Have you ever just had one of those days when no matter how hard you try you feel like your swimming upstream?

Mine was yesterday.

This all happened in a span of 2 and a half hours.
I stopped by the county court house to pick up a new license plate for the new car for what should have been a 10 minute errand.
But it turned into a three hour tour.

First I had never been to the court house even though I drive by it multiple times each day. I eneded up turning up a one way street the wrong way. Not a good idea by the court house where you’ll find more officers than a 24 hour doughnut house.
I got it turned around with no one even noticing.
No ticket, maybe luck was on my side.

I then go and find the tag office and there is no line.
Maybe it is my lucky day.
They only take cash and checks.
I carry neither as a habit.
There is an ATM in the lobby so I tell the nice lady I’ll be right back.
For some strange reason my card won’t work.
I go back and tell the lady I’m going to walk up the street to a bank.

A nice hot day for a 2 block stroll. The first bank has no exterior ATM.

The second bank has a drive through ATM with no one on line. Once again my card does not work.

It dawns on me it is a new month and sure enough my ATM card is expired.

I then call my favorite bank in the whole wide world (only because my cousin works there).  Actually I only use them because every time I have tried to run away in the past they have bought whatever bank I ran to and I was beginning to think it was personal.

Last month before I went to Des Moines I called and told them I was having trouble with my card and I thought it may have been an expiration issue. I explained I had lost the replacement cards. They assured me the card was fine and did not send me new ones. But that was last month.

This time I get through to a nice gentleman who I believe was on the job for his first shift helping others. I explain I don’t know my secret code word so we go through the alternate questions. So after that he tells me all my accounts are frozen and I have no funds. I explain to him that I believe he is looking at old accounts that were closed a few years back at which point he replies “Oh, okay, what is your secret password?” After explaining to him again that I do not know it we answer all the same questions again. And he asks how can he help me and I tell him that I need a new debit card. He says “So you need to check on pending transactions?” No, he is obviously reading from wrong script. I finally straighten him out in my nice, gentlemanly way and I’ll have my cards in seven to ten business days.

I am still lacking my $20 for the license plate.

No problem, I’ll just head down the street to one of my stores and buy a Coke, use my Discover Card and get cash back.

Brilliant. That is until I realize in the name of fiscal responsibility I had put most of my cards in my desk so as to not use them. I pull out another card and least I am now refreshed.

Now it is plan C. Which is to head to the house and find a check.

I arrive home and see a package on porch. Yay, my new business cards are here. Maybe it is my lucky day.

But I also find the door knob has fallen off the front door. We had been looking to replace it as we have had issues with it in the past. None as serious as the current suicide attempt.  Replacing it with a similar set up would cost about $140 and the missus and I were in disagreement over the expenditure. She wanted the same and there was no way I was paying $140 for a door knob.

I entered through garage as is my norm in search of checks only to discover that the spouse of the $140 door knob fan club fame had the last checkbook. So we continue to cycle through our plans and return to the Discover card purchase cash back plan.

It is at this time that I can not find our new cat. (Pictures and story in later post) I find her behind the dryer. So I rescue the cat and head out to get that elusive license plate stopping only to get the mail and inadvertently dropping all car registration paper work in the driveway.

I head to the store and purchase some toiletries and I now have cash in hand. The end is in sight.

I head back to the courthouse, driving only in the proper directions on all marked streets.

It is then I discover that I am missing my paperwork. Oh well, no problem the nice lady said she would hold the plate until I returned. The nice lady must be a part timer as she was gone for the day.  Some other nice lady went in to the back and spoke with a supervisor and retrieved my plate.

I then headed to Home Depot bought a $9 door knob and headed to the nearest store to buy a Mega Million ticket as it seemed to be my lucky day. On to the house where I discovered my car registration paperwork in the middle of the driveway.

I installed the knob on the front door and the best part was the $140 door knob spouse knew better than to ask where her $140 knob was as I had already explained my day to her.

The fire drill was over! I know there are a lot bigger problems in the world but there are just a few days where the stars align so badly that all you can do is laugh.