Griever/Detailed Timeline
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Timeline
I'm rephrasing this in first person; it was probably written in third-person due to some misguided idea of trying to be/sound objective for lawsuit purposes.
1994-1996
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 1994? 1995? | I started work with Dan Dudley on recording studio at 2895 Danielsville Rd. (Dan and others had built a stage in the back yard while the previous tenant was still there), eventually to be called Red House (because of the house's exterior color). No official paperwork was filed. I provided some equipment (much of which was purchased earlier at Dan's recommendation – total about $2000 – when we were in a band together) and purchased additional equipment on Dan's recommendation, including a large Quantum mixing board (I initially paid for half and later had to buy Dan's half from him or lose the board) and a baby grand piano – total Dan-recommended purchases about $4000. Dan left angrily after several months of carpentry, most of which was unfinished in one way or another. I tried to make a go of the recording studio even though preparations were not complete and equipment was not all working quite right.
I had occasional paying clients and wasn't losing money heavily, but it just wasn't enough. I was always having to apologize to clients for equipment problems. I needed more income from somewhere. I would have kept going with it anyway if Chris Cox hadn't come along and talked me into what happened next. |
| 1995.08.14[1] | Cox-Staddon Enterprises, Inc., d.b.a. Red House Media and Olymprop, was incorporated. Chris Cox, President; Nick Staddon, VP, Livia Wade, Treasurer. The company operated from the Red House location. I paid for incorporation and other setup expenses using credit cards.
I continued to work on the recording studio when time permitted. |
| 1995.09.13 | I finished refinishing the floor of the Red House control room (heart-pine flooring exposed and coated with polyurethane) |
| 1995.10. | Red House set up web sites for several local musicians and began offering their CDs for sale through The Red House Store (at http://redhouse.com/store), as well as licensed merchandise commemorating the Athens (GA) part of the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. Also, Olymprop went online (http://redhouse.com/olym/prop) – web site attempting to market rental housing for Olympics visitors, in contract with a local realtor. |
| 1995.11.19 | First mention of "Florida family", i.e. Lynne and Bubba, in my logbook. (12/4 "$50 from Fla folks (Lynn & Bubba)") Apparently Lynne and Bubba had arrived at 2895 Danielsville Rd. and begun staying in the "Tipi Village" which was then still operating in the back yard, relic of the previous tenant and his extensive social network. (Not sure what brought them to the Village, but I've assumed they heard of it through the grapevine.) They were paying $50/month to help with expenses incurred by their stay (standard Tipi Village policy at that point). Their daughter Jess and her husband Frank were also staying there and paying $50/month (earliest mention: 12/4) |
| 1995.11.30 | From RH log: "Nick foolishly loaned Chris another $35.00" -- evidently I have become tired of dealing with Chris. |
| 1996.02.16 | Earliest evidence of orders being received at The Red House Store. |
| mid/late 1996 | 1996 Olympics end; no Olymprop houses were rented. Chris's interest in Red House's other operations seemed to begin drifting, and he became increasingly problematic. |
| (1995? 1996?) | By this time I was doing sporadic recording studio gigs, many paying, through 1996 and (early?) 1997. New web clients during this time included: Autonomous Records, WPUP, J.J. Reneaux. I switched to athensnet.com (Merph Ellis) for web hosting. |
| 1996.04.17 | Work for "Day Trip" (for-profit music fest organized by me and Chris, funded by my already-overburdened credit cards) was apparently well underway; L&B's daughter Cimmeria helped to sell tickets downtown. |
| 1996.04.29 |
|
| 1996.05.03 | Chris abruptly moved out from the house shared with his girlfriend (Nancy) and moved his dilapidated RV to the woods behind 2895 (in the back of the "Tipi Village", see later entries). |
| 1996.05.13 | By this time, Chris owed money to both me and Nancy; I tried to help Nancy by setting up an accounting. I agreed with her that, due to circumstances, she needed her smaller amount back more urgently than I needed my larger amount back. |
| 1996.05.15 | I set down terms for Chris's continuing involvement in Red House. These included no drinking, no sleeping around, regular cash payments on his debts to RH and Nancy, no being in RH without me there, and his name off the bank accounts. |
| 1996.06. | There is further evidence of my continuing irritation with Chris' lack of follow-through etc. |
| 1996.07.10 | I was still trying to square things with Nancy. |
| 1996.07.29 | I set up redhouse.com email account for Bubba to use. |
| 1996.08.04 | Red House registered & pays for vbz.net domain, which went largely unused at first. |
| 1996.12. | Lynne Griever assisted (Bubba in attendance but not participating) with negotiations between Chris & me for complete termination of his involvement with Red House/CSE. A small but annoying error was made, requiring follow-up work and apologies to a potential business contact. (Chris was gone by 12/6.) Chris eventually donated his RV to the RDA.
In retrospect I don't think Lynne's assistance was actually helpful. Lynne and Bubba began storing disused vehicles at 2895 Danielsville Rd., starting with a small covered trailer and eventually escalating over the next few years to include 2 schoolbuses, a wrecked Camaro, a disused two-door sedan, Chris Cox's motor home which he later donated to the RDA (sometime after 1/28/98), and a covered pickup truck donated to the RDA by another departing village resident. (The pickup truck was sold; the other vehicles were all eventually – after much fuss – moved to the Grievers' residence at Hull Road, mostly after I moved out of 2895 Danielsville Rd.) |
| 1996.10.26-27 | Shanti Fest – charitable music festival organized by Bubba, Lynne, myself, and others in the back yard of 2895. I performed with the Grievers and made audio recordings of most of the festival. (Many other local artists performed as well. The festival was a musical success, but attendance was small and profits were zero-ish.) According to Lynne, Bubba did extensive groundswork to help make the fest a success, and became somewhat ill (from exhaustion) for several days as a result.
Lynne & Bubba described to me their ideas for a network of organizations to assist the underprivileged (towards which end they planned to start their own nonprofit, to be called The ReDistribution Alternative), and offered to help with Red House work in exchange for my help with the computer side of their operations. I told them that trading certain onerous tasks (most notably phone calls and paperwork) for computer work would be agreeable. I assigned Bubba office space, a computer, and a key to the red house (2895). |
1997
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 1997.02.17 | I help put together a web site for the RDA, and Red House hosts it (http://redhouse.com/rda). |
| 1997.03.25 | Jessica Whitehill (Lynne's 3rd daughter) gives birth to Gabriel Dembe' Whitehill. |
| 1997.04.12 - 1997.05.06 | In the absence of paying employment, I put in regular hours working on Mubbie's rental properties. |
| 1997.05.23 | Livia and I file for bankruptcy in order to escape some $40k of credit card debt which began accumulating in August 1991, shortly before our move to Georgia.
The "Tipi Village" is apparently still open for all comers at this time (see email in Bubba's acct) |
| 1997.06.20[2] | Lynne and Bubba incorporate The ReDistribution Alternative, Inc. ("RDA") Willard Griever, President, operating address is 2895 Danielsville Rd. (same as Cox-Staddon) |
| 1997.07.10 | Bankruptcy court date has happened by now. Approval to be 3-6 weeks later. Hackers broke into at least one server at AthensNet, and redhouse.com was affected. Apparently the store is offline at this point because of the resulting server configuration changes. |
| 1997.07.16 | The stage in the Red House back yard has, by this time, fallen down, and I cannot get permission from the landowner (Mubbie) to hold further concerts. |
| 1997.08.14 | Red House Store is apparently still offline; I am hoping to get it back online by the end of August. |
| 1997.09.13 | AthensNet.com folds; redhouse.com goes down briefly, but I am able to find hosting again fairly quickly. Vbz.net takes a little longer, so The Red House Store (then at vbz.net/store) is still offline when the following events happen.
