Mother Hoodwink

Changy Change

This will most likely not be permanent. I was just so sick of my old design. I need to have Dim make a banner for me. As soon as I figure out what I want and he has time to do it, I'll change everything again. That could be another six months but hey, at least it's a goal.

I added my Twitter feed to the sidebar under Live Action Bitching. It's a tad addictive. It also saves me a bit of guilt for not writing here as often. Dim is also Twittering. He Twitters from his iPhone mostly. I find it pretty amusing, but I'm his wife, so I guess I would.

Dim has a brand new blog. He's been blogging on his MySpace for awhile now. He finally got a Blogspot. He's moving up, y'all! You can find him at Kosher Tofu. Go give him some love!

Randomness

Nothing like watching the marathon of Inside Brookhaven Obesity Clinic to make you put down the bag of Hershey Kisses you are mindlessly eating.

Friends make friends sell crap.

Have you ever had an old friend from years ago that you lost touch with get back in touch with you? I'm sure you have. But has this person tried to get you in on their stupid pyramid scheme type thing? I am only 25 years old and this has already happened to me twice.

The first time I got a call from some guy asking for me. He said he was the husband of an old friend of mine. I went to high school with this girl who I'll just call Christy. Mostly because that was her name. Christy was a year older than me so I didn't know her too well. I was more friendly with her younger brother, John.

This guy started in on his pitch. "Christy and I were talking about people who we thought were really smart and business savy. She recommended you." I don't know how she could have even remembered me since we said like five sentences to each other our entire time in high school together. But she was right. I am smart. No, really.

At this point I hadn't realized that he was pitching me anything. So I started to ask about John. Christy's husband seemed annoyed that I was interrupting the very important thing he was trying to sell me. "Uh, what? Oh. John is doing great. Now back to these revolutionary vitamins..."  They wanted me to be one of their team members and help sell freaking vitamins.

He and Christy wanted to get together with us and talk more in depth about everything. Back when this happened I was kind of bad at telling people 'no' and I sort of agreed to have them over the next evening. As I gave them directions to my house, I knew that when they came over the next evening, Dim and I would pretend to not be home. They came over and we hid under the covers in our bed. Of course we locked the door first just in case they would be crazy and let themselves in.

The most recent one happened just the other day. A few months ago the brother of one of my oldest childhood friends contacted me on MySpace. He asked me how I was and what I was up to. I responded back to him and asked how he had been. Well after two months he finally wrote back to me and this was part of his message:

I am working with [Company Name] and associates out of raleigh north carolina they are doing some big time expansion through out the country. I am heading up most of the expansion here in Virginia beach. I know there are looking for some sharp stable to help fill some slots out there where you are. I know you guys are kicking but and chasing success but do you guys keep your options open to extra income outside what you are currently doing? I think you guys fit the mold so much better than me. hit me back or call me

Oy. If by "fit the mold" he meant I can type coherently then yeah, I fit the mold.

Swap Bot

The last couple of months when I have been browsing blogs I have noticed a lot of people writing about swaps they were a part of. Usually it was another blogger getting everyone together to do a candy swap. I always wanted to get in on one because I want candy from Canada too, damn it.

Well I Googled "swaps" and found Swap Bot. I've only been signed up for three weeks but have already been a part of four swaps. I love it and I think I'm addicted.

Every time you do a swap, your partner rates you on how good you were at that swap. The good swaps usually require you to have a high rating. Since I was a "newbie", I had to start off with something little so I could build my rating. I did an easy little sicker swap. I had two partners and had to send each of them 25 stickers. Then I did an old DVD swap. You pick an old DVD you have that you don't want anymore and send it off. I got an awesomely cheesy movie called The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension. Dim and like stupid movies so we can be all Mystery Science Theater with them. The next swap I was a part of was a flavored lip balm swap. I had two partners that I had to send five flavored lip balms to. I am now the proud owner of ten different lip balms/glosses.

