A couple weeks ago I got a disconnect notice from AT&T due to the past due payment of $175. That $175 charge was due to two 10-10 phone calls made to Cuba in May - minus a $15 credit from the 10-10 company.

A phone technician came out shortly after I received the original bill and confirmed that there was a problem with my phone wires - they had somehow become crossed with another persons phone line. I was credited for all the extra local distance phone calls made (97 over my alloted 25/month) - the next month I had to call again, and was credited for another 15 local calls over my alloted 25/month. (I use my landline ONLY for DSL and Tivo.)

At&T customer service is and was wonderful and has attempted to help me get this resolved however they can.

The 10-10 company on the other hand has been completely unhelpful and completely obtuse and obstinate and HORRIBLE! AT&T has of now taken the charge off my account so I won't see it anymore on my bills from them, and won't receive anymore disconnect notices. The charges are being reversed to the 3rd party 10-10 company.

If my dealing with this particular company today are any indication of what will happen once I get a direct bill from them . . I'm in for more headaches and hassles. BUT I AM NOT going to pay those charges!!

I spoke with a rep first today of the 10-10 company who kept repeating that their company had given me a $15 credit back in July and that is all they can do. So, I asked to speak to a supervisor. The supervisor said the same thing. I asked her if it mattered at all to her that the phone calls were NOT made by me nor anyone else that has ever been in my household. She just kept repeating that the phone calls were made from my number and all they could do was issue me a $15 credit.

I got so fed up because it was going nowhere, that I finally just hung up.

The lady I spoke with at At&t told me that once I'm direct billed by the 10-10 company I'll have to contact them directly once again and see if they'll budge any at that point. Most likely they won't, so then my next step will be to contact the Public Utility Commission or the FCC. Either of those agencies will be able to contact At&T for my account records and will easily see the validity of my story - and hopefully put an end to this saga once and for all.

So, that's how I spent the better part of an hour of one of my few vacation days this year.

Some of you may recall near the beginning of this year my bout with some terrible jaw pain, which was diagnosed finally as nueraliga. I was told that I may only have the one episode, and never have one again. But if it did come back, then I'd probably have problems with it the rest of my life.

Well, the last few weeks I've been getting pain in my upper left jaw/teeth area which I've summarily written off and ignored. Till this past weekend - it let me know that there was something wrong and it wasn't going to let me sleep till I got it figured out.

So when I got to work today I called and made an appt with a new dentist who was able to get me in on my lunch break. Long story short - she took an xray of my teeth , then did what she called a "cold test" on one of my teeth, and determined that it was dead (due to no reaction.)

So ... Root Canal $$$$$$$ here I come. It may sound crazy, but I was actually relieved that there was an actual reason for the pain - no worries of the nueralgia coming back.

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My church has kicked off a 20 week Fitness Challenge. It started on Sunday with an Initial Weigh In and will end in March. The participants are divided into teams of 5.

The team at the end of the 20 weeks with the most points gets $250, and the individual with the most points gets $200.

You earn points by:
Eating 5 servings of fruits/veggies per day.
Drinking 6 glasses of plain water per day.
Exercising 30 minutes per day (or more).
Attending the free seminars.
Bonus points for attending all 5 seminars.
3x your percentage of weight loss up to 20%.

Let's put it this way - I'll have no problem earning max points in all but the last area. I want that $200 so I'm going to work extra hard to lose weight in the next 20 weeks. If I actually lost 20% of my body weight, I'd be within 10 pounds of my ultimate goal.

My bf is being very supportive of me. We played basketball at his gym on Friday for 90 minutes. Later I told him how many calories that had burned. He told me we should play again this coming Thursday night so I could lose more calories for the challenge. (At first I thought he was going to say - so you can lose to me again - oops!)