I might have mentioned that one of the repercussions associated with my upcoming move involves the folks currently living in my basement room. The mother, who is employed as a caretaker for the property owners, will be moving into the basement of the house next door. I’ve been supplementing her meager wages with a 1000 peso ($20) a week bonus, so she will be losing out on that after I’m gone. The real impact is on her daughter, Inday, who won’t be permitted by the landlord to join her mother when she moves. Inday is in her late 20s and unemployed. Her boyfriend, who has also been staying in my basement, is minimally employed in the construction trades. Inday is also a Hasher (Cum In My Basement) and we are Facebook friends. I’ve seen her increasingly desperate posts asking for leads on affordable housing in the area. Of course, with very little income there ain’t much they can afford. Although it is not my responsibility, I do feel bad about her situation.

I also probably mentioned that my part-time helper, Gina, left my employ a couple of months ago. And when I was checking out my new digs yesterday, including what is actually a pretty nice basement maid’s room, a thought occurred to me: I could offer Inday the part-time job, pay her the P1000 a week I was giving her mother, and let her (and the boyfriend) reside in my basement. I mentioned that possibility to Inday and she seemed grateful (her English isn’t that great). I saw her mom later and she thanked me profusely. So, it looks like I am going to have another helping hand around here.

Otherwise, not much else is going on. The rain has put a, um, damper on my walking activity, or at least provided a handy excuse for my laziness. One of those. I took advantage of a break in the storm yesterday and hustled down to Cheap Charlies.

Anyway, it was Saturday night so I played the role of big spender–lots of lady drinks and food for the girls. That’s kind of a once-a-week undertaking for me; I’m not rich, after all. Why all that generosity last night set me back a whopping $60! Yeah, I must be crazy, I know.

This morning on the dog walk I took the boys to see their new place. They didn’t pee on anything, so I’ll take that as a good sign. I’m going to need to rearrange some furniture to get everything to fit. It should be cozy (that’s the nice way to say “cramped”, right?). It’s gonna be a bit of an adjustment, but it will be fine once I’m settled in.

I took myself out for a French lunch today at The Pub.

And that’s today’s installment from the story of my life. Thanks for dropping by, and remember, don’t let those masks slip! Right Dr. Fraudci?

The rent-paying saga has now come to an end. But there was one last gut-wrenching episode to that story. In yesterday’s post, I mentioned that Western Union had extracted nearly $3000. from my bank account as I had authorized for my move-in expenses at the new apartment. They also attempted a duplicate withdrawal which my bank rejected for non-sufficient funds and charged me a $29. fee for my failure to let WU rape me. Regardless, the rent money was out of my account and presumably on its way to my landlady’s bank account.

Not so fast! Late in the afternoon I received an email from Western Union advising:

We’re sorry to let you know that we canceled your recent transfer. We needed additional information from you to complete it but were unable to reach you at Not-A-Number(false).

Are you f’n kidding me? They unhelpfully provided a US 1-800 number to call if I had any questions. I was livid and drafted a nasty email response, then noticed that the fine print advised that responses to this email would not be seen and suggested contacting a customer service representative via their webpage. I went to the webpage and no email addresses were provided. You could call, mail a letter (people still do that?) or chat with someone online. So, I tried chat. After waiting a few minutes, I got connected with someone named Adhar. He took my basic information, asked me what the problem was, and after I explained he told me to hold while he looked into the issue. When he returned he told me I would have to call a 1-800 number. I explained that I was in the Philippines and couldn’t call a toll-free number in the USA. He came back and gave me a number that he claimed would work from here. It didn’t. That was thirty minutes of my life I’ll never get back.

