Fix my credit PLEASE??

October 7. Day 99.

I was wondering what to ask for today. Then I saw my credit report.

I went to freecreditreport.com, which I check once per year, and saw that there was some "negative activity" under an account I've long stopped using. It's a credit card I keep for emergencies, so imagine my surprise when I saw it was listed as 30 days past due, and account closed.

I logged on to Chase's website and saw that someone made two small charges, a month apart, in the spring. I don't know if it was an individual or a service that tapped into the account, since they were from an internet service provider I don't use. Well, those two small charges were then buried under late fees and finance charges. Strangely, a few months later the balance reverted to $0, despite the absence of payments.

The total losses weren't huge -- under $100 -- but the effects on my credit are grave.

I called Chase to sort it out.

First, it was too late to dispute the fraud, since you only get 90 days.

Second, I must say they were humane, even charitable, under the circumstances. After the charges appeared and I didn't pay, they closed the account and didn't refer it to a collection agency. Instead, they closed it as soon as possible, so I wouldn't get more late fees or have the balance grow. They wrote off the balance as their loss. And they listed in their files that the customer closed the account, which doesn't look bad on credit histories.

I'm really impressed. Of course it's all about the bottom line -- sending it to collection would have cost more than the $30 they paid that merchant. But it was nice of them to avoid screwing me over, particularly when they just thought I'm a delinquent customer.

In tears, grateful but still scared, I asked the agent if she could help me dispute the charges to the credit bureaus, so I could get the "30 days past due" pock removed, and she said she will.

I'm keeping my fingers cross this will be resolved, but when it comes to the credit industry I feel so powerless, I dare not hope.

Slap me out of my complacency, please?

October 6. Day 98.

Big plans this week. Because today is October 6 -- 85 days until the new year, 11 months until I turn almost-30, almost 100 days into this project -- and time to start getting shit done.

I'm going to start working on my thesis again, after taking a week off to do some freelance work. Same time next year, I vow won't be a grad student anymore, so I really hope it's because I graduated.

I'm going to help my dad make a website to sell portraits and renderings online.

I'm going to play tennis as often as possible, since something is finally starting to click.

I'm seeing one more house this afternoon, a two-bedroom craftsman cottage for which I hope to find a roommate. I'm getting exhausted by this hunt, but it will be worth it once I find my home for the phase of my life. A place to write and think and make delicious dinners for whoever's around that evening. In my earlier dalliances, long before Mr. A came along, I admit I had imagined that by this point (this age and this much time with someone) I'd be sharing a kitchen, making dinner with some hazel eyed Mr. Wonderful with irresistable stubble and a soft European accent. That sort of thing. But it's actually a good step I've shaken my bourgeois fantasies of stability and the other "things we are taught to wish for," and pushed toward a different kind of purpose. To pursue Craigslist as an existential state. Always seaching, never settling.

I'm going to ask for something sexy, risky, surprising even to myself.

On a different note, here's a bright idea from CNN: instead of negotiating your salary, shoot for perks:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/worklife/10/06/cb.negotiate.at.work/index.html

What I'd ask from my grad school, if I were in any position: quarterly paid travel to and from campus, an office on campus, a carte blanche for library fines, a few grand to do some archival research, and a book/materials fund.

Excellent. If I write out the things I want and know I'll never get, that makes my bitterness so much more palpable.

What will I ask for today? TBA.

UPDATE: I asked for a chick flick. Canceled other plans, asked myself what I really wanted to do, and the answer was: watch "The Dutchess."

Gained: 1:45 watching a wiggy woman struggle against the conventions of her day.

Can I borrow your segway scooter?

October 5. Day 97.

I've had this asking on my mind for some time, and tonight was the perfect opportunity.

After biking on the beach and reading Vanity Fair over a latte at Peet's, I went for a walk downtown to clear my head. It's been a complicated weekend.

On one of the quieter streets, I saw a police officer standing next to a Segway. Another man, a few feet away, was barking into his cell phone. Were they interacting? Was a fine in progress? An arrest?