I am offered programming work in Wisconsin, on contract, at a high rate of pay. Being desperately short of money for business, family, and personal projects, and with Livia's full support, I accept the job and head off to Wisconsin in the Nissan. Lynne and Bubba agree to "mind the store" while I am out – not that there's a whole lot to do, since business is slow, but the existing clients do have needs which pop up from time to time and there are one or two issues being resolved which I will not be able to "stay on top of" while out of the office. I continued to stay on top of the technical work while out of the office, but I had been hoping Lynne or Bubba could cover most of the human-contact stuff I really hate doing. They repeatedly fell down on this, though, to my great frustration, as expressed in at least one email. Livia buys a beat-up old Datsun ($900) to serve as her primary commute vehicle (the Nissan being in Wisconsin). Just before all this, or possibly during the visit below: I remember Lynne approaching me, while I was still in Athens, with a request from Bubba to get my permission to pursue some additional lines of merchandise for the store. I remember thinking this an odd request, since it's not clear why Bubba needed permission to gather information, but I said "sure". In later conversations, it turns out there was a miscommunication; apparently Bubba wanted a promise that I would put his items in the store once he had them ready, even though he had not given me a reasonably specific list or description of them. |
| 1997.10.28 | I return to Wisconsin after visiting GA for a few days (?) to pick up some things and tidy up a few loose ends. (It may have been during this visit that Lynne approached me as above.) |
| 1997.10.01 ~ | I arrive in Wisconsin, and continues handling web site maintenance and store orders while there (including credit card processing... I can't remember if Bubba handled shipping or if I decided to bring all the stock up with me, since at that point it was mostly CDs/tapes and didn't take much room). |
| 1997.11.? (early Nov.) |
I am able to get hosting for vbz.net, but further work is needed to get the store back online. |
| 1997.11.06 | Bubba leaves Athens for a trip to Gatlinburg. Lynne says she may be able to assist me with any "minding the store" tasks I need, though it's not clear how much she can do. |
| 1997.11.26 | Bubba returns; gets back in touch with me on 12/1. |
1998
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| Early-mid 1998? | Lynne asks me for permission (via phone?) to temporarily set up a "food pantry" (free food distribution site for the needy) at 2895 Danielsville Rd. Lynne agrees that the pantry should be gone in about a month and certainly by the time I return from Wisconsin. |
| 1998.02.11 | Bubba has arranged to receive extensive (and expensive) chiropractic care from Five Points Chiropractic in exchange for a web site which he will set up and which I will host at vbz.net. The partially-completed site (with which I assisted in the layout and image processing) has been online for some time by this date.
Bubba sends me a list of suppliers he would like to add to the store (but not any details on the actual items or quantities involved), including The Mountain. So as yet the Red House Store is still entirely indy music and a few related products. |
| 1998.03.15 | I am able to get the store working again (while trying to keep up with maintenance for the Autonomous Records web site and of course holding down a full-time-plus job). |
| 1998.03.27 | I experience trouble with Autonomous leaving RH invoices unpaid, complicated by financial problems on the Red House side of things. L&B are no help in resolving the issues. |
| 1998.04.01 | Another artist, J.J. Reneaux, announces that she is unhappy with the long hiatus and will be taking her business elsewhere shortly. Lynne agrees to call J.J. and discuss the situation; I explain the situation in great detail from my POV, but there are no emails from Lynne indicating that she actually made the call.
I also remember feeling like this had been left very much unresolved, although Lynne may have told me verbally (phone) that she called and given me all the details – which of course I would not have remembered since they were not written down, and at that time it probably would not have occurred to me to take extensive notes or email her "here's how I understood what you said on the phone". |
| 1998.04.15 | Bubba sends me a list of a few dozen Mountain shirts to add to the store. |
| 1998.04.22 | I email Bubba "Hey, if you're planning to not check your email for a week, maybe you could give me a heads-up first???" |
| 1998.04.24 | I email L&B "I haven't heard from you in a very long time despite repeated inquiries. I'm thinking that this isn't working. Comments?" |
| 1998.04.25 | Bubba replies that he was working and thought I would appreciate a break from his silly emails. He also says he didn't receive anything to which he didn't reply, and apologizes for the inconvenience.
I respond with a list of what he emailed to which there was no response. I also send a situation update based on what I have heard from Livia, including the fact that Lynne has tried several times to reach JJ without success, and has left messages on JJ's answering machine. |
| 1998.04.29 | I ask Bubba who will be shipping the items on the Mountain list he sent – Mountain or Red House. The items are online but have not been tested for ordering glitches. |
| 1998.05.02 | Minor layout changes to the store are in progress during this time; several emails back & forth. |
| 1998.05.04 | I compose a formal plan to Pierce (employer in Wisconsin) for doing much of their programming work in Georgia instead of Wisconsin. I email the plan to Lynne for critiquing before sending it to Pierce.
Bubba asks me to add Alexander Flores to list of artists at the store. I tell Bubba that I need more information before that will be possible. Store is still at vbz.net/store. |
| 1998.05.07 | I become extremely frustrated with Bubba and tell him "If you haven't had time to do it, it's more important to me that I know this than it is that you feel guilty about it" and "You have a bad habit of picking one of the questions I ask and only answering that question." |
| 1998.05.11 | Me to Lynne, regarding some order information she gave me on the phone: "If you told me on the phone, you need to always follow up with email because then I have a record of it." I subsequently found where I had written the information down, but re-emphasized that email would have been better. |
| 1998.05.12 | I mention to Bubba "I've mentioned to various people [at Pierce] that I'm currently planning my nervous breakdown for August, if I can hold out that long." |
| 1998.05.19 | At Lynne's request, I update the "Mad Housers" page within RDA's web site.
I send Bubba a rather urgent request about a customer order ("Can you attempt to contact Autonomous and find out what's going on?"). |
| 1998.05.26 | Bubba sends me information about a used inkjet printer he is interested in having me purchase for use at RH. |
| 1998.05.28 | I ask Bubba if he needs a daily reminder to deal with the issue emailed on 5/19. |
| 1998.05.29 | I send Bubba "no response #1" email, including a to-do list, in very irritated tones, with much use of the word "urgent". |
| 1998.06.01 | I send Bubba "no response #2" to the 5/29 email, with updates. |
| 1998.06.02 | I send Bubba "no response #3" to the 5/29 email, with an update: "If I don't hear from them in a week, I'll be refunding the money and pulling [Autonomous's] stuff out of the catalog." |
| 1998.06.03 | Bubba sends me a reply, saying he thought the issues had been dealt with via IM "last night". The rest of the message seems strangely off-target, although it is apparently responding to the issues remaining as of "no response #3". |
| 1998.06.04 | I respond and send Bubba an updated list of priorities. |
| 1998.06.11 | Bubba emails me some details about L&B's physical reorganization plans, including "so things should be back to as you remember them by time you get here." – which I think means that they were intending to have the food pantry gone from RH by the time of my next trip to Athens.
I mention me plans to move the small storage shed from the Brown House to RH. I receive a mail package sent by L/B, and note that there were two overdue internet access bills (said internet access being used only by L&B at that time) and an envelope marked on the envelope that it needed to be returned by 5/13. I am very upset about this and tell them so. |
| 1998.07.25 | I visit Georgia to retrieve some items and take care of miscellaneous business. I work for Pierce on 7/28, 7/29, 8/3-8/14. |
| 1998.08. | Earliest documented borrowing by the Grievers - $300 for an undocumented purpose. |
| 1998.08.15 Sa | Probable date of drive back to Wisconsin (was written down as 9/15, but that can't be.) |
| 1998.08.17 | I am back in Wisconsin. |
| 1998.08.26 | I have planned another GA trip. |
| 1998.08.29 | I drive back down to GA. When I arrive, the food pantry is still taking up most of the space in the living room; Bubba's office in the recording control room has become a bedroom. The room is unusable for recording work, and the living room is unusable as performance space.
Under pressure from Lynne and Bubba to live up to my "agreement" to put Bubba's new items in the store, I hastily did an extensive redesign of the store so it could accommodate the items he wanted to add, which pretty much overwhelmed the content (independent music) I had originally put there. This took significant time away from the work I was supposed to be doing for my employer and may have harmed my credibility with said employer – although the hourly log still shows me doing mostly 8+ hours per day. Perhaps I felt under pressure to work 10 hour days? RH log book shows a lot of work on vbz.net during 9/21-10/8 I bought Livia a used Honda to replace the beat-up Datsun. The Grievers begin borrowing the Datsun soon after this. |
| 1998.09.24 | I drive back to WI. |
| 1998.10.06 | There are signs of (the start of?) conflict with Don Verhoff of Pierce. |
| 1998.10.19 | Probable last day of Pierce contract (work log has start time but no end time; progress log also ends on this day). A couple of days later, I return to Athens and get a similar contract with a local company (Carrier Transicold) and begin working there almost immediately. Computers at Red House become networked (CSE and/or I paid for the networking equipment, and I ran the necessary network cables.) |
| 1998.11.08 | I perform with the Grievers at Shanti Fest 2, held on private property off Route 441 north of Athens. |
| 1998.12.03 | From log book: "When will the control room stop being a bedroom? When will pantry be gone from inside house?" Grievers are still using the recording studio control room (Bubba's office) as a bedroom, and the pantry is still occupying most of the living room (there was probably an email about this on 12/9).
