Slipshod R&M

Let me put some thought into this situation, and I will say more. First things first. Food/water/shelter/income. In other words, immediate needs first for survival. In order to continue that, income will have to come into play, obviously. If you are saying you have to leave the house immediately then focus on the first three noted above.

I will go into more detail regarding emotional/work/liscense when I've thought about it a bit further.

Very sorry to hear about your father, and that it happened like that. I've been there, and no the feeling.

My sincere condolences Wisky.

The death of a person we relied upon or who relied on us is always especialy influential. And if your fathers passing effects your lifestyle in such a manner that you have to change it dramaticaly my advice to you would be that you should not hesitate to do so. I fear that I might not be knowledgable enough about the american society/legislation to give much practical advice but what I learned from the losses I experienced is that sinking into despair or later indifference is a real danger and that you have to take things into your own hands.

It is never to late to get diplomas or licenses of any kind.

Please excuse me asking but does "died in arms" mean that your father was part of the military? Neither a dictonary nor google could help me geting an exact translation.

This.

thanks guys, and yes, i'm getting situated in that order, essential needs first. The house is all paid off and everything, so no payments there at least, and still no luck on finding his insurance info yet, this place is a cluster of papers and things strung about. My brother is wondering if we should transfer is bank funds out, but i'm personally hesitant on it since a lot of the bills for utilities are on auto-pay withdraw from it and we should probably get the services cut off or changed to my account before moving the funds.

Quiz: unfortunately, this was in the literal sense....i was performing cpr and was present the entire time. I bugged my neighbors to assist me, but by the time the ambulance got here, they said there wasn't any way to save him (about 5 minutes from the 911 call). It probably hasn't settled in yet for me, but i haven't slept and have only eaten a little bit since then since i don't have an appetite.

Well, to sum things up, i'm currently moving anything of value out of the house to my brother's place, he's gonna let me crash there a little till things get situated better with my own personal stuff like job and whatnot, mostly because i helped him out with his missus issues a little while back and did the whole surrogate parent routine with his 4 kids for a good 4 months while all the legal issues were sorted out.

Ah, there i go blabbering on again, heh, but yes, to sum it up, gotta figure out how to move/change billing info, get ahold of the insurance informations, burial arrangements (my brother is handling this part), and of course find a way to store safely all the junk laying around this house (there's a good $5000 worth of tools and equipment, if not more). I've got around $50 to work with in the meantime, which is better then $0, but i've got a good thousand or so in the bank i can always dip into if need be.

Sorry to ear that
Condolence to you a your family.

normally, I wouldn't bother anyone with all this stuff, but I think it's finally time I tried asking for help for once. I've always tried to stay out of everyone's way, and keep from being an inconvenience, but it hasn't gotten me anywhere trying to do stuff on my own when i haven't a clue where to begin. I think in all honesty, I just want SRM to know what's going on, so you guys can keep me from doing something stupid, like coming back to Alleg and playing for 12 hours a day, when i should really be getting things done

Sorry to hear that bro. My condolences go out to you and your family.

Here is some info I found on the web that might help you.

Steps You Must Take When Someone Dies

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/CollegeAndFamily/CaringForParents/StepsYouMustTakeWhenSomeoneDies.aspx

Checklist

http://www.help4srs.org/publications/pdf/Death_Checklist.pdf

Do you know if your dad have any contact to an attorney? If so contact him/her as they would tell you any steps you need to take (social insurance, will, etc)

ah, thanks a lot for the checklist and steps, this helps a lot, since i hadn't thought about needing to inform for his death to SS and for his retirement checks, i actually assumed they would get the information on their own. Really, this alone is helping in great measures

My condolences mate, best of luck with getting everything sorted out, wish i knew what to tell you but i dont

Whisky

My mother died when I was 27 in a Landslide
There is nothing harder in your life...and I could imagine it is harder in your situation.

You have to rely on other people to help. You become too emotional to think rationally. I was lucky that I had my wife to lean on. If you have someone similar, you need to ask them for help.

After sorting out the funeral etc, then you need to to resolve what needs to be done for the estate as quickly and painlessly as possibly. It is critical because that will haunt you for months after if not done and interrupt your grieving. You will need a lawyer for this to do will searches etc. You will also need to contact all your banks to confirm debt etc. Most banks should write off minor credit card debts due to a death.

Start collecting mail and informing said parties of your fathers death. Advertise an obituary in the paper so it is publicly recorded. Again, get legal to do this for you.

theres more but I will have to add later

I'm a noob at life so can't give advice on the practical things.

