The Taxman Cometh to Get Me

We interrupt this regularly scheduled blog post to announce that there won't be a blog post tonight because of foreseen circumstances that could have been prevented with only a little planning.

Have I mentioned that I'm a procrastinator? Yep, I am. You know last night I told you that my dentist declared me royalty? I've decided that my royal title is Queen of Last Minute from the Land of Procrastination. It's a lovely place, you should come visit sometime. Only make sure you're late. It's expected there.

I try to justify my procrastination by saying I work best under pressure. Yeah... anyway...it dawned on me that tomorrow is April 15, tax day and I hadn't even started on my taxes. But get this-- I have not one tax return to file, I have FIVE. You read that correctly. Five. One for me, one for Julia, one for Jenna, one for Trace and one for Ross. (Julia and Jenna both receive Social Security thus necessitating their very own tax returns! What big girls!)

Yes, I do my own taxes. After I got hosed by my accountant in Tennessee with a $2000 bill for my personal taxes I said a big "No thank you!" the next year, paid $60 for Turbo Tax and actually had fun feeling very accountanty putting all those figures in the little boxes. A big plus was that it only cost me $60. Sixty dollars or $2000? Hmmm... hard choice.

I can hear you. You're saying "But the accountant is a trained professional and you are so... not." True but my dog Fifi could practically use Turbo Tax. It's so incredibly easy. It literally tells you what line/box number to fill in certain boxes. Not to mention it has cute little boxes at the top labeled Federal Refund (or Tax if your just that unlucky) and State Refund with cute green numbers that tell you your amount. And you can watch it change while you enter your numbers. Instant gratification. How cool is that? (And let it be known that while Turbo Tax should so totally be paying me for that glowing review, it was a completely voluntary. It was my way of making me look less procrastinatey.)

So, this morning I decided it was time to finally upload that Turbo Tax CD-Rom that I bought back in January. I put it in my laptop and nothing. It didn't load. I dug deep into the computers innards trying to kick it in the pants to start and it didn't recognize that there was even a CD there. Great. Technology and I just don't seem to be getting along this past week. But once again, the kids trusty upstairs computer came through and loaded it like a charm.

Without boring you any further with all the irritating details, let's just say things haven't gone smoothly. I couldn't transfer last years tax information from the laptop to the other computer. No big deal for the kids, but I have a feeling it might turn out to be a big deal for mine. Mine's a lot more complicated especially when you figure in the adoption tax credit carryover. I know, yada, yada, yada. Cry me a river. I already did that on Saturday, not going there again.


So here I sit, entering in information fueled only by vast amounts of Diet Coke and then waiting for the printer to spit out copious amounts of paper. Who knows how many trees have sacrificed themselves to let the government know that no taxes are owed? (Although the boys did get refunds and they e-filed.) Three and half tax returns done. One and half to go. I saved the best for last, mine of course with it's large stack of papers. It's going to be long night.



PS> Please disregard the first paragraph of this post. Apparently even the Federal Government can't shut me up. The state, however, might.