Wednesday, March 23, 2016

In which the water is almost cut off at Sly and Doris' house because the City of St Augustine utilities division is the only place in the world that does not allow their mail to be forwarded

On the phone with Primo as he drives from Nashville to Chattanooga. On the phone again after two hours because we were fighting on the last call and I thought, "What if he dies in a car crash tonight? I cannot have that be our last conversation."

I called and asked if he was better and he said he was and then he said he was cranky because Jack has been texting him with questions about Doris' computer, which Primo had prepared for Jack ("What's the password?" "Where's the information about the savings bonds that Doris gave to the kids?"), questions Primo really could not answer while he is driving AND NOT LOOKING AT THE COMPUTER.

And then Jack was totally oversharing about his kids and some problems they are facing - things I won't talk about here because they have always been great to me and have done nothing to deserve having their dirty laundry washed in public, but it was very stressful stuff and things Primo could not do a darn thing about now or ever because you cannot fix someone else's kids. But it was still hard to hear and now he is very worried and so am I.

He apologized for being cranky and I asked if he wanted to Throw The Cheese and he laughed and we were done fighting.

He is on a journey to Florida to retrieve boxes of what may be important papers but may not be important. We. Don't. Know. We will have to go through all the papers to make sure. Maybe there is a safe deposit box. Maybe not. If there is, the papers and the key could be in one of the boxes.

Maybe the Good Bracelet is in one of the boxes.

If it is, I am keeping it. Just because.

Four more catalogs and two random solicitations came today for Sly and Doris. Six more places I had to tell to STOP.

Primo put Sly and Doris on the Deceased Do Not Call list in August, well before he put in a change of address at the Post Office.

I read someplace that the way around getting the junk mail for dead people is to put in a temporary change of address. I hope this information is useful to you. I wish we had known.

So we are getting all of Sly and Doris' junk mail. All kinds of catalogs for trashy cheap made in China crap that we do not want.

That is the only sort of gift Doris ever gave us. Not a renewal of the Cooks Illustrated magazine. But junk. And a potted lemon tree that needed a tropical environment, which most definitely is not what we have to offer.

The only piece of mail that Primo has not gotten is the water, sewer, and trash bill. For the past two months. Which he did not know about because he is in the middle of all this drama and not thinking, "Wait! Have I gotten a bill for the water, sewer, and trash?"

Also, where we are, all the utilities come on one bill and it comes only once a quarter.

Primo did not realize this until he got a letter from the water company threatening to cut off the water if the bill was not paid.

Turns out the water company does not allow bills to be forwarded.

So if you are forwarding the mail for your dead father's house so you can pay the bills - not so you can get their junk mail - you will not get all the bills.

You will get the junk mail, but you will not get the bills.

Primo is cranky about that and so am I.


1 comment:

  1. Are they afraid people are putting in forwarding requests so they can ignore the bill? After all no one would dare die and their heirs would always live down the street so they can pick up the mail.

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