The phrase "incredible mess" accurately describes the house, inside and out, at this point. |
| Late 1998 – early 1999 | I buy Livia an old beat-up pick-up truck ($1000) to use for hauling stuff to/from/around the property. Additional repairs are done to make the truck dependable, for another $1000 or so. |
1999
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 1999.03.24 | Lynne and Bubba begin borrowing Livia's pickup truck. Nick & Livia have to tell L&B quite explicitly (a) not to borrow it without asking, and (b) to return it the next day unless a different time has been agreed on. Equipment Livia leaves in the truck tends to be missing when the truck is returned. Livia investigates how to get L&B on the truck's vehicle insurance, to avoid complications if they are in an accident while driving it. |
| 1999.03.29 | Cable Internet is installed at Red House (paid for by CSE/me). Eventually, all workstations are able to access Internet through the network instead of having to dial up. |
| 1999 early April |
Livia and I sell the Datsun to Lynne and Bubba for $300 (?) |
| 1999.04.15 | Bubba wrecks the Datsun with Lynne and their son Jody in the car. Lynne is in the hospital until 4/21. Jody's leg is broken and he is in a cast for many months. The Datsun is totalled.
Not too long after this (date uncertain), Bubba is burned by gasoline while helping a friend repair their car at L&B's Hull Road house. He is in the hospital again for at least a day. |
| 1999.09. | Bubba and I set up web site for a nonprofit Lynne is working with, the Georgia Coalition to End Homelessness (GCEH). Hosting costs ($15.95/mo) are fronted by CSE/me, with the understanding that these will be covered once the site is approved by GCEH. |
2000
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 2000.01. | I start trying to get a handle on the seemingly constant stream of Griever-associated people moving into and out of the "Village" area. (Some of them may not be Griever-associated, but Grievers are supposed to be in charge of clearing permissions for people who want to stay there overnight.) |
| 2000.06.06 | I'm still doing maintenance on the gceh.org website, without pay, and covering the cost of hosting until RDA is able to obtain funds. |
| 2000.06.18 | Email from Lynne mentions a loan (amount unspecified) which I had apparently agreed to leave for her. |
| 2000.10.13 | RDA (or was it me?) registers madhousers.org on behalf of Frank Jeffers's nonprofit The Mad Housers. |
| 2000.10.30 | RDA registers redistribution.org; no hosting yet (or was it hosted somewhere else?) |
| 2000.11.02 | Lynne spends some time critiquing the redesign of vbz.net then underway.
Lynne wants to talk to me before I go somewhere. |
| 2000.12. | I complete another major design revision of vbz.net, with some undocumented assistance from L&B. Bubba created almost all of the images then in use (backgrounds were original, and product images were processed from images provided by suppliers); he also did all the legwork of tracking down suppliers and obtaining images and catalogs from them. I did all the programming and HTML/layout work. |
2001
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 2001.02 | GCEH is dissolved; I set up redistribution.org on gceh.org's web hosting account. |
| 2001.02.19 | I ask Bubba, via email, to please handle customer inquiries without waiting for me to ask first. |
| 2001.02.23 | I ask Bubba to handle a specific customer email inquiry. |
| 2001.04.04 | Apparently I responded to one of Lynne's loan requests (or a promise to pay back a loan, perhaps) by asking if she could provide a post-dated check for the amount due. Lynne declines the offer.
Bubba is working for Lofty Ideas at this point. Apparently I left a copy of the spreadsheet showing RDA's then-debt to RH/me, but mentioned that the t-shirt sales percentage might affect the total. Lynne circuitously says they can't do anything about it right now, and agrees that it would be best to have the total with the sales percentage included. Lynne promises to pay the current batch of bills "around the 25th to the 27th of this month." |
| 2001.04.20? | Livia and I visit NC; I briefly visit Sandy for the first time. (earliest: 20th; latest: 23rd). Lynne emails me asking for a $200 loan. Lynne is working for GA Task Force. |
| 2001.04.26 | There is evidence of my frustration with non-responsiveness from B. I'm is also helping Bubba with a web site project Bubba has taken on (CarCapsule), without any specificagreement about payment.
I receive [possibly I mean "relay" here; need to check sources] Bubba's response to customer, but it isn't at all clear whether Bubba responded to the customer as well, since I did not receive a copy of anything sent to the customer. |
| 2001.05.01 | I ask B about Lynne's "moving plan" -- not sure what this might refer to; had RH been broken into yet? |
| 2001.05.16 | I send Lynne a reminder for $130.15 of their phone bills which I had covered. |
| 2001.05.24 | I email Lynne about an unexpected charge on Livia's SunTrust check card. I mention that Lynne paid him for another charge on or around that date. I remind Lynne that I need a written list of everything Lynne uses the SunTrust card for (date, amount, and payee), whenever she uses it. |
| 2001.05.25 | I inquire about whether Lynne has paid back for several other charges on the SunTrust card, totalling $235. |
| 2001.05.26 | A mysterious charge shows up on my personal check card; I ask Lynne if she did it. Lynne says she did but that she already told me about it and wrote me a check which should have covered it but didn't quite; Lynne also mentions some other transactions. |
| 2001.05.28? | Sandy and Charles visit Athens ("the Josh trip"); they camp out behind Red House and spend days in Livia's backyard. (I am still working days at Carrier.) |
| 2001.05.29 | Lynne mentions having written a $330 check to me but having decided not to leave it on my keyboard because Charles was using my computer. |
| 2001.06.10 | I ask Lynne (email) if it would be ok to haul off Frank & Jess's car, which was at that time parked behind the "Village" area. It had apparenly not been used for some time; the rear window had been replaced with a plastic sheet which had torn almost completely away, allowing rain to come into the back seat. |
| 2001.06.10 | Lynne requests (email) to put off making a decision on that car as they are currently focussing on moving "the big bus" (probably the one which they parked in back of Red House, blocking my office window view – an ongoing source of annoyance and frustration for me). Lynne suggests talking over the options, after which they would consider disposing of F&J's car if no other possibilities came up. |
| 2001.06.10 | I agree to this (email) and suggest that I will have more time for discussion soon, probably in 2-3 weeks. |
| 2001.06.12 | Lynne requests to speak with me for maybe 10-15 minutes. I say "any time tonight" should be fine. |
| 2001.06.13 | My job at Carrier ends. No new job being on the horizon, I decide to devote all my available energy to making vbz.net profitable. |
| 2001.06.15 | Sandy had planned to drive down with Mel; at the last minute Sandy finds herself panicking about it, so instead I drive up in the Benz and drive them all down to Athens in Sandy's minivan the next day. |
| 2001.06.16 | Lynne emails me a Word document (odd, that) requesting a $200 loan in addition to $400 apparently already loaned, and requesting an extension on that $400 with a payback plan of $200 per paycheck, starting in 2 weeks, for the $600 total. Lynne apologizes for continual borrowing. |
| 2001.06.30 | I email Lynne & Bubba about having left the thermostat turned way down low when I had been trying to save electricity by leaving it turned off except when desperately needed, due to the new need to save money. Lynne apologizes for accidentally leaving it on. |
| 2001.07.10 | I email Lynne about a mysterious BellSouth charge ($141.10, 6/22) on my Sears Mastercard. I remind Lynne about always writing down any charges she makes on any of my cards. |
| 2001.07.11 | Lynne claims having discussed it with me verbally and having already paid me for it that same day. Lynne agrees that putting such things in email is a good idea. I reply that I can't find any record of having received or deposited the check, and wonders if maybe I gave it back to her as part of some exchange.
(Lynne's justification for such an exchange at the time would have been that it would simplify things, presumably for Lynne, but obviously if such an exchange did take place it has also had the effect of making it entirely unclear whether Lynne did in fact pay me back for the charge.) Lynne says she will have to check her notes and get back to me about it. |
| 2001.07.11 | I ask Bubba where my auto-battery trickle charger might be. I originally loaned it to him to charge up the battery of their schoolbus (Big Bus) so it could be moved (whereupon it got dripped on by some fluid or other); I had last seen it in Bubba's Big Black Truck. (...which means that Bubba has acquired the Big Black Truck by this time, and I believe the Big Bus had not yet been moved because that's where I first looked for the charger.)
