It has been a long time since I posted anything so wanted to let you know I was still around. Life has been extremely difficult this past year and I haven’t felt much like being upbeat on here… Hopefully things will improve soon… and then I might feel more like sharing things again…
Keep plugging on you guys… never give up no matter how hard life gets…
It has been a long while since blogging the last time. Things go on day by day and life finds its balance. Up and downs, but life goes on. I am still struggling with my circumstances and am not at a place where I can cheerfully accept what has happened but am having to learn to live with the consequences of being placed in the situation I am in. I am slowly learning to adapt to my new situation but not liking it any more… 🙂 I guess time will heal all wounds and these last years are going to have to take a lot more time for me to get to the place where I can find acceptance. So, never give up no matter what life throws at you. Try to stay cheerful with others and maintain hope that things will eventually get better and karma will make a triumphant visit to those who have done you wrong!
During this time of year when so much pressure is being put on us to provide the ultimate gift for our loved ones, prepare the best meal of the year and entertain family and friends, time is the one thing that we seem to run out of. I hope that we can all take some time to appreciate those things that mean the most to us whether that be family or friends.
For seniors who don’t have family close to them or who are living alone, this time of the year can be especially difficult. I have had to learn to scale way back on what I do for the holidays. I do still bake cookies and make candy but now give them away as gifts. I also make sure that I spend time volunteering to do things that I wouldn’t have normally done when I was younger.
Sometimes it helps to make the season pass quicker when we are doing for others who may not have as much as we do. Christmas can be a melancholy time for a lot of people, but if we share our time and talents we can get through the season perhaps a little less stressed.
When I take my mind off myself and help others, the time passes quickly and before I know it, Christmas is over.
However you spend the holidays, I hope it is filled with happiness and joy for the blessings we have.
I dropped off my signed consent form this morning to my MP’s office. Within 2 hours I had a phone call from Victoria wanting to resolve my issues. 🙂 They asked for more information, which I gave them. They told me they will call my MP on Tuesday with some answers…..
The interesting thing? The lady today told me they are currently working on ONLY THOSE FILES THAT HAVE BEEN ESCALATED TO THE THIRD STEP…. Really…. so anyone who might be fighting with the pension people… go straight to your MP and have them act on your behalf… I can’t believe that after 38 weeks of fighting, waiting, frustration and being stalled and lied to, I go to my MP and within HOURS my file has been miraculously looked at… hmmm interesting eh… 🙂
Squeaky wheels get resolved… hahaha… so I guess my new nickname is squeaky!!!
Synopsis…. 35 week waiting period. Check.
Application not even looked at. Escalate to next level. Call back in two weeks. Check.
Application not even looked at. Escalate to supervisory level. Call back in two days. Check.
Application not even looked at. Sent another email to processing centre. Call back next Tuesday on the 25th.
NOPE!
Contacted my MPs office. Have filled out the forms for them to act on my behalf. I will be meeting with the office person who handles the pension issues tomorrow morning. The Canada Revenue Service (service being the oxymoron here) can stall and lie to my MP instead of me anymore. I have had my limit of being given the run around.
I feel as enthusiastic and happy as this fella…. After patiently waiting the 35 weeks for the reassessment, I called on June 29th only to be told my application hadn’t even been LOOKED at yet…. They then escalated the request to the processing centre and to call back in two weeks. July 17th. Today.
Called this morning. Oh, guess what… It STILL hasn’t been looked at. So now it has been escalated AGAIN and bumped up to the supervisory level to be resolved in 2 days. I am now to call on Thursday. I am feeling so defeated with this whole process. A mistake that was made 20 months ago, has altered what my pension amounts are supposed to be and in order to try and rectify it and have it corrected, it has been a series of long and frustrating phone calls.
So, I called my MP to see what other avenues I might have to get this resolved…. He is taking appointments in AUGUST!!!!
Holy cats… And they wonder why so many seniors are depressed, suicidal, homeless and mentally ill. Having to deal with the bureaucracy that the government is wears a person down to the bare bones.
Too bad for them I am a scrapper and I don’t give up…. They may have beaten me down each time I have to deal with them, but I will not stay down long…
Thanks to the reduced to clear bins/shelves at Walmart and the local Kins market, I have had my dehydrator going full bore for weeks now with no end in sight!
So far I have dried: oranges, cantaloupe, pineapple, various fruit leathers, mushrooms, apples, kiwi, strawberry, pears, red cabbage, potatoes and snap peas. I did splurge and go to Costco for some steaks to make beef jerky and a tray of pork chops for pork jerky.
Currently I have sliced tomatoes with parmesan cheese/spaghetti spice mixture on top.
With summer just starting, I am looking forward to dehydrating many more things. I have 4 plants of parsley planted and 3 plants of chives… which once they take and get going will provide me with lots of material to dry over the summer which will do me through the winter.
I had a big dehydrator when I first moved down here that had 12 trays and of course after 10 years of not using it I gave it away… now, 5 years later I had to get a newer one. Which is okay. This one has a temperature gauge, and a timer which the old one didn’t, so sometimes upgrading to the newer model is a good thing. The one that I currently have is a Hamilton Beach 32100 C model with 5 trays. I am very happy with it, but will want to buy 4 more fruit leather trays and 4 more herb drying trays. It comes with one tray each but that won’t be enough for me…:) I did some research on the various dehydrators and for what I will need it for the Hamilton-Beach is exactly what I needed. It has a 5 year warranty. If you are wanting to attempt dehydrating be careful… you might get addicted! hahaha… don’t over buy a machine that does way more that what your family may need. Check out warranties, ease of use and how many watts it has. The timer and temperature gauge is really handy as I can put things on at night and it will automatically shut off when the timer runs out. I am really loving it.
After 30+ weeks of waiting for my pension to be re-evaluated, I called yesterday and was told a decision would be made by June 29. Hopefully they will judge in my favor and I should be getting a bit more each month and possibly some back pay for the months that I was shorted.
On a positive note, I also called MSP… they approved me for regular benefits and back dated it to January of this year. Now I just wait for my company pension to do what they need to do and adjust my pension. It is only 37 dollars a month more, but with as broke as I am, it is a windfall. At least for a short while until August when my rent goes up 40 bucks.. sigh… it seems like a no win situation these days…
It has been a very long winter for me. I have been sick on and off for the entire winter with hospital visits for help with breathing, dying tooth, chest infection and the last blow was being diagnosed with diabetes…
Now that things are steadying out I am feeling much more like sitting at a computer and writing.. so I apologize for not being very active the last while.
Surviving The Senior Years 