From time to time I peruse the articles on BrideTide, looking for inspiration for my own wedding or just the occasional good laugh.  I recently stumbled across an article about bridesmaid contracts, and to be honest… I had to buy a vowel.

This, I thought, had to be a joke.  Up until this point, I had never heard of such a thing!  Me being me, I had to research this a bit more, so I headed to Google and did a search for “bridesmaid contracts,” where I found out it is a joke… sort of.  Kind of.  It depends on who you ask…

According to this article from ABC News in 2007, there was a real bride who sent her bridesmaids a contract AS A JOKE.  But the joke backfired badly (really badly), the contract wound up making its way across the internet, and the bride wound up labeled the queen of all bridezillas.

I don’t want to post the bridesmaid contract here – it appalls me too much – but if you’re curious about it you can check out this blog, which gives a good example of what these things look like.

What shocked me most was when I did further reading in The Washingtonian and discovered a UK magazine called You and Your Wedding did a poll of 1000 women and found 1 in 5 were in favor of making their bridesmaids sign a contract forbidding things like pregnancy, weight gain, and hair style changes in the months leading up to the wedding.  Apparently this concept I felt sure was a joke turns out to be quite serious to some brides!

I sat and tried to figure out how my bridesmaids would have responded had I presented each of them with one of these “bridesmaid contracts.”  I don’t know for sure, because I haven’t asked any of them, but I suspect I would have had a lot of paper cuts to cover up from the contracts being flung back in my face.  And I know I’m not the only person horrified by this whole idea – my Google search confirmed that big time.  I mean… a contract?  Really???

I know that brides like to feel their wedding day is special and just about them.  That’s fine.  The problem, at least to me, is that a contract like this makes it more like your special YEAR, instead of just a day.  Narcissist much?!  These contracts ask your most trusted friends to put their lives on hold for you, which is perfectly RIDICULOUS.  And while it would be nice to have your ‘maids promise to not complain about the dress you’ve chosen for them, or to show up for all your pre-wedding events, it’s downright crappy to make that kind of demand on someone’s time.  I’d rather my bridesmaids do those things because they want to support me, not because they are contractually obligated.

© 2009, The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities). All rights reserved.

I feel I must give an update on Friday’s blog topic.  You remember, the one in which I gave an account of my financial freak-out last week?

*sigh*

Well, I had to call my bank back today because a stop payment fee posted to my account that should NOT have posted, since all this crap is not my fault and my bank assured me no such charge would show up as part of their remedy to my wacky situation.  I’m quite happy I called, because I was informed that the remedy – stopping the direct deposit from clearing and then blocking that transit number from ever touching my account again – isn’t actually possible.  Apparently banks can’t stop money going into accounts, only out.

*sigh again*

Point of the story?  I’m now told all I can do is not touch this money that isn’t mine, and close the account if I don’t want more money being deposited.  Oh, and the person who told me this clearly thought I was crazy.

It seems there is a good chance I will be left with this money sitting in my account for a while.  If anyone knows the statute of limitations on unclaimed money, I’d love to know what it is.  I still don’t want it, but if no one is ever going to fix the mistake or take it back, I have no idea what else to do!

© 2009, The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities). All rights reserved.

For the last 2 weeks, my financial life has been in a crazy upheaval.  It’s not because I screwed up keeping track of my money, or spent more than I have, either.  It’s because somewhere, someone decided to start depositing money to my checking account, and I don’t know who they are.

To be more specific…

I’m really protective of my checking account.  And I’m paranoid about it.  So I log in to my online banking account at least once a day to make sure everything is correct.  And it always is.  At least, that was true until 2 weeks ago, when I noticed a direct deposit into my account from a place listed as “Simon Property G.”

What the heck is that?  you may wonder.  Well, I did, too.  I had no idea what this company was or why they would be giving me money.  It turns out, it’s a mall holding company, and one of its properties happens to be the mall near me.  You can learn more here.  For the record, I am in no way plugging this company.  In fact, they really ticked me off, because when I tried to call them and their bank to tell them they made a mistake, no one could be bothered helping me.  Hello?!  I’m trying to return money to you, you idiots!  You’d think in this economy they would appreciate such a call, but apparently I am mistaken.

So I called my bank and explained what happened.  They said there is little they can do, except look up the scant details available on the transaction – which told them the direct deposit had my name on it.  So as far as my bank can tell, it’s legitimate.  This didn’t sit well with me, because it means someone has my name and my bank information, and I didn’t give it to them.  So I made the decision to start the process to close my account and get a new one, so that there can’t be any future issues.

Well, that’s a little more time-intensive than I expected, because my employer uses direct deposit.  So I have to leave this account open until they can change everything over.  *sigh*

In the meantime, nothing else shady had happened with my account.  I logged in everyday, and everything was totally fine.  And then I logged in today… exactly 2 weeks since the initial problem transaction.  Guess what?  There was another direct deposit – and this one was for a LOT more money!

So I flipped out.  To me, this is obviously someone’s paycheck, or else a huge mistake of some sort, so I called my bank again.  They, of course, think I’m certifiable for complaining.  The deposits are coming in with my name, after all.  I had to explain to 3 different people why this is not OK with me, and that I do not feel this is money I am owed before they realized I was just being HONEST and trying to do the right thing.  Now steps have been taken to remedy the problem and find out what is going on.  In the meantime, I am left waiting for a new pin number for a new account, with limited access to cash, because I am trying to protect the money that IS mine from being tampered with.  Oh yeah, and did I mention that I am going to Europe next week?  Fantastic timing, isn’t it?

I will say, the people at my bank (the name of which I do not want to disclose here), were very helpful and understanding.  I suspect they simply aren’t trained for dealing with a person calling the bank and complaining about an excess of money.

My friend tells me I probably get double good karma points for reporting the problem.  I wonder if she’s right….

© 2009, The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities). All rights reserved.

© 2009, The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities). All rights reserved.

Another reason birds are bad:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/01/15/new.york.plane.crash/index.html

© 2009, The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities). All rights reserved.