The ABC Murders, by Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot gets involved in the sort of case he normally doesn't handle - a series of semi-random murders by an alphabet-obsessed serial killer. His involvement is because the serial killer sends him taunting letters teasing the location of the murder that he hasn't yet committed, forcing Poirot and the police to scramble to prevent a murder when all they know is the town, the day, and the alphabet letter the victim's name begins with.

One of the interesting aspects is that when it was written and published (1936) profiling serial killers was apparently just starting to become a thing, and we get to see Poirot working with a series of police detectives to do so.

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This is a fun book with a very clever plot and some nice Hastings-Poirot banter, but lacking in memorable characters. It's not a particular favorite of mine, but I did enjoy revisiting it.

Snowpocalypse: The Reckoning

It's snowing! In honor of that, here's how things are going two months post-snowpocalypse.

Car

Pro: AAA was very pleasant to deal with, reimbursed me for the car that was destroyed, and will pay for the damages to the other car.

Con: The destroyed car is still parked on the street in front of my house. The tow company AAA wants me to use keeps not showing up. Someone put a note on the windshield asking to buy it for parts. I can't sell it or get rid of it, as it's now owned by AAA.

Other car still not repaired due to delays in getting AAA's permission to do the repair transferred from LA to Crestline.

House

Insurance just denied my claim for the rain gutters getting ripped off, as they say it's within my deductible. WE'LL SEE. I will now go ahead and try to hire someone to fix that. In Crestline. lolsob.

Have not yet submitted a claim for the tree that fell on my shed. They're going to love how long it's been between when the damage occurred and when I submitted a claim.

FEMA

Pro: We are now eligible for individual grants!

Pro: FEMA has set up a center in Crestline. Everyone working there is extremely nice.

Con: This is the process for getting a FEMA grant.

1. You must get a letter from your insurance company denying your claim. Your contract stating that certain things aren't covered doesn't count. So to have a chance of getting my plumbing covered, I either need to make a claim with my insurance even though they already refused to let me do so as it's not covered at all and then have them deny it, or get them to write me a letter saying it's so not covered that they won't even let me make a claim.

2. You must apply for a loan with FEMA. Yes, even if you already paid for repairs as I did. Yes, even if you don't want a loan as it has interest and so will actually cost you money to get.

3. FEMA must deny the loan.

4. IF FEMA denies the loan, THEN you can apply for a grant with FEMA. Which they may or may not approve.

It took me three hours at the FEMA center to figure this all out. Also, in order to do any of this, FEMA must send a text to your cell phone which you have ten minutes to respond to. They set up their center in a cell service dead zone so the parking lot was full of people running around waving their cell phones in the air desperately trying to receive a text.