JonSidneyB
Flashlight Enthusiast
I think there are some people that deserve and explanation as to why I have been missing for so long. I know that some of you are a bit mad at me, I hope this will help some of you understand a little bit better that this is an unusual situation. This is going to be a lengthy story as so many things have happened.
I am writing this stream of consciousness so some things might not make much sense as I don't have time to proof read.
Some time ago my Father was found unconscious, it was thought that he had fallen and struck his head. It turned out that that was not what happened at all, he had passed out from a 106F fever from meningitis. I quickly lost 3 days when I learned he was sick but this would have been quickly recoverable but this is not where to problems ended. My father was unconscious and I wanted to stay where he was at but I also thought he didn't even know that I there so I went to take care of my business. The hospital said his prognosis was not good and I told myself that I was just getting in the way anyway. I was contacted the next day telling me that I needed to provide a list of information that I did not have. I then went to dig for this information and was having little luck finding all that they wanted. It seemed my father had kept almost every piece of paper since 1954 so there was a ton of stuff to dig though and now I am up to 6 lost days.
I was at home trying to again take care of business and the hospital contacts me. They say that he is being sent to another location as hospital care was not going to do him any good; he was sent for 14 more days of anti-biotic treatment at a nursing home. I was also told that I needed to meet with them and take care of paperwork with them. When I got to the nursing home they told me that they were not equipped to take care of him and that they needed to send him to a sister facility. I asked them if we could get him into the VA system as he was a veteran. I justified this by telling them that he had regular appointments at a VA hospital for minor things. The nursing home told me that the VA hospital would not take him because once a patient in a private facility that they would not accept a transfer. I asked them to call the VA hospital and confirm that they could not get him in. The next day I was told that the VA hospital had refused him. I accepted what they told me and trusted everything I was being told and started signing all the papers they said needed to be signed. They did let me know that they were a large chain of both nursing homes and long term care facilities so I had him sent to one of their long term care facilities located as close to me as possible, fortunately this was only an hour drive from me. I am reconstructing this from memory but I think at this point with all of the driving, meetings, and digging through papers that I have lost about 9 days.
I am at home trying to get things caught up. I normally have enough email questions to take up 2 hours a day and sometimes 3 hours. I am right now pretty far behind but I know I can get this caught up quickly. I decided to break up my day with 4 hours of email catch-up, a couple of hours a day of time on my forum and CPF, and the balance of the time filling orders and taking care of other needed tasks that had been neglected. I was going to devote 16 hours a day to this catch-up effort and thought I could be current on everything in maybe 3 or 4 days.
Before all of these things related to my father happened my website had vanished due to problems with my service provider. I had called them and e-mailed them for a week with no response so a new store was built. This made things tough for a little bit as I had no store and that was my only source of revenue. During the period mentioned in the previous paragraph where I was playing catch-up the opportunity to be the US Huntlight dealer came out. I decided the day it would take to set up the new site for the Huntlight products would not hurt me too much and a good thing to do as I had lost quite a bit of revenue when I had no website. I at first ordered a sample size order of just 3 each of the lights. I just 2 days later decided that I would go ahead and stock these items before seeing the samples and made a regular order and announced that I was the Huntlight dealer for the USA and let people know that I was not accepting orders.
While playing catch-up and waiting for the Huntlights to arrive I was contacted by the long-term care facility to get them information and fill out paper work. I asked them for a little bit of time since I was trying to get my business caught up and they agreed to grant me some time. The long-term care facility tried to call my cell phone and got voice mail as I was in an area where reception was not available. When I returned to an area that had service I responded to their message. The facility explained to me that they needed me to be available to take calls from them all of the time and they were quite adamant about that and wanted me to come on in for a meeting. At this meeting they explained what information that they needed. I explained that I didn't not have all of that information so I am now off trying to find this information for them again. While trying to get this information I was in areas that had no cell phone service for a few hours and this made them quite upset. They told me that if they could not always contact me that they would contact the State and have them take guardianship of my father and they let me know that I would not like that. I am now stuck between a rock and a hard place as I have to be out of reach to do some of the things they wanted.
I decide to again try and get him into the VA system as they have all of his records but will not give them to me. Another reason I want him there is that he had been going to the VA hospital to check for skin cancer (this was recommended by them since he was very fair skinned and spent tons of time outdoors) and other regular checkups. I thought going to the VA system was justified as they would have his full medical record and I didn't have much of that information. Also If I got him there I would not be stuck trying to dig up his insurance information that I could not find. I was again told that the VA would not take him since he was already in a private system. My lost time is starting to get serious now, I am spending money at a very fast rate after a period that I had no revenue due to my old service provider going missing. I am now starting to get worried but I know I can get things caught up if I can be left alone for a few days. The long-term care facility now wants me to go get information on my father's appointments. I went to a VA hospital to get my fathers information on his appointments and they told me that the other place knew better than this and told me that they had to contact them for his information. From what I can tell the long-term care facility never contacted the VA hospital about this from talking to both places but I cannot know this for sure.