The most recent swap I was a part of was a tote bag swap. I had to swap a fairly new totebag I had or buy a new one. I sent an old totebag that I bought years ago and never used once. It had some piece of art on it and was accented with sequins. For a really good rating we were advised to put a little surprise in it. I looked at my partner's profile and saw she liked Winnie the Pooh and lollipops. I sent her some Pooh stickers and a couple of lollipops.  I put in a few other things I thought she would like and sent it off. A few days later I got my totebag. The woman that had me for a partner bought a new totebag and personalized t for me.

There was something inside every pocket and a whole bunch of stuff at the bottom of the box.

This person really took time to read my profile. In my profile I talk about the love affair I have with chocolate. How I like to read, cook, scrapbook and make my own cards. She gave me three different kinds of chocolate treats, a novel for the beach, blank cards that I can decorate, a women's magazine for "me time", scrapbooking and cooking magazines and a kid's magazine.

This swap only cemented my addiction. I already love getting packages and this website guarantees that I'll get them. You should sign up too so you can be addicted like me.

Things that make me nervous:

- Boomba's new love of vigorously shaking his head 'no' while walking around the sharp corners of furniture.

- That no matter what I do, I just can not keep up with this household's laundry.

- I have become oddly addicted to Goldfish crackers. I used to hate them; now I can't get enough of them. 32 of those suckers are 140 calories.

- That I am having a horrible time trying to keep a particular secret. Just saying I have one makes me feel so much better. I'll spill it later. It's just not the right time yet.

- How mad Dim is going to be at me for writing the part above.

- Whenever Dim eats Mexican food.

- The fact that our lawnmower which is only a year old already needs a new part. A part this isn't only not covered under the warranty we paid extra for but costs more than the actual lawnmower did in the first place.

Ok, that's it for now. I'm sure there will be more to follow.

Be back Tomorrow

I'm over at ...and the Pursuit of Happiness today. Sonia is out of town and I'm guest blogging. See ya there.

Beware of AFNI

About a month ago Dim got a bill in the mail. It was from a creditor that had taken over his old Verizon account. The last time Dim was a customer of Verizon's was back in 2001 for our home phone. I specifically remember paying that bill because we were all of 19 back then so we didn't have that many responsibilities. It was pretty much get paid then pay rent, phone/DSL, car insurance and buy Ramen. Like I said, 19. We were not swimming in cash in those days. We aren't really in these days either, but I digress.

Our phone/DSL service never got cut off so obviously we were up to date on it. This bill claimed that we owed $385. Um, no we don't. Dim called the number on the letter and they told him that he needed to pay this bill immediately or they would take him to court. Dim asked why now were they collecting on this bill. They said they hadn't been able to find us.

I found it strange that we lived at the same address for three years after moving from our apartment and we have lived in this house in a whole other state for a year, and this is where they find us. We won't talk about the fact that we have had two extensive credit checks since leaving Verizon and they both have turned up clean. Not one outstanding piece of debt. Hmmm.

I got a weird feeling about them because they had no real address. Only a P.O Box. I quickly Googled AFNI, the creditor that was about to make us sell organs to pay this unexpected bill. I found numerous sites that had people sharing their stories of AFNI. All of them had these outrageously expensive old Verizon bills. Some people were never even a Verizon customer or never lived in the state that AFNI had the bill for.

The weird thing is that AFNI showed the phone number that they were collecting on, and it was our old number. Dim called Verizon and they said that they give their old outstanding accounts to AFNI to take care of. They had no more record of our account so they couldn't even help us. (Verizon sucks.) Even so, it's been almost seven years since we have had that number. I was thinking they were trying to get some money before the statute of limitations ran out.

I still wasn't buying the fact that we really owed this money though. I vividly remember paying the very last Verizon bill because I got all misty that we were moving from our apartment. Dim, however, wasn't so sure. If asked, he couldn't remember what we had for dinner yesterday. He was scared to trust my instincts and was so close to paying but I convinced him this was a scam.

