Yet Another Sucky Day

Arghh!!

The economy sucks. I'm watching what little money I have in my 401k plummet. Unemployment is at an all time high. This is fucking ridiculous.

Finally Teach has started grading assignments and mama ain't too happy. The class I really thought I'd fuck up on was the management class - which I'm somehow pulling an A (97%) in. I got 50/50 points on that horrible case analysis paper. Personal Finance - which I thought I'd breeze on by in - not so good. I've currently got a C (73%). Fuck. I have got to get A's in both of these classes to pull my horribly low GPA up so I can get financial aid for next fall's semester. I've got another case analysis, as well as two 10 point discussions and 2 mandatory online chats on the 11th. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that my mother won't be down until after that. I've got midterms due by the 18th for both classes. It's not even noon and just by typing about this I'm getting stressed.

I went to the campus today to apply for my student loan for the Spring/Summer semesters. Yippee. Again mama was not a happy camper. I started at 8a in the financial aide office. I'm approved for a loan through Discover which for whatever reason the college is not currently accepting this lender, and is considering it a private loan. The lady sent me down to the cashier. The cashier sent me backup to the financial aide office. On a lighter note, it looks like I'll get approximately $10k for this that and the other up until next fall. Thank goodness. Hopefully my GPA will be in the 3's somewhere so I may be able to pull in close to $25k this year just for school. My Man doesn't want me working full-time next year but I may or may not. Hell - I don't know anything anymore.

I have figured this out though - Life really isn't fair. My Man has been depressed which has been rubbing off on me. It absolutely breaks my heart to see him in that condition. I sobbed last night for the first time in I don't know how long. I prayed to God and asked his dead mother for help. I've waited 30 years to find a man who treats me the way he does and takes care of me mentally, emotionally and financially (even though the financial thing I never really wanted) and he is a defeatist, like I was for so many years. He's horrified that he's going to bring me down but I know some way, somehow I'm going to bring him up.

This housing market shit has fucked us both. I put in four fucking years at A/D and I get laid off. I was on time, if not early every bloody day when half the office was always at least 30 - 45 minutes late. I gave my heart and soul to that company and I got fucked up the ass with no lube. Loyalty, seniority and hard work mean nothing. The bitterness is sinking in. Big time. He's stressed because the work isn't coming in like it used to - not to mention the fact he feels he should be making at least another hundred bucks a week since he's been doing what he does for the same company for over 10 years. He is signing his checks over to me weekly so I can manage life but it still sucks and is totally unfair. Why is it the hard working white, single, non-child having people seem to get fucked? My taxes have supported welfare and food stamp mothers for years and what have I gotten for busting my ass? Not a fucking thing.

Bitterness. Anger. Resentment. Blah.

Still Bored...

At least today the time flew. I slept in to 9:30a and headed to the bank, then Walmart, then the grocery store (oh yeah - I made a pit stop at McDonalds). I didn't get home until close to noon! Where does the time go? I even had lists.

When I got home I decided to go all arts and crafty. Grandma recently gave me this big knick knack holder thingy (something I really need so I can have even more crap in my office) and these two horribly gaudy (so of course I love them) lantern like chandeliers that have brown and yellow glass surrounding the iron where the light comes out. I don't think the previous owner could get them down so they came with her house. They hung in her bedroom for years until on one of her Superwoman days. She took the bitches down and they've been hanging out in the handicapped bathroom (for real - there's a roll in shower - was she planning ahead for something?) she uses for storage. I was there the other day and decided to snag them. My Man didn't seem too happy, they are quite tacky-ish and all, but I have a vision for both of these (and it's my house bitch) so I got on started.

I filled in all of the little holes, nicks and cracks in the knick knack thingy with wood putty and I'm still waiting for it all to dry so I can sand the spots down. What to do? I busted out the lanterns and cleaned the layers of dust off them as best I could. They have a lot of metal on them, (have no idea what kind but they're heavy as fuck) that looked kinda like black with hints of gold under all the grime. Our bedroom is painted yellow with a yellow bedspread (no it's not bright and sunny in there - I wanted like the Gold Room on Big Brother a couple of seasons ago) and we have big ass head and foor boards that are wood and black iron. I headed down to the Home Depot for supplies and it's on. As always, I'll have before and after pictures. I'm get so proud of my work.

