June 24th, 2003:

I’ve gotten a lot of the apartment stuff taken care of.

First of all, I called South Western Bell. They agreed that I don’t owe them any money. I had them look up that specific account to be certain and they said that it was closed and paid in full last June. They are sending me a letter that states exactly this that I can use as proof for the new apartment, as well as proof for disputing the mark on my credit (because, according to them, since they account is closed, they can’t report that it is closed to the credit agency for me).

I also contacted both apartment complexes and both collection agencies.

The debt from the apartment of five years ago has been in collection for so long that they offered my 40% off my bill. I drove to their office and paid it with a Money Order in person in order to receive a receipt stating that my account was paid in full and closed. However, I still don’t agree with the reasons behind why I was charged above what we left for deposit. The manager said she would call me back in order to discus these matters, but she did not.

The debt from my recent apartment seems to be justified as best as I can tell. It’s really hard to say. I know that the prices they are charging me for the items are decent, fair prices. And I know that the carpet was in pretty bad shape thanks to our pets. So, for now, I’ve agreed to pay the amount. The new manager, Amy, was very nice to me on the phone, and actually took the time to talk to me and explain things to me. The collection agency told me that if I pay the full amount, they too will give me a receipt stating that I have done so and enabling me to move into the new place without any additional deposit or trouble.

The only problem that I have is that, in both cases, the debt owed was in a roommate situation, which means that I am only responsible for a portion of the damages. However, the full amount has gone on my credit report. When I spoke with the first collection company, I informed him of this fact and he told me that, while I can pay him any amount I’d like to pay, if the full amount is not paid, I will not receive a letter stating that I have paid my part, and the negative information will continue to be reported on my credit.

That just doesn’t seem fair. Does anyone else know how this works or what the law is here?

The break from coding Inklog was good. I talked to my dad, one of the only people I can talk to about code and have them understand everything I have to say the first time around, and he gave me some great ideas on how to make Inklog faster and perform exactly as I want it to. Additionally, with all of the other code I’ve been writing, my mind has had time to relax and rethink a few things. It’s time to get started again.

I’ve been playing with bBlog, an up and comming blogging engine, in my spare time. It is written pretty well and is fairly easy to use. I actually migrated my blog to that engine completely. However, I never put it online because there were a few features it lacked that I really wanted. I implemented most of those features (either by code contribution to the author, or via small changes in my local site). However, after I did that, I realized there were even more features that I wanted that it didn’t do. In looking into building those I realized that, with all the time I had been spending enhancing bBlog, I could have just been writing Inklog. So I’ve decided to stop improving it for now, and therefore, will not be using it on this site.

However, the engine is excellent. It is very flexible and can accomodate almost any style. Additionally, after all of the author’s intended features are in place, it should be as full featured as the best of them.