Now what? I asked a local techy friend if there was a way to contact a toll-free number from my mobile phone. He said, “just add three zeros before the one”. Seriously? I tried it and it worked! So now I’m “talking” to some AI voice that assures me it will understand my responses. It took my name, my transaction number, and my issue–then told me to hold while I was transferred to an appropriate customer representative. Moments later I’m connected to a young-sounding woman speaking in accented but understandable English. She asked what my problem was and I let her have it–with both barrels. Yeah, a week’s worth of frustration came spewing out. In essence, I said, “you tell me the transfer was canceled because you need more information. And yet, you had enough info to withdraw the funds from my bank and are now refusing to send that money on to its final destination. Then you have the audacity to say I provided a false phone number. I’m talking to you from that non-existent number right now!” I was using my “BIG VOICE” which I’ve been told is both loud and intimating. I actually felt bad about it afterward and semi-apologized. To her credit, the CSR simply said she was sorry for the misunderstanding and proceeded to try and rectify the issues.

First, she said she needed to call me at the number I provided. “You want me to hang up?” I asked incredulously. “No,” she said, “stay on the line. I’ll be right back.” I’m not sure what she did, maybe dialed and go a busy signal. Anyway, when she returned she said that there are many fraudulent transfers to the Philippines and therefore it was necessary that I provide additional information about my transaction. Fine, fire away.

What is the money being sent to be used for? Paying two months rent and two months security deposit.

Who is the recipient? Karen van Scheck, the owner of the property.

Have you ever met her in person? No, I’m dealing with her agent who is a personal friend of mine.

How do you know this person owns the property? Um, because I know other tenants in the same building who have not encountered any issues with her or their wire transfer services. *Ahem*

Hold on, sir. Okay, I’ve submitted your responses and your wire transfer is now approved. When will the money arrive? It is there now, sir.

Thanks. Have a good day. *click*

Anyway, I get what they are trying to do–prevent me from ripped off. I still contend if my transaction was flagged as potentially fraudulent they should never have taken the money from my account. The landlady emailed me this morning saying the money was indeed in her bank account. And oh yeah, my bank responded to my message about the insufficient funds notice and said the $29 fee was being waived. Another victory!

This morning I met with Heidi, the landlady’s rep, and we did an inventory of the house contents. Then she gave me the keys:

I’ll figure it out. I’m going to need to get duplicates made to the essential doors–for the helpers and to hide outside for the inevitable drunken night when I lose mine. Ain’t life grand?

I’m going to start a slow transition to my new digs. Need to get the internet transferred before I move for one thing. I’m tentatively looking at Thursday next week for using the Hash truck to move my larger items. I don’t like moving, but doing it piecemeal might make it a little less burdensome.

In other news, Facebook reminded me of a painful memory from three years ago:

Speaking of hiking, there was a Friday get-together yesterday. Given the recent heavy rains, we stayed down low and mostly on paved ground. One of the gals with us said the hike was “long and hard, just the way I like it!” You are welcome. Here are a few pictures:

As I mentioned, we didn’t get much rain during the hike. But right as we finished lunch the sky opened up and rain fell in torrents. I chose to walk home anyway and was soaked to the bone. Damn, I miss those sunny hot days! Kidding, I’ll take the rain for now. Ask me again next month!

I am going to miss this view. Things change, life goes on.

A quick epilogue to yesterday’s rent-paying fiasco. I received a notice from my bank that a transaction had been rejected due to insufficient funds in my account. Well, that was my stopgap measure to keep Western Union from double-dipping. Seems to have worked although I was not happy about being gigged for the $29 bounced check fee. Oh well, lesson learned.

I spent yesterday evening at It Doesn’t Matter. It appears I enjoyed myself:

I bought from the Yakult vendor and the peanut vendor, but not the ladies’ sportswear vendor. She had an interesting setup though:

My doctor’s appointment went about as I expected. She took some history, reviewed my prescriptions, and referred me to Bay Pointe hospital for some lab work. When I get those results she will review them with me and we’ll make a plan from there.

So, that’s that. Keeping this post short and sweet to make up for the torture I put y’all through yesterday.

Oh, has anyone else noticed the whole COVID narrative falling apart like an old building?

Regular readers are well aware of my fondness for going out every night–eating, drinking, and carousing with the ladies like a rich man. Well, those things come with a price and now I find myself in the unenviable position of having difficulty fulfilling my obligation to pay the rent on my new place. It was due on the first and remains unpaid as of now.