Things are getting ready to get complicated. I had already paid for a booth at a national caving convention in Washington State as well as all the other expenses that go along with it and it is a great opportunity to get some much needed revenue but I also know that this will cost me a few days of catch-up time. I am really thinking hard on this trying to see if I will be acting unethically if I go to this convention and sell at the booth there. It turns out that the long-term care facility basically made up my mind for me. I knew that if I went that they would likely complain when my cell phone was off if they called during the flight and I didn't want them going to the State for them to take guardianship. Well the long term care facility told me that I needed to get legal guardian ship of my father in a week or they would turn this over to the State. This is the first mention of my getting legal guardianship of my father. I am defiantly not flying to Washington now. I go visit and hire an attorney immediately to start the process of getting a guardianship. The attorney tells me that I have more time to do this than the long-term care facility has told me. The lawyer let me know that this process was going to take 30 days or more. After I told the long-term care facility that I had an attorney working on guardianship I got no more static from them. Unfortunately the lawyer gave me a list of things to get him but he told me I had time so back to catching up on business I go. The lawyer also told me that I needed to quit signing everything stuck in front of me. I am risking taking responisibilty of things that I am not responsible for.
I at this point have only gone to see my father on the times the facility wanted me there to meet with me and have only seen him for 15 minutes or so each time.. I am feeling pretty guilty about this because my father is starting to become aware of his surroundings a bit but does not consistently know who I am. I now come up with a new game plan and create a schedule to get back on track. My plan of action is to see my father 1 hour every other day. This eats up a total of 3 hours every other day. I would spend 10 hours a day catching up on business by answering emails, filling orders, posting a tiny bit about what is going on on CPF and EDCF. Any remaining time would be spent gathering the information on the lawyers list. I am not really killing my self due to lack of sleep.
I am making some headway on getting caught up and seeing dad every other day but another disaster hits. The sample Huntlights have arrived but there were no customs charges on this. I called to find out why I was not charged duties on this package. I finally found out that it was because the box was marked samples. I let them know that I was selling these so that they are not legally samples and I let them know that I needed to pay customs charges on these. After I finish talking to them I get a call on the second package from DHL. This is an ugly story and deserves a couple of paragraphs of its own.
The person at DHL told me that customs opened the package and knows what is in there. I was a little surprised and told them I know what is in there as well. I told them it was a whole bunch of flashlights. The guy at DHL's tone changed a little bit, it turns out he didn't know what was in there as well but had a list of information he wanted. He wanted me to describe what has in the box, tell how it was used, what the purpose of the products are, prove how much I paid for them, and send a copy of my social security card. I sent them all of this information as requested. I asked what the problem was with this shipment and they told me that the problem was the name on the items. They gave the example of someone using the Nike name on shoes that are not Nike. Ah, trademark violation. I know this is an easy problem to fix. I asked them if I can call customs about this and the customer service person at DHL told me that no one talks to customs. I knew this was not true as I have contacted customs on many occations. I also told him I thought to information he asked for was not the needed information but I needed to prove something else instead. They told me that they would use the information that I had sent but I knew that this was not going to work. I ended calling DHL over and over again to talk to a different customer service rep to see if I could convince them I needed to send them different information. All of them were convinced that the information I sent was all that was needed. They were very wrong and I knew they were wrong. I contacted the US patents and Trademarks office and looked up information with the Madrid Accords (the Madrid Accords is the rules and listing of international trade names) and was able to verify that no trade name violation had taken place. I also contacted US customs and told my story. They told me that everything should be ok based on what I had told them.
I called DHL again and let them know that I have sent the information that they needed to get this cleared. I call each day to check with DHL on the status of the package and was told that it had been cleared. No package arrived so I start calling again and find that I am getting a different story from each person I talk to. I now make it a point to call multiple times in order to see what different story I get and the stories are all over the place. I do not know what to believe at this point. The package has been setting in a released state for quite sometime but not moving and I am getting frustrated. I had some funds set aside that I had been saving to start production of the Larry Lights when we were ready to go. I used this money to buy more Huntlights but before that I communicated with DHL and Customs that I want to make sure we are doing things right and that this package would clear. The third, fourth, and fifth package clears but not the main order. DHL explains to me that more than 50% of orders are illegal, I explained that I had shown that his one is not and that other packages have gotten though and show customs inspection. DHL tells me that my package would be shipped to me each day. I do not believe what they are telling me anymore and call again and again until I think I have talked to everyone there each day. I also call customs and ask them to investigate what is happening at that customs location. I now have the package, it arrived last Friday after being trapped for about a month and a half. The other Huntlight orders that I placed were not big enough because I had so much tied up in the second order that was not moving. I found out the truth on what happened to the order but it will make this already long story even longer. The bottom line is that DHL messed this shipment really bad according to Customs.
I spent much more time trying to deal with this issue with DHL that I am expressing here. I ended up after the first week spending almost all of the business day trying to find out what is going on with this package. My father is becoming more aware of his surroundings and the long-term care facility informed me that talking to him would help him get more grounded in reality. At this time I am carrying a ton of guilt. My plans for seeing him on the schedule I created has fallen apart. I am not seeing him as often as I told myself I would. I am angry because I feel I was taking all of my Dads time by dealing with DHL, legal issues, and trying to get business caught up. Dad is getting taken up with other issues and everyone who sees me tells me that they can see that I am falling apart from lack of sleep though I try to hide the fact that I am exhausted. I do realize that Dad needs more time and I am going to find away to get him that time (I fail as I do not give him the time that I really should have).