Bubba replies that he has needed to take the charger to work with him because of a malfunctioning charger in the vehicle. He implies he will return it on Friday. |
| 2001.07.11 | Lynne emails me a complicated list of transactions with explanations, all in a single paragraph, explaining what happened with the BellSouth charge and other items. I have set up a new computer, "Sweetums", which is now the fastest computer in Red House. My recollection was that I told Lynne she should use Sweetums instead of borrowing Bubba's computer, which she was in the habit of doing and thereby preventing Bubba from doing Red House work. I planned to use Sweetums for myself when Lynne wasn't around and also to run data-processing tasks in the background when she was; Lynne's use of the Sweetums was generally not a major obstacle to this, although I did feel like I was doing her a major favor by providing her with a such a nice computer just so Bubba would be able to use the one I had provided for him. |
| 2001.07.16 | Anna and I go to visit Sandy in NC, "back Thursday afternoon". I leave a rush order in Bubba's chair, with instructions and an email to Lynne mentioning the rush order and the NC visit itinerary. |
| 2001.07.18 | I email Lynne & Bubba asking if the rush order went out on time because I hadn't heard anything, and also asking Bubba to handle another customer inquiry (attached). |
| 2001.07.19 | Anna and I return to GA. I forward another customer inquiry to Bubba, and ask "let me know when y'all are gonna be around". |
| 2001.07.30 | I try to straighten out housekeeping issues which have become a problem (e.g. the cloud of fruit-flies around some unemptied trash in the kitchen; supplies running out). "Am I now [in charge of housekeeping]? Or is someone else?" I also ask when would be a good time for the next "regular" meeting (as I recall, we had all – L,B, and me – agreed that we needed to have a weekly meeting), and mention planning to be out of town (in NC and DC with Anna & Livia) approximately 8/2-8/11. |
| 2001.07.31 | Lynne agrees that regular meetings are a good idea. Lynne confesses to the housekeeping oversights but suggests that the piles of boxes (related to shipping and/or stock, I believe – probably the boxes in the middle of the living room, which tended to crowd around the kitchen door at times) are making it difficult to keep on top of the housekeeping. Lynne also mentions that they will be busy with lofts 8/9-8/14 and presumably will not be over at RH much, nor able to stay on top of anything RH-related, during this time. |
| 2001.08.01 | I mention a delay in travel plans; family and i will be leaving Sunday morning. Lynne describes her various efforts to deal with the trash situation. |
| 2001.08.02 | I ask L&B about (1) plans for the J&J Flea Market web site (domain renewal came due), (2) plans to pay for hosting for redistribution.org. I also mention a plan to get dedicated server. |
| 2001.08.06 | I apologize for interrupting possible pre-loft activities but need to inquire if Bubba had been able to find out information needed to fill a very large order (Flores) over which he had been enthusiastic when originally queried. |
| 2001.08.07 | Having heard nothing back from Bubba, I attempt to contact Flores Art by email. |
| 2001.08.08 | I ask Bubba or Lynne to please try and find out the status of a different order. (From what I remember, Bubba had made some arrangements about it and I didn't have enough information to answer the question myself.) |
| 2001.08.09 | Lynne replies, suggesting that I check my laptop for the missing information, although she says Bubba will also investigate... I am frustrated by the response. |
| 2001.08.28 | "Lynne's" hard drive dies. (Not sure if this was the one on Waldorf, or Bubba's computer which Lynne co-opted, or Sweetums – or maybe even Statler before Statler got cannibalized to fix Waldorf.) |
| 2001.10.05 | I ask Bubba/Lynne about the nature of the hosting account they have apparently set up on Affinity (same host as redhouse.com), and remind everyone about the redistribution.org hosting charges. |
| 2001.10.10 | I discover that the deadbolt on the RH back door has been left open overnight. (Lynne responds: "Good catch... sorry.")
I call "HLNA Platinum", something which Lynne apparently initiated but had not intended to be a repeating charge, to have them cancel charges on the Sears Mastercard. $23.85 on 9/11 cannot be refunded but HLNA agrees to refund the other charge(s). |
| 2001.10.?? | I assume musical production duties to finish off the RDA's Benefit CD project, begun soon after 9/11. I am verbally promised 1/3 of proceeds after expenses, and compensation for expenses (mainly blank CD-Rs for duplication) although this is not put into writing. |
| 2001.10.26 | I use up my last $400 of credit buying a new, smaller mixing board to make recording at Red House possible again (see email to Tigger 10/27). |
| 2001.11.01 | I move out of Livia's house, by mutual agreement, and into Red House. Divorce plans are underway by this time. |
| 2001.11.10 | I ask Lynne for the $200 due for the first two weeks of Benz rental, which we can then deduce must have begun on or about 10/25. I also mention that two RDA phone bills have come in, totalling $139.71 and due 11/19, and ask for a status update (it seems clear that I do not believe I have yet been paid for the previous month's RDA phone bills, but am willing to believe that I might have overlooked something). |
| 2001.11.13 | Lynne mentions the Benefit CD project in email; she is seeking funding for equipment. (Lynne also was campaigning heavily around this time for vbz.net/RH to become a non-profit, though I there's not much evidence of this in email. I was tentatively ok with the idea, but needed more details and an assurance that business details would be taken care of if this were to happen.) |
| 2001.11.26 | Lynne writes text for homelessness web page, to be posted at http://benefit.vbz.net and used as a promotion for the Benefit CD. I compose the web page, proofread Lynne's text, configure the "benefit." subdomain, and put the page up. |
| 2001.11.27 | Livia begins leaving boxes of my stuff (mostly books) at Red House.
I believe she may have said she was planning to do this and I would have told her I didn't think I had the room for them yet, which was the case. They ended up piled behind the front doorway, and I later had to move them into the storage shed behind the Red House – and then almost immediately into L&B's storage trailer, from where most of them went directly to NC as space permitted though a few of them ended up in my rented storage space on Danielsville Road before being moved finally to NC. |
| 2001.12.05 | Nick configures "lynn@redhouse.com" email to forward automatically to "lynne@redhouse.com", since several of Lynne's key correspondents seem to be stuck on misspelling her email address and I always end up forwarding their emails by hand – and then receiving Lynne's replies to them when she hits "reply"... |
| 2001.12.07 | Lynne completes Word document containing lyrics for Benefit CD songs. I send Bubba an action list reminder, signing it "your harried recording engineer". |
| 2001.12 | Intensive recording and mixing sessions through most of December fail to finish the CD in time to catch any of the Christmas market (I believe they were told at one point that it would have needed to be ready several months earlier), although it is in fact finished before Christmas.
Apparently many of the really good deadlines passed even before I started work; the project was poorly planned, at least as an attempt to make money. I was doing late-night recording and mixing sessions at Red House most nights while also trying to keep up with shipping for vbz.net, which always gets very intense in the last couple of weeks before the 25th. The fact that we already had this potential money-making machine in place didn't seem to matter; the CD was top priority, and in at least one case Lynne's actions actively hindered vbz shipping (see 12/24). |
| 2001.12.14 | The Mad Housers ask me to transfer the madhousers.org domain to them; I check with Lynne & Bubba to see if this is ok. |
| 2001.12.22 | I am in the process of setting up an artist account on MP3.com for The Benefit CD; at my request, Lynne sends me track descriptions to use on the web site. |
| 2001.12.23 | In the last-minute shipping scramble, one large package (Siegert order) is left behind at Red House in the last shipment of the day (too late to go back to the PO by the time I noticed it). |
| 2001.12.24 | I was on my way to NC that day, and asked Bubba if he could take the package to the PO (it would have been a substantial delay for me to do it). He said he could, so I left it with him. Later, it turned out that Lynne waylaid him all day with last-minute work on the Benefit CD (to what end, at this late date? I was baffled); see 12/27 for more.
While waiting for one of the tracks to be approved (which will probably take until after Xmas), I decide to put together a partial CD to be sold on MP3.com as an EP. |
| 2001.12.? (shortly before Xmas) |
(verbal) Lynne asks me for permission to borrow $500 to cover CD production costs, against RDA's earnings from vbz sales. I tell her that I won't know if there is enough profit to cover that until mid-to-late January, when all the debits and deposits have come in... but agree to a very short-term loan ("maybe a few days" is what I remember saying). |
| 2001.12.26 | I'm in NC for Xmas. I ask Lynne to please use her check-writing powers to transfer $500 from the Red House account to my personal account (which was, at that time, covering order expenses due to the unavailability of a business check card from SunTrust; SunTrust also did not yet have any locations in NC). I mention that the RH/SunTrust account balance is currently about $2300 (according to online banking), but that at least $1000 of that is spoken for by checks written and that another $1000 is owed back to Sandy, who provided it so that I could afford to buy the merchandise to fill the last batch of Xmas orders. |
| 2001.12.26 | Lynne replies, agreeing to make the deposit today, tells me to relax because it's Xmas, and asks if I can do a little modification of "the page" (MP3.com page or benefit.vbz.net, not sure which). |
| 2001.12.26 | Sandy and I return briefly to Athens to take care of a few things. (Sandy's then-husband had kidnapped her kids for Xmas, so she was unexpectedly available for travel during this time.) I overnight the Siegert package. |
| 2001.12.26 | I email Lynne that it's ok if she wasn't able to make the deposit in time because Sandy was able to front me another $200 to deposit. |
| 2001.12.27 | Lynne says Red House was burglarized but the only thing taken was half a pack of frozen chicken belonging to me – actually, this was just Lynne's slightly off-kilter way of saying that she had borrowed it when they ran out of food on Xmas day when all the grocery stores were closed. Lynne does not mention success or failure with regard to depositing the $500 as requested. |
| 2001.12.28 | I ask Lynne about whether the $500 made it, because it hasn't shown up in online banking yet and my account is down to $30 and falling – but fortunately I have enough Xmas gift-money to cover the deficit. Lynne responds that she didn't do it because when she came back to do it, she saw my email saying it was no longer necessary (which was sent after 5pm, so how did she plan to get anything into the bank at that time, much less before the 2pm deadline?? Plus, at no point did I tell her to hold off; I was just reassuring her that it wasn't a huge disaster if she hadn't gotten it in that day. I was still expecting her to deposit it.)
