The Road To Margaritaville

[greg]

Nords: I believe the family of the woman who went to prison was fairly well off. The woman's male child moved in for a short time, claiming he was a student. Which I believe to be true. Almost immediately, students started visiting the house late at nite, staying for 15-30 minutes and leaving. I alerted the police, and the boy moved out shortly thereafter. Hum! Another good reason for having an estate tax.

The even stranger thing about the undercover cops was that when I tried to give them a weekly receipt for the cash rent, they did everything but refuse it: "Na, we don't need." "Give it to us later." etc. One would think someone in gov't would have wanted a receipt. They're bureaucrats, aren't they? Ahhh, to be deep undercover snooping around for trouble, with not a trail to be found. My dream job--Margaritaville.

--Greg

 

[Nords]

Based on my experience, military families are the tenants from heaven!  8)

If you're within an hours' commute of a military base, ask them to list you on their off-base housing website.  Leases usually require a "military clause" in case of an unexpected transfer, but military families would prefer to stay in a place for the entire tour-- that's at least an 18-month lease and more often three years.  

Military housing allowances & COLAs are on the Web.  You can determine down to the last dollar how much they're getting paid for their housing expenses.

When we rented our place the local housing office provided an escort for their more senior clients.  One couple wasn't too thrilled with Hawaii real estate as they'd just left North Carolina, and when they got ready to leave our place the escort pulled them aside in the driveway for the "You need to understand..." talk.  The housing office was a better advocate for our rental than we ever could have been.

 

[justin]

The even stranger thing about the undercover cops was that when I tried to give them a weekly receipt for the cash rent, they did everything but refuse it: "Na, we don't need." "Give it to us later." etc. One would think someone in gov't would have wanted a receipt. They're bureaucrats, aren't they? Ahhh, to be deep undercover snooping around for trouble, with not a trail to be found.

Let me explain the government accounting system these undercover cops were using. They do a drug bust. They find, say, $35,000 in cash and a couple kilos of something. They turn in $30,000 and all the drugs to the evidence room at the station. The other $5000 they use as their personal slush fund to pay for future undercover operations. This way, they can get an apartment for observation across the street from their target within a few hours by using their slush fund money. If they had to go through official channels to acquire property, they'd have to get approval from their boss, their boss's boss, the deputy mayor, and have a resolution signed by city council. Then, after a month or two, have the Property Management section of the City put out a request for proposals for property they could use, wait 45 days for the open bid process. Then there would be a 30 day due diligence process where the vendor would be investigated and approved. Then they would have to have a City inspector come out and look at the place to make sure it met code. The the Property Management section would have to do the whole request for proposal bid process for furniture for the apartment (which the cops don't want or need).

Long story short, ten months and many thousands of dollars later on the other side of town, the undercover cops will be wondering why they can't see the target drug house from their carefully selected vantage point hand-picked by the Property Management section.

Instead, the cops know that to put the bad guys behind bars, they have to have a flexible interpretation of their department's policy on turning in cash siezed as evidence. At the end of the day, the bad guys get busted.

I wish I was exaggerating a lot.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

Let me explain the government accounting system these undercover cops were using.  They do a drug bust.  They find, say, $35,000 in cash and a couple kilos of something.  They turn in $30,000 and all the drugs to the evidence room at the station.  The other $5000 they use as their personal slush fund to pay for future undercover operations.  This way, they can get an apartment for observation across the street from their target within a few hours by using their slush fund money.  If they had to go through official channels to acquire property, they'd have to get approval from their boss, their boss's boss, the deputy mayor, and have a resolution signed by city council.  Then, after a month or two, have the Property Management section of the City put out a request for proposals for property they could use, wait 45 days for the open bid process.  Then there would be a 30 day due diligence process where the vendor would be investigated and approved.  Then they would have to have a City inspector come out and look at the place to make sure it met code.  The the Property Management section would have to do the whole request for proposal bid process for furniture for the apartment (which the cops don't want or need). 

Long story short, ten months and many thousands of dollars later on the other side of town, the undercover cops will be wondering why they can't see the target drug house from their carefully selected vantage point hand-picked by the Property Management section. 

Instead, the cops know that to put the bad guys behind bars, they have to have a flexible interpretation of their department's policy on turning in cash siezed as evidence.  At the end of the day, the bad guys get busted. 

I wish I was exaggerating a lot.

Re. "exaggerating", I expect it's even worse than what you describe.
I might be wrong, but I doubt it.

