It's time to roll up the sleeves, sharpen the pencil and put new batteries in the calculator. It's almost tax day. I actually don't use pencils or calculators, because I use a tax program for the computer. I do sometimes, however, roll my shirt-sleeves up to my shoulders to relive my glory days from the Eighties.But enough Wang Chunging, and back to taxes.
Everyone always dreads tax time. It's a big pain to have to get your big shoe box full of receipts down out of the closet and try to remember which of Sweet Pea's imaginary friends to claim as dependants. We also had a few goldfish die in the course of the year to claim along with funeral expenses.
Luckily, I don't try to figure it all out myself. I use Turbo Tax each year because it is simple enough even for me to use. It asks me questions. I answer them. Then it tells me what my refund is. I always have tax taken out of my paycheck because I never want to be short at tax time. For me, it is worth it to sacrifice a little interest to the government for the security to know that I won't have to pay in April. It also provides a little bonus check to start the year off. I know it was my money to start with, but it's like finding something I had forgotten about.
Using Turbo Tax also is a bit humbling. I ask it if I can deduct movie rental fees for renting documentaries for the kids. It says, that does not qualify. Then I ask, can I deduct medical expenses? "You did not spend enough." , it replies. "Well, can I at least deduct the Foreign sales tax on that set of lederhosen I bought from Germany on Ebay?", I pleaded. It shouts back, "No! You are too much of a loser for buying lederhosen!"
I then typed in, "What can I deduct then, you stupid computer program!"
It typed back, "Thank you for using Turbo Tax. We have submitted your return to the IRS for audit. You will need to come with some creative receipts because we told the IRS a bunch of stuff about you."
Groan. I wonder if HR Block is any nicer.