Lynne mentions the idea of opening a "savings account", something which had apparently already been discussed – possibly she means the Red House BB&T account we had discussed verbally? |
2002
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| Early 2002 | I don't remember the exact date, but certainly by the time Livia announced her plan to raise the Red House rent to $500+, I was making plans to be elswhere. I remember a discussion with L&B (possibly in Nov or Dec of 01) where I said I probably ought to rent a storage unit and move all but my essential day-to-day stuff into it so as to make it possible for me to move somewhere else quickly if/when needed. L&B at that point – or soon thereafter – offered the use of their storage trailers, and I ended up moving a few things into Trailer #1. (Trailer #3 was the one I later ended up renting outright.) They later rearranged Trailer #1 so all of my stuff was at the back and I couldn't retrieve it when I wanted to consolidate everything into #3. I believe, though I am not certain, that I stored my TV in #1, and that it never reappeared.
The Red House Break-in (see 6/11) was what ultimately precipitated the decision to move out of Red House completely (and over to Hull Road, at Lynne's suggestion). |
| 2002.01.02 | Apparently the idea is now on the to-do list of trying to get the Taylor House for both Red House and RDA to use for their various operations and residences; I email Bubba in a sort of "why haven't I heard anything about this but I know you're busy" sort of tone. Other Red House / vbz projects seem to be in the air, too (CD-izing the catalog, uploading to t-shirtshopper). I have been keeping up with orders by printing them and filing them in my portable filing cabinet (the DB being solely for catalog maintenance at that point, no order-tracking yet). |
| 2002.01.03 |
|
| 2002.01.04 | I ask Bubba to instant-message me when he gets in. (12:56pm) "Still haven't heard from you." There are several emails exchanged between myself and Lynne about an RDA phone bill which Livia received (reason unknown) and paid late because she kept forgetting to hand it over to me. Lynne mentions the need for a Long Conversation to work out financial arrangements. |
| 2002.01.05 | I email Lynne about an unexpected $700+ charge from a supplier; Lynne replies promptly with a theory. |
| 2002.01.06 | I mention the $1000 RDA has borrowed unexpectedly. The first $500 was authorized (I signed the check), but Lynne did not even mention the second $500 before writing the check. |
| 2002.01.07 | More evidence of my frustration with B. (9:35pm) Lynne responds that she tried to get permission to borrow more $$, but I was always too busy to talk with her. (Why is it assumed that no answer = permission? Why no email on the subject?) I respond to the accusations of always being too busy to talk. I also mention urgently needing some information about whether orders got placed, in increasingly frustrated tones. |
| 2002.01.08 | (11:59am) I ask Bubba to please email or IM as soon as he gets in. (1:36pm) I ask Bubba again if the orders got placed. |
| 2002.01.09 | I forward to Bubba an irate email from Siegert complaining about his package being so late (arrived 12/28). I suggest that Bubba should be the one to call Siegert and apologize. |
| 2002.01.10 | I email Lynne asking about my missing cooking pot (the only one in the house which doesn't leak, so this was kind of important). Lynne admits to having taken some home which she thought belonged to them, and eventually returns the one missing. |
| 2002.01.19 | My Sears Mastercard having been filled to capacity by several Benefit-CD-related purchases, it begins declining the hosting charges for redistribution.org (which I have been covering without compensation by using that card). I ask Lynne if there is a budget to pay for the hosting. |
| 2002.01.23 | Lynne says she can't cover hosting charges at all, and asks me if there are any funds available to cover it (presumably from RDA's share of t-shirt sales). I suggest that it may be time to cut some costs. I ask for information about a debit from a supplier which came through at an unexpected time. Lynne answers the question about the supplier and adds that a conversation from 1-3 pm on 1/24 would probably be a good idea. |
| 2002.01.24 | (11:40am) I send L&B a long email outlining the situation as I sees it, which can also serve as my agenda for the upcoming meeting. KEY EMAIL - discusses value of services exchanged by RH/me and RDA/L&B, how far back to figure it, exact nature of (eventual) Benefit CD profit split, $1000 loan to RDA, and also asks whether or not the time might be approaching when L/B might consider further work on the vbz project to be not worth their effort. (5:33pm) Lynne responds that this is a wonderful email, thanks me for the time and effort, mentions that it's almost what might have resulted from a summary of a two-hour conversation (which presumably didn't happen after all), and suggests what the conversation should start with (whenever we're going to have it; possibly it was intended that we would discuss it over supper at their house, to which Lynne invited me in that same email).
I also remember being heavily censured – though it must have been verbal-only, because I see no evidence of it in writing – for the contents of the 11:40 email. I don't remember any details, but the gist was "how could you say that about us, after all the hard work we've done??" |
| 2002.01.25 | I ask Lynne if the redistribution.org hosting couldn't possibly come out of the GA Task Force money, which is apparently something Lynne has mentioned recently (but not in email). Lynne says they can cover future months of the hosting charges, but that the GATF money will only be enough to help them get caught up a little bit on other expenditures for which they were supposed to have been reimbursed. Lynne also states that she believes RDA has paid back its debt to Red House. |
| 2002.01.26 | I tell Bubba that Bubba must still have the RH SunTrust card, and that he can keep it because for some reason SunTrust sent another, with a different number but having my name on it as did the original. (Did L or B perhaps order a spare without asking me?) |
| 2002.01.28 | I announce plans for another trip to Sandy's in NC for "sanity recovery" and working on the RH database. I suggest a standard procedure for placing supplier orders, starting with data from the database but allowing input from Bubba before the order is sent. |
| 2002.01.29 | I mention (email to Lynne) plans to pay back the cable company for amounts past due due to a billing snafu. I apparently also left for NC after a visit to the cable company (to make a payment, probably). |
| 2002.01.30 | I (in NC) asks Bubba to IM when he gets in. Lynne replies that Bubba is outside. |
| 2002.01.31 | More frustrated email from me to B. I'm still in NC. Several back & forth emails regarding supplier orders. |
| 2002.02.01 | I forward the latest RDA phone bills ($244.87 and $366.81) to Lynne. Lynne responds that she made arrangements with BellSouth prior to these bill and plans to carry through with them. Lynne decides that the "3 lines special" might help keep costs down (it largely turns out to be effective in hopelessly entangling responsibility for payments). |
| 2002.02.03 | I was considering driving back down to GA, but decide to stay a little longer to finish some work on the vbz database. |
| 2002.02.04 | The BB&T account which Bubba had partially set up mysteriously acquires a balance of negative $1900. I email BB&T about it and send a copy of the message to Lynne. |
| 2002.02.05-6 | There are emails back & forth between Lynne and myself regarding the cable disconnection notice, about which Lynne is attempting to call the cable company. |
| 2002.02.06 | (11:33am) I suggest that I might be able to cover the next cable payment if and only if there will be money coming in from GA Task Force to start paying up the unpaid rental on the Benz, but also note "if there's any sign that the GATF $ might not come thru on schedule (i.e. by the end of February), please do let me know so I can plan accordingly..." (1:04pm) Lynne says "I will be able to come up with $100 from GA Task before the end of February..." |
| 2002.02.08 | I forward the latest RDA phone bill ($120.24) to Lynne. |
| 2002.02.13 | (9:27am) I email L&B that someone has removed my towel from the RH bathroom. (10:25am) I plan another trip to NC; Bubba replies sarcastically to the idea. |
| 2002.02.14 | Frank Jeffers emails me with severe criticisms, including possible risk of fire and loss of life, regarding L&B's handling of a Mad Houser Hut he allowed them to borrow and keep in the RH "village" area. |
| 2002.02.20 | I head back to NC. (I only came back to Athens this time because I had agreed earlier to drive Livia to and from work on Monday while her car was in the shop.) |
| 2002.02.25 | (email to L&B) I discuss improvements made to database, plans for further improvements, and related financial issues. |
| 2002.02.26 | I mention no response to emails and idly joke about thieves breaking in and removing all the computers so L&B couldn't respond... so this must have been before the break-in. Lynne's reply email puts heavy pressure on me to be at Red House to keep Bubba motivated to do RH work. |
| 2002.02.28? 9? | I head back to Athens. |
| 2002.03.01 | (10:25) I email Lynne that the financial situation is becoming increasingly unworkable – power bill 2 months overdue, rent due, payment on Sears Mastercard due, and no funds to cover any of them except temporarily. I ask her if GATF ever came through with "any of the car money they thought might be available". RDA pays $200 towards Benz rental, bringing the balance due down to $1600. |
| 2002.03.06 | I send Lynne a KEY EMAIL discussing possible terms for continuing to work together. (My recollection is that I had been asked at some point not to attempt to discuss money arrangements with Bubba, as he found it difficult to think about and was entrusting all of his financial arrangements to Lynne.) Lynne's response expresses surprise and partial disagreement. This is also a KEY EMAIL because it expresses Lynne's opinion on several relevant issues.
