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firemama · 2 years

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Hey, Tumblr.

Sav’s 2022 saga of misfortune has come to a spike this fabulous May with a serious car issue. What makes this so bad, Sav? well... my only source of income, at this time, is that I am a delivery driver with shipt. Hard enough with the gas crisis- 5$ a fucking gallon- in orlando traffic, you might say. You’d be right.

I’ve got no savings; most of my money was burned through during a month long period of homelessness, a couple months of not being able to work due to being generally transient and out of town and thus out of my shipt metro and unable to even deliver for income, medical bills for an injury, moving and storage costs, and some other bullshit. I’ve got no savings, and i’m pushing debt on my credit card. And at this time, with my car in need of repair, I have no source of income and another bill.

So I am asking for donations, if anyone has something to spare, however small.

Patreon Paypal Kofi

If Donations arent your speed, or you would like something in exchange, I also do commisions. Moodboards for small cost donation/commissions as low as a dollar, and I also do art and writing commissions. Hit me up to talk about commissions if you’re interested. Some basic information about that is pinned to my blog, and my other blogs.

For those who are not familiar with Sav’s 2022 saga, the summary is:

Orlando/Florida major property tax increase. See: sudden rental cost hike. 1200 to 1300 will net you poorly managed slum lord apartment in orlando now. Our previous rent of roughly 1300 (which had been steadily increasing with every re-sign of the lease) suddenly jumped up to just shy of 1800, and would continue to climb with future extensions.

Preparations to move to new york for sibling’s school; see, also very fucking expensive, because im talking New York, New york. but its sib’s grad school, scholarship, gotta go, very important.

Just before moving time, a series of... events occured. Including but not limited to:

Major fall out with roommate (one of three tenants) which would result in one less person paying rent come renewal. With just me and the sib, never could afford to stay in our current house anyway. So, no going back, no resigning lease if New york falls though.

Rather serious workplace injury to my dominant hand. At the time, thought, oh kind of serious- a deep injury to the knuckle joint that... i probably should have taken in to get stitches, but.. didnt, and instead just bandaged it up. “I cant afford medical bills right now” i said, unaware of a big storm coming.

My work, a few months prior to this, had every single Senior Manager quit in the span of a couple weeks for the entire franchise. This was a warning sign. At this point in time, it is much worse. For starters, I had been demoted from Manager to Assistant Manager and then to Associate again... because my Migraines had become worse (from stress because COVID and the mail system and all the mangers left and xyz) and i could not keep the minimum 50, then 40 hours. Despite being demoted, and less pay, I was responsible for neigh all the managment responsibilities at my location because there was no one else. For 11$ an hour. And then all the other less-senior managers from other locations also quit, because no one was making more than the average Mcdonalds employee. Very bad, all around.

I had to submit my resignation anyway, because we had an out-of-state move coming. And I was already being paid less, and expecting to take on the work of more than one salaried job. But before I submitted my resignation?

(Tw, injury)After two-three weeks of excruciating pain despite the visible damage to my finger being healed, and no increase of motor function, and also a strange mishape to my finger. I finally filed for workers comp, belatedly, and went on down to an urgent care. The deep injury, if you’re curious, had been caused by a tape gun; specifically, a customer trying to grab the tapefun from my hands anddesimating my hand, most expressly my poor fucking finger joint. And upon xray at the urgent care, they found a metal tooth from the tape gun in my finger. more specifically in my finger joint. quite literally grinding against my bone. doing serious damage to my joint. (I am now legally allowed to complain about pain and no one is allowed to tell me im complaining too much. broken off sharp metal tooth in my finger for nearly three weeks.

Surgery, obviously, to remove the sharp foreign body from my hand. It was a very quick surgery, actually. But to the point, my workers comp covered most of the injury. Most. Not all. expensive, like I thought, and i definitely couldnt afford it. but necessary.

And then we found out the ‘scholarship’ covered less than a 16th of the overall tuition to the gradschool in new york despite it’s title of ‘full ride scholarship’.

