Life Stories: February 2007 Archives
I hate doing taxes. I spent more than five hours yesterday afternoon transferring numbers from one form to another, and it would have taken a lot longer if not for TaxACT. I really resent the complexity of determining how much money I've got to hand over to the government, and I'm always left with the nagging feeling that I did something wrong that's going to land me in jail.
Let me just say to any potential future auditor: I did my best. I try very hard to be as accurate as possible, and I err on the side of the Treasury. I attested at the end of the filing process that all the numbers were true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, and that's right. The fact of the matter is that after five hours of crunching numbers everything was a haze and I don't fully understand all the fields the software wanted me to fill in. I took line 934 from form 1040-WTF and put it in field XJ-09 like the software told me to, so I hope it's right.
There's got to be a better way to fund the government, no?
Update:
Nope, we're going to have to file an amended return for federal and both states. Yay. I filled out our moving expenses form wrong, thinking that lines 1 - 3 were for our moving expenses above what my employer reimbursed, not including. So most of the reimbursed moving expenses were wrongly counted as income. At least we'll get some additional money back. Good grief, could this be more complicated?
I've got a cold. Weak. The progression of cold symptoms is:
Days 1-3: Sore throat
Days 3-4: Thin nasal discharge, congestion
Days 4-5: Thick nasal discharge, congestion
Days 5-7: Cough, gradually fading away
Ugh. The sore throat is my least favorite part.
So I'm trying to cut back on caffeine, reducing my intake from two to three diet sodas a day to just one in the morning. I'm not sure why I'm doing it, but people have told me that when they've quit caffeine they feel great and full of energy, etc. I've been down to one soda a day for a few weeks now, and I don't have any "cravings" for caffeine, but I also don't feel great or energetic. The afternoons seem especially slow and tend to drag on forever, and I don't feel as sharp as I used to after drinking a soda. So, I'm not sure this caffeine-free existence is for me.