Lynne gives me $35 to go towards redistribution.org hosting. |
| 2002.03.10 | I update the credit card for the redistribution.org hosting to a valid one (probably the RH SunTrust account, or possibly my personal BB&T account). |
| 2002.03.14 | Livia and I sign consent to trial for divorce. |
| 2002.03.19 | I email Lynne in panic over unexpected charges, including a backorder which Bubba had placed without consulting me ("bears backorder part 2" $471.15 – I believe I had already dealt with "bears backorder part 1" for $408.43, perhaps thinking that it was a regular Liquid Blue order I was expecting; in any case, these 2 larger-than-usual amounts both being debited within a few days of each other caused serious financial problems. I believe it was at this point that I decided I could no longer trust Bubba to handle supplier ordering.) I exasperatedly point out that once again, no list of transactions was emailed. |
| 2002.03.21 ~ | I begin working for Juliet Easton (in Athens) in order to have operating cash. |
| 2002.04.08 | (4:23 pm) Lynne replies to an email of mine (not found) in which I complain about finding an extremely powerful speaker magnet placed on top of some irreplaceable but highly eraseable sound-sample discs. Lynne takes exception to my harsh tone, and complains about the boxes, dropped off by Livia, taking up room in the Red House and causing rearrangement-induced mishaps to occur. The email is clearly indicative of some friction between Lynne & myself. (9:37 pm) Lynne actually sends me a clear list of transactions on the borrowed credit card, though without any dates attached. |
| 2002.04.12 | Lynne sends me a further list of credit card transactions and the check she wrote to cover them (no dates, no check #). |
| 2002.mid-Apr/early May | Tentatively, I think these were the weeks I spent moving out of Red House and getting set up to be able to operate the business at 1242 Hull Road. |
| 2002.05.08 | Another transaction and check listed (these match my accounting). I note in an email (of which I can't find the original, but it's included in Lynne's reply) that the insurance & tag fees for the Benz are due (insurance due 4/28, will be cancelled if not paid by 5/16), total $241.37. I considered this amount to be Lynne's responsibility to come up with at this point, since Lynne was the only one using the Benz and owed me some $2600 for rent by that time and had as yet only paid me $200 towards the rental – not even covering the total on tags/insurance. |
| 2002.05.09 | I announce plans to be in NC (at Sandy's) approximately 5/11-5/18. |
| 2002.05.11 | Lynne sends me an email saying "we need to talk about money". |
| 2002.05.17-22 | More frictionish emails between me (in NC), Bubba, and Lynne – me trying to keep ordering operations moving while bank balances keep going negative and yelling at Bubba for being unresponsive, Lynne answering accusations in circuitous language, etc. Apparently I am still doing some things over at Red House – moving out? |
| 2002.06.06 | (10:47) In response to Lynne & Bubba's frequent gripes about the way they are being handled by Lofty Ideas, I suggest getting an investor and going into business for themselves, thus keeping more of the profit and being able to set their own terms. (I have a likely investor in mind, but make it clear that the numbers would have to be nailed down before I would speak with the investor.) Lynne says she'll think it over and get back to me.
(11:12) Lynne wants a window of opportunity to speak with me. I am apparently back in Athens, possibly at Hull Rd. |
| 2002.06.11 | The Red House Break-In occurs while I am in NC (not sure about the date; it was definitely no later than this). Lynne talks me into driving down to deal with the situation; it is already 3:30pm, and I decide I really need to have someone else in the car if he I'm going to be driving several hours after dark – so Sandy comes along for the ride, since the kids are with their father for the night. |
| 2002.06.12 | By the time I arrive, Bubba has secured the back door with a 2x4, and no further work is needed. I confirm Bubba's estimates of what has been taken: several batches of shirts, for the most part, though at that time there was no inventory and so no way to be certain. I believe I went right back to NC (next day) after assessing the situation, since Sandy had to be back to receive her kids. |
| 2002.06.13 | Lynne sends me a long email explaining how overwhelmed L&B are, in part because of the work necessitated by moving me and Red House into Hull Road. This is apparently in response to an email I sent from NC asking if I should buy a cheap computer found at Duke Surplus – which I had asked because L&B had been talking enthusiastically a few days earlier about expecting some significant amounts of grant money to come in for the purpose of buying computers and such. There is lots of back & forth about various things mostly relating to the move to Hull Rd. and my return plans. |
| 2002.06.16 | I mention in an email to Sandy that I plan to continue sleeping over at RH at least until the phone lines are moved to Hull Rd., which will be no earlier than 6/19. |
| 2002.06.21 | My divorce from Livia is finalized (court hearing). |
| 2002.06.24 | Long email from me to Lynne about usage of the SunTrust acccount. I again ask for more consistency in the ccard transaction emails. Lynne acknowledges. Much back & forth 6/24-6/26 |
| 2002.06.27 | I am still moving stuff out of Red House. |
| 2002.06.30 | SIGNIFICANT EMAIL: I make an attempt to delineate roles required for successful operation of vbz.net, with pertinent questions about which roles those involved would like to be playing. I then answer my own questions with regard to myself. Lynne responds at length but without any specifics that are easy to discern. |
| 2002.07.01 | I give Livia 30 days' notice that I am moving out of Red House. |
| 2002.07.02 | Lynne contacts Livia to ask about having an option for first refusal of Red House after I move out. |
| 2002.07.09 | I finish re-building a shelf for my LP records (which needed to be moved from RH) at Sandy's, and then help Sandy move her ex's posessions out of her basement. |
| 2002.07.10 | I return to Athens. |
| 2002.07.11 | I ask Lynne whatever became of two blank checks I apparently gave her, #1338 and #1345. |
| 2002.07.12 | I am apparently driving to NC again. |
| 2002.07.19-20 | I email some suggestions for controlling the cigarette butt proliferation in the driveway at Hull Road (just a small corner of the general trashiness problem there). I also re-send an email (originally sent 7/11 but not received) aimed at controlling other aspects of the trashiness. |
| 2002.07.21 | I return to Hull Road. |
| 2002.08.07 | I email another alert that the SunTrust account has gone negative again, for reasons that aren't clear. |
| 2002.08.08 | I mention that the net change in RDA's credit with RH since 7/30 is now negative $325.48, and adds that I consider any subsequent NSFs to be RDA's responsibility until that balance is cleared. Lynne responds that she needs time to go over the figures, and that she and I should really talk it over face to face. |
| 2002.08.10 | I recommend against waiting for a f2f before trying to figure things out. I also mention that I don't expect to be around much for extended periods of time any time soon. In response to another email where Lynne asks about Red House phone charges which she says RDA has been covering, I ask for a list of charges so I can include them in my accounting (which I am at this point spending a lot of time working on). |
| 2002.08.14 | I send Lynne another warning about the bad state of the SunTrust balance and express hope that she has been keeping an eye on it. I also ask Lynne if she knows when RDA will have its own account so they don't have to keep using RH's check card. |
| 2002.08.20 | I receive a returned check from SunTrust – check #1355 for $1000 was returned unpaid. I'm pretty sure Lynne wrote this check to the RDA, and no way in hell did I authorize that... but I haven't been able to find the check again to be sure. I ask again about when the RDA expects to have its own check card. |
| 2002.08.22 | I'm back doing things at Red House – probably moving stuff out of the storage shed this time. |
| 2002.08.28 | Sometime on or shortly before this date, the cable guy shows up to shut off the cable (including internet) at Hull Road<. I write a Red House check for $207.27, the minimum due to keep the cable from being shut off, since Lynne says she doesn't have funds to deal with it. (There is disagreement over whose idea it was to get cable; I know I never would have recommended it, since we were doing ok with a dial-up at Red House, but Lynne at one point claimed that it was my idea.) I wonder when Lynne's proposed "quieting down" period is supposed to start, so that RDA can get its own bank account. (But they already had a SunTrust account, and surely by now SunTrust was offering business check cards?) |
| 2002.08.29 | I return to Hull Road from somewhere (Juliet's?) and have to go in through a window to get into the house, not having a key and nobody being home. I email Lynne to ask for one ("I am definitely going to need a key"). I head back to Sandy's / NC, taking another load of stuff. |
