Call Lowes, Ask for Hal in Lighting...

The other day, I made a strange discovery.  I looked up the sale price of my first home on the assessor’s website because I couldn’t remember what we had sold it for.  (Don’t ask me why the sale price from 15 years ago was important information because I have no good reason other than I couldn’t remember and my brain cannot handle not knowing stuff…you can’t imagine how awful my life was pre-Google or “P.G.” as I refer to it.)  When I got to the site, it gave me the information I was looking for, but it also said that my home was bought and sold by not my first husband and I, but by my first husband and HIS CURRENT WIFE.  Um. No.  I then checked our next home…same thing.  Now, I don’t have a problem with his current wife—we actually get along pretty well—but I would have been irked if it was anybody’s name on the record other than my own.

I called a friend of mine who works for a title company.  I didn’t think she would be able to tell me what happened, but I knew she could point me in the right direction.  She agreed it was weird and advised me to call the Treasurer’s office.  I didn’t realize the can of worms I was opening.  Here is what followed:

 

1.        I called the Treasurer’s office and got K who informed me that they don’t handle that--I needed to talk to the auditor’s office—she transferred my call.

2.        The woman in the auditor’s office was CLUELESS and didn’t know how to even get on the assessors site to see the record (she literally told me she didn’t think she could access the site, so I offered to send her a link to this public site.)  Once she did, she kept spewing back information about the current owners.  CLUELESS I tell ya.  She told me to call the assessor’s office and hung up.   Apparently my amazement at her incompetency came through the phone and was not appreciated.

3.        I called the assessor’s office and got B.  B was funny—I liked him.  He felt bad that I had been shuffled but told me they don’t have any control over the data on their site (?!?) so I should call the recording department and maybe info services.  He gave me the direct line for info services and transferred my call to recording.

4.        S in recording sighed loudly and said no, they don’t do this--I needed the assessors department.  I told her I had already been there and what B had told me.  She told me B was wrong and good luck with Info Services.  Gee thanks.

5.        The lady at the Info services department didn’t have an answer either, but she took my name to ask her manager and said she would get back to me.  (3 days later, she has not.)  She also said she was pretty sure I needed the title company.

 

I would like to point out that I manage an office in a customer service industry.  Maybe this makes me hyper aware of the service I receive, but I can tell you that if any of my customers were ever shuffled around the bank the way I was shuffled around the county building, I would be appalled/furious.  Be helpful!  Take ownership!  FIX IT!  Sheesh! 

I’m just bummed my name wasn’t missing from the records back when the house payment was due.  When the mortgage company called, I could have told them “I don’t handle this, call the assessor’s office.”  Click. 

I’m now too grouchy to deal with this anymore.   

On a better note, I am continuing to run.  I don’t have a schedule, I pretty much do it whenever I can fit it in, and for the most part I have moved from a morning runner to an evening runner.  Morning, outdoor runs are still my favorite, but it requires me to drag my sleepy butt out of bed and that’s just not happening lately.  I am using my treadmill in the garage way more often than I planned to during our beautiful August and I think I may regret that when it’s raining sideways in November and I no longer have the option of running outside without drowning.

 

I did something new this week with my iFit on the treadmill and it just has me tickled.  iFit holds weekly competitions where you can log on and join a 5k or 10k.  The competitions are all over the US, and this week it was in Cheyenne, Wyoming.  You sign up for the race and it loads into your schedule as the next map to run.  You have a week to run it and it shows you on the map where the leader and the average runner are at any given time.  (i.e.  10 minutes into the run, there is a green dot showing where the fastest runner was at 10 minutes, where the average runner was at 10 minutes, and where you are in relation to those two at 10 minutes—even if the others had run the day before—does that make sense?).  You also have the option of running with a “street view” but then you can’t see the other dots for comparison.  When you are done with the race, you can go to a results page which posts how many people have run the race so far, their times, and your stats compared to theirs.  This changes throughout the week as other runners compete and then at the end of the week, they have a final tally.  I love it, and look forward to running a new 5k each week to prepare for the live races I will be doing in the upcoming months!