You might need to take this in more than one gulp!

I don't have any new top ten lists, but I do have the most frustrating story. We received an order on Monday night for 600 books. This is the biggest order we have had yet, so we were totally excited. It's for a military base. As you can guess the final price is somewhat substantial. So yesterday morning I send an invoice to the woman that I'm working with through Paypal. A little later in the day she emails us back saying that Paypal won't let her pay with a credit card and that she needs to provide a bank account for verification. This is a military grant credit card which means that she doesn't have access to the bank account and isn't going to use her personal one - which I don't blame her. So literally I spent all afternoon and part of the evening trying to work this out. I think I have read just about everything on Paypal. Ask me any question on their policies! We even ended up calling the company, which required a 30 min wait to actually talk to an agent. We told them our dilemma and the agent said that all our client would have to do is call them and they could verify her over the phone. So we give her all of the information and she calls them this morning. Because the credit card is not in her name they couldn't verify her card and thus there is a cap on how much she can spend. She has all ready purchased books from us before through Paypal and is probably $100 away from her cap. So you can see the problem. She is now going to try to get us a check and we'll do it that way. Although we have yet to get a check from the military this way. Usually it has to be through the credit card. And furthermore the money expires on Friday. So if we don't get this worked through by Thursday night (tomorrow) we don't get the sale. Now she has to go through red tape to try to expedite the check - if she can get a check at all. I feel so bad because between this woman and myself we have easily spent 5-6 hours on this. We also could really use this sale, so it's frustrating to have it dangling in front of us and we might not be able to get it.

I think my mom and I are doomed to do things the hard way without any luck or guarantee of a positive outcome. Nothing is ever easy for us - except perhaps finding the closest parking spot or making a green light. I just don't get it. Have we irritated someone? Or is this just a test of our character? To see if we can handle and get through the most difficult situations and still have a positive attitude. I mean if I were to compile a list of the hard things that just I have had to face in the last 5-6 years, that should have been easy but due to some unknown reason wasn't, it probably would take several pages. Then if you added my mom's also, you'd have a small novel. Now I realize that other people face hardships and adversity, but to be perfectly honest I have yet to meet someone who has gone through as much crap as we have. You know how the saying goes that if we all threw our bag of problems into the middle everyone would pick back up their own bag? Well if I threw mine in I'd gladly take ten people's bags if it meant I didn't have to take mine back! I know that we are only tried as much as we can handle, but for real! I must be incredibly strong or something. The worst part about this is that I know even if more crap was heaped upon me I still would be able to handle/juggle/solve/work through it. It's just disgusting! I hate being strong! I wish I was a more simple person where all I had to worry about would be getting married, finding a suitable someone to spend the rest of my life with. That kind of stuff. But instead I face such hard challenges that I don't have any time to worry about such 'simple' things. But then again that worries me because if I don't have time to really concentrate on the simple things - they might never come to pass. (BTW I don't mean simple to be offensive, but rather to demonstrate a point.) So then not having time to worry about them then becomes a worry. It seems when one trial ends three more pop up. And they are usually emotionally, intellectually and sometimes even physically draining. At this point I am very grateful I have all of my limbs and that I'm pretty healthy. Although who knows what's next!

You can see now why I read so much. It's one of the few things that I can do that has the possibility of taking my mind fully away from whatever I have to deal with. It's an escape. Case in point: I stayed up last night until 1:15 am reading a new book I bought. 240 pages in about two hours is pretty impressive. And even still when I finally put my book down it took me easily another half hour to fall asleep. I'm glad I work for myself because I would be rotten to be with if I couldn't sleep in until between 8:30 and 10. Just for a point of reference I read at least eighty 400+ page books a year. And that doesn't count the ones that I skim and read only my favorite parts. I have kept a list since I turned 18 and this is about average for me. I am a very fast reader (not skimmer as many have accused me of, although when I do skim I'm even faster!) but even still I am generally in need of a lot of escape time.

I don't tell you this to make you feel sorry for me. I guess I just needed to vent. I will be fine. Either that or I will spontaneously combust one of these days. I'm telling you the idea of dying in my sleep some days is very appealing. No, I am not suicidal! I'm merely stating fact. I don't want pity, it's more like I want recognition. Recognition that my life has been harder than most and doesn't seem to be getting easier. (Just when I think it might be mellowing things like this happen!) I don't really need cheering up either - although you might feel different about that. To be perfectly honest if you were to call me on the phone right now you would think that nothing is wrong. Sometimes I think that I am a master deceiver. I don't trust easily. I will be ok! I have some fun projects lined up for me to do and I have a wedding album on the way for me to work on. So there are good things coming, even though they don't usually out weigh the challenges. I just have to take happy moments when they come my way and hope that they will last more than just a moment!

Thank you for listening (reading) to my rantings. Although, I wouldn't blame you if you just skimmed it. It is rather depressing who really wants to deal with that. I know that I don't. I hope that your day is better than mine. Although I think that someone would have to die or you would have to lose your job for it to be worse. Anyway, I'm rambling so I will close.