Here’s what happened. You may recall that last Sunday I initiated a wire transfer of the first and last month’s rent, plus two month’s security deposit via Western Union. That’s nearly $3000. at current exchange rates. Shortly thereafter I received an email from WU advising that I had failed to supply some required information. I clicked on the link in that email and it took me back to my submission but didn’t specify what was missing. I messed around with it for a while, then inadvertently submitted a SECOND transfer request. When I attempted to cancel the second transfer, I got a message advising it was “too late” to do so. What the hell? So, I went to my bank account and transferred money from checking to savings, leaving only enough for one wire transfer in the amount I owed my new landlady. Then I took a wait and see what happens approach.

Well, as of this morning, nothing happened. I had told my landlady to be on the lookout for funds coming via Western Union. She sent me a message last night saying nothing had arrived and mentioned the previous tenant had paid via Xoom without issues. By the way, my landlady is a Filipina living in the Netherlands, but the rent money goes into her Philippines bank account. That shouldn’t be a problem, just makes the process a little more complicated. Anyway, I told her if the funds had not been transferred from my account by this morning, I’d initiate a new action using the Xoom service. It wasn’t, so I did.

Nothing comes easy for an old-timer like me it seems, especially when it involves any kind of technical skills; like reading, writing, and following instructions. Turns out, Xoom is an affiliate of PayPal, so I had to use PayPal to log into Xoom. I didn’t recall having a PayPal account until I tried to create one and was told that my email address was already associated with PayPal. That started me on the process of getting a new password since I had no idea what the old one was. I got the emailed security code, plugged it in, and hooray, was able to change my password! After that, it was no problem getting into Xoom and completing the form required to initiate a wire transfer.

Now, Xoom does things a bit differently than WU. They don’t charge a fee for the transfer itself, they just gouge you on the exchange rate (they are upfront about that). So, with WU the dollar to peso rate was 47.63 or so. With Xoom, it was 45.10. With the amount I was sending that made a significant difference in cost, but what are you going to do? I submitted the transfer, got a notice that it was approved, and the landlady would have her money in a matter of hours. What a relief!

And then I got an email from Xoom. My transfer had been cancelled due to “security concerns”. They gave me a number to call, which doesn’t do me much good from the Philippines (no, I don’t know how to do international calls from my mobile phone either). I sent an email explaining I was trying to pay the rent and asking what steps I could take to resolve their security concerns? Their response was they’d get back to me maybe tomorrow.

Now what? Well, a friend here had mentioned he uses World Remit, so I logged onto their site and registered an account. But when I tried to set up a transfer from my U.S. bank, the Philippines did not appear on the list of countries I could send money to. WTF? I assume the problem may have something to do with my having a Philippines address, but I don’t know why that should matter. I was too frustrated by this point to be bothered with trying to resolve the issue.

A company called Wise (formerly TransferWise) was my last option. I was pretty impressed with the ease with which the submission requirements could be accomplished (or maybe I was just getting good at it by now). In next to no time at all, I was ready to make the transfer. Well, there was one thing that made me cringe. They use a third party to extract the funds from my bank account “for my protection and security.” This third-party app needed my bank account log-in and password. I did a Google search of the third party and Wise and found nothing derogatory. So, I gritted my teeth and supplied the information. I’m going to go to my bank account and change the password, so I should be okay. And just like that, I had the message that the wire transfer was in process. Even got a link to a way to track the progress online. Then a little later an email telling me the transfer was taking longer than normal, but the money should be in the landlady’s account by tomorrow. Alright then, mission accomplished!

I’ve been checking my bank account throughout the day watching to see if and when the money is withdrawn. And finally, just before I sat down to write this post, the three thousand bucks had been removed from my checking account. By WESTERN UNION! Aw, shit. I thought after four days of no contact they were out of the picture. So, now what? I went back to Wise and canceled that transfer. I guess it is safe to assume the money is finally on the way to the landlady. I’m anxiously awaiting her confirmation of receipt.

Next month’s rent ought to go easier at least. I’m an old hand at this now. I do believe I’ll be using Wise next time though, they were the easiest of the lot and I like their tracking feature. Although maybe not since I’d have to change my bank account password every month. It’s getting hard for me to remember my name these days.