I turned the corner and casually lurked.

After a few moments of listening in, it seemed they weren't talking to one another, so I gingerly approached the officer with my request.

"Hi," I started.

"Hi."

"Am I interrupting you? It looks like you might be busy."

"Oh no, he's just getting his car towed. What can I do for you?"

"I just had a quick question. Would it be possible for me to try your segway, for just a second? I've always wanted to know what that's like."

"No, I can't let you, sorry."

"No worries. Thanks anyway."

180 degrees. Bye bye.

Guess I hadn't really picked the best target, after all. A police officer? Someone who's supposed to keep people safe? Giving a scooter to a random woman for a test ride? During a law enforcement procedure? Good thinking, Roxy.

And it was a lazy asking, if I've ever seen one.

But if that's the last time I try to bum a segway sample, my name isn't The Daily Asker. Oh, wait... Anyway, you know what I mean.

Gained: Zero service from one who should protect and serve. Fine, that's harsh. How about: nothing I particularly merited.

Bad news in fast times: asking for a lifeline

October 4. Day 96.

I fell asleep slowly last night, thinking of my parents.

My father called me from Texas, where he's made his home for the past 15 years as an architect after my parents separated, with some news.

He lost his job.

Pushed out for younger workers. Textbook ageism. If he still had any disposable income or I had a law degree, I'd tell him to sue.

Then he asked me about using Craigslist, calling it, simply, "Craig's," and with that elision the profound and disheartening realization sank in that this technology gap may make the difference between retiring with a healthy nest egg and barely scraping by. People who aren't friendly with Craigslist, who don't gmail, are (some may add, be it with cruelty or justice, "at last") being shown the door.

Yeah. I'm sick as hell of hearing about the boomers. You don't want to relinquish power? You're threatened by the millennials? You lost the primaries to Obama? Boohoo. The most selfish generation out there, who spawned the second-most selfish generation, Generation Y/Generation Me. (Or, as I'm sure they're already starting to moan, Generation "Why Me?") The boomers need to retire already. Let go. Give it up already. Go fly a kite. Our turn.

But as soon as I write these words, I think of my parents. Their struggle for relevance in a cannibalistic world. Ambition, I remind myself, is survival. We are all boomers.

A few hours after we hung up, I came across an excellent blog, Threatened Journalist, which details the meltdown of a venerable San Diego institution, the Union-Tribune, written by an editor still working there. Whatever you think of its quality or relevance right now, it's still one of the few remaining family-owned newspapers in our country. In a few months it will take an even sharper nosedive, once the paper sold to the highest bidder. So many people have lost their jobs over the past few months, mostly older journalists who in their best articles gave a nuanced context that will be impossible to recreate by even the most talented newcomers. I sigh to think what the world will be like without them, or without my father, contributing their art.
My father, though, is not even a boomer. He was born during the war and grew up under a torturous regime where he was punished every day for refusing to join the Communist party. He and my mother arrived in the U.S. with a suitcases filled with books and art, scraps of a life blown to pieces by exile. He worked tirelessly to build a name for himself as an architect, creating some of San Diego's iconic downtown skyscrapers.

To be told, three decades later in Texas, by a visiting partner who refused to look him in the eye, "Your skills are not what we're prioritizing currently."

I am disgusted.

I asked Mr. A if he could get his hands on some free bootleg copies of expensive professional software. So my father, instead of relaxing, oil painting, and playing with his grandkids (oops!), will spend the next year learning the latest software programs and searching for the job he shall keep for the rest of his life -- if he is "lucky" enough to continue working to the end.

Gained: Hope for a tiny, tiny solution for part of a much bigger problem. If anyone is interested in seeing his digital portfolio, which includes portraits, watercolor renderings and residential and commercial blueprints (new and remodels), please let me know.

Would you mind getting up and doing your job?

October 3. Day 95.