One thing I can say is that you shouldn't be too afraid of bothering people. Fuck 'em. They'll bother you for crap all the time. And I think that's good. No one person can do everything on his own, and why should he.
It's kind of like a computer cluster. You can sit on your own with gears spinning in your head or you can let other people know and they might just join in.
So ask for help; if they help you, good, if not, meh. People get a kick of hormones when they get a chance to help someone in a weaker state.
Yeah, that's just something I've come to realise in my slow journey towards independent life.

Another thing. Missing something or someone is a good emotion. It means that it was worthy of being missed. How much worse it would be if you didn't feel sad?

Hang in there bro. No matter how whimsical it sounds: things work out.

hmm....i think the hardest part of things now, is finding a way to meet the requirements in my area for my license and GED applications. I essentially score 90%+ on the GED tests i've been taking, and the license itself i shouldn't need more then a week or so to freshen up to be capable of passing, but i'm having issues with the paperwork.

Apparently i need.....

1) Identification – A certified U.S. birth certificate (hospital birth certificates are not accepted); a valid U.S. passport; a consular Report of Birth Abroad; a certificate of Naturalization (Form N-550 or N-570); or a certificate of Citizenship (Form N-560 or N-561).

The issue here is, if i can't find my birth certificate among my father's clusters of papers, i will have to send for one. The problem though, is that the process requires identifications that I NEED the certificate to get (ID card, License, Passport, etc.) so it's a bit of a paradox situation where you need one to get the other. This will have to be delt with if i cannot find a copy of my birth certificate.

2) Social Security Number – Card, W-2 form, paycheck or any 1099 form.
This i have covered

3) Residential Address – Two (2) items mailed to you that contain your address. Acceptable is a mortgage statement, voter ID card, a utility bill or a car insurance policy.

I was thinking about this one, since i can't quite cover it atm, but if i were to have my father's utilities bills transferred into my name, i could possibly get this.

Ya know, i'm starting to wish my old man would have been a little more interactive with me over the years. I'm seriously regretting not pushing the subject of learning all this paperwork stuff and all these things i apparently need to survive on my own.

haha, oh well, as long as i keep chopping away at it, i should be able to eventually get something decided in the end.

edit: seems i got a snafu to deal with....gotta figure out how to pay for the funerary expenses, the funeral home wants me to pay them $2500 up front -_-, and i've got all of $60 or so to my name.

I'm starting to wonder what the hell is really going on, since this whole situation isn't relatively as simple as it was supposed to be, and it isn't even playing out in a similar fashion then what i was told to expect. The first being the fact they didn't bother performing an autopsy on him (it's supposed to be standard procedure when his doctor isn't present during death, right?), meh, i think the sheer overwhelming part of this is settling in now, and i'm starting to get paranoid

haha update lads, this depressing stuff is still coming, but good news at last. My half brother, 'buddy' has shown up, and i thank the gods he's helping us out with this. I love him to death, even if he is a good 25 years older then me, and we don't have regular contact. He's delt with this stuff a little bit, so he's gonna make things have a little less burden. I should really remind myself to thank him whole-heartedly, he's taking additional leave time from the military to do this.

Progress: Documents pertaining insurance has been found, and tallies somewhere around $10,000 or so. Managed to gather some funding, totaling around $3000 or so, which is a start for the down payment costs to get things started. We've been careful and select as well when dealing with people, since giving insurance and such too much forewarning will only hurt more timewise. I've got all my identification stuff in order too, which is nice since now i can get a license once i gather some personal funds, and after that i can try for a GED or something, i've been doing practice tests and i'm 95% success in all but a few math instances involving algebra/geometry and a little on reading comprehension stuff.

I've taken most of the advice you guys have given me, and it is making things easier on the whole.

To-Do: I still need to find the title to the house, i'm hoping he has a safety deposit box with it and the car titles and such. I haven't found hide nor hair of any of it so far. I'm half tempted to post a picture of what his room looks like so you guys can see what i'm working with

Things always look up if you want them to!

good to hear your making progress man. goood luck with the ensuing paper hunt!

For the title try the land registry office you would have to pay for the search, a copy of the title and certification (well at least that's how things are in Ontario, Canada)

+1 :/

uwahh!....its too bloody hot and i need to work clearing and cleaning things up, i'm getting tired of studying for my GED.

100F outside, more in the direct sun, and the backyard is like a jungle..... (

I should probably start running the AC too, this sweating all day stuff is getting a bit old as well

That's what you get for living in a hot state .

Should I just visit and see for myself?

i dunno fuzzy, you 'could' but i don't got a place you could crash, besides, you wouldn't find the place livable to begin with, it's like the A&E tv show Hoarders, but worse in some aspects.

