Money, money, money.

So after yesterday's post about my pitiful checking account, I got home and had a refund check in the mail from one of my (many) recent medical bills I'd paid. Nearly $200! You think I didn't deposit that sucker on the way to work this morning? Sheeee-ut.

Then I had a dream last night that I was in the desert, and this dude rode up to me on a camel and handed me $50,000 cash. No strings. No taxes. Just mine all mine. I fell to my knees and wept because it was such a relief. I dreamed about all of the things I was going to do with that money...pay off my credit card, pay off my car, put a downpayment down on a house that wasn't in the ghetto or Cedar Park, buy some new clothes for myself for the first time in nearly six months. It was such a wonderful sense of peace. Then I woke up.

I guess all of this stress is also tied up in the fact that, just for grins (and because it's been a few years since I've seen it), I ordered a copy of my credit report with my credit score last Friday. I have always been very, VERY careful with my credit. Have never missed a payment on anything, have paid off loans on time, never bounced a check. I've been a little angel. So imagine my utter astonishment when my credit score read: 666--POOR! Um...EXCUSE ME?!! I about fell on the floor. Not only because it's the Number of the Beast, but because it was just inconceivable to me that after all my carefulness that this could be my score. Well, after close inspection, I realized that the fucker is riddled with mistakes:

• They had that my birthdate was in 1929. I'm old, but I'm not that old.
• They still had me listed by my married name, which I changed in 2002.
• They had that my Master Card's credit limit is $0 when it's actually 5-figures. So it made it look as if the balance I owe is WAY out of whack with the credit I'm allowed.
• There was a $53 bill from last summer's fun trip to the emergency room in an ambulance. I'd paid the bulk of the bill to the ambulance company itself, but this was some sort of left over EMS bullshit that insurance hadn't covered. And they'd tried to send the bill to an address I hadn't lived at since 2001. And phone me at a phone number I hadn't had since 2001. And when they couldn't reach me, they turned it over to a collection agency, who'd been trying to reach me by mail at some address in Crane, Texas. Is that even a real town?

So I've had to spend the last couple of days on the phone with the credit reporting service, my credit card company, the bill collection company, etc. to try and clean up this freakin' mess.

My advice to you? Check your credit report. Now. If a credit angel like myself can be branded with the Number of the Beast, so can you...