Here's an example of asking for something stupid, just because you've signed up to ask for something every day for a year.

I'm still vaguely searching for an apartment, although it's not pressing or a necessity. But, if I could find a room of my own, for a good price, I wouldn't say no.

The deal with this place, a 1 bedroom with hardwood floors, was that I was supposed to go to the management company, pick up the keys and give myself a tour. On the drive over, I realized I'd pass right in front of the apartment on the way to the management office; suddenly didn't really want to make a huge detour. So I called and asked:

"I'm by the apartment now. Could you actually meet me here, rather than me driving all the way over there to get the keys and then dropping them off again?"

"We have so many properties, we just don't show any of them. We give keys out to all our rentals. And we're really busy today."

"So, am I to assume that you are usually this hands off?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, if I were your tenant, would I have to come to your office to talk to you about a problem, ask to get the toilet fixed, would I have to change my own lock, whatever? Are you a-do-it yourself kind of management company? Because that's what I gather."

"Oh, no! We take really good care of our properties. If you have any problems, of course we'd fix them."

Despite the traffic, and my waning enthusiasm for this place, I did it. I drove all the way to the intersection of College and University (which I never knew intersected!) through a series of neighborhoods in San Diego I never knew existed. I met this apartment manager, who was too busy eating a taco and chatting with her coworker to show the apartment herself. I picked up the keys, drove back, stepped in side and quickly turned around. The place, naturally, was a dump. And so ends this round of apartment hunting. Defeated again.

Gained: the loss of an hour.

I CAAAVED!

October 2. Day 94.

I did it:











Can you guess what color I got?

As for askings: I was pretty sure negotiating wouldn't work because

a) I really wanted it, and the salesman could see that.
b) It's the newest model, on the shelves for a few days.
c) I didn't expect it to work.
d) I really wanted it. Enough to type it twice.

Here was my feeble attempt:

"Do you have any kind of specials right now, an iTunes gift card, anything?"

"Not right now, sorry."

"I'll take it."

Gained: Nothing.
Lost: Any distinction between myself and the ipodinous masses.

Click and Clack, heal my car?

October 1. Day 93.

The first and only time I've called with a radio station until today, I was in eighth grade. My friend, the brilliantly bossy Heather H, told me to request a song from a rock station I didn't even listen to. Just to say I did it, you know?

Around that time, by the way, I was vying for the spot of least popular girl in my Catholic school class with someone named after a handbag. I listened to 'smooth jazz' and classical music, and my bangs were most definitely not the cool, crispy, hairsprayed kind (see diagram).

"What song should I ask for?"

"Love Shack."

"I've never heard it before!" Sounded kind of romantic, but trashy. Was I about to make a fool of myself on the home of San Diego's best mix of music, Q106?

"Do you have any other ideas?"

The answer, obviously, was no. So I called, requested "Love Shack," and a few minutes later, heard that song for the very first time.

I felt strangely underwhelmed.

After a fifteen-year hiatus, I made my second call today.

My car, as you know, has been acting up (history: here and here). Yesterday, Mr. A replaced the air filter, since he suspected it was an air flow problem. A few hours later, the check engine light came on.

I've been listening to Car Talk for years, ever since I commuted between Boston and New Jersey every other weekend (to visit Mr. A at his grad school), and more recently on podcasts.

The brothers themselves greeted me on the voicemail, encouraging me between guffaws to leave a message with my problem and contact info. The staff selects a few calls "at random" to be featured on the show.

Random my ass.

I hung up.

What did I need to do to be featured? Sound memorable? Be concise? Be bratty? Tug at their heartstrings? I looked at their website, but there were few clues. So I thought about previous calls, I jotted down some notes with my problem and a few dashes of "flair," and called again.

And I talked slowly -- which is very hard for me to do when I'm not nervous, let alone when I feel like I'm auditioning for a national radio program.

We'll see what happens.

Thank you, Lisette, for giving me idea to call Car Talk!

Gained: TBA