JG

 

[justin]

Re. "exaggerating", I expect it's even worse than what you describe.
I might be wrong, but I doubt it.

JG

I remember my first day at my current job vividly. I had ample office supplies at hand so I could do my job. Pens of all colors, paper, folders, my own tape dispenser and a stapler that worked. This was at a private company. I really loved those office supplies.

This deep and meaningful love of office supplies may seem strange to some. Let me explain.

My experience working for the state: I needed a red pen. I got a red pen. Here's how I got it. I had to go through two departments to get to the property control stock room where the pens and other office supplies are guarded stored. This vault storage room was five floors down and on the other side of the building from my office. I just needed one red pen. The stock room refused to give me one. They said I must take the entire 12 pack of red pens because their accounting system can't track just one pen (and I presume it also can't track a pack of 11 pens either!). They also gave me tons of other stuff that they said I, as a new employee, needed. The other crap they gave me had to have been worth at least $60. When they got done loading me up, I had to inventory everything on a sheet of carbon copy paper. The carbon copy didn't work so well, so I had to copy down in quadruplicate my inventory of supplies I was taking. Then I had to go back to my office (up five floors, to the other side of the building) to get my supervisor to sign my "Official State Property Acquisition and Disposition Form and Notice of Possession". Then back to the stock room (down five floors, to the other side of the building) to give the stock clerk my signed form. Finally, I got my one red pen. And 11 more of them, and a ton of other stuff I didn't want or need. They would not issue me a stapler or tape dispenser because those are furniture and need to be special ordered and shipped from the main State warehouse. So, back up five floors, to the other side of the building to my office to enjoy the red pen. This ordeal took me at least 2 hours. I never needed another office supply all summer. The state implemented this system of restricting access to office supplies in response to their increasing expenditures on office supplies. They were trying to reduce costs.

Some may say the state is inefficient. I don't know if I would go that far.

 

[BUM]

Stop it! Stop it now! This thred reads like a 1960's eight family party line sounds. The road to Margaritaville seems paved with:

creeping mommy-states
welfare
landlords
tax cheats
naked lady pics
undercover cops
and red pens?


If this doesn't get turned around, I'm informing the moderator! Excuse me. I need to get a band-aid. Just stepped on a pop-top.

 

[Patrick]

Just stepped on a pop-top.

Really? Those haven't been around for decades. But I digress . . . . 8)

 

[Mr._johngalt]

Really? Those haven't been around for decades. But I digress . . . . 8)

Remember when people would drop the pop-tops in the beer and then drink it? I always wondered if anyone ever swallowed one.
Must have I would assume, but I don't recall hearing about it.


DW and I refer to our place in Texas as Margaritaville. Been using this name even before we knew where we would end up. Jimmy
certainly planted a lifestyle seedling when he wrote that one.

JG

 

[SteveR]

JG,

Yes people have managed to swallow, inhale and impale those darn things. I used to work in an Emergency Room and we it was not uncommon to have to deal with those things in various body parts from time to time. We also had ripped fingernails, cut fingers, arms, lips, broken teeth, etc. from them.

I still like the memories of opening a bottle of Bud on the bumper of my friends '57 Chevy.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

JG,

Yes people have managed to swallow,  inhale and impale those darn things.  I used to work in an Emergency Room and we it was not uncommon to have to deal with those things in various body parts from time to time.  We also had ripped fingernails, cut fingers, arms, lips, broken teeth, etc. from them. 

I still like the memories of opening a bottle of Bud on the bumper of my friends '57 Chevy. 

Well, I managed to uncork a wine bottle on a motel room towel rack once,
but opening a beer on the bumper of a '57 Chevy. That's heresy man!

JG

 

[BUM]

I still like the memories of opening a bottle of Bud on the bumper of my friends '57 Chevy.

Yeah man, at 85 mph. Those were the days! BTW did every town have a Bud Rock? You know that boulder or stone wall by the side of the road where one could, at a very precise time, discard ones empties?

 

[SteveR]

BUM,

Growing up in the southern mountains, EVERY boulder was a Bud rock! Hunters "killed" the Bambi Crossing signs with shot guns while others "disposed" of empies via mother nature. I would never do that now but when you are young and stupid you do stupid things. "Stupid is as Stupid does" re: Forrest Gump.

We had enough bootlegger places in around there that you never went dry no matter how young you were. "Grannies" was our favorite as you could half pints as well as beer there. You just knocked on the door of the run down shack and Grannie would take you through the house to the kitchen and let you pick out your favorite beverage.

Those were the days!