My Dad knows who I am not but thinks he is still in the army and had duties to perform. He keeps telling me that he has orders and that we are stopping him from carrying them out. He also slips into other realities and was telling me about his girlfriend (my mom). He does not even realize that he had married her at this time and that that was many many decades ago. The facility does tell me that physically his is very healthy, he has low blood pressure, a strong heart, and other indicators of good health, and the only thing wrong is his memories. He does have some lesions on his brain but he is recovering much better then expected. I am told that after rehabilitation that I would likely be able to take care of him at home. The long-term care facility said he is going on to a nursing home for rehab and tell me to keep talking to him and more memories will start reconnecting. I am very worried about business now and also concerned about taking care of legal issues but I am now diverted. I am told what I need to do in order to be able to have things prepared to take care of him at home. I am stressing now at the breaking point and spending like crazy to get things done.
Dad is now at a nursing home affiliated with the long-term care facility. I did ask again to try to get him into a VA facility but I am told the same story again. I have really given up on this at this time but thought I would ask. Dad breaks though a mental wall while I am visiting him. Dad asks me if his mother is dead, I had to tell him that she died in 1980, suddenly it seems that things are coming back. He knows what year it is, he knows that he is in a nursing home for rehab. The good news is that everything seems to be getting better but he also seems like a little kid but his memories are coming back but he is also not very rational. I am trying to see him more but I really do not have the time. I start getting calls from the nursing home telling me that Dad has been getting out of bed and is trying to leave the facility, they also tell me that he has taken a few calls. The nursing home each time also asks me what we are going to do about this????
I have no idea what to do on this so they have me in for a meeting. Dad wants out of the nursing home, I try to explain that he will soon be living with me for sometime and then he could be independent if he wants but he has to stay at the nursing home.
I am spending more time with dad but not enough, I am still getting things done not related to dad but I am not doing enough and I have fallen asleep at the keyboard many times and am falling behind even more. I am getting stuff shipped but emails are what are really falling behind and I am now past 700 emails to respond to even though I am answering 50 a day the list keeps getting bigger. The very last time I see my dad I ask him if he wants to have one of this dogs come visit him. This is the first time I saw him get really excited about something. I told him that I would bring a dog to see him the next day. After I got home I started to think "why wait till Friday, I will take one of his dogs to see him now" I then changed my mind, I told myself that he is getting better and that I could do this Friday. I went home and started calling DHL again then tried to take care of more legal issues and answer some more emails. I went to sleep about 2:00 am . At 6:00 am I got a call from the nursing home telling me that my father had been rushed to the hospital. The lady on the phone told me that he was alert and asking if he was doing more tests that day at 5:00am but that when she checked back he was not breathing. I called the hospital and they told me that he had died. My first thought was that I really cheated dad by not taking the dog to see him Thursday like I thought about doing. It might not seem like that big of a deal but it was something that got him very excited. I felt do guilty that I sat most of the Friday doing nothing, by Friday evening I started letting a few people know and when onto chat a bit but I did no work. I ended up sleeping most of the weekend away almost doing nothing. I know that was not very responsible of me but it is what happened.
Monday rolls around and I know I have to get something done since I wasted the previous three days but I really do not feel up to it. The hospital tells me that I need to do something about my father's body. I told them I really don't know what to do in this situation, they told me that I am supposed to call a funeral home so I do and they go pick him up. The funeral home tells me what things they need from me and ask me what my plans are. I tell them I have no idea what my plans are. I do have a list of things they asked me to do. Since he was a veteran I was told I needed to get a DW214 or something like that. I get home and call all the places that I think he is getting retirement checks from. One of the places I call is the VA to stop his military retirement and ask how to get this DW214. The VA tells me that they can find no record of my fathers being in the military. I explain that had been seen by a VA hospital many times and should be in there system. They tell me that I should call a group called DFASS, I call DFASS and they find his retirement check information and stop it. I ask them about the VA not having a record of him and they advise me to go to FT Harrison and go to the RSO office at building 1. I ended up spending the rest of the Day at Ft Harrison. No one seems to know what an RSO office is or where it could be. Finally I talk to someone that knows what it is and tells me that there has not been one of those at Ft Harrison for a decade. This day is gone. Monday night I start researching what I am supposed to do when someone dies online until I fall asleep. Now my customers are really getting the short end of the stick.
I decided that I should go to a physical VA location and talk to them. They kind of blew me off, they said they show no record of him existing. I start asking people for advise on how I should move forward and get some bits of information. I collect proof that my father was retired from the military and go back to the VA, this time I am taken seriously and they try and find information and cannot get it. I spent the rest of the day trying to find out how to get his DW214 and each person I talk to passes me off to another person all day long and nothing gets accomplished. The next day I contact the American Legion, no help, I contacted the State, they think they can help me. I also called my Congressman and it looks like I am going to get help. I am promised that these records are to be faxed to me the next day. I spend that evening trying to figure out what dad would want me to do and trying to find if he has a will.
