Taxes

Theo Sparks ( Last of the Few ) had this video up on his website today. I thought it was appropriate for the day after, so I stole it. Some interesting facts about the US Income Tax.


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I tried doing our income taxes—once. After fifteen minutes of going through the forms trying to translate the gobbledegook I got so freakin’ pissed off that the papers got thrown across the room. Terry took over and did them for years. At the time she worked in NYC and I worked in NJ while we lived in NJ. We had to file forms for three different areas (NJ, NYC, and NYS) plus the feds.

Then the kids grew up and started working. In different states. Jess was in Maryland then California then Massachusetts as well as NJ. Rick was in NJ and then NJ, Idaho and God knows where else with the Marines. And I had a summer camp job in NYS as well as my teaching in NJ and Terry still had the NYS and NYC thing. Terry tried doing them all one year and vowed never again. So it was off to a CPA who happened to do them all for a cut rate as a special for teachers in the district. (He was a school board member and a friend.) That happened for several years until the kids went on their separate ways and we retired.

Terry’s back to doing them for just the two of us. I still can’t take the hassle of looking at the freakin’ things. The tax forms are one of the few things that can get my blood pressure thumping just by seeing ‘em in the post office or library. We owed PA something less than a dollar this year and got enough money back from the fed to pay for a new hutch and a trip to California in June for a wedding we’ll be attending. I hate the idea that we loaned the government so much money but it beats the hell out of having to write them a check.