WELL…[sub]taps foot, taps foot some more, checks email…[/sub]
WHERE ARE THEY? 
Well - send me some too! Just kidding…
Scotticher - true or false - are you still in Seattle?
Hon, I live 30 miles south of the Canadian border, along the “coast.” About 80 miles north of Seattle. A beautiful, quirky little town called Bellingham.
And no, I am NOT still in Seattle, although I was there for the past few days for Christmas. [sub]my sister lives in Edmonds, just north of Seattle. I took my 84 year old father there for the family celebration of Christ’s birth.[/sub]
I liked Bellingham a great deal when I was there last (to visit friends) - and lived there as a child.
As I type this, I am about 15 mintues outside Seattle…
NO WAY!!! You lived here? That is so…[sub]weird isn’t the right word, but I cannot come up with another[/sub] FUNKY!
I wish I had known that you were there, we could have gotten together for a latte. Maybe next time? Keep in touch.
I will definitely do that! It will be good to get together with you!
ummm, whomever’s putting together the PC hasn’t responded to my (previous post) offer of a video card, is it needed?
No WAY Cheri! You’re in Bellingham?
I lived there for 2 1/2 years - 1998-2001, managed the local TV station up there.
Yeah, I’m back in El Lay now, though…
Too bad we never crossed paths…
How’s the fund going?
“Well, I’m back,” as Sam said at the end of the LOTR.
I am absolutely amazed at the response to this thread – at the love and compassion so many of you have shown and are showing for me and Barb. There just are not words to express how I feel – but I’ll try to find them, and thank each of you individually for what you’ve done.
To bring my story up to date, here’s the present situation:
*Job{/i]: Nothing definite as yet, but I go for “a second interview” for a fundraising position with our local MDA chapter on Jan 3. The woman who did the initial phone interview implied, though she did not state outright, that the second interview was more or less pro forma, to weed out the inappropriate people that might have slipped through the phone interview, and would be more in the lines of initial training (eliminating any candidates that wouldn’t work out in that) than of a final screening. The program they’re doing is analogous to “Cardiac Arrest” and similar fundraisers – people agree to be “arrested” and network among their colleagues to “raise their bail” – that bail actually being contributions to MDA. What I’d be doing is contacting local businessmen and such to solicit their being willing to participate.
Car: This is a funny story – one of those things that proves that one of the primary features about God is that He dearly loves a practical joke. Thanks to the extreme kindness of a couple who belong to this board (and whom I believe wish to be anonymous), we were given a check for enough to pay off what we thought would redeem our car from the repo man – past due amount plus towing and storage. As I mentioned in an earlier post, though. the finance company started adding charges in on that beyond what we’d expected. Since we were only about 16 months into a 60-month contract, the car was (as we found out later) overpriced and had depreciated, we had effectively no equity in it.
So, we checked with local dealers on what they could put us into that was reliable and within our price range. And encountered one of those people who would have restored one’s faith in human nature if this thread had not already done that almost beyond belief – a semi-retired man, former car salesman, who runs a small used-car operation more or less as a hobby. While he gives no formal warranties, he stands behind what he sells in terms of being willing to fix what comes to light as needing repairs and/or taking the car back if truly a lemon – and does in-house, low- or no-interest financing for people who need it.
What he had on the lot that was cheap enough for us to afford and reliable enough was a 1992 Pontiac Firebird – high mileage but maintained extremely well by a younger man who had been dealing with him all his adult life and needed to trade it in on a car that would fit his growing family. It required a new catalytic converter and an ancillary pipe, and the dealer split the cost of that with us; with that replaced it runs beautifully.
So you have the picture of a fairly sedate couple in their fifties driving a white sports car around the Triangle. We had the experience of a kid in a little used Honda passing us on the freeway, glancing over, and doing a perfect double take – which cracked us up!
Computer: Another couple, who also wish to remain anonymous, shipped us an absolutely wonderful computer – one that apparently does everything but go out and do odd jobs for the neighbors when not being used as a computer. I cannot express how beautiful this machine is. We hooked it up with a decrepit monitor, broken but functional, that had belonged to our old Packard Bell 486, now three years in its grave, so as to have a screen available to log on tonight.
Finances: We have been managing to keep most of the wolves from the door – phone bill is now paid off and utilities current, rent current and heating fuel can be paid off with money now on hand (thanks again to all of you). We are not heavy eaters and have been able to have a more or less good diet within our means (I noticed Tris being concerned about that).
My unemployment was scheduled to run out on Dec. 28 – I was extremely fortunate in that the law governing unemployment had a quirk that allowed me to claim benefits for a three-month period after my initial benefits ran out. While I’ve worked a few temp. jobs in the interim, office temp. jobs seem to have largely dried up around here. (I spent a week as supplemental floor staff when a new BJ’s Warehouse opened here, among other things.)
Any ideas people have on using my writing skills professionally in some way would be something I would dearly love to hear.