Today i'm working on the insulation of the storage shed out back, so i have space to put stuff that is still salvagable. Once me and my brothers manage to get the shed itself done, and then store away the scattered about pieces of tools and things everywhere, we are probably gonna have to call out some salvage guys to come get the rest (my idea is they can keep and sell anything they find worth recycling for scrap, which is a lot of stuff). Then i gotta figure a way to get those 2 old trucks in the back towed out and junked, since they are beyond repair and have been for a good 15 years.

Also, the backyard is so overgrown, you'd need a machete and some very strong mosquito repellent if you want to get to the back fence line..... also, our backdoor doesn't work as a backdoor either, it's been sealed up....so yeah, imagine how bad it has to be to where you can't use a DOOR as a door.

edit: well, there's less biological stuff around, sans mold, which there is plenty of at least. If nothing else, i take pride in keeping rotting food and such from ever being an issue

Craigslist does wonders but you will meet some of the freakiest/scariest/nicest/insert-extreme-word-here people. You could put random shit on there at midnight and five minutes after it's up some random fucker could want to come and pick it up in an hour.

The house sounds pretty bad, but I'm sure it's nothing I've never seen before . Good to see shit is getting done, though.

guh, i hate being spun about. Apparently my brother hasn't done anything yet, so i guess i'm taking that part up as well. It shouldn't be all of that hard to call Social Security and his retirement stuff and whatnot, but I guess i have to do that part too aside from busting my ass clearing up the place and sorting organizing stuff......blah

It almost always falls upon one. I have been that one....many times.

...... wow....this is some bullshit

apparently when they made up the death certificates, they screwed up 1 number on the SS number, but now i've gotta file a freaking (whatever that A word was) just to get it fixed, because they aren't going to do it on their own.....

$@^J#%I^YJ#%^BIIN%J&B@&NB@%$&B#^M$KLM%V@#$

ouch

damn that sucks,
hope things start working out for ya soon

You're pretty unlucky
I hope a better luck for you.

hmm, bills are starting to come in now, and i don't have any money (no new, been this way for weeks). I'm looking for temp work in the meantime, but there just isn't anything around that i qualify for.

I really wish the job advertisements in the paper were at least SOMEWHAT legit. Something has to be wrong when you have an ad for Federal Postal Employees with full benefits at $13 an hour with no experience needed, and that ad runs all year.

edit:
correction, $15/hour

funny....there's people hiring for oil spill cleanup, $19 an hour but the hours are ball busting long (14+hour days) and you of course need the Hazwoper 40 certification lol.

also, i'm not entirely stupid, so i wont be falling for all those "Earn $500 a week working at home!!" stuff, so no need to tell me that ^_^

I'm gonna be a stocker at a place where i kinda know the boss (long story, i like her though). Too bad it's a good 30minute drive, and i sort of don't have a car atm (well, i have my dads old beat up truck), or a license (issue being i don't have a good car to take the test in, the truck is all 'no power steering' and stuff).

woo! yay for little steps of progress!

I'm starting to get the feeling i need some guidance....somewhere, somehow...

Thing is, every so often i get the idea of what i should do, but my head keeps emptying out and i just sorta fade out. I can't seem to get my priorities straight, and i'm still digging myself deeper and deeper into a hole i'm already in over my head...

I can't quite understand or figure it out, and i'm feeling kinda lonely by myself and all... there's a lot to this i couldn't quite fathom, and am definitely not prepared for...

Despite everything though, i still have my overwhelming state of apathy bearing down upon me as well. Perhaps i'm just delusional or something, but at least i'm not so delusional as to think stupid thoughts like 'I was born in the wrong age' or 'Everything will work out' at the least. We all know this isn't true, and maybe in time i'll find a way to fix things, or at the very least get out of it all.

Good news on this front, for once. I don't know if any of you care, or even read this, but i'll continue to use it as a weblog for the hell of it.

Today i finally got my money issues settled in the short-term. At this very moment, i probably have around $300 worth of bills, and probably $700 worth of debt, but i have $2000 in my checking account now. Time for Robert to finally start getting his shit in order now that he has the proper funding to achieve it.

edit: Oh goddammit, figures i'd get poison ivy all over my hands. Fuck you universe!

yeah, constantly, i'm starting to see a pattern here.....

also, apparently it's not a simple matter anymore to get bills charged to another resident. I swear if all this excessive paperwork BS is due to 9/11 or some nonsense....

I could understand the new identity theft protocols and such, but you would think they would gladly accept a payment for a delinquent bill from someone other then the person who's name it is in, without having to jump through a circus filled with hoops.

All they should need is a copy of the death certificate and maybe your birth certificate to prove you are his son. Worse case is that you might have to go to a lawyer to be declared executor of his estate.