School handed me a can of whoop ass last week... And I player slacker during that time. I had a Critical Analysis Case to criticize for the management class in a narrative form, so of course I had to look up what narrative form is. I need to be in remedial classes or something. Teach said initially Case Analysis papers should take about 8 hours and the bitch wasn't lying. I had to do a minimum of 4 1/2 pages and after 2 1/2 into in, I didn't have anything else to say. She wanted 'facts - no fluff.' How the hell do you read 3 paragraphs and then turn them into 5 fluffless pages? I started working on it Friday at 11a and worked for about 4 hours. I took a breaks just to do some of my housewife duties only because I needed to get the fuck away from the computer. I was up at 9a on Saturday and finally finished the fucking paper around 3p. 8 hours my ass. It took me a long, grueling 10 hours. I WILL NOT wait until the late minute to do that shit again. And then I still had to do a 'Case in Point' for the finance class. I finished everything up around 6p or so and then ran from the computer. Fortunately I only have 'Discussions' for each class this week where I have to make a couple of posts on savings accounts and ethical stuff or something by 11p Saturday night. I'm not procrastinating with this again. On Sunday I rested. In Monday I crafted, and tomorrow I'll get schooled. And get this - after all the assignments I've done: 8 between the finance and management classes - I've only received TWO(!!!) grades. I started handing in Assignments on August 30. WTF is taking so long? Doesn't this lady know I'm obsessive compulsive? Can I just get a grade or two? Puh-leeze? On a good note - I'm pulling A's (based off of the one assignment graded in each class) in both classes. Thank gosh!

And relax kids, I won't bore you with the case analysis.

Boredom

I'm tired of being at home and it's only September! Eeek!

The CW has fucked me up as it's changed their daily line up. Cosby was on at 8a but now comes on at 9a, a slot previously held by Judge Maria Lopez. George Lopez is on at 10a now; My Wife and Kids comes on at 5p; South Park was on at 11p or something last night. I used to know what time it is based off the shows but now I'm all kinds of confused. I have to remember to watch the Steve Wilkos Show today - I was livid as yesterday it was To Be Continued. Fuck me. I need to get outta here.

My Monday was a'ight as Gossip Girl was on. My Man (yes, surprisingly enough he is still here) thinks I need a life because I get into all of these teen dramas. Hey - I have to live vicariously through someone! I am semi-happy it's Tuesday though since 90210.2 comes on tonight, however I think this is kinda crappy because it should come on Wednesdays at 8p, their time slot for like a decade, but Mizz Tyra has that on lock down, which is okay by me. I have new TV shows to watch on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at 8p. Blah, blah, blah. I'm starting to sound like a whiny 15 year old.

We're still living in happy coupleness, but a housewife's work is never done. I swear it takes me half the day to clean the kitchen, clean the floors, do laundry, cook dinner, etc., etc., etc.. My Man is pretty hard up on me staying home when I start spawning off babies. I don't know if I'll be able to do that. I told him last night I will absolutely not drive a minivan or anything that has a sliding door EVER. No way, no how, it ain't happenin'. You can put me in an SUV or some type of 4 door sedan, but my ass is out the door if you think you're gonna throw in a Dodge Caravan and call it a day. NEGATIVE. I'm still getting used to the idea of being sperminated in 5 - 7 years, thus I am no where near ready to think about the prospect of being a soccer mom. I would like to win the lottery and get a surrogate. However My Man doesn't like this idea because he thinks the kid will come out with some of the baby carrier's features. I patiently explained that that is not how it works - my egg plus his sperm in the womb of someone else does not equal a baby that looks like the three of us. He disagrees. This is why I am the brain and he is the brawn. Bless him.

I went on a bit of a Xanax bender this weekend, just for fun, and I'm still recovering. I kicked that stuff like a month ago but I get so bloody bored that I'm searching for something, anything to do. I think I might take up drinking.

Just Kill Me

In my Personal Finance Class, due the week of September 20, I have to have to do 3 'Discussion' posts over 7 days. NOT IN THE BLOODY MANAGEMENT CLASS AND NOT THIS FUCKING WEEK. Even when I typed the assignment on my blog here I typed nothing about 3 posts - only CHAPTER 3 and QUESTION 3. I feel like a fucking idiot. But things usually come in threes, right?

Jeepers, I'm having problems remembering what I'm doing in two classes - what the fuck will I be like next semester in four?

Principals of Management, Chapter Three, Redux

Please make sure you read the first Chapter Three post before you read this one.

