Step away from the desk...

So last week I sat down at my little work area/desk, which is just a built-in to the right of our fireplace. A small space that managed to cause me a big headache.

At first my goal was just to balance the checkbook and update the budget. Never a very fun thing, but usually not too frustrating or painful.

Until I saw online that the auto parts we purchased so the mechanic could repair John's car, were like, twice or triple what I thought it would be. What I thought was simple rear brakes and a front right strut turned into both front struts and all four brakes. And then struts also have to have mounts and boots. Since John's car is older these are sold separately and are more expensive. A lot more expensive. Like total parts and labor was almost $1000 expensive. Womp womp.

Fortunately we got an unexpected check that very week that covered the repair bill short only $100. But- we had already spent that money in our minds- on new cell phones and house repairs/improvements. So although I am grateful that we only had to take a tiny bit from our "emergency" fund for the car repairs, it was bittersweet.

Then I decided to check with John's health insurance about our application to add me to the policy. To be clear, I'd called them 10 days prior to this when I'd gotten a letter stating our application was incomplete. I let them know the original application was sent in late December but that the first week in January I had sent a completely new application since I couldn't ever confirm with them they'd received the first one. I wanted to make sure they did the underwriting from the new application "Yes, I see the new application" they said. "No, we won't close your file" they said.

I knew it wasn't good when I called to check and heard "May I place you on hold while I investigate this further?". Long story short "it appears that underwriting has not been reviewing the new application, I'm going to have to forward this to a specialist, we try to call you back within 72 hours, but Monday is a holiday". Great. They did put a note in my file at my request that I am NOT happy and am trying to avoid making another whopping COBRA payment for February. That was Friday. No one has called. So that'll be on Thursday's to-do list.

Then I called my current health insurance to make sure they added Sophia for February. Apparently her pediatrician has been having trouble billing. They told me "due to a high call volume we are taking messages at this time and returning phone calls with 48 hours". I did manage to find out what her number would be on the policy if she had been added.

So yeah, at that point I just had to step away from the desk...