My father only really talked about three things, the Army his mother, and backpacking. He loved the Army so much that he would find reasons to be where active duty people could be found. I decided that there were only two choices. At a military cemetery or where his mother is buried, everyone that I could find that knew him seemed to think the military cemetery was where he would want to be but some thought both were good choices. The rest of the week was two activities only for the most part. I kept trying to prove dad existed, and try and find his will. Since the VA hospital knew he existed I went to one of those and they had his records, I called the State again as well as my congressman. When I was talking to the VA hospital they told me that might have the document that I need. I spent about 4 hours at the hospital while the searched, they could not find what I needed but they asked me why I didn't have him transferred to a VA facility. I told them that the VA rejected him. They asked me where I got that idea. I told them my story and the person told me that I had been lied to. He also told me that I would not be doing all of this running around if he had been in a VA hospital as they would have done this for me. I am really really angry when I heard this but I don't have time to think about this and I have been called and told that the regular VA had Dad's records now. I rush to the VA regional office to get the ball rolling on getting my father in a Military cemetery. When I get to the VA, they tell that they can see him now but they only have when he entered service and his rank but nothing else. They made some calls and tried to get his records.
I can't get dad buried in a military cemetery until I get these documents or his shows up on the VA system with his records. This is not the only thing I work on as nothing else mattered. I let my Dad down while he was sick and was feeling really guilty, I was determined to not let him down not that he is gone. I was going to find away to get him into that military cemetery. Well, time ran out and I still had nothing. I could not let him set any longer so I made arrangements to get him buried in the same cemetery where his mother is at. I rushed around to get the arrangements made, I had his body flown to Oklahoma, the funeral home where he was at would not release him until I paid them so I gave them their money and then made arrangements with a funeral home in the town where his mother was buried. I spent over $7000.00 dollars and still had more to spend (the money for projects is vanishing fast, I am actually spending money I do not have at this point) . I drove to Oklahoma and got a few friends to join me at the funeral. The whole time I felt like I had really let him down.
After the funeral I started to drive back to Indiana but a lady named Bobbie (quite a few CPF'ers have met Bobbie) would not let me do it. She thought I was too tired to do so and wanted me to stay a couple of days so I did but I really felt I needed to get home as I am super far behind. As soon as I got home I called DHL and was very angry but a little irrational. I complained that all my time I spend talking to them unable to get information took time away that I should have spent with my Dad, like I said I was angry and not very rational. I check out of curiosity to see if dads records were updated and if the documents had been faxed to the State. Nope, no documents. I know it is too late now but I am still upset that they have not arrived yet. I slept the next day away in a state of depression about how the last months were wasted and I got so little done. I finally got the DW214, you are not going to believe this but this is not my father's records. It shows that he had duties in 1954 and 1957 but enlisted in 1962. It also shows that he has 10 years service in foreign countries but only 6 years total service but that he was in for 27 years. It also shows that his last assignment was Conarc (Continental Air Command). This is the Air force, my father was never in the air force. I asked around and some CPFers informed me that many records from people in the Army and Airforce were destroyed in a fire in St Louis. This caused me to spend another day digging. Yep, that is what happened, dads records were cobbled together and only part of it is him.
In the middle of all of this the reflectors for the Stenlights arrived. There is a problem, the diameter is too large. This is not Don's fault at all so don't yell at him. Jtice was able to take off some of the diameter by filing and made them fit his Stenlight. What I need to do now is find out exactly how much metal needs to be taken off to make them fit then take them to a machine shop and have them reduced in diameter. I also have learned that Stenlights have inductors on two different places on Stenlights. I need to have a small groove cut into half the reflectors to account for this. Jtice managed to do is so I know it can be done. I just need to do it now.
The next day I call the lawyer to tell him that I am not longer seeking a guardianship because my father had died and that now I need different legal services. I am unable to talk to the lawyer so I left a message for him to call me with the receptionist. I never get a call back from the lawyer. I have no idea what I am supposed to do now so I consult the list and start trying to go down it. I try and learn if I can do probate myself but I cannot collect enough information. I try the lawyer again and I still get no response so I do lawyer shopping. I hire a new lawyer and then needed to go though my fathers stuff to find what bills he owes and I keep trying to find the will. Bobbie joins me to help me for 6 days. With her we worked from 6am to 9pm each night trying to go through my fathers stuff. From what we are finding it looks like dad's estate might be insolvent. I was hoping that there would be enough left over to reimburse some of my expenses. Right now it looks like that will not be the case but we will see. I have not really had a chance to talk to the new lawyer much yet but she tells me that I now have sometime. I am going to use this time to try and rebuild my business and only spend a couple of hours each day working on my fathers affairs so I should be more responsive now.
I do know that many of you are quite upset with me. I have only mentioned about 25percent of the things that have happened over the last months (the people hosting my old website vanishing at up time as well) but I wanted to show why I have not been around. I am sorry and I have probably made some very poor decisions. My only excuse is a lot has happened and I have made tons of mistakes since I really did not know what I was doing on all of this. I hope in time I can rebuild my reputation out here. Please do understand that I have gone through a time consuming and very mentally and emotionally costly thing due to all the road blocks I have come up against.
