bed+breakfast

first off, theres been a little update in our visitation situation, lol. 

i got my parent itinerary yesterday and they are coming for 6 days starting wednesday, feb. 18th and staying through tuesday, feb 24th. thats cool with us, a nice long visit [and hopefully we could get this electrical situation under control with dads expertise while they were here]. additionally, last night my brother called and informed us that he and cassie [my future sister-in-law] were planning to come up and visit as well [but just for the weekend, theyve gotta work and such] - no problem, we've got enough beds, although the sleeping situation might be interesting. weve got the new windows and they definitely help in keeping a lot of the rooms on the second floor much warmer that they used to be, however, theyre still quite chilly for some reason. so, if anyone sleeps on the second floor they'll definitely have to cuddle up a little extra, lol! mom says its no big deal, we've all shared hotel rooms before, they can just share the attic room we were going to put mom & dad in [which also happens to be the warmest room in the house when the little electric heater in there gets going.], which is fine with me, i dont have to sleep in there with the snoring. ;] well, if that wasnt enough of a full house, dad informs me this morning that my sister doesnt want to be left out of the festivities either, so she'll be tagging along as well for the full 6 days that my parents are in town. shes off school during that time or something. so now theres going to be all of them in that room i suppose? its certainly big enough, and we've got enough air mattresses, so im not too worried about it. 

the one thing i am worried about however, it the showering situation. as far as bathrooms go, we've got three functioning toilets & vanities, so i think we can accommodate all the women. showering on the other hand... well theres only one operable shower and that wont be changing before this visit happens.. additionally, karen and i have discovered recently that we have about half an hour to maybe 45 minutes of continuous hot water with our new water heater [depending on how hot you keep the water i assume - karen takes scalding showers while mine are slightly less so]. it gets nice and hot, but i guess the tank doesnt last forever. so now that we're going to have 7 people sharing the one shower, it's going to be interesting, lol! its like being back at home in the mornings before school all over again... im thinking everyone gets 10 minutes and we do it in shifts, not to mention divided between the nights & mornings. anyway, dad assures me itll be fine, we'll make it work, and im really fretting over nothing. at any rate, it sounds like we're going to have plenty of hands and little assistants to help out for bit, so we should be able to get TONS of work done... i hope. karen and i are going to have to sit down this weekend and plan out all the projects we want to work on, coordinate materials & such, and hopefully we can be fully prepared for all the projects we have the potential to accomplish. the only two problems i foresee being a real possibility:

1. all the new recruits might not be up to working at our pace, haha! we hit the ground running each weekend [if you hadnt noticed yet] and we dont stop till we drop. 

2. ever heard the term "too many cooks in the kitchen"? my family, god love em, is a very opinioned bunch... its bad enough when karen and i cant agree on how something should be done or a color choice, etc. but now add this group into the mix with their views and thoughts on how it should be done... its going to be interesting. we're definitely buying any and all paint required BEFORE anyone gets here, haha, that should cut out at least half of the problem - if its already purchased, they dont need to "help" us pick it out. ;]

in other news, karen and i have recently been hit with credit card fraud and its really pissing me the ef off. it started last monday when i checked our bank account. im a little bit on the anal retentive side at times [real news flash there, huh? as if you hadnt already picked up on that, haha!] and i tend to check our accounts online at least every other day [if not everyday when im tracking certain purchases, bills, or expenses]. well this time around it paid off and i caught these 3 charges while they were still pending. 

well i called the bank and told them i didnt recognize the charges [theyd been made under my debit card number, not karens] but that i had the card in my possession so it obviously hadnt been stolen. furthermore, my lovely wife and i had been asleep at 12:37am, 2am, & 2:19am when the charges were made and no where near the address it showed the purchases being made. well they tried their best to assist me, we cancelled the card and ordered a new one [takes 5-10 business days minimum... ugh.] but they were clueless as to how it had happened or what the actual businesses were that were listed. when something posts to our account it lists the amount, time, date, and location, but depending on how the business has it set up a lot of times it just shows an address. this time it was simply an intersection of two streets which wasnt much help. not to mention, the intersection in question just happens to literally be a block away from my office, we drive by it every single day, and theres nothing on that corner! [or so we thought...]

anyway, i was frustrated then, but since we'd caught it early and it had only been my card used [although i still dont know how!] we thought we'd be done with the mess and just move on. id still have to call back later after the purchases actually posted to my account to dispute them and get them taken off, but i was assured that wouldnt be to much of a problem. 

well fast forward to this morning... i get on to check the account and sure enough those purchases had finally posted, however... theres a new one!! the same place! again at a time karen and i were at home and together and both had our cards[well, mines been destroyed since then]! this time however, there was a new twist. it was under karens card number... im irate at this point, not to mention completely confounded as to HOW! its obvious at this point that its not some kind of accident, not some kind of bank error, this is definitely intentional and too much of a coincidence to not be the same person doing it... but HOW?! karen has her card! anyway... so i called the bank and disputed the original charges, and karen has to call and do everything for her card. so now im assuming we're going to have no debit cards and depending on how we have stuff set up to debit for our bills [which i honestly couldnt tell you if its electronic check or debit card off the top of my head for any of them] its going to cause some nice problems for us to sort out. not to mention we pretty much strictly use our debit cards for purchases, and 90% of the time its my card we use because we're together when it happens. needless to say im a bit miffed right now and anxiously waiting for my new card. 

one problem still remains however... the how! ive yet to figure it out for sure, and the bank is no help. dad thinks we may have inadvertently had our cards cloned somewhere. apparently some crafty thieves can now take your card to pay a bill, lets say at a restaurant you frequent, swipe it in a card reader that makes a digital copy of the magnetic signature on your card, then ring up your bill as usual and youd never know the difference. well they can then take that digital copy and essentially paste it onto a blank credit card [dont ask me where you get any of this equipment, im befuddled!] and then voila! cloned credit card! i dont know how real this is or not, but i tend to believe my dad. either way, its bothering me that this has happened, and even more so that i dont know where that is. i cant for the life of me think of any place that we frequent often enough that this would have happened, or for that matter, anywhere that we've both used our cards for this to happen. like i said, its almost always just my card, rarely karens... so how do we avoid it happening again? honestly, i doubt anyone is going to catch the person doing it, and i cant figure out where id even stop going to avoid possible scammers... we really dont go anywhere that frequent other than the grocery store or home depot - and i assure you neither of those places has a person thats swiped my card twice, hell we usually do the self check out - so unless someone is installing fake readers at these places or something... ack, im so far beyond confused...

anyway, hope you've enjoyed this little update. hopefully you figured out the title [hint: i feel like im running a bed & breakfast soon, lol!] but if not... wow, youre dumb. ;]

if you dont already do so, id advise watching your bank account and credit card summaries like a hawk. this fraud thing is a serious epidemic and it doesnt seem like anyone is coming up with a solution that really works. i never thought it would happen to me, but now i know it really can happen to ANYONE!

have a great afternoon!! miss you all!! leave some love =]