I’m sure you know (since I begged for votes everywhere); I was the finalist in a contest for $5000 over at Gather.com.  The contest was sponsored by Boca Foods and of all the entries, 10 were chosen for a week-long voting session to determine the winner.  First and foremost, I entered this contest on a whim and really didn’t think my essay was very good.  It could only be 250 words and I had to edit and cut a ton out. But I wrote to the audience; I knew Boca wasn’t going to give the money to someone who needed to pay off credit card bills (which we do), or install a new hot water heater (yep, we need that, too) – the whole point was about finding “balance” in your life not using a contest to fix your financial issues; and was selected as a finalist.  I did not win, nor did I ever expect to, but during the week of voting I found myself biting my tongue quite often but now that it’s over I’m going to vent a little. 

First of all – until I heard about this contest from one of my favorite bloggers who sometimes writes articles for Gather I had never, ever heard of the site. After I joined and entered the contest I dug around a little and found that they think themselves the grown-up Facebook – “the premier social network for the over-30 crowd” is how they describe themselves.  Basically, it’s a lot like Facebook (the old version) but it also allows you to have a personal page for posting “articles” much like if you had a blog, and allows any of the other members to read your posts (if you want).  It also, apparently gives you points for your activity which you can redeem for gift cards to stores like Target and Starbucks.  The site is big on “Engagement marketing” which is exactly where this contest, and dozens of other contests they host, fits in. 

So, I’m selected as a finalist along with 9 others.  7 of us were new members of the site who registered for the purpose of entering the contest.  Immediately the bitter and hateful comments begin.  There was a lot of whining about “all these new people who are only here for the contest” and griping about other entries from long-time members not making the cut.  Once one of the finalists started to pull ahead in votes people started attacking her entry and making fun of her ideas.  Some starting crying foul over the voting poll used (I was one because they only allowed one vote from a location, so of my entire office of 90 people only one vote counted, but I got over it pretty quickly).  After about 3 days of this I was pretty much done with Gather.  I had enough of these kinds of clique relationships in middle school.  Once the winner was announced (with a HUGE lead over everyone else – the girl knows how to market herself!) more cries of “the contest was rigged!” echoed through the comments.  Ugh!  So much for being “a social network with substance”!

I have enough to deal with in my real life to get caught up in the childish antics of a closed-off, bitter, judgmental group of people on the internet.  I quit reading ParentDish a long time ago because of this kind of thing.  I’m not naive enough to think that the internet is all rainbows and unicorns, but what happened to common decency and wishing others good luck and congratulating them on their success?  For a group of people who belong to a social network for adults they all need to grow up already.

I mentioned before that I was pissed at Charter One Bank (part of the RBS banking group). We had been with them for about 6 years with no problems and in the last few months all of a sudden we were getting hit with all kinds of insane charges. For instance, my paycheck gets direct deposited around 2 AM on Friday and I have always had several automatic payments withdrawan out of the account on payday; for 6 years this was never a problem. Apparently they recently changed their rules for deposits  so that now the direct deposit (which is available immediately for a cash withdrawal and shows up in my available funds total) is processed at the end of the business day for to pay automatic withdrawals. So when those payments were automatically withdrawn the deposit technically (by their new insane rules) wasn’t there and my account was technically overdrawn. And here is the new kicker – they charged me TWICE for each overdraw; once when the payment was initiated and AGAIN when the credit card company actually took the money (even though by that time the money was available for payments). So a $100 payment to a credit card cost $80 in fees even when the money was THERE and AVALIABLE for withdrawal (but apparently not avaliable for bill payment)!  This makes all kinds of sense to me made me batshit crazy.

So I call to complain and they tell me I have to go to a branch to get assistance. I go to a branch and the teller is just as confused as I am over all the crazy fees so she calls the “banker” from the back office up to help me. The dude who walks out is no more then 24 years old and I hate to say it but this gets me even angrier. I mean, come on – I’m sure he was well educated and all but I don’t need the Doogie Howser of banking to tell me it’s going to be okay. 