Thanks
Jon
PS
Oh my this ended up being long and I did not even come close to telling you everything that has happened.
I wonder if I have some bad Karma out there haunting me.
I am writing this stream of consciousness so some things might not make much sense as I don't have time to proof read.
Some time ago my Father was found unconscious, it was thought that he had fallen and struck his head. It turned out that that was not what happened at all, he had passed out from a 106F fever from meningitis. I quickly lost 3 days when I learned he was sick but this would have been quickly recoverable but this is not where to problems ended. My father was unconscious and I wanted to stay where he was at but I also thought he didn't even know that I there so I went to take care of my business. The hospital said his prognosis was not good and I told myself that I was just getting in the way anyway. I was contacted the next day telling me that I needed to provide a list of information that I did not have. I then went to dig for this information and was having little luck finding all that they wanted. It seemed my father had kept almost every piece of paper since 1954 so there was a ton of stuff to dig though and now I am up to 6 lost days.
I was at home trying to again take care of business and the hospital contacts me. They say that he is being sent to another location as hospital care was not going to do him any good; he was sent for 14 more days of anti-biotic treatment at a nursing home. I was also told that I needed to meet with them and take care of paperwork with them. When I got to the nursing home they told me that they were not equipped to take care of him and that they needed to send him to a sister facility. I asked them if we could get him into the VA system as he was a veteran. I justified this by telling them that he had regular appointments at a VA hospital for minor things. The nursing home told me that the VA hospital would not take him because once a patient in a private facility that they would not accept a transfer. I asked them to call the VA hospital and confirm that they could not get him in. The next day I was told that the VA hospital had refused him. I accepted what they told me and trusted everything I was being told and started signing all the papers they said needed to be signed. They did let me know that they were a large chain of both nursing homes and long term care facilities so I had him sent to one of their long term care facilities located as close to me as possible, fortunately this was only an hour drive from me. I am reconstructing this from memory but I think at this point with all of the driving, meetings, and digging through papers that I have lost about 9 days.
I am at home trying to get things caught up. I normally have enough email questions to take up 2 hours a day and sometimes 3 hours. I am right now pretty far behind but I know I can get this caught up quickly. I decided to break up my day with 4 hours of email catch-up, a couple of hours a day of time on my forum and CPF, and the balance of the time filling orders and taking care of other needed tasks that had been neglected. I was going to devote 16 hours a day to this catch-up effort and thought I could be current on everything in maybe 3 or 4 days.
Before all of these things related to my father happened my website had vanished due to problems with my service provider. I had called them and e-mailed them for a week with no response so a new store was built. This made things tough for a little bit as I had no store and that was my only source of revenue. During the period mentioned in the previous paragraph where I was playing catch-up the opportunity to be the US Huntlight dealer came out. I decided the day it would take to set up the new site for the Huntlight products would not hurt me too much and a good thing to do as I had lost quite a bit of revenue when I had no website. I at first ordered a sample size order of just 3 each of the lights. I just 2 days later decided that I would go ahead and stock these items before seeing the samples and made a regular order and announced that I was the Huntlight dealer for the USA and let people know that I was not accepting orders.
While playing catch-up and waiting for the Huntlights to arrive I was contacted by the long-term care facility to get them information and fill out paper work. I asked them for a little bit of time since I was trying to get my business caught up and they agreed to grant me some time. The long-term care facility tried to call my cell phone and got voice mail as I was in an area where reception was not available. When I returned to an area that had service I responded to their message. The facility explained to me that they needed me to be available to take calls from them all of the time and they were quite adamant about that and wanted me to come on in for a meeting. At this meeting they explained what information that they needed. I explained that I didn't not have all of that information so I am now off trying to find this information for them again. While trying to get this information I was in areas that had no cell phone service for a few hours and this made them quite upset. They told me that if they could not always contact me that they would contact the State and have them take guardianship of my father and they let me know that I would not like that. I am now stuck between a rock and a hard place as I have to be out of reach to do some of the things they wanted.
I decide to again try and get him into the VA system as they have all of his records but will not give them to me. Another reason I want him there is that he had been going to the VA hospital to check for skin cancer (this was recommended by them since he was very fair skinned and spent tons of time outdoors) and other regular checkups. I thought going to the VA system was justified as they would have his full medical record and I didn't have much of that information. Also If I got him there I would not be stuck trying to dig up his insurance information that I could not find. I was again told that the VA would not take him since he was already in a private system. My lost time is starting to get serious now, I am spending money at a very fast rate after a period that I had no revenue due to my old service provider going missing. I am now starting to get worried but I know I can get things caught up if I can be left alone for a few days. The long-term care facility now wants me to go get information on my father's appointments. I went to a VA hospital to get my fathers information on his appointments and they told me that the other place knew better than this and told me that they had to contact them for his information. From what I can tell the long-term care facility never contacted the VA hospital about this from talking to both places but I cannot know this for sure.
