clueless

Ok, a company called me, saying that they're calling on behalf of a college because I owed this college money. This is an out-of-state college that I've never heard of. They have my correct name and asked to verify SSN and DOB. I'd never give out info over the phone. They kept saying that someone might have stolen my SSN and use it to get money from the school. I said No many times and hung up.

This could be a scam or just an honest mistake. Either way, I gave out no information.

However, my question is this, if someone stole your identity to get a student loan, is there anyway to find out? Would it show up on the annual credit report?

When I was little, my mom got my ear pierced by someone at a carnival! I was amazed that I didn't get ear infections then. However, since then, one of the holes on my ear lobe has completely filled up, the other one is visible but I can't get any earring though. So now I want to get my ear pierced to wear earrings.

I've recently learn that Claire's and Walmart offers ear piercing but the places I've visited are always so short-staffed (holiday season, there was only 1 employee at Claire's) and they sounded like seasonal worker to me so I'm not sure how experience they would be.

I'm 23, not allergic to any thing as far as I know. I want to get my ears/earlobes pierced. Where should I go? What metal should I get? What type of earrings would be good for starters? And what tips do you have for me? What do you wish someone would have told you before you got your ears pierced?

Thanks a bunch.

My computer just crashed, I need to know why and how to fix it. Note: I'm not an expert, maybe an intermediate, my terminology might be wrong so I'd just describe it to you.

It's a Gateway, Windows Vista. It was shut down during the night. This morning, I turned it on, first thing in the morning, as usual. After being on for a few minutes, the hard drive made a clunking sound, like something just dropped from the inside. Then it made a whooshing sound for about 10 seconds, it's like wind-whooshing or when you just put a CD in the drive. After that, everything went quiet and my monitor shut down. At this point, the hard drive still appeared to be on but the monitor was off and non-responsive.

I restarted everything. Now the hard drive still appears to be on, it looks like it normally would. The monitor is on, green light indicator is green but the screen is pitch black. There is nothing on the black screen but a flashing cursor (the blinking/flashing “_” like when it's ready to type). It looks like a DOS command screen except I can't type anything. After being reboot, the monitor did not display the eMachines logo or anything else, it just went straight to black screen with the flashing “_”

Tried Esc, all the F keys on the keyboard. Nothing works. The hard drive looks normal, the monitor is on but pitch black, there's a blinking cursor but not sure what is does. The way it is now, I can't type or access anything. The CD drive doesn't open so there's no chance of booting from CD.

I've researched it and there are some online posts saying that if I unplug the PC, press and hold the power button for 30-60 seconds, then plug it it and turn it back on. Seemed to work for some people. I tried that. The first time I turned it back on, it was on just like it normally would. The hard drive was on and running, the monitor displayed the eMachines logo, with all the F command options. Everything was restarting exactly like normal but after 5 seconds, the monitor shut down. Just the monitor, light indicator turned from green to red like when it's off, hard drives still appears to be on and running.

I restarted it again, this time, the monitor went straight to the black screen with a blink “_” again. If I unplug the whole thing and hold the power button for 30-60 seconds like before, the first time I restart it, everything would just restart as normal but the monitor would always shut itself down after about 5 seconds. I couldn't even tried the F12 boot menu yet.

Any idea what's wrong with my computer? I need to fix it but don't even know where to start. I've seen a lot of computer crashes over the years but never seen this. There was no error message or anything like that.

My Mom just got a citation for reckless driving and I need advice.

Here's the situation. It was 6:30am, winter, still dark outside, it was raining and my Mom is 58 years old. She turned from a secondary road to the main road, thinking that she was driving on the right lane.

Between the forth coming lanes, there's an area that's looks like a shoulder. I don't know what it's called but you have seen it. It's the gray lane in the middle of the street, you pulled over to that area to make a turn. Anyway, it turned out that my Mom was driving on that "dividing lane." Its surface was flat like a normal lane so she had no idea. She was pulled over for reckless driving, no speeding here.

The fine was $20 but the court fee is $140. I want to plead not guilty but my Mom worried about appearing in court. About 2-3 years ago, my Mom had a speeding ticket which she paid and attended traffic school (didn't know that she could plead not guilty).

If we were in a better financial situation, I'd have paid but just days ago, my family was debating whether or not to spend $35, now, we're fined $160.