Some of my classmates had some replies to my 'discussion' (and these are cut and pastes so I personally would have hit spell check before hitting the post button):

Subject: Discussion 1
Author: ***** Simpson
I would have to agree with Elizabeth ***** when she said "It’s too bad ‘greed’ isn’t an organizational environment as it is THE element existing outside the organization’s boundaries that have the potential to affect the majority of organizations." It efffects us every day. The Economy hurts many people and small companies fill it to but sum of the lager companys are not effected by the economy (wal-mart) Some companys are doin better becuse of the economy. Because there dealing with supply and demand. Thats were greed comes in hand.

Subject: Re:Discussion 1
Author: ***** Sutton
I also agree with what Elizabeth is saying. I also belive as consumers we have some power if everyone would use other smaller stores these big stores would have to make some adjustments. I am basically saying stomp out greed by not feading it.

Subject: Re:Discussion 1
Author: ***** Padgett
Elizabeth,
Although I agree with you, it is definitely a dog-eat-dog world, on the other hand isn't that why someone starts a business.....to make PROFIT. I wouldn't exactly call it greed. Greed is defined as a selfish and excessive desire for more of something (as money) than is needed. Just as the company you worked for was in business to make money, so is the company that took their business. Unfortunately someone else was bigger, though not necessarily better. These larger companies just have the ability to play the upperhand and they use it to their advantage...that's how they continue to climb to the top. That is what business is all about. I did like the points that you made and your post was very informative, all in all I think you did a great job.

~~end comments~~

Look - I have some 'new fans' (but y'all will always be the only ones I care about). I'm finding fun with this because I'm enjoying the topic and able to voice my opinion on something I somewhat care about and (hopefully) get a good grade on(it's not graded yet though - hopefully I wasn't too jumping too much on my Tide box and/or way off the Richter scale; I'm also still waiting for my LoTR grade. That paper was due last Saturday. How long must I wait? But I am acing Personal Finance with a vengence.).

Like I said in the first Chapter Three post : (e) All of this work for a 10 point assignment. I need to create comments to at least 2 more of my classmates' posts between now and Saturday at 11pm. Comments only this time. I am no way in hell writing another short essay. I think I may take Friday off to cook. My brain hurts.

I did take Friday off and cooked me some homemade Cheesy Chunky Lasagna, a recipe I invented myself. Very very good. Even though I was supposed to do two more posts for that management thing I thought about saying fuck it because A) Everyone else wrote like a sentence or two - some wrote very brief paragraphs - some looked like a long post because they typed out the whole question at the top, while I on the other hand wrote was seemed to be a short novella (and I'm like Cher dammit! I deserve that 'A'); and B) it's only worth 10 points - exams are worth 200. So what if I don't get the whole whopping 10 points on this?

But you know me. I go big or go home. I haven't been in the mood for blogging but I was in the mood for writing. Then came the 'retort' from ***** Padgett. I felt like I needed to be vindicated. So here we go:


*****,
How you defined greed ‘as the selfish and excessive desire for more of something (as money)’ defines my case exactly.

We didn’t lose the account due to a poor marketing campaign, poor customer service or outrageous prices. Our employees played their roles exquisitely, everyone functioning and living in the environment of the customer. The sole reason we lost the account was greed. The homebuilder formed a company*, or ABA in violation of RESPA (the Real Estate Services Protection Act, a consumer protection statue first passed in 1974 in which the purpose is to help consumers become better shoppers for settlement services and to eliminate kickbacks and referral fees that unnecessarily increase the costs of certain settlement services), so the builder could make an additional profit for a service they did not perform. Their ABA does not market to any potential outside sources of business and does not perform all ‘core title services,’ both of which are flagrant violations of RESPA. Greed.

Our account situation also contained the legal-politic dimension on the side of the homebuilder. The builder’s middle managers who dealt our staff on a daily basis (the local VP of Finance, VP of Sales, VP of Land, VP of Construction and Division President) did not want to cease operations between our two businesses as our company was able to aid and improve their over all customer service ratings by our willingness to accommodate their buyers and closings, day or night, and pull so called ‘miracles’ out of our air conditioned offices. (This is probably the biggest difference between ABAs and individually owned and operated companies; ABAs are guaranteed incoming business from their ‘source’ while individually owned organizations must create an environment dedicated their customers as an environment in which to compete scarcely exists.) In the unfortunate end, the builder’s corporate politics possessed by the top managers prevailed and disservices were and still are handed out like candy at Halloween.