Things are getting ready to get complicated. I had already paid for a booth at a national caving convention in Washington State as well as all the other expenses that go along with it and it is a great opportunity to get some much needed revenue but I also know that this will cost me a few days of catch-up time. I am really thinking hard on this trying to see if I will be acting unethically if I go to this convention and sell at the booth there. It turns out that the long-term care facility basically made up my mind for me. I knew that if I went that they would likely complain when my cell phone was off if they called during the flight and I didn't want them going to the State for them to take guardianship. Well the long term care facility told me that I needed to get legal guardian ship of my father in a week or they would turn this over to the State. This is the first mention of my getting legal guardianship of my father. I am defiantly not flying to Washington now. I go visit and hire an attorney immediately to start the process of getting a guardianship. The attorney tells me that I have more time to do this than the long-term care facility has told me. The lawyer let me know that this process was going to take 30 days or more. After I told the long-term care facility that I had an attorney working on guardianship I got no more static from them. Unfortunately the lawyer gave me a list of things to get him but he told me I had time so back to catching up on business I go. The lawyer also told me that I needed to quit signing everything stuck in front of me. I am risking taking responisibilty of things that I am not responsible for.
I at this point have only gone to see my father on the times the facility wanted me there to meet with me and have only seen him for 15 minutes or so each time.. I am feeling pretty guilty about this because my father is starting to become aware of his surroundings a bit but does not consistently know who I am. I now come up with a new game plan and create a schedule to get back on track. My plan of action is to see my father 1 hour every other day. This eats up a total of 3 hours every other day. I would spend 10 hours a day catching up on business by answering emails, filling orders, posting a tiny bit about what is going on on CPF and EDCF. Any remaining time would be spent gathering the information on the lawyers list. I am not really killing my self due to lack of sleep.
I am making some headway on getting caught up and seeing dad every other day but another disaster hits. The sample Huntlights have arrived but there were no customs charges on this. I called to find out why I was not charged duties on this package. I finally found out that it was because the box was marked samples. I let them know that I was selling these so that they are not legally samples and I let them know that I needed to pay customs charges on these. After I finish talking to them I get a call on the second package from DHL. This is an ugly story and deserves a couple of paragraphs of its own.
The person at DHL told me that customs opened the package and knows what is in there. I was a little surprised and told them I know what is in there as well. I told them it was a whole bunch of flashlights. The guy at DHL's tone changed a little bit, it turns out he didn't know what was in there as well but had a list of information he wanted. He wanted me to describe what has in the box, tell how it was used, what the purpose of the products are, prove how much I paid for them, and send a copy of my social security card. I sent them all of this information as requested. I asked what the problem was with this shipment and they told me that the problem was the name on the items. They gave the example of someone using the Nike name on shoes that are not Nike. Ah, trademark violation. I know this is an easy problem to fix. I asked them if I can call customs about this and the customer service person at DHL told me that no one talks to customs. I knew this was not true as I have contacted customs on many occations. I also told him I thought to information he asked for was not the needed information but I needed to prove something else instead. They told me that they would use the information that I had sent but I knew that this was not going to work. I ended calling DHL over and over again to talk to a different customer service rep to see if I could convince them I needed to send them different information. All of them were convinced that the information I sent was all that was needed. They were very wrong and I knew they were wrong. I contacted the US patents and Trademarks office and looked up information with the Madrid Accords (the Madrid Accords is the rules and listing of international trade names) and was able to verify that no trade name violation had taken place. I also contacted US customs and told my story. They told me that everything should be ok based on what I had told them.
I called DHL again and let them know that I have sent the information that they needed to get this cleared. I call each day to check with DHL on the status of the package and was told that it had been cleared. No package arrived so I start calling again and find that I am getting a different story from each person I talk to. I now make it a point to call multiple times in order to see what different story I get and the stories are all over the place. I do not know what to believe at this point. The package has been setting in a released state for quite sometime but not moving and I am getting frustrated. I had some funds set aside that I had been saving to start production of the Larry Lights when we were ready to go. I used this money to buy more Huntlights but before that I communicated with DHL and Customs that I want to make sure we are doing things right and that this package would clear. The third, fourth, and fifth package clears but not the main order. DHL explains to me that more than 50% of orders are illegal, I explained that I had shown that his one is not and that other packages have gotten though and show customs inspection. DHL tells me that my package would be shipped to me each day. I do not believe what they are telling me anymore and call again and again until I think I have talked to everyone there each day. I also call customs and ask them to investigate what is happening at that customs location. I now have the package, it arrived last Friday after being trapped for about a month and a half. The other Huntlight orders that I placed were not big enough because I had so much tied up in the second order that was not moving. I found out the truth on what happened to the order but it will make this already long story even longer. The bottom line is that DHL messed this shipment really bad according to Customs.
I spent much more time trying to deal with this issue with DHL that I am expressing here. I ended up after the first week spending almost all of the business day trying to find out what is going on with this package. My father is becoming more aware of his surroundings and the long-term care facility informed me that talking to him would help him get more grounded in reality. At this time I am carrying a ton of guilt. My plans for seeing him on the schedule I created has fallen apart. I am not seeing him as often as I told myself I would. I am angry because I feel I was taking all of my Dads time by dealing with DHL, legal issues, and trying to get business caught up. Dad is getting taken up with other issues and everyone who sees me tells me that they can see that I am falling apart from lack of sleep though I try to hide the fact that I am exhausted. I do realize that Dad needs more time and I am going to find away to get him that time (I fail as I do not give him the time that I really should have).