So,I explain the whole thing to him and he pulls up something on his computer that he won’t let me see and I can tell he can’t really figure the fees out either as he keeps trying to search for the same thing over and over and doesn’t get the result he wants.  He gives me a half-hearted and vague explination of the new double fee rule. When I tell him this is total crap and ask for him to waive one fee he tells me he can’t do that and I need to call the 1-800 number from the website (the same people who told me to come to a branch!).  I tell him I plan on closing this account and he tells me “if you think you want to do that I can help you with that, ma’am“.

I ask Mark to go to the branch by his office the next day to see if he can get compentet assistance.  The “banker” there looks at the account, is surprised by the all the fees and takes time to figure out what they are all for. He then apologies profusely and says HE doesn’t have the authority to waive fees but he would call the regional manger to see what he can do. I’m not sure if this is because Mark was dealing with actual adults or because of a gender-respect think but either way we were angry over all of this. The banker from Mark’s branch called back later that day and said while the manger wouldn’t approve the fee-waiver (!) we could submit a formal request to have the fees refunded and in 6-8 weeks they tell me if they will even consider it. UGHHH!!

Later that week, we opened an account at a local Credit Union and started the process of switching banks. We left $5 in the Charter One account for about 2 weeks after the last automatic payment was made, just in case. We went to close the account for good this past weekend only to discover a new fee had been charged – $35 was charged for low activity (again, I had this account for 6 years and never experienced anything like this). Then, of course, since the money I had remaining in the account was less then $35 they then charged me an overdraft fee on the fee they charged me! Apparently Charter One is not a bank so much as it is a never-ending hellish vortex of fess.

I pitched a fit, but no one would help so I ponied up the cash, closed the account and stormed out. In my view, they owe me $155 and I’m going to keep throwing tantrums until they pay up.

From August to December of 2008 I lost 40 pounds. It just fell off week after week and I felt great. I was using WW eTools religiously and started working out regularly and everything just clicked and I felt like I had made a lifestyle change that would stick. My gallbladder surgery was scheduled for December 10 and in preparation I worked out HARD for the 2 weeks leading up to that date, knowing it would be a week or two before I could return to my regular schedule seemed to motivate me and it felt great.

Then my surgery got cancelled at the last second (literally, I was prepped and waiting to be wheeled to the operating room) and everything fell apart. I fibbed about the real reason for the cancellation, telling everyone that some chest congestion kept me from going under the anesthesia, when in truth I found out during the surgery prep that I was pregnant. Pregnant! After trying for a bit with no success, then getting sick and trying hard not to get pregnant, here I was knocked up and unable to have surgery. I was excited and shocked – this timing was a perfect fit for our “3-years apart” plan – but I didn’t feel pregnant at all and was trying to wrap my head around it.

Knowing I was pregnant gave me an excuse not to continue my workout schedule; which lead to me not working out at all, and to fall off the WW wagon. The holidays hit and then I lost the pregnancy to miscarriage and everything got put on hold. The miscarriage did not hit me as hard as I expected – nothing about this pregnancy felt right and I wasn’t terribly surprised when it happened. It was hard and emotionally draining but I was not as wrecked as I thought I would be. It also gave me an excuse to further my delay my return to eating right and exercising and instead indulge in comfort eating. All of this lead to me gaining 7 pounds back in about 6 weeks. I felt sluggish and tired so getting back in my routine seemed even harder.

Now my surgery is back on for February 9 which has given me some motivation to hit the treadmill and turn Jillian back on. But I just can’t get my eating back on track. I’d lost most of the 7 lb gain but now my weight is starting to creep back up. I KNOW it’s because I’m only doing half of the job – it takes working out + eating right to lose weight, but I’m getting increasingly frustrated. I’m working out really hard (I’m actually running on the treadmill – something I haven’t done in …well I don’t think I’ve ever run on a treadmill before), I’m keenly aware of my abs, quads and shoulders as they are always sore, but the scale keeps moving in the wrong direction.

There is a new wellness competition starting soon at work which has me as a co-captain of a team and I’m hoping that my competitive spirit will help me get back in balance with both the eating and the exercising. I hope to recover from this surgery and get pregnant again quickly and I know being healthy is a key component to that equation, but right now I’m really struggling to keep both things going at the same time.