So, 6:30 in the morning, winter and rainy day, 58-year-old woman alone in the car driving on the wrong lane (not an actually lane but she really thought it was). In the citation, the box "In-car camera" is checked, so I'm guessing that the officer had it on tape. Does my Mom stand a chance? Should she plead not guilty? And what do I need to know about the process? All help is appreciated. Thank you very much.

We're in Louisville, Kentucky, by the way.

My Mom just got a citation for reckless driving and I need advice.

Here's the situation. It was 6:30am, still dark outside, it was raining and my Mom is 58 years old. She turned from a secondary road to the main road, thinking that she was driving on the right lane.

Between the forth coming lanes, there's an area that looks like a shoulder. I don't know what it's called but you have seen it. It's the gray lane in the middle of the street, you pulled over to that area to make a turn. Anyway, it turned out that my Mom was driving on that "dividing lane." Its surface was flat like a normal lane so she had no idea. She was pulled over for reckless driving, no speeding here.

The fine was $20 but the court fee is $140. I want to plead not guilty but my Mom worried about appearing in court. About 2-3 years ago, my Mom had a speeding ticket which she paid and attended traffic school (didn't know that she could plead not guilty).

If we were in a better financial situation, I'd have paid but just days ago, my family was debating whether or not to spend $35, now, we're fined $160.

So, 6:30 in the morning, winter and rainy day, 58-year-old woman alone in the car driving on the wrong lane (not an actually lane but she really thought it was). In the citation, the box "In-car camera" is checked, so I'm guessing that the officer had it on tape. Does my Mom stand a chance? Should she plead not guilty? And what do I need to know about the process? All help is appreciated. Thank you very much.

We're in Louisville, Kentucky, by the way.

My daughter is 23 years old who has always lived with my husband and I. She was a full-time student but is taking a year off. She didn't go to school at all last year and does not work so no income. So my question is, I pay for all of her expenses, including her health and car insurance, can I claim her as a dependent even though she's not a full-time student?

I have an old printer that I've been using for years which connect directly to the PC via a printer port. I just bought a new PC which doesn't have a printer port, so I tried the printer-to-USB cable and plugged in the printer via a USB port. This is where the problem starts.

Whenever I try to print something, it doesn't print. Instead, it'd say "Send to OneNote" and open the print page in OneNote. No matter what I do, the printer just doesn't print. All it does is open another OneNote page. I've never even heard of this OneNote software before and couldn't find any help on Google. Can someone please help? How do I print my files?

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

I'm making an AMV and need some resources. What anime have dancing scenes? It can be a couple dancing or just 1 person, would be better if they were dancing under the stars or something with a nice background.

I've thought of a few but they're not enough:

- Ouran High host club

- Sailor Moon

- Tokyo Mew Mew

- Vampire knight

- Princess Tutu

- Kuroshitsuji (not a real couple so I doubt I'd use it)

If you think of any thing else, please help me out. Thanks so much.

I’m moving in one month and have some pieces of furniture to sell. I need some suggestions on how and where to sell them.

I need to sell two 6-ft-long drawers and two 9-ft-long desks. All pieces are almost brand new made of high-quality wood and so they’re heavy. I can’t sell them in a moving/garage sell because I’d need professional help getting them out of the house. My mom said she recalled seeing an ad about a company that comes to your house to buy your furniture. Is such a company exist? I don’t have a clue on how I can sell these furniture pieces. I don’t care if I don’t get a lot for them, as long as I do get some money back.

Any suggestions on how to sell them? All suggestions or recommendations are greatly appreciated. Thank you.

I’m a first-time home buyer and I don’t have an agent so I need as much help as I can get. I really love this particular house but there have been several offers so I don’t want to hire a realtor because I think that might just give me the edge in this buying competition.

My question is this: How do you make an Earnest Money Deposit? I’ve read that it should be about $1000 or 1% of the purchase price and that it should be a check made payable to a third party or an escrow account. However, I want to know WHERE do you do this depositing process? At a bank in front of an agent? Who should be there when I make the money deposit and contract besides the seller’s realtor and myself? Who should this third party (to make the check payable to)? If the realtor is from Remax, should I make the check payable to the Remax company? Or should I ask the realtor? What if the realtor told me to give the money directly to his/her or the seller?

I have that happened to me before, the seller’s realtor told me to deposit in cash and I didn’t know any better then. I know not all realtors are like that but I’m afraid I might be fooled again.