My Dad knows who I am not but thinks he is still in the army and had duties to perform. He keeps telling me that he has orders and that we are stopping him from carrying them out. He also slips into other realities and was telling me about his girlfriend (my mom). He does not even realize that he had married her at this time and that that was many many decades ago. The facility does tell me that physically his is very healthy, he has low blood pressure, a strong heart, and other indicators of good health, and the only thing wrong is his memories. He does have some lesions on his brain but he is recovering much better then expected. I am told that after rehabilitation that I would likely be able to take care of him at home. The long-term care facility said he is going on to a nursing home for rehab and tell me to keep talking to him and more memories will start reconnecting. I am very worried about business now and also concerned about taking care of legal issues but I am now diverted. I am told what I need to do in order to be able to have things prepared to take care of him at home. I am stressing now at the breaking point and spending like crazy to get things done.
Dad is now at a nursing home affiliated with the long-term care facility. I did ask again to try to get him into a VA facility but I am told the same story again. I have really given up on this at this time but thought I would ask. Dad breaks though a mental wall while I am visiting him. Dad asks me if his mother is dead, I had to tell him that she died in 1980, suddenly it seems that things are coming back. He knows what year it is, he knows that he is in a nursing home for rehab. The good news is that everything seems to be getting better but he also seems like a little kid but his memories are coming back but he is also not very rational. I am trying to see him more but I really do not have the time. I start getting calls from the nursing home telling me that Dad has been getting out of bed and is trying to leave the facility, they also tell me that he has taken a few calls. The nursing home each time also asks me what we are going to do about this????
I have no idea what to do on this so they have me in for a meeting. Dad wants out of the nursing home, I try to explain that he will soon be living with me for sometime and then he could be independent if he wants but he has to stay at the nursing home.
I am spending more time with dad but not enough, I am still getting things done not related to dad but I am not doing enough and I have fallen asleep at the keyboard many times and am falling behind even more. I am getting stuff shipped but emails are what are really falling behind and I am now past 700 emails to respond to even though I am answering 50 a day the list keeps getting bigger. The very last time I see my dad I ask him if he wants to have one of this dogs come visit him. This is the first time I saw him get really excited about something. I told him that I would bring a dog to see him the next day. After I got home I started to think "why wait till Friday, I will take one of his dogs to see him now" I then changed my mind, I told myself that he is getting better and that I could do this Friday. I went home and started calling DHL again then tried to take care of more legal issues and answer some more emails. I went to sleep about 2:00 am . At 6:00 am I got a call from the nursing home telling me that my father had been rushed to the hospital. The lady on the phone told me that he was alert and asking if he was doing more tests that day at 5:00am but that when she checked back he was not breathing. I called the hospital and they told me that he had died. My first thought was that I really cheated dad by not taking the dog to see him Thursday like I thought about doing. It might not seem like that big of a deal but it was something that got him very excited. I felt do guilty that I sat most of the Friday doing nothing, by Friday evening I started letting a few people know and when onto chat a bit but I did no work. I ended up sleeping most of the weekend away almost doing nothing. I know that was not very responsible of me but it is what happened.
Monday rolls around and I know I have to get something done since I wasted the previous three days but I really do not feel up to it. The hospital tells me that I need to do something about my father's body. I told them I really don't know what to do in this situation, they told me that I am supposed to call a funeral home so I do and they go pick him up. The funeral home tells me what things they need from me and ask me what my plans are. I tell them I have no idea what my plans are. I do have a list of things they asked me to do. Since he was a veteran I was told I needed to get a DW214 or something like that. I get home and call all the places that I think he is getting retirement checks from. One of the places I call is the VA to stop his military retirement and ask how to get this DW214. The VA tells me that they can find no record of my fathers being in the military. I explain that had been seen by a VA hospital many times and should be in there system. They tell me that I should call a group called DFASS, I call DFASS and they find his retirement check information and stop it. I ask them about the VA not having a record of him and they advise me to go to FT Harrison and go to the RSO office at building 1. I ended up spending the rest of the Day at Ft Harrison. No one seems to know what an RSO office is or where it could be. Finally I talk to someone that knows what it is and tells me that there has not been one of those at Ft Harrison for a decade. This day is gone. Monday night I start researching what I am supposed to do when someone dies online until I fall asleep. Now my customers are really getting the short end of the stick.
I decided that I should go to a physical VA location and talk to them. They kind of blew me off, they said they show no record of him existing. I start asking people for advise on how I should move forward and get some bits of information. I collect proof that my father was retired from the military and go back to the VA, this time I am taken seriously and they try and find information and cannot get it. I spent the rest of the day trying to find out how to get his DW214 and each person I talk to passes me off to another person all day long and nothing gets accomplished. The next day I contact the American Legion, no help, I contacted the State, they think they can help me. I also called my Congressman and it looks like I am going to get help. I am promised that these records are to be faxed to me the next day. I spend that evening trying to figure out what dad would want me to do and trying to find if he has a will.