In other news, I made it through last night’s tropical storm unscathed. It didn’t really kick in until after my bedtime, but I was awakened a little after midnight by the sound of the wind’s fury and the rain pounding down on the roof. I was still awake when the power went out. I figured it’s o’dark-thirty and a storm is raging. What are the odds this is going to get fixed anytime soon? Well, fifteen minutes later the fan came back on and I returned to sleep in the relative comfort of its breeze.

My neighbor and fellow Hasher, Simon (Leech My Nuggets), was not as fortunate. When I walked past his house this morning, I saw this:

Kevin Kim posted a funny video of this brothers in uniform–The Grammar Police. I know I could be arrested at any moment for the crappy way I write the crap I post here. The history of the Grammar Cops goes way back to the Egyptian times as this rare drawing demonstrates:

Alright, I promised some pics from the Wednesday Walkers hike yesterday. We trekked up Kalaklan ridge again, but took an unfamiliar route. There is no easy way up, but comparatively speaking, this one wasn’t too bad. We did about 7.5K all told. It didn’t start raining until we were down from the mountain at least. Lucky us!

The last of the hike was in the rain, but by then I was so hot and sweaty it was a relief. Still, it was a good day in the Philippines.

Yesterday afternoon I’m minding my own business, just walking up the highway to get a haircut from my bakla (transgender) barber. The next thing I know the skies have opened up and water is pouring down on me from above. Luckily, I was right across the street from Cheap Charlies when the deluge began, so I made a dash for the relative safety of the bar.

Of course, there are other dangers every bit as severe as the rain. I count thirsty bargirls as one of them. With few customers in the bar, I promptly became the target of their attentions in pursuit of the coveted lady drink commission. Alas, my resistance proved futile, and drink they did.

Eventually, the rain stopped and I was able to make my escape with a lightened wallet. Back on the street and hungry now, I made my way over to Sit-n-Bull for some dinner. One of the daily specials was Salisbury steak, a dish I hadn’t tried for quite some time. I ordered it up and enjoyed a cold brew while the cook did his work.

With my hunger satiated but still thirsty, I headed over to Palm Tree for beer and beach views. I wasn’t disappointed.

Finished the night with a couple more at Queen Victoria and then on to the house ahead of my 9:00 p.m. bedtime.

Speaking of the rain, it is raining as I write this. And if the forecasts are to be believed, lots more rain is in my immediate future.

And it looks like tomorrow is really going to blow too.

Oh well, it could always be worse. Oh, shit! It is. Saw this post on Facebook from the Barangay Captain:

We are reminding everyone that there are a lot of jellyfish / guinea fowl in our seaside, all are prohibited from bathing in our sea in Barretto.

What the fuck is a “guinea fowl” anyway? Oh, I guess it’s like a chicken. Not sure why that would preclude you from “bathing in our sea”, but whatever. These would likely keep me out of the water though:

Apparently all those folks I saw on the beach and in the water yesterday didn’t get the message. Or maybe it’s just a bunch of overblown nonsense. There are other reasons I’d avoid the waters of Subic Bay, but that’s just because I’ve been upriver and seen the shit washing downstream. No thanks!

I’ve got a doctor’s appointment in the morning. Actually, I’ve been feeling better lately. Sleeping better, too. My helper (who is a certified caregiver) procured some hydrochloride tablets that seem to have cured whatever was itching me. Still, I need to get the annual physical I haven’t had for a couple of years now. We’ll see what the doctor has to say about my future.

That’s the report from here. I’ll tell you about the Wednesday Walkers hike tomorrow. Now I have to contend with the rain as I make my weekly journey out to Dive In. Heh, who knows? Maybe I’ll meet a rainy day love.

Rainy day people always seem to know when you’re feeling blue
High stepping strutters who land in the gutters sometimes need one too
Take it or leave it, or try to believe it
If you’ve been down too long Rainy day lovers don’t hide love inside they just pass it on

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPEmtRVT5zo