I got a check from Messe Frankfurt Inc. via UPS today (UPS Next Day air). On the check, my name, address, the date, amount of money and the Routing # and Account # were written. However, there are also some handwriting on the upper left corner and lower right corner. One read "Messe Frankfut Inc." and then their address. The other handwriting reads "Wachovia Bank" plus the bank's address.

The thing is, I've NEVER even heard of either of these companies.The amount was quite large for someone like me. What should I do with the check? Cash it? Toss it? Keep it for future references? I've googled both companies but didn't come accross any similar incidents. What do you think? Is this a scam?

I got a check from Messe Frankfurt Inc. via UPS today (UPS Next Day air). On the check, my name, address, the date, amount of money and the Routing # and Account # were written. However, there are also some handwriting on the upper left corner and lower right corner. One read "Messe Frankfut Inc." and then their address. The other handwriting reads "Wachovia Bank" plus the bank's address.

The thing is, I've NEVER even heard of either of these companies.The amount was quite large for someone like me. What should I do with the check? Cash it? Toss it? Keep it for future references? I've googled both companies but didn't come accross any similar incidents. What do you think? Is this a scam?

I got a check from Messe Frankfurt Inc. via UPS today (UPS Next Day air). On the check, my name, address, the date, amount of money and the Routing # and Account # were written. However, there are also some handwriting on the upper left corner and lower right corner. One read "Messe Frankfut Inc." and then their address. The other handwriting reads "Wachovia Bank" plus the bank's address.

The thing is, I've NEVER even heard of either of these companies.The amount was quite large for someone like me. What should I do with the check? Cash it? Toss it? Keep it for future references? I've googled both companies but didn't come accross any similar incidents. What do you think? Is this a scam?

I'm selling books on Facebook and got an offer from a guy who's buying the book for "his client in the Republic of Benin." I was stupid enough to give him my full name and home address so that his client can "send his check to me."

Now I've received several different offers from Facebook from different IDs, same content. Now I'm sure this is a scam. But I already gave my full name and address. What should I do? Should I report this to someone? What can they do with my name and address? Would they be knocking on my door harrassing me? Did this happen to anyone here? What's gonna happen next? What should I do? Help!

I'm selling books on Facebook and got an offer from a guy who's buying the book for "his client in the Republic of Benin." I was stupid enough to give him my full name and home address so that his client can "send his check to me."

Now I've received several different offers from Facebook from different IDs, same content. Now I'm sure this is a scam. But I already gave my full name and address. What should I do? Should I report this to someone? What can they do with my name and address? Would they be knocking on my door harrassing me? Did this happen to anyone here? What's gonna happen next? What should I do? Help!

I'm selling books on Facebook and got an offer from a guy who's buying the book for "his client in the Republic of Benin." I was stupid enough to give him my full name and home address so that his client can "send his check to me."

Now I've received several different offers from Facebook from different IDs, same content. Now I'm sure this is a scam. But I already gave my full name and address. What should I do? Should I report this to someone? What can they do with my name and address? Would they be knocking on my door harrassing me? Did this happen to anyone here? What's gonna happen next? What should I do? Help!

I'm selling books on Facebook and got an offer from a guy who's buying the book for "his client in the Republic of Benin." I was stupid enough to give him my full name and home address so that his client can "send his check to me."

Now I've received several different offers from Facebook from different IDs, same content. Now I'm sure this is a scam. But I already gave my full name and address. What should I do? Should I report this to someone? What can they do with my name and address? Would they be knocking on my door harrassing me? Did this happen to anyone here? What's gonna happen next? What should I do? Help!

In Japan, do they write day-month-year like in Europe, month-day-year like in the US?

I need a cable to connect my JVC camcorder, model GR-D22U to the computer. I already have the cable to connect it to the TV, but still missing the cable to connect it with the computer. Does anyone know where I can buy one? Also, does this kind of cable (the one to connect a camcorder to a PC) have any specific name? I've searched on eBay and they have all kinds of cables, I don't know which one is which.

I've just won an HDTV and had no idea how to record the shows. I had never paid any attention about anything HDTV-related before (never thought I'd actually get to use one!) so I'm clueless.

Right now, I'm just using the HDTV to watch plain TV, no cable, no direct TV or anything like that, just normal TV channels. If I want to record shows from my HDTV to a VHS tape so that it'd have that high-definition quality, what do I do? What do I buy to record from an HDTV? Should I buy a TiVo or a DVR? What's the difference between the two? And because I'm new, is there anything else I should know about recording shows from an HDTV?

Thank you. Any suggestion will be greatly appreciated.