My father only really talked about three things, the Army his mother, and backpacking. He loved the Army so much that he would find reasons to be where active duty people could be found. I decided that there were only two choices. At a military cemetery or where his mother is buried, everyone that I could find that knew him seemed to think the military cemetery was where he would want to be but some thought both were good choices. The rest of the week was two activities only for the most part. I kept trying to prove dad existed, and try and find his will. Since the VA hospital knew he existed I went to one of those and they had his records, I called the State again as well as my congressman. When I was talking to the VA hospital they told me that might have the document that I need. I spent about 4 hours at the hospital while the searched, they could not find what I needed but they asked me why I didn't have him transferred to a VA facility. I told them that the VA rejected him. They asked me where I got that idea. I told them my story and the person told me that I had been lied to. He also told me that I would not be doing all of this running around if he had been in a VA hospital as they would have done this for me. I am really really angry when I heard this but I don't have time to think about this and I have been called and told that the regular VA had Dad's records now. I rush to the VA regional office to get the ball rolling on getting my father in a Military cemetery. When I get to the VA, they tell that they can see him now but they only have when he entered service and his rank but nothing else. They made some calls and tried to get his records.
I can't get dad buried in a military cemetery until I get these documents or his shows up on the VA system with his records. This is not the only thing I work on as nothing else mattered. I let my Dad down while he was sick and was feeling really guilty, I was determined to not let him down not that he is gone. I was going to find away to get him into that military cemetery. Well, time ran out and I still had nothing. I could not let him set any longer so I made arrangements to get him buried in the same cemetery where his mother is at. I rushed around to get the arrangements made, I had his body flown to Oklahoma, the funeral home where he was at would not release him until I paid them so I gave them their money and then made arrangements with a funeral home in the town where his mother was buried. I spent over $7000.00 dollars and still had more to spend (the money for projects is vanishing fast, I am actually spending money I do not have at this point) . I drove to Oklahoma and got a few friends to join me at the funeral. The whole time I felt like I had really let him down.
After the funeral I started to drive back to Indiana but a lady named Bobbie (quite a few CPF'ers have met Bobbie) would not let me do it. She thought I was too tired to do so and wanted me to stay a couple of days so I did but I really felt I needed to get home as I am super far behind. As soon as I got home I called DHL and was very angry but a little irrational. I complained that all my time I spend talking to them unable to get information took time away that I should have spent with my Dad, like I said I was angry and not very rational. I check out of curiosity to see if dads records were updated and if the documents had been faxed to the State. Nope, no documents. I know it is too late now but I am still upset that they have not arrived yet. I slept the next day away in a state of depression about how the last months were wasted and I got so little done. I finally got the DW214, you are not going to believe this but this is not my father's records. It shows that he had duties in 1954 and 1957 but enlisted in 1962. It also shows that he has 10 years service in foreign countries but only 6 years total service but that he was in for 27 years. It also shows that his last assignment was Conarc (Continental Air Command). This is the Air force, my father was never in the air force. I asked around and some CPFers informed me that many records from people in the Army and Airforce were destroyed in a fire in St Louis. This caused me to spend another day digging. Yep, that is what happened, dads records were cobbled together and only part of it is him.
In the middle of all of this the reflectors for the Stenlights arrived. There is a problem, the diameter is too large. This is not Don's fault at all so don't yell at him. Jtice was able to take off some of the diameter by filing and made them fit his Stenlight. What I need to do now is find out exactly how much metal needs to be taken off to make them fit then take them to a machine shop and have them reduced in diameter. I also have learned that Stenlights have inductors on two different places on Stenlights. I need to have a small groove cut into half the reflectors to account for this. Jtice managed to do is so I know it can be done. I just need to do it now.
The next day I call the lawyer to tell him that I am not longer seeking a guardianship because my father had died and that now I need different legal services. I am unable to talk to the lawyer so I left a message for him to call me with the receptionist. I never get a call back from the lawyer. I have no idea what I am supposed to do now so I consult the list and start trying to go down it. I try and learn if I can do probate myself but I cannot collect enough information. I try the lawyer again and I still get no response so I do lawyer shopping. I hire a new lawyer and then needed to go though my fathers stuff to find what bills he owes and I keep trying to find the will. Bobbie joins me to help me for 6 days. With her we worked from 6am to 9pm each night trying to go through my fathers stuff. From what we are finding it looks like dad's estate might be insolvent. I was hoping that there would be enough left over to reimburse some of my expenses. Right now it looks like that will not be the case but we will see. I have not really had a chance to talk to the new lawyer much yet but she tells me that I now have sometime. I am going to use this time to try and rebuild my business and only spend a couple of hours each day working on my fathers affairs so I should be more responsive now.
I do know that many of you are quite upset with me. I have only mentioned about 25percent of the things that have happened over the last months (the people hosting my old website vanishing at up time as well) but I wanted to show why I have not been around. I am sorry and I have probably made some very poor decisions. My only excuse is a lot has happened and I have made tons of mistakes since I really did not know what I was doing on all of this. I hope in time I can rebuild my reputation out here. Please do understand that I have gone through a time consuming and very mentally and emotionally costly thing due to all the road blocks I have come up against.
Thanks
Jon
PS
Oh my this ended up being long and I did not even come close to telling you everything that has happened.
I wonder if I have some bad Karma out there haunting me.
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