answers.

Posted by: Ensie at 05:15 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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1 Sucktastic totally sums it up! I don't know if we're much more on top of it, just more on top of finding out how screwed we are. He was in Provider Relations, handing calls and assisting doctors' offices with claims. He knows the insurance and provider side of claims as having experience in training. Here's hoping my job is secure!

Posted by: ensie at February 12, 2008 05:55 PM (yNgp+)

2 oh, man that bites; I know that situation, and I know that feeling and it's just.... Ew. Bad. Here's big virtual hugs your way, since I can't think of any merry platitude to make things right. (((((((ensie)))))))

Posted by: jcbetty at February 12, 2008 07:04 PM (lvOTL)

3 Just wow. Maybe when they notice their computer is missing, they'll straighten up. Maybe he could go into the medical side of stuff? Here's hoping he can find something good soon.

Posted by: Eden at February 12, 2008 07:47 PM (BDCWt)

4 Maybe you should hire this guy to send Aetna a message. Love you both -- let us know how we can help.

Posted by: K to the F at February 12, 2008 09:13 PM (ROdeo)

5 God that sucks...I'm so sorry.

Posted by: erin at February 13, 2008 05:30 AM (+Ng2w)

6 Oh my gawd - that totally and completely blows. But like you say, the upside is buh-bye crapass job. Sending good job-finding vibes your way! I bet hubby'll find something fantastic and then he can send a big old finger to those asscats!

Posted by: Heather at February 13, 2008 07:43 AM (Zx158)

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I waited in one of the enormous lines to get into Key Arena today. Frinklin and I got there about 10:40 and the line was growing in leaps and bounds (we were standing under the Space Needle). After 11 we were practically running as we moved forward to get inside - but there were two lines and we missed getting in by just a couple of hundred people. It was about 11:15 when we were turned away. We were told they had 14,000 people in the stands and another 5,000 on the floor. We booked it out of there (yay for valet parking at the Needle!) and arrived home just in time to see the speech live on Northwest Cable News.

When we left there were hordes of people behind us in line as well as tons of people still arriving by the thousands. We let as many people as we could know that Key Arena was full, but most continued on to see if they could still get in. Most said they would be caucusing for Obama tomorrow and when it continued to be announced that the event was full people's attitude was, "That sucks that we didn't get in, but that's fantastic!"

There's been some discussion as to weather Obama has outdrawn Hillary at their Seattle events. Even with their respective venue choices, I'd say that Obama could have easily had another 7 - 10 thousand people should he have chosen a larger venue. I don't think that Hillary could have drawn that kind of numbers.

In other news - Frinklin met Janet Huckabee at the Starbucks headquarters this morning. But I'll let him tell that story later on his own blog. He's busy at opening night for his new show (How the Other Half Loves - tickets available now!) right now. It's a funny show he tells me. I'll be there a week from Saturday.

If you're a Democrat and you need information on the how to and where to caucus for (Obama) your (Obama) chosen (Obama) candidate (Obama) in Tacoma (did I mention that Obama rocks?) check out http://wa-democrats.org/. Everything goes down tomorrow at 1 PM. Be there or be square.

Also - (FINALLY!) our long backordered Obama yard sign and rally sign arrived. They went up in our yard and window to tell the world that we're in the cool crowd. Hopefully the yard sign won't blow away!

Posted by: Ensie at 06:34 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Setting: Ensie-Frinklin Bathroom

Time: 5:42 AM

Ensie is awoken to the sound of much cursing and strange sucking noises. Going to investigate she finds Frinklin standing over an uncooperative toilet.

F: The damn toilet will not unplug.

E: What did you do?

F: Nothing! It was like this when I came in!

At this point our heroine takes the plunger from our hero and vigorously begins to plunge the toilet. After a few moments a successful toilet flush is heard.

Frinklin stares in awe.

E: See? And you thought all that time playing Raving Rabbids was in vain!

Posted by: Ensie at 09:52 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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The other half of the Ensie-Frinklin household has started a new political blog with an old high school friend, markxiano. You can check out their thoughts at Electoral College Dropouts. Currently mark is making me ill with his predictions that Edwards and Huckabee will take Iowa and Frinklin is analyzing the sad state of many of the available candidates and making me laugh along the way.

Posted by: Ensie at 01:18 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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