More paperwork, more delay

[howeird]

At the mfg office for my 10 am appointment, I said maybe give me 15 minutes slack. I was there on time, she was 20 minutes late. I guess that's fair enough.

Dozens of pieces of paper to initial and sign,

some to do with state regulations about what needs to be inspected, which were already covered in the initial purchase document, most about the requirements of the mobile home park. The second one is they wanted me top bring my actual Social Security Card. A copy of my driver's license was fine, but they also needed my SS card, not a copy. Absurd, because the SS card says on it clearly it is not to be used for ID. No worries, I knew exactly where it was. I have a file folder toward the back of the top file drawer with all kinds of cards, and I had put it there the last time I traveled, along with my SCUBA card, since there was not reason for me to be carrying those around.

Instead of going straight home, I drove through the mobile home park, checked out the outside of the clubhouse and then went home.

Took all the cards out of the folder - there are about 200 of them, most of them bundled in a sort of category order with rubber bands. For example, all ID cards (old drivers licenses, AAA cards, high school ID, CNN and Direct TV contractor badges, etc.) which is where I expected to find it. Nope. Next most likely was one of the loose ones, because those are mostly still active, like library cards, a BART ticket, Starbucks card, CHM membership card. Nope. Checked all the bundles. Checked everything again. Did I shred it? I know I thought about doing that.

So, in a semi-panic because I need this in hand before I can make an appointment for an interview at the park, I look up SS online, fill out the form for a replacement card, find the address off the nearest office, and make plans to go there Tuesday (Monday is a Federal Mistake Holiday), and wait a week for the card to be mailed to me. I need my passport or birth certificate for that.

Those are in the top of the 4 small fireproof boxes in the bedroom closet. I open it up, pull out the current passport (it's on top of all the others dating back to 1975) find the envelope with two certified copies of my birth certificate, and as I am putting the envelope back, there is my SS card. Whew.

Next on the list is a letter from my apartment manager saying I pay the rent and don't throw heavy metal band parties in the room, or set fire to things. Walk to the apt. office, the nice lady says I can print that online. But no, what I can print out online is a for to fax to Corporate requesting they send the info. And the link is broken. I call the office, get voicemail, leave a message.

Also need an employment verification letter. I'll have to ask how to get one Monday, because I don't think I actually got one, what we got was email confirming we were now employees of the new company at the same job title, manager and salary as we had before the acquisition. I fired up VPN to the corpnet, but didn't see a way to ask for that letter on the HR pages. Kind of ridiculous, since they also want my last paystub. To me that's all the proof of employment they need.

So, things will be delayed a bit. I wanted to have the interview this Thursday, because I'm planning to work from home and avoid the bogus earthquake drill. Been through two of the largest ones in US history, don't need to fake it. And with the A's out of the World Series race, we're not due for another one.

Watched the UW-Oregon game until it was clear my home team was going to lose. Heated up some honey glazed wings and baked beans (the former to help reduce the clutter in the freezer).

So, out on the patio for some gardening. All the plants I had planted in the planters are dead and dried up. They were dead first, I just didn't pretend they would resurrect with the overnight temps dropping as they have been. So, three planters' worth of dirt & dead plants into a big black trash bag. I was hoping to save 1/4 of the 4th, the catmints plant, but it was also dried up. I did pull it out, dried branch by dried branch, took it into the kitchen and stripped off the leaves & seeds, and put that all in a ziplock bag. Spilled a little on the floor. Kaan did some excavating - the stuff turns him on. Later Domino also sniffed around.

Put the big bag by the door, washed my hands, and went back out on the patio to read the two very heavy texts from the park. The lease itself was pretty straightforward, much didn't apply to me because it talked to people moving a home in or out of the park. You would think they would have split out those pieces. The rules of the park, an "attachment" almost as thick as the lease, was also pretty clear. And there's a showstopper. It says there is a limit of one cat per household. WTF? It requires the cat to be indoors at all times, no cat doors. Every apartment which allows cats allows two. Part of the reason to buy my own home was so I could have more than two if I want. But just one? Insane. I'll see if they can come around to my POV at the interview. Unfortunately, part of my argument is Domino is about 18 years old, and probably won't be around much longer. I am disappointed that when I showed the rep videos of the cats this morning she didn't mention this possibility.

Reading took till it was time to scoot. Met Janice and a long time friend of hers from CO Springs at the newest Starbucks. Nice chat, mostly about techie stuff. Friend asked me if she could import from a USB drive to a smartphone. I was not sure, it sounded feasible with the right cable.

Home, dinner was some assorted dim sum, also a freezer item but it didn't free up any space because I only used half the items in the tray.

Watched some of the Cal-UCLA and WSU-OSU games.

Tried to rig up a USB drive to my phone using a USB hub and a standard phone cable, but the phone only saw the charging part, not the data connection. Online research says I need a USB On The Go (OTG) cable, which is basically the connections I did with the hub but in a single small cable. Other comments sounds like most phones have to be "rooted", that is, hacked to give root access, which is something I won't suggest anyone to do. As techie as I am, it's not something I'm very interested in doing myself. I'll look into that more just for curiosity's sake.

Mail had only 2 items, a letter from the company with the PIN number to use to enroll in the employee stock purchase plan, which they were supposed to have gotten to me 2 weeks ago. The window closes on the 27th. And a coupon from Toyota reminding me my next scheduled checkup is coming up. 5k miles or 6 months. They are 1800 miles and 1.5 months early.

Plans for tomorrow:
11:45 am showing of Gravity 3D. Theoretically IMAX is a higher resolution experience, but the local IMAX theaters give me vertigo, without a movie showing.
Football
Catch up on Tivo.