| 2002.08.31 | Lynne bizarrely insists that Livia extend the "move out" date so that Lynne & Bubba have time to move their stuff out. Lynne deals directly with Livia, against Nick's preference for moving out quickly and quietly. I was the tenant, not Lynne or Bubba. I don't know where Lynne got it into her head that she had any official tenant status. RDA's move-out deadline is now 9/9. |
| 2002.09.01 | Redistribution.org is now moved to Red House's new dedicated server. Further hosting is charged to RDA at $10/month on the spreadsheet (charges were never billed except as line items in the spreadsheet... My thinking was, "what's the point?"). |
| 2002.09.06 | I note that RDA has made some new charges on the card (again, no notifying email), and that Lynne did not see fit to make any corrections to "my earl[ier figuring with which you disagreed." |
| 2002.09.16 | Sandy and Charles's divorce is finalized. I decide to move in with Sandy, and to conduct my business from there as much as possible. |
| 2002.09.21 | In the wake of a customer complaint about a delayed order, I email Bubba to ask why the order wasn't sent when the customer and I both understood it was going to be sent. Further email exchanges on related subjects ensue. (These are probably good examples of the problems I had trying to rely on Bubba as a business partner.) |
| 2002.09.25 | The beginning of the end. A $350 check which Lynne has apparently written without permission shows up in online banking. I say "enough is enough" and revoke Lynne's check-writing privileges. The check clears and throws RH's bank balance thoroughly out of whack yet again. I tell Lynne "$516.43 would bring RDA back to their standing as of July 1. At a minimum, I would expect to see $250 or so of that deposited today." Before sending this, I send Bubba a heads-up about the situation and make it clear that I still don't consider it impossible to work with him; it's just that boundaries will have to be very clearly defined. Several significant emails follow. |
| 2002.10.05 | I return to Hull Road, in part for a face-to-face meeting requested by Lynne. |
| 2002.10.06 | I send a SIGNIFICANT EMAIL ("hello, hornets") first thing in the morning, outlining the situation and setting my agenta for the meeting. Topics include the terms originally offered to the RDA for their portion of sales. The meeting never happens; I get an intense headache towards evening and ask if it's ok to postpone the meeting. Lynne says that's ok. I encounter Lynne in the house many times while I'm still there, but Lynne never proposes another date or time for the meeting. Later, Lynne blames me entirely for preventing the meeting, as if the headache were just an excuse (and a lame one at that). |
| 2002.10.07 | I send another email with a couple more agenda items, including an overdue gas bill someone left on my desk, and asking for the keys to the Benz. |
| 2002.10.10 or 11 | I drive back to Sandy's. |
| 2002.10.11 | I send an email summarizing a financial discussion with Bubba, and what he has done as a result (changes to spreadsheet). A copy of the "Small Balancing Act" spreadsheet (changes in RDA's credit with Red House figured back to June 1) is attached. |
| 2002.10.12 | In response to Bubba's request that I stay longer so as to "get a lot of stuff coagulated to make pulling stock easier for here" (i.e. Inventory of merchandise located at Hull Road), I mention disliking to be in Athens these days and suggest that I should take boxes of merchandise up to NC for inventoring there. (I have already done a certain amount of that by this time.) |
| 2002.10.24 | More disagreements about who ought to pay for what (this time, a domain renewal of Bubba's). I send an update to the RDA's credit-change since June (now stands at -$535.66). I ask again whatever happened to the long-promised RDA bank account. I add that "Red House is no longer floating RDA purchases." A few lightly-heated emails are exchanged. |
| 2002.12.01 | Sandy attempts to pay for neutering of several cats on the Hull Road premises. Bubba loses the check. |
| 2002.12.14 | I set up streaming MP3s for the Benefit CD web site. |
2003
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 2003.03.03 | I mention that I am working on The Big Balancing Act (spreadsheet reconciling all known transactions between RH/me and RDA/Lynne/Bubba), and suggests that Lynne/Bubba should start going through their records to look for any transactions which they would like to see included (implication: items for which they believe they should be credited). |
| 2003.03.15 - 19 | There is an email exchange about storage and phone. |
| 2003.04.05 - 07 | I email Bubba in response to a phone conversation we had (Bubba called me). More highly topical emails ensue. |
| 2003.04.28 | Lynne discontinues the 3-for-1 phone line arrangement with BellSouth. Somehow, 0474 (the Red House line) ends up with a balance of $470.58 due. I email Lynne to ask about this. |
| 2003.04.30 | I email Bubba to ask what's happening with the 2003 catalog images from Liquid Blue and The Mountain. Bubba replies that he's been very busy with lofts and hasn't had energy to deal with it, but that there is one folder of Fantasy images from LB ready to upload and he will upload it. I reply that this seems to reinforce the idea that I should have copies of the image discs so I can do image work when Bubba is too busy. |
| 2003.05.02 | Lynne and I negotiate about the splitting-off of the Red House phone line (0474). I agree to pay $207 towards the phone bill as Lynne requests, and then do so. |
| 2003.05.05 | Lynne and I engage in some minor negotiations about the storage trailer. |
| 2003.05.11 | Bubba and I discuss (on phone) arrangements for disbursal of RDA sales share. Bubba wants 50% in cash, 50% applied towards debt. I am unhappy with Bubba's handling of shipments from GA; this may have been discussed earlier, and may have been discussed in this conversation as well. |
| 2003.05.30 | Sandy and I meet with accountants in Chapel Hill to start getting the business's paperwork and taxes straightened out. I remember that by this point, I had definitely decided I could not count on Lynne or Bubba to manage the business in any capacity, although we might still be able to work together if boundaries were clearly defined. |
| 2003.06.22 | I visit Athens to do some work for Carrier, and stop by Hull Road to pick up image discs from Bubba. This turns into a long conversation with L&B, because Bubba is very reluctant to give up the image discs without (apparently) some kind of reassurance that I'm not attempting to "take over the business" (something like that). I believe this was also the time when I arrived at the trailer to find that Bubba had changed the lock – I had a key to the original lock, but not to the one he put there. Bubba gave some explanation about needing that lock for some other purpose. I sent an email (upon returning to NC that evening, presumably) to L&B summarizing his understanding of that conversation. Attached to the email is a copy of the "Big Balancing Act" spreadsheet. |
| 2003.06.24 Wednesday |
Bubba calls me at close to my bed time; we talk for an hour or two and I eventually have to hang up on Bubba. The substance of the disagreement was that Bubba did not want to allow me to have possession of the master image discs (or perhaps wanted some kind of compensation or guarantee in return). If he was willing to settle for something in exchange, it was never quite clear what that would be, though it might have had something to do with keeping possession of more (all?) of the inventory. I ultimately state that any further conversations will need to be in mediation. Bubba protests this repeatedly until I hang up. THE BIG HANGUP |
| 2003.06.27 | I send Bubba a substantial email reiterating the need for mediation, and that RH/me is willing to front the expense (implication: it can of course be decided in mediation who ultimately will pay for that mediation, although this point apparently escapes L&B). Subsequent emails serve largely to emphasize that I have substantial communication problems with the Grievers. |
| 2003.07.13 | I inform L&B of plans to visit Athens to pick up Anna for a North Carolina visit, and to pick up some items from storage at Hull Road while in town. Lynne objects to the apparent casualness of this announcement, in view of the fact that I have "hijacked the store" and also not returned any of the merchandise taken to NC for inventorying. Lynne adds that any trust L&B may have had for Nick has been "shattered" (with an implication that this makes it very unpleasant for them to be around me) and makes vague statements about whether or not the trailer will continue to be accessible to me. |
| 2003.07.14 | (9:15 am) I state that the betrayal of trust goes both ways, that I have been paying L&B cash up front for the storage despite believing that L&B owed me money far over and above the cost of the storage, and that I expect the storage to be available. I say I will be there Tuesday morning and will not come to the house (so as to avoid causing more unpleasantness for L&B than is necessary). I also explain my plan for emptying out the trailer under existing budget and time constraints, and suggest that if L&B do not feel they can provide accessible storage to me anymore, that they should send me an eviction notice (some suggested wording is included).
