It's pretty much a mixed bag right now.
The bad: I'm stranded in frozen WI as my truck is in the engine shop. Again. As I suspected, they had to pull the head. I just spoke with them and my truck won't be ready until late Monday. So much for making any money this weekend.
The good: Yesterday was payday. As business has been slow it wasn't such a great payday, but it was something. I called my friend Naomi and sent her a comcheck for enough to pay about 2/3 of what I am behind on the lot rent for my house. Still not enough to fully pay that up or to catch up the actual house payment yet (or the utilities), but it's a start and would be enough to prevent them from eviction due to non-payment. At least for a couple more weeks.
Naomi called me back later in the day yesterday to let me know that she had deposited the comcheck into her account and wrote a check to pay the back lot rent. All of it. WTF? She said she didn't want to see me keep getting hit with the mounting late fees so she went ahead and paid the full amount, covering the balance herself.
I was somewhat floored by this. It was totally unexpected. I thanked her several times and promised that I would repay her next Friday when I get paid again. I know she really couldn't afford to do this as several of her renters (she owns a number of rental properties) are behind due to the crappy economy.
Her generosity was especially touching seeing that her husband had just wrecked her Jag on Tuesday (his Rolls was in the shop), and as she was in the passenger seat at the time she injured her neck in the crash. She is having to deal with all of the crap of being treated for that, the insurance company, trying to get her car repaired, and yet she still cared enough to go above and beyond to help me out.
Things are still very tight for me right now, but thanks to the kindness of this friend perhaps there is a little light at the end of the tunnel. Assuming I can get my truck out of the shop and do some serious running there is a slim chance that I may finally be able to start catching up on things within the next several weeks.
That's a relief as just a week or so ago I didn't think it would happen at all.
For now I just have to hole up in this hotel and wait for my truck to be repaired. It snowed again last night, and was still snowing a little this morning as I drove one of my co-workers back over to the yard so he could go deliver his load. I'm not a fan of snow so being inside where it's warm and dry is not such a bad thing right now.