Cell phones and vacations...

Okay, so as I posted the other night, we got Keigan a cell phone. Mind you, she is 8 years old. Every 8 year old needs a cell phone, right? Anyway, the day after she gets the phone, we are headed to see some family and we stop at the gas station. The hubs and I get out of the car. He pumps gas and I go into the store to pay for it and get me something to drink. Both kids stay in the car. I get done in the store, come out, get in the car and Keigan is hysterical. I try asking her what is wrong, and all I can understand is "I'm sorry, it was an accident" and so I am trying to get her to calm down so I can understand what the hell is going on. Finally, she gets it out "I changed my password to my phone and now it won't work!" Really? You are 8, and all of this because you can not remember the little lock code? That is what I was thinking, but I did not dare say anything. She seems to be a little sensitive if she thinks people are laughing at her or if she is going to get in trouble. Inside I was busting out laughing. Outside, I was a little irritated that she was acting like this over a phone, at 8 years old, and also because she was trying to be sneaky. After looking on Google and trying to figure out how to get in to the phone, I ended up having to call the phone carrier and tell them what was going and they reset the phone, deleting all of her games she had already put on the phone. When the Hubs handed her phone back she quietly says (in her I guess you were right, pouty voice) "I guess I am not ready for a phone!" I did explain to her that she does not need to set a password on her phone. I did tell her that if she wanted, she could set up a pattern code, but that anything that she tried to lock and keep secret, that I could and would find out how to get in it. I told her that until she and her brother are 18 and out on their own, I would have passwords, pattern codes or whatever they had, I would know what they were as well, and that they were not going to try to hide things. She agreed and has decided that she will just leave the phone and passwords alone. Lol.

We have also finally been able to set our vacation. This has been about the most stressful thing! Here's the deal. We have been paying on a time share for the last 2 years or so, which is a whole different blog in itself, but like I said, we have been paying for this thing for at least 2 year now. We have never used it once. $350 dollars a month for at the very least 2 years is $8,400 that we have pretty much just given away, for NOTHING. For vacations that we never take. For something that we have never been able to get reservations because they are always booked. For whatever other reasons, it has been money wasted. Hell, we could have gone a couple of cruises with that money. Paid a car almost off.
Anyway, this $350 dollars use to come directly out of our bank account, but I had to put an end to that when they started taking money out of my account without letting us know about it, or when they were not suppose to be taking it. I called my bank and they put a stop payment on them and they were no longer able to take money out of the account. Well, this being the last of our priorities, when the Hubs work slowed down, this became the last bill that we worried about and so we would either pay it or not. (Usually not) but we would let them know what was going on and they would work with us. Then it got to the point where we were like "fuckit, the deal was that we were only going to pay of the monthly payments and the other person who went in on the deal with us would pay the other half each month, but that never happened and we have been the ones stuck with it, so we decided we would just let them foreclose on the whole thing and be done with it. We have a place to live, 2 new cars, who gives a shit if it goes on our credit? After a couple of months, and the steadily trying to take money out of our account and the bank not letting them, they called us and made us a great deal. HAHA. They waived all of the late fees, maintenance fees, all this shit and basically ate all the missed payments. We said fine, we will give it one more shot, and we tried to make reservations and of course it was the same as always, everything was booked. I called the billing people back and told them just to foreclose on the stupid shit, and that I would not be making a payment, and I let them know exactly why. Low and behold, within 5 minutes they were able to make us some reservations. Not at the resort we really wanted to go to, but we were going on vacation none the less.
I make the payment, and then call the bank to let them know that I did give permission for them to take the payment etc. The bank then tells me that if they lift the stop payment on that company, that I will no longer be able to ever stop payment on them again. Of course I tell the bank not to lift the stop payment. Well, a couple of days later the payment comes out of the bank. I was like "fuck it, we will pay it, and see how it goes, and if all else fails, we will close the bank account and open another one?"
Everybody is all excited, we are going on vacation. Yay. Then we start reading reviews of the actual resort that we will be going to, and there are far too many more bad reviews than good. There appears to be NOTHING to do other than swim in a little lake, or a swimming pool, and we don't need to drive 5+ hours to do that. We have a neighborhood pool and the kids dad has a boat and they go swimming in the river or bay, or wherever they go on the boat. Then...a day or two later, I am online looking at the bank and see where the bank stopped payment and then put the money back into my account. I could not help but laugh my ass off and think "this is a serious sign that we should not be going to this place!"

Now that vacation is like 4 days away, SOMETHING had to be planned. We were not letting the kids be all excited about going somewhere and doing something fun and then bust their bubble and tell them SIKE. Just kiddin, we are not going anywhere.
Let me tell you, this planning a last minute vacation for 2 families has been one hell of an ordeal and I don't, and won't do it again on such short notice. lol.
I will be sure to blog and post pictures.