I also ask for details about the accessibility of the Benz for towing purposes, and suggest a date when I might be able to have it towed. I also suggest that they might have it towed themselves, and I will let them know where I want it to go. (11:04 am) Lynne replies, saying (1) we disagree with everything you say; (2) Bubba asked repeatedly to be allowed to pay for orders. (This last is something I only remember happening once, and as I remember it he was more suggesting that he might be able to loan some money for a short term but would need it back soon – and I did not feel comfortable guaranteeing that I would be able to pay him back, as I was still borrowing frequently from others to cover RH expenses at that time). Lynne says she will check with Bubba on the Benz situation (but I never heard any more about it.) (11:31 am) I respond to Lynne's responses. (early afternoon) Sandy and I depart for Athens. (9:49 pm) Lynne asks me not to arrive at Hull Road before 9, but I didn't check my email before going to Hull Road, so didn't see the message. I have no idea whether we arrived there after 9:00 or perhaps a few minutes before; either way, it doesn't seem to have become an issue. |
| 2003.07.15 | (morning, time not certain) Sandy and I stop by Hull Road and retrieve a few things from the trailer then head off back to NC. I tell someone (Lynne?) that I will work on getting the plan together to move everything out of the trailer, and ask again for information about moving the Benz. |
| 2003.07.30 | I email Lynne that I tentatively plan to be in Athens 8/8 for some contract work and may be able to move the Benz at that time. I tell her that I will need to get the key from L&B at that time, if not before. |
| 2003.07.31 | Lynne experiences some difficulty accessing her redhouse.com email; I direct her to the webmail interface I recently discovered on the dedicated server. |
| 2003.08.01 - 04 | I inform Lynne that I will be cancelling the RH phone line (0474) and that they might want to move the ringmaster number (currently assigned to that line) over to one of their other phone lines. Lynne protests that she doesn't understand why I continue to eliminate tools needed for continuing to partner with Bubba. Many small accusations and replies are exchanged. I send her another copy of the Big Balancing Act spreadsheet (they had trouble reading the file, so several weeks later I mailed a printout). |
| 2003.08.29 | I ask Lynne to mail me the Benz keys . (No reply?) |
| 2003.09.20 Sunday |
I inform Lynne that:
I plan to spend all day Saturday moving things out of the trailer, and to return to NC on Sunday. I print a copy of the email and a copy of The Big Balancing Act spreasheet and mail them all to Hull Road with delivery confirmation. They arrive on 9/24, according to usps.com. (No response from L/B.) |
| 2003.09.24 | I inform Lynne that I am now leaning towards 10/3-4 for the Athens visit, and that it may get pushed back still further to 10/11. (No response from L/B on this issue.) |
| 2003.09.25 | Bubba calls at 5:42 pm asking for the username and password of the redistrbution.org domain registration so he can move it to another server, and then again two minutes later to ask me to please pick up the phone and give him the information. I email Bubba irritatedly but send him the requested information. (At the time, I thought my response said something about not calling me – but apparently I just said not to call repeatedly and that he should not insist that I pick up the phone when he is leaving a message. I think I also thought "don't call me at all" was implicit in the 6/27 email's statement that any further communication would need to be through a mediator.)
I email Lynne that the visiting plans have now moved to 10/17-18 for sure. We thought they were definite because we had a commitment from The Arc for respite care over the night of 10/17, but at the last minute it turned out they had made a mistake. |
| 2003.10.16 | I email Lynne that the sitter which Sandy and I had been promised was not in fact available for 10/17, so the date will have to slip yet again. We were going to get a commitment from the Arc and the sitters first before setting a date this time. I also ask if L/B have any objections to my calling the towing company from NC to have the car towed, if it can be done. (No response from Lynne or Bubba.) |
| 2003.10.30 | I email Lynne to ask how she would prefer the check to be sent. Lynne answers this question. Lynne says that she had told Neff that the trailers would be empty October first (so Neff could retrieve them), and then later that they would be empty by the middle of October. Lynne says she can't make any guarantees that they won't cause problems about this, and adds that they are having difficulty responding to my emails "like nothing is going on". Lynne (again) accuses me of having "stolen the business". She claims that the accountings Nick has sent are "partial accountings containing 'made up figures', 'left out figures' and 'outlandish charges' made up in retrospect". |
| 2003.11.01 | I respond with apologies but also counter that the Grievers don't seem to be working very much to reach a solution, having neither suggested a date range for mediation nor provided information needed to make moving my stuff out of the trailer feasible (aside from never having confirmed whether or not the dates suggested earlier were acceptable or not).
I revoke the offer of mediation (my programming contract had ended and I no longer had the cash to throw around, though I didn't especially want them to know that) and tell them that any further communication must be in writing. I reiterate that I have asked many times for a list of errata or counter-claims to be made against my accounting, none of which they have provided. I address the rest of the points in Lynne's email and finish up with a list of specific practical questions (some of them already asked on 7/14): is the Benz accessible, do they have the keys, do they object to my moving the piano as well. I emphasize that the more answers I can get, the easier it will be to get my possessions off their property sooner. |
| 2003.11.03 | Bubba leaves a message describing a line-item which he believes should be included in the accounting. (Bubba adds that he believes I am making a serious mistake in the way I have treated the two of them.) |
| 2003.11.03 | I email Bubba to insist that he communicate only in writing, and ask Bubba to please re-send the dispute via email so there will be a record of it. (By this time, though, I have begun taping all of Bubba's voice messages, so there is a record regardless.) I also ask Bubba if he can give an approximate date and amount for each payment, since there was apparently no record of it (there is probably a deposit record, but that would not indicate the source and may be combined with other transactions). |
| 2003.11.03 | Bubba calls to say he hadn't understood that I didn't want him to call, and that he will now stop calling. Bubba says he doesn't understand where I'm coming from, says he is still my friend, asks me to chill out, accuses me of "pissing on" Bubba and dismissing Bubba's opinion. |
| 2003.11.04 | Bubba writes an email calling me a "pissy prick", cc:ing my dad. Dad decides it's time to stop pussyfooting and hire a lawyer... |
| 2003.11.05 | Lynne sends email responding to my 11/1 email, but it doesn't seem to resolve anything. I talk to a NC lawyer who advises going to pick everything up (or as much as possible) unnanounced. |
| 2003.11.23 | I drive down to GA. |
| 2003.11.24 | I rent a Uhaul in Athens and drive it over to Hull Road. The storage trailer is gone; nearby on the ground is a large sign saying "Free Stuff!". I speak with Lynne, who informs me that Neff has hauled the trailer away and that my stuff is down at Neff's location. Lynne declines to get Neff's number for me ("I don't think that's the sort of thing I should be jumping up and doing right now"). I drive the truck back to Livia's house, look up the number in the phone book, call Neff, and verify that my stuff is in fact there, and not in immediate danger. I drive back to the Grievers' house and ask for the keys to the Benz and permission to have the piano moved. Lynne and Bubba refuse to give a clear answer, so I calls the police.
In front of the police, Bubba refuses to allow me to take the Benz or the piano. I drive over to Neff and spend the rest of the afternoon moving items out of the trailer and into a rented storage unit. There isn't time to move everything out, but Neff says the trailer will not be emptied before 12/5. I then return the Uhaul. |
| 2003.11.25 | I get a copy of the police report and pick up blank warrant applications from the courthouse, then drive back to NC. |
| 2003.11.28 | I remove the last of the RDA email redirects (b@vbz.net), soon after which Bubba sends an email (cc:ing Dad again) protesting this action and accusing me of having a childish snit. |
| 2003.12.01 | Still in NC, I'm finally able to get word from Neff that they will not be able to extend the rental of the trailer past 12/5. Unfortunately there's no way for me to get back down to Athens to move anything else out of the trailer, so I hire an Athens locksmith to drill out the padlock on the trailer (since there isn't time to get the key down to Athens) and rent local labor to retrieve a few remaining crucial items from the trailer. |
| 2003.12.05 | I fill out warrant applications for the arrest of Lynne and Bubba for theft by taking (because that is what the police report said) of the Benz, piano, merchandise, and computer equipment, and mail them to the Athens Courthouse.
LaborReady moves the requested items out of the trailer. |
| 2003.12.09 | Email arrives, sent to b@vbz.net, from a company in Japan, indicating that Bubba owes them money and that they are tired of Bubba's excuses. (I reply to sender, giving them Bubba's new email address.) Soon after this, the court summons arrives, setting the court date as 1/8. |
2004
| When | Description |
|---|---|
| 2004.01.08 | The Grievers do not show up for the hearing, apparently in the belief that it was the next day. The judge orders them to return the Benz, piano, and computer equipment (but not the merchandise), and gives them 30 days to respond. |
| 2004.01.14 | An email arrives from a US company (sent to b@vbz.net), indicating that Bubba owes them a total of $387, and stating that they will be initiating collection procedures on 1/31. (I reply to sender, giving Bubba's new email address.) |
(This is obviously an incomplete accounting.)