Friday 28th August 2009 - The Root of All Evil

          It is unfair to tar all of government with the same brush. Even the Immigration Service are only trying to do their job. It's not their fault the legislators gave them an impossible job to do. Although it is worth noting that some do it well, and some do it badly.

          Nor should we forget the likes of the Park Rangers out in the Mohave, who were devoted to their job, and went out of their way to help me with my stupid little project.

There is no getting away from the fact, however, that the government has got me in a corner, and is about to bundle me out of the ring, if I don't do something about it.

 

          Which brings me to the subject of money. Funny stuff, money: there are quite a lot of definitions of it. What I mean is the common-sense definition, what I've got in my pocket, and in the bank: what economists call "M0". Or is it M1?

          I had to get myself an American bank account to pay for Rozzie. I had to make an arrangement with currency brokers to transfer that much into dollars.

But I've settled into using my Nationwide credit and debit cards, which is by far the most efficient way to convert my pounds into dollars. And it's also the best exchange rate I can get, by a long way.

          Imagine my disappointment, then, when I find out my lawyers are too posh for plastic. They want to be paid in good old-fashioned paper. I am, in turn, too posh to thrust wedges of cash at them(maybe cash is 'M0'?), although I'm sure they would manage to stiffle their embarrassment and accept it.  After all, they specialise in US Immigrations problems: there must be a fair bit of that business conducted in the cash economy.

          So I have to go back to topping-up my American bank account. And it turns out that my currency broker is too posh to deal in the piddling sums that my lawyers want (I hope my lawyers aren't reading this).

          In the end, in this electronic, computer era, I'm reduced to toddling down to the ATM, extracting as much cash as it will give me in a day, then slipping nervously into the bank and putting it in my other bank account.

          Funny old world, init?