New york fell through, and we would not be able to keep our then-current lease.

so now we have less than two weeks to find a new place. And all of our research and propsects were in another state we cold not afford to live. we had no time, and due o afformentioned text increases, out prior 1200... just does not exist. not for sale anywhere. If it does, we ‘technically’ make too much to afford it, because our combined annual income if I ‘pretend’ to still work at UPS is too high for rent control. (the irony is that we could barely afford 1200-1300 and yet somehow rent control says we make too much money for it). If I say I do not work for ups, which I dont, because i quit... well we dont meet minimum income.

Mostly, we’re screwed!

4 days before must-be-out-of-house, we find one option. 1200$ 2 bedroom that will allow our two cats. We do a fast walkthrough, because we dont have any options anyway. Place has infestations twofold, the maintenance guy is trying to fix 12 different holes in the walls, and we cant test the power or water because it isnt on yet and we cant really wait. Front door locks, has AC, theres an on-site laundry facility, has working fridge, sold. We mostly only interact with property manager, who I did like quite a lot, and he assured us he will help fix the issues and can get the place ready by our frantic date.

I move into apartment with all of our stuff. We rapidly find several, several issues. No smoke detectors, window (ground floor) with no lock and two that can’t even close all the way. Both of those things, some of you may know... are illegal. It was not the only illegal aspects, such as one room being incredibly unventalated, most of the lights not working with no other light sources, occasional plume of smoke from the fuse box, and (this is in florida) no netting on the windows. Things that are not included in the ‘illegal’ list but still very much problems: hidden mold (did you KNOW it’s not illegal for landlords to rent a property with mold?), and other fucking stupid shit. The real show stopper, however, was that the apartment’s payment portal malfunctioned. We paid them the deposit the rent, everything... and it paid it back to my sibs account.

This is when we meet the actual landlord. Who is insane. She is incapable of texting legibly, and is almost incomprehensible over the phone. She does not know the landlord laws- which is her only job as a landlord- which she showed by telling us it’s our responsibility to provide smoke detectors, for example. (no, that’s illegal). She tries to back up this claim by saying it is stated in the lease we will provide the smoke detectors. Which proves she cannot fucking read a lease, either, because it does not say that in the lease, it says we are obligated to provide batteries for pre existing smoke detectors, and even if she had written that into the lease... it would still be illegal. it breaks housing codes. like a lot of other shit. Her excuse to all these issues was “well this isnt luxury housing.” Our windows not locking and you meeting builing code, lady, is not luxury, it’s minimum.

This whole thing is summed up with her ignoring all these issues and demanding we pay her. I tell her we did, because we did, but the portal doesnt work. She says that isnt her responsiblity, pay her again and make it work. I am speechless. It does not matter if im speechless, of course, because she never lets you get a word in edgewise and will simply talk over you, but anyway.

Obviously, only option or not, we cant fucking stay in this apartment. Legally, we cannot, and if we play along despite that, we wave our rights. And im sure if we give her money, she will try to keep that fucking despoit and declare our rent non refundable or some shit. So we declare that she broke our lease (illegally) and that we’re going to leave as soon as possible. She threatens to call the police because we’re scamming her- as if we get anything out of this. could kill her and feel no remorse. she gave me a crazy stress migraine that was not relieved by excessive stress panic attack or crying.

We break the lease. With nowhere to live, we put all our shit in storage. more costs we cant afford. Insues a month of having no home. I go out of town for a while and bum a guest bedroom. Sib stays with partner.

