Thank You Jo!!!!

Last May we went on a Disney Cruise to Mexico. The day after we got back I was exhausted and kinda in a daze but I had responsibilities and a meeting that night so I trudged forward. I went to Target with 3 kids and managed to get all 3 kids and shopping bags into the car but not my purse. I either left it in the cart or someone swiped it as I was dealing with the kids and bags and didn't notice. Either way the purse was gone and I was beside myself because I hadn't taken out all our important documents like our passports & social security cards as well as my credit cards and drivers license. I hoped and prayed feverishly that someone would find it and return it but nothing happened. So I set about protecting us against fraud, theft, and other maliciousness that might occur. I immediately reported all my credit cards & my debit card stolen and had them replaced. Then got my drivers license replaced. Then my husband figured out how to put a credit hold on our social security numbers...its easy to do just go to the web sites for each of the 3 big credit agencies and they have the instructions, basically you send in a letter and $10 for each company for each person...so for us that was $60. Basically it means if anyone tried to get a credit card in our name and use our social security numbers,when they went to do the credit check they would be told...nope sorry you can't access their credit and so then are denied credit. We tried to get a BOA checking account and were denied for even that. To take the credit hold off you do the same thing, mail in letters & $10 per person per agency. We worried about the girls numbers but we discovered its illegal to give credit to anyone under 18, so if someone did try to get credit they should be denied immediately but if the credit company didn't check they would be legally liable for the $$ not us. So we decided not to spend another $60 to "protect" them since they should already be protected. We also had to report our passports lost which really bugged me because we had all just gotten the passports and it had cost a us a fortune and now that we've reported them they are no good and we basically have to start all over again if we want to have them reissued and yes that means paying all the fees again! ugh


ANYWAY, its now November and we have replaced everything but the social security cards (we haven't needed them so I put off spending the day at the office and another expense) including our membership cards to everywhere we shop and all the other "important" things we keep in our wallets. This morning I got a call from the passport office at the Ontario Post Office...she had my purse!!!!!!!!!!! And amazingly everything was still in it..passports, credit cards, drivers license, social security cards...everything except whatever cash was in the wallet, and I no longer remember how much that was and no longer care. I was so excited/ thrilled that I made her cookies!! :) Someone put it in their mail box and she did some leg work and found our phone number and called! She seemed to think it was hanging out in the bottom of their mailbox this whole time...which is what I hope for because it means it wasn't floating around out there for someone to do damage with buuuuuutt it seems weird to me that a there is a mailbox that only gets opened once every 6 months....so I still don't know what adventures my purse went on but I am glad it is safely back home with me where it belongs!!!

Thank You Jo at the Ontario Post Office!!!!