And I want to tell you that Cheri is an absolute angel – as also is CJ, and Aenea, and every single one of you – but I’ve gotten to know her through long-distance calls she’s placed to me, on her dime, to cheer me up and keep me updated on what’s happening. (Not to mention several calls from CJ and Lib. and Andros …)
And if I go on about how wonderful you all are, I’ll end up crying on this beautiful new keyboard.
So let me say again my heartfelt thanks to everybody, until I can get a complete list and start thanking you all one by one. I don’t know if any of you have ever been lifted from despair and made to feel like you are loved by people you haven’t even met yet – if you have, you know how I feel, and if you haven’t, let me say that there is no feeling in the world quite so wonderful.
May God bless you all as richly as your kindness has blessed me. (And if you don’t believe in God, then may you come to feel the love of your fellow man as fully as you have shown it to me – sorry; if I get theological in MPSIMS, I might incur someone’s wrath! ;))
Glad to see you back, Poly.
You are too kind, Polycarp…I only did what anyone of us would have [sub] and DID, too…[/sub] and I am thrilled to be of help. Truth to tell, getting to know you better is worth anything I have contributed. You are a gem of a person, and I am proud to call you my brother.
The fund is growing, more slowly now as should be expected, but still growing. I’ll give you an update tommorow morning.
** //\etalhea|) **…I am not technilogically inclined and I don’t KNOW if your video card is needed…I am waiting on some advice from the people who contributed the computer…I’ll email them again since I think maybe my intial email must have gotten “lost in space.” Sorry if it appeared your offer wasn’t being noted or appreciated, I should have said something sooner. I didn’t think you would see this until Sunday, so I held off until I knew something.
I should also let all of you know that, due to the mention in this thread of another Doper in need, donations have been coming to me for THEM, too. And I am eternally grateful for that. Again, if you want details on that situation, email me at my newly available email address. (See below)
As Poly said, there are not words enough to say how wonderful all of you are.
[sub]and sorry for the Bellingham hijack there…it is just so amazing to find that people here have actually even heard of my town, let alone lived here! Truly amazing if you knew how small and insignificant my town is. I think there is some sort of lesson in there somewhere, as I am also small and insignificant in the scheme of things…yet so many of you have been so kind as to know who I am, and to appreciate me, too. However undeserved, it feels good anyway.[/sub]
welcome back Polycarp 
::happy dance::
Welcome back Poly; we’re just happy to have you back and glad that we were able to help out in some small way.
Cheri, of course people have heard of Bellingham – it’s the city where they launched the spacecraft that defeated the invading Snouts in Niven and Pournelle’s novel Footfall!
Of course, there wasn’t much left of Bellingham afterwards – using A-bombs to launch a spacecraft kind of messes up the launch site and surroundings! :eek:
Glad you are back, Poly, to say the least. And, yes, I was worried about the “little things” like food, and fuel, and medicines. It’s probably a professional reflex, but I tend to think of things in a particular order, Socialization, Hydration, Nutrition, Shelter, and Medicine.
Not that I suspect you of not being willing to admit a real need, but I just don’t leave stuff like that to chance. I guess I’m pushy. Now I will start praying for a good job, since that seems to be the next real steppingstone you could use.
Thanks again, for being the sort of person that this thread happened for. We needed this. We also need you on a few threads, too. (Take at look at Lel’s thread on the very personal aspect of Predestinationism.
Tris
“Write a wise saying and your name will live forever.” ~ Anonymous ~
I won’t pretend that I have a CLUE what you are talking about, but I am so happy to have you around again that I won’t quibble.
[sub]and I WAS wondering what happened to that little patch of downtown Bellingham that seemed to disappear the other day, so…it is nice to have the mystery solved! Especially since it sounds like we WON?[/sub]
Sigh.
How the heck did I miss this thread before now?!? A belated “sorry to hear of the woes, and welcome back,” Poly.
Welcome back Poly…
Scotti, a meager amount of funds will be headed your way USPS tomorrow.
Both funds. Seperate envelopes.
Poly,
I read your post in GD. It is great having you back. I rushed over to read the latest. I am tickled with the news of your car situation. Enjoy. I wish you look on the new job possibility. Have a happy New Year.
One week, people, one week.
One week ago today, I got up, logged onto my computer, found out about Polycarp’s situation, and despaired. This morning, I woke up, went over to GD, saw Polycarp’s name in a thread, and immediately came over here. It looks like I get two Christmas mornings this year. In my family’s tradition, Christmas Day is reserved for family; Boxing Day, the day after Christmas, is for friends. This year, you’ve given me the best Boxing Day present ever – the return of a friend. Thank you doesn’t begin to express it.
I feel like I’m being incredibly selfish, but I can’t tell you how much the overwhelming generosity I’ve seen here has touched me, and I’ve just been watching it. If anyone asks, this thread will stand as a reason why this Board takes up too much of my time.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s a thread I promised I’d start when Polycarp came back.