We spend most of that month looking for somewhere to live. I burn through savings with no source of income- cant deliver outside of my Metro zone for shipt, and other issues with delivery, and I wont be in one place long enough to apply to work anywhere. Spend money on storage, on moving trucks getting shit back and forth, on ‘non-refundable application fees’ and on medication for the cat, and on follow up appointments and medication and treatment for my fucking hand.

some fucking asshole backs into my car on easter sunday. Not once- no, he backed into my car and then paused. surprised he is no longer backing up. tries to back up again, continuing to back into my car he is already hitting. pulls forward a little. backs up again. slightly louder crunch and this time he realizes what he’s done. Mind you i am on the fucking sidewalk less than 6 feet away from my car, walking to it, about to get into it. He looks me dead in the face and tries to leave the scene despite me trying to flag him down. Only stops because someone stepped out into the road in front of his fucking truck to stop him. Is drunk. fights insurance trading like hell. Takes about an hour to get it from him on threat of the cops.

ensues, while without home, an exausting insurance battle. drunk guy tries to claim the damage was prexisting. I have witnesses, and I also have a fucking picture of the back of his truck with pieces of my car stuck in his bumper. Eventually he gives up, and I spend stupid amount of time conversing with car insurance. My car is old. and it is also a saturn, which is a company that no longer exists. It is also not technically one saturn, but two saturns franken-steined together with different parts of two older saturns. Obviously, despite the damage being cosmetic, they want to declare my car totaled. not-drivable. Obvious unacceptable, nd even if i did, the value on my car is shotty and i’ll get nothing from them for it. dribble car is much more valauble. but because it’s cosmetic damage, on an old ass already costmetically ugly car... basically zip on pay out. not even enough to get the specific cosmetic damage fixed.

Hardly fucking matters, because the check... is now being held by the bank. When will i be allowed to have it? they dont know yet.

Technically, my fucking car isn’t okay to be driven yet. I have to wait on a new title to be delivered, take it to a dmv to be inspected and declared drivable, hope to god it passes, and then pay them for all this shit. The check, if i ever get it, will probably fucking pay for that. *thank god for insurance.* so glad i pay them for this. I will have a car that is not repaired and no money to repair it with. fuck. At least it’s mostly cosmetic, except for my slightly warped gas tank hatch that is now a struggle to get open.

We find an apartment. This is great. We have a place to live.

This means more moving fees.

so we’re back in orlando. I have no savings left. I have a bit of credit card debt I cant pay off, and we still need some essential shit to buy for this place. but hey, we’re not homeless. Place isnt perfect yet- has rats, might have roaches, neighbors are wild and loud, pretty sure theres an active drug dealer based on the weird activity in the parking lot at all hours day and night.

but we’re not homeless. and im back in my metro, so i can deliver, so I have a source of income again. Everything will be fine.

Check is still being withheld. car is still technically not supposed to be drivable. this is fine. I will make enough money to survive this month, wrack up a little bit more debt on the essentials we need, but thisll be fine for a month or two until better work... good thing i can still deliver.

Lived here for a week. Sibling’s car breaks down and needs repairs. uh oh!

The day we get my sibling’s car back from the mechanic’s? today? today? Obviously, my car breaks down. Obviously. fuck.

There’s more. This is a mostly abridged highlight. Other details- such as the fact that I had to borrow money from someone to get even this far, and my very old cat needing a vet visit that i just cant fucking afford yet- are all involved. My hand still has poor mobility- yesterday someone commented “I thought you were right handed” because they noticed i dont use it to do things like pop the fucking water pressure cap off my car engine to refill it’s leaky collant tank. Our current fridge may or may not be cool enough to store dairy in, we arent sure yet. we still need to buy a fucking dryer, we dont have a means to wash/dry clothes yet, and I dont own a lot of clothing so I’ve been stretching one outfit over a week.

Look, 2022 is fucking killing me. At this point I need roughly 6000$ to magically make it out of may without debts in three different places. Obvious not feasible, and it would still put me out roughly nuetral with no money. So... whatever I can get. Preferable enough to get the fucking car fixed so i have income. And then hopefully rent so we don't end up homeless again and with an eviction on our record.

If you read all this, please. Even if you dont wanna donate for nothing in return, it’s literally only a dollar to commission a cute little mood board.

#munchatter #donations #I am once again asking you...#eh that meme u know it #I think im going to have a mental breakdown #real soon #sorry if this has typos its 6am and I made this because im so stressed i cant fucking sleep

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