In most real estate transactions, few consumers are shop around for the best price, but are instead steered to particular companies by real estate agents, builders and lenders. In all real estate transactions, your agents, brokers and lenders have fiduciary responsibility to you, the consumer. However, I’ve watched that fiduciary responsibility shift from the consumer to the agent or the agent’s employer (one of whom is usually affiliated with a settlement service provider of some sort) in order to receive some type of compensation for themselves. The latest example I’ve seen locally is through a homebuilder – the builder require a lower down payment from a potential buyer, allow a buyer receive upgrades at little to no cost, pay all allowable closing costs (and as many non-allowable closing costs as possible) but ONLY if the purchaser uses their ‘preferred’ lender, a lender in which the builder most always has a financial relationship with. Greed.

Again, this happens everywhere in the real estate industry. It is common practice. NOTE TO HOMEOWNERS: Make sure you read the fine print and shop around.

Sadly, a group of individually owned and operated title companies have not banded together to fight this issue head on. The only thing these organizations can do is travel to Tallahassee to try to speak with Florida’s Office of Insurance Regulation. Unfortunately (but fortunately) the OIR has a full plate dealing with home, car and health insurance as well as workers compensation. I do know there have been some inquiries by the OIR, the last being October 2007. This only led to setting up another inquiry date (I believe this date is still to be determined). It does not appear that HUD (the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development) has made any changes to its regulations regarding ABAs since June 1996, years before the magnitude of the ABA scene was created.

Very little to no significant change has been made in over 10 years, which makes the future of the independently owned and operated title company seem rather bleak. I do however, believe these companies will persevere by continuing to make the customer their number one priority, all while patiently waiting for the bureaucracy red tape to be cut.

*a good definition of newly formed company entity can be found under ‘sham controlled business arrangements’ as defined in RESPA 34 CR Part 3500 http://www.hud.gov/offices/hsg/sfh/res/res0607c.cfm


~~end paper~~


I was looking at some comments on some of the other peep's "discussions" and they were like I agree with you! Great job! Valid Points! I'm going to close my eyes, point to the computer and just pick one and say Very well written. No more massive works for me right now. I have a long ass paper due next week and my two ABA bashings have taken a toll on me.

Dear Diary,

Life is not fair.

Why couldn't I have been the one?

Me and Emu - I mean EMO at the Zoo

I went to Busch Gardens again this year with my two dad having emo cousin. I love that kid. He is really polite, actually funny and said 'bad ass' and 'oh shit' in front of me. I like him a lot more than that brother kid I have.

Whenever I go to all you can eat buffets I never get my money's worth, so I decided we'd get a bang for our buck at the big BG. We rode ALL the rides (even the carousel - but we didn't go on the transport rides and the ones we were too big for. My ass is getting fat and I need my exercise.) I will NEVER go on the Phoenix again. It's one of those pirate ships that rocks you back and forth and then holds you upside down. All of the blood in my body rushed to up to head and I thought it was gonna explode. Rides don't make me sick but that one fucked me up all kinds of crazy. I'm just thankful I didn't eat first.

Like I said, I love the emo kid. Last year he had all the leather bracelets going up his arms. This year he had a studded collar and all kinds of shit hanging off his shorts (I still don't know if that is a suspender), and a purple and black striped hoodie. A HOODIE! I was in shock when I picked him up because it's (was) August in hot ass Tampa. The tourists were all staring and gawking at him. Oh what it was like to be young!

I emailed Michelle this pic with my WHAT THE HELL WAS HE DOING WEARING A HOODIE IN THE BLOODY SUMMER?! question.

Her reply:
I think maybe since the emo heart is so cold and barren, they are unaffected by changes in the climate.

Good answer, good answer!

Principles of Management, Chapter Three

I'm skipping the post for Chapter Two (unless you really want to read about what I have interpreted as my poor management skills in the common workplace - it is summarized by my inability to see the gray) because I don't think my paper was all that great however, I still scored a 10 out of 10 (with the instructor's comment of GREAT JOB!). I'm still waiting on my management movie grade. I have an eerie feeling on that one. I think it's taking me entirely too long to write these papers, especially if I have some passion for the subject.


ASSIGNMENT: Read Chapter 3; enter Discussion #1 online (See Discussion Questions, page 97, #3)


So I'm a dumb ass, read Question 4 and get all excited: Contemporary best-selling books often argue that customers are the most important element in the external environment. Do you agree? In what company situations might this not happen? Oh hell. This is a loaded question as I just lost my job because my 'client' cared more about the almighty dollar than customer service. I wrote half a response and then saw I was supposed to discuss Question 3. Fuck. I saved part of it under Ethic Notes and used the rest of it in here.



Question 3: What do you think are the most important forces on the external environment creating uncertainty for organizations today? Do the forces you identify typically arise in the task environment or the general environment?