Dim called AFNI back and told them that we researched them and found them to be frauds. The woman on the other end claimed that if you research any debt collection agency, you're going to find people calling them frauds. So I did research other agencies and I couldn't find one negative thing about them. Interesting.

Dim and I decided that we were going to ignore this "bill" and pay it only if they actually did take us to court. Well I went to the mailbox today and found a letter from AFNI. They said that they "investigated our dispute and are closing the account."

When I was researching AFNI after we received this letter today, I had found one woman who's husband went through the same exact thing as us. Down to calling AFNI and calling them con artists and getting a letter saying they owed nothing. Apparently, AFNI is getting better at scamming people because they are using public records so the names and numbers match up. Oh and they have been known to ask for copies of driver's licenses and passports. If a creditor is asking for those things, that should tell you right there they are just trying to steal from you. AFNI didn't ask Dim for either of those things but they did ask him for his full name, address and social. He told them that they obviously know his name and address if they contacted him. As for his social, he politely told them to kiss his ass.

It's just so confusing to me since Verizon said that they give AFNI their old outstanding accounts so they must be legitimate in some way. Maybe there are people claiming to be AFNI to get money in their pockets, or maybe AFNI has a a lot of thieves working at the company. Either way, people are getting scammed left and right.

I'm really only writing this for people that Google AFNI located at 404 Brock Drive P.O. Box 3427 Bllomington, IL 61702-3427. I want these people to keep their wallets shut and let them know all they have to do is tell AFNI that they know they're cons and they will get a nice little letter saying they don't owe a dime. Do not fall for this!

Top Momma

I entered this thing a long time ago. I'm finally being featured. I'm not even sure what it is exactly. They show 25 pictures and each of those pictures represents a blog. The picture that gets clicked on the most, wins I guess. Well maybe not wins but gets their picture to stay on the front page. I'm not sure what the benefit is other than creating traffic for me. Whatever, go vote for me. (I used the picture of Boomba covered in spaghetti.) Please don't leave me sitting here voting for myself.

Since I posted this Dim voted a ridiculous amount of times. He said he was trying to get me up to 5,000 because the person that has the most and has been there the longest, has about 5,000. He wanted me to get over 5,000 within 24 hours. He said it was his way of sticking it to the man. He pretty much cheated by figuring out how to vote hundred times a minute. So if you vote for me, I appreciate it but in the long run, it doesn't really help all that much since my husband is totally freaking cheating.

Virtual Prom

Sonia/Sunshine over at ...and the Pursuit of Happiness is having a virtual prom on May 8th. You should go there now and sign up. It should be lots of fun. There is only one problem though. I don't have a date. Anyone like to take me to prom? Please? I promise that I'll put out.

The coolest blog ever!!

My friend, Kerry, and I met when both of our husbands were stationed in New Orleans. They worked together and Kerry and her husband were actually our sponsors. Which means her husband helped Dim check in at the base and they took us out and showed us around town. We liked them immediately. Hopefully, the feeling is mutual because if not, they have been stringing us along for years now.

Kerry and her husband were stationed to Hawaii a few months after we moved there. We kept in touch by email. We got pregnant within five months of each other and we both had sons. So we emailed each other a lot about pregnancy, labor and child rearing. With each email we got a bit closer and we somehow discovered that we are basically the same person. We even had our gall bladders out within a couple weeks of each other. The similarities are pretty creepy.

Another eerie similarity is that we both take kind of awesome pictures. We thought a cool way to showcase them was to, what else? Make a blog about them. Everyday we will each post one picture and tell a little story about it. Go check us out at Double Exposures. Kerry made the design. It's freaking beautiful. I love it. Every time you refresh the page, the pictures in the sidebar change. Kerry is so creative and kind of a genius for putting that together. Oh, and I'm sure if you wanted, you could pay her to design a template for your blog. (Sorry if I just called you out, Kerry.)

Well what are you waiting for? Today is our first post. Go look now!