Tale of woe
Interesting story on our trip to/fro Niagara Falls, Cn. New passport for all 3 of us, 2 dogs, worried about the dog food situation, breezed thru Canadian customs on way to
rally. On return trip, remember's Alf pepper fiasco and I had an apple in my sink under the cover. We crossed the bridge back into states , present passports and got stopped. "We would like to inspect your trailer and all 3 need to go to customs, please pull over there". I locked the truck with both dogs inside, locked the trailer, disconnected the plug and went into customs. We sat until our name was called, All 3 of us went up and they instructed Noelia and Brittany to sit and wanted just me. They asked me if my passport has ever been stolen or lost? I said no, it is only 30 days new. They then wanted to know my password? I looked at them, he looked at the screen, called over 2 more agents, they looked at the screen and said to me, "It says there is a password on the account" Again I had no idea what they wanted. They told me to sit down and conferred. Because an event 3 years ago someone had used my cc on line and ordered $5k of items from Las Vegas. I had tracked them down to an apt in New Jersey. The cc company said I needed a police report and they would reverse the charges. I called local police, filed report gave them the perpetrator's name and that was done. But unknown to me, that report has a password that I must have given to the policeman, which I thought was for the report. Well this is/was the password that had frozen my account with customs. I said, I had no idea and questioned why was I given a passport without this "ID" and showed them my photo id permit to carry, my old government id and said that was all I had other than my
license and passport. Finally, they said ok, you are free to go and we rushed out of there. I said let's go, I'm not waiting for them to inspect the trailer and find that apple. We rushed back to the vehicle, got in and I took off down the road. Finally a minute later I realized, "Oh crap" I forgot to reattach the trailer plug. There it was, scrapping along the ground, I lost about 1/2 inch rubber on one side, but everything still worked when I plugged in.
Upon return I went down to local police department and asked for a copy of the police report, they said they do not have it, all they have is an incident number and an online version. I explained I needed to see it to get my password that is someplace on the report. she asked for my
license and then wrote down on a piece of paper the password.
So in conclusion, remember your password if your identity has ever been stolen.
Postscript:
Went to a wedding this week and there was another person there with the exact same name as mine. Thinking there was a mistake, I sought out this other guest to see who it was. We started talking and later I mentioned the password episode and the false Las Vegas charges on my cc. This other person looked at me and said with a straight face "You know my wife and I wanted to send you a thank you note for paying for our wedding in Las Vegas, but we had not had to opportunity until now"
We both burst out laughing.