Okayyyyyy......
Well, I'm at a hotel in Allentown, Pennsylvania.  According to my GPS, it's 12 miles from the plant I'll be delivering to in the morning.  I will be literally spend the entire day here.   Why?  Well, I guess I misread the instructions.  It's only 1,400 miles up here, that's 2 full days and a couple of hours on the third. Easily make it to the plant on the 3rd day.  Instead, it is a Monday delivery, which is quite ridiculous.  I could have been there this morning for the 8am delivery.

We must have some really lame drivers to be scheduling a delivery the 4th day on the start of a run.  Well whatever, there's nothing I can do about it.  Whatever, I'm not going to complain about it.  I took a medium class (well, upper lower) hotel at the Red Roof Inn. I went to the Wingate at first - nice hotel. I made reservations last night for it.  I spent the money for a decent place and when I got there? They wouldn't let me in until 3:00 pm.  They are completely renovating the facility and many of their rooms are vacated for the renovation.

Nice, but that didn't help me.  I called Expedia, who called the hotel, who approved to let my reservation go without any cancellation fee. $94 back - well back in 7 days probably - but then I decided the heck with it, might as well get a cheaper place and hope it's a decent room. And yes, this is a decent room.  I always like it when I come into a cheaper room and find nice furniture in good condition without scratches tears and wear.  No carpet - fake wood flooring but in nice condition and I don't have to smell old foul carpeting.  Haven't turned on the tv yet - because I don't feel like watching tv.

In fact, I'm going to see if anything nearby to go and visit.  The Liberty Bell museum is closed this entire month, just my like. That is what I would have really like to have visited.  That kinda of took my aspirations to go see stuff out of me.  Cause to go see anything, I have to use Uber or Lyft.  Im still thinking about it tho.  There are a couple of interesting looking things only 4 miles away.

Anyway, the advent of Rene has come and gone.  She finally moved out, leaving her reign of terror in that house behind her.  She really abused her position with Maria and it really pisses me off.  She also instigated Addler into a fence fight with neighbor dogs and now he has a 1 inch gash in his jowls.  I have doubts it will heal properly, but I have Maria dumping antibiotics down his throat to make sure it doesn't get infected.  I have FishMox - dog antibiotics that are available online without a prescription but labeled for fish so they can sell it without that prescription - always available in the refrigerator.  I can only hope a half decent healing.  But, it's his mouth. Constantly licking, jowls constantly flapping back and forth. My beautiful Dane? Will still be beautiful in my eyes regardless. He isn't a show dog so it really doesn't matter.

Rene's drunkenness was the problem with her and she got much worse with her drinking problem near the end.  I'm quite sure all the attitude and bs she has now is being transported with her. Maria is enjoying the bliss of being alone. The other roommate is hardly ever there - making me question if he's going to stick around or not.  Although, I think he kind of figured the lunacy that Rene is and was staying away until she's gone. And now that Rene is gone, I don't have to worry about her driving tenants out.

I have to be honest: I'm actually gleeful that she's gone.  That's just a confession.  She will never be welcomed back to live there.  Not that she has any such desire, but if she asked, I would flatly tell her no and give her the reasons why.

Onto other things.  My TransUnion score dropped to 660 2 months ago for unknown reasons.  I could only figure that Christmas debt on one of my credit cards. But it was only $700 and that out of 25 grand worth of available credit.  Didn't make any sense, but perhaps my history is so bad that anything will drop it.  Last month, tho, I asked 3 of them to up my credit line and they did.  Not to use it, thanks, I don't want any more debt, but to have the increased amount of credit available. The more of that, the better I'm finding, especially if you aren't using it.  One of them specifically asked why I wanted it: I just want to raise my credit score. I have no history of using that particular card except for a balance transfer and that debt it completely gone.

Well, yesterday I got an email notice from creditkarma: Your score has gone up!  I instantly went to their app I have on my phone and sure enough, it went from 660 to 722 and my equifax went from 718 to 739.  I mean, I'm not bragging or anything, I know lots of people with better scores, but that puts me back into the good range.  It's soooooo easy for you to do the wrong thing, without understanding you are doing the wrong thing, and have them dump your score just like that.  It's kind of ridiculous actually. I get it, they want to be a credible source for bankers and loan companies to be able to reference them for good information, but you will spend a long time figuring out what works and what doesn't to get your credit score up.

They don't freely give you that info, they just speak in generalities.  I'm no expert but I've been the rounds with this and I've learned several things that work and that don't work. And things you think should work, but doesn't work. Just craziness.  One thing that definitely works: Keep your balances at zero.  And another: get the card issuers to increase your credit line.  That really seems to be a lot of it tho: don't keep any balances on your card. I know, they all say keep it below 30% of your credit usage and some 20%, but I didn't see any real results until I took out that cash loan and paid off all my cards excepting care credit - that was the one to get my teeth fixed, desperately need work and I still don't regret going into debt for that.  It is what it is. My goal is to try, somehow, to get into the very good credit score range.  How one accomplishes that, I have no clue.

Anyway, this morning I got up and had breakfast at the Iron Skillet at the Petro I stayed at. I actually had to pay to park last night. The truckstops were all full and the only available parking places were the pay one at the Petro.  I'm going to try to get my company to reimburse me for it - no idea if they will. And also try to get my company to reimburse me for this hotel room. It's not my fault they are sending people up here 24 hours early.  There is no way I was going to sit in the truck all day long, on a Sunday, alone and just - sit there. No thanks.

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That was the ticket:  A nice, long, hot shower.  I mean, there is nothing like it after a couple of days of not having one.  I was going to last night, but the Love's truck stop was totally filled up.  I could have paid for one at Petro but I knew I would end up in a hotel room today.

Anyway, now that my credit score has ramped back up, I'm considering that 72 acre property not far from where I am currently living.  It's still up for sale and it's still a beautiful, wonderful piece of property.  But I'd have to take out a loan to get the rest of the down payment money that I don't have.  And that still wouldn't put a structure on the property to live in - we all discussed it, everyone is down to move.  They even voiced their approval of a manufactured home - something I didn't bring up but would definitely consider if it was big enough and it was in excellent condition.  Not a new one, thanks, way over-priced for what they are.

And how would I pay for it?  Have about 20 acres of the forest taken down for a logging company. Not my first choice to get rid of all of those trees, but it would pay for a house.  It would basically be worth about 20 grand.  It's just me thinking again tho.  The reality of it?  Probably not.  I would rather have the cash up front for the down payment and not have to go into 5k worth of debt to go into - more debt.  The upside would be the forestry/lumber and getting rid of the debt shortly after getting into it and also if it worked out- we'd all move there.  I would be getting rent from them instead of vice versa but the mortgage would be paid for.  Which would be another question: How much would the mortgage be?

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I did nothing today.  In terms of going anywhere.  I mean, I went for a 2 mile walk. It was a sightseeing adventure of itself.  Houses and lawns and everything are different here.  Much different than AZ or Texas.  Lots of houses with this vinyl siding.  Even new housing developments with that stuff on there. Not a fan.  Not a fan of stucco, either tho, which they love to use in AZ. 

Oh, and the Mueller report. Trump won, the left lost.  End of story.  Seriously, what else is there to say? That dems want to continue on with even more incessant investigations? Shocking! If you can't win an election, attempt to steal it. 

That's it for today. It's not really late, per se, even on Eastern Standard time it's only 8:30. And I don't have to get up until 7:00 am.  Just enough for one post.