My Discussion/Post/Answer/Whatever:

It’s too bad ‘greed’ isn’t an organizational environment as it is THE element existing outside any organization’s boundaries that have the potential to affect the majority of organizations.

With the declining economy and the ever changing real estate market, small organizations are having a difficult time staying afloat. My personal experience is with real estate title insurance companies. These are the companies which handle the processes and functions involved in residential and commercial real estate closings. The smaller companies or ‘Mom and Pop Shops’ are individually owned and operated and are not partnered in any Affiliated Business Arrangements (defined below).The ‘Mom and Pop Shops,’ as well as the consumers of these services, are being strongly affected by the task environment of competition (or in this case, lack thereof) between the individual organizations and ABAs. ABAs have created an inability for smaller companies to compete for business, as referrers tend to steer clients to the outfit in which they (or the company they work for) hold a financial interest. This inability to compete forces the smaller organizations to make difficult decisions, such as reducing their employees’ pay, laying off seasoned employees, or worse, shutting down their operation all together.

I’ve spent the last four years working for an individually owned title company that’s primary goal is to please their customers and provide a smooth closing process. However, I recently I lost my job due to an ABA. I was employed as the account manager servicing the business relationship between my company and a national homebuilder. I was let go (or was ‘voted off Survivor Island’ as like to say as I did manage to make it through a few rounds of lay offs) because the homebuilder opted to discontinue utilizing our services in order to use its own ABA, causing a significant loss of revenue for my company. As the builder’s ABA did not handle any portion of the ‘physical’ closing process, my former company was contracted to act as an ‘escrow agent.’ However my previous employer had the same responsibilities – managing the account, coordinating closings with the lenders, builder and home buyers, preparing documents need for closing, disbursing monies due to all parties involved in the transaction, all at ¼ - ½ of my company’s previous fee.

In this particular situation, the use of the builder’s ABA created two main disservices for buyers, the first of which related to the closing process. Unfortunately, an escrow agent is a notary only and not legally able to explain all of the closing/loan documents as to do so would constitute the escrow agent fraudulently acting as an attorney. The use of the builder’s ABA also affects the buyers financially. Our services based off a sales price of $200,000 would be $150.00 - $300.00 cheaper than that of the ABA.

Individually owned and operated title companies’ live in the task environment of the customer. With so many ABAs forcing out competition, small organizations must focus on providing services at reasonable fees in hopes of obtaining repeat business.


An ABA is defined as “An arrangement in which (A) a person who is in a position to refer business incident to or a part of a real estate settlement service involving a federally related mortgage loan, or an associate of such person, has either an affiliate relationship with or a direct or beneficial ownership interest of more than 1 percent in a provider of settlement services; and (B) either of such persons directly or indirectly refers such business to that provider or affirmatively influences the selection of that provider.”

Note from author: Basically this means the referrer (real estate agents, banks, home builders, and lenders) of a real estate transaction to a title company is receiving some type of compensation for closing from the referred title company. This happens THROUGH OUT the real estate industry and is not limited to title companies.


--end paper--

a) I really did submit the snarky comments.
b) It took me 4 - 5 hours to complete this one page because I possess way too much interest and knowledge in the subject. My 'discussion' should have been completed in an hour to an hour and a half or two hours max, but the perfection in the wording fucks me up every time.
c) I'm freaked out about next week's paper. It's a case analysis (worth 50 points - I have like 3 or 4 of them due this semester, just in this class. Sheesh.) and I've never written case analysis before. Anyone out there who can help me? (I'd like a proof reader too, any takers?)Teach says it should the case analysis should take about 8 hours to complete so in Danielle terms, I should have started last week.
d) I'm debating on sending an expanded version of this to Mr. D.'s contact at the Tampa Tribune to possibly start a discussion and acquire some type of media attention to this god awful situation and bring in some unemployment issues as well (title and mortgage employees are basically being blacklisted from any potential employers), as this industry sucks. Maybe I'll do something with 8 on your side too. Employment is at an all time high and a lot of this is due to shady schemes in real estate transactions. Again, I have the time. Kinda..
d) Boy am I looking forward to the Ethics section of the book. It will be a verbal (or shall I say written) assault on the real estate market as a whole. At least I can vent some of my frustrations.
e) All of this work for a 10 point assignment. I need to create comments to at least 2 more of my classmates' posts between now and Saturday at 11pm. Comments only this time. I am no way in hell writing another short essay. I think I may take Friday off to cook. My brain hurts.