There's a bone in my taxes!

I've been so busy, it's been hard to sit down and make note of it. Plus a lot of it is probably boring... driving here, watching a game over there...

My in-laws were here for a few weeks, and we had a really nice visit. No controversy or misunderstandings. They seemed to have fun with us, just going to kids games and trying to keep up with us.

The Girl's team didn't do well in the State Cup competition in Temecula. They lost all three games, but lucky for us, that meant we didn't have to come back the next weekend! It's a 1.5-2.5 hour drive! When things go well, the team looks good. When they don't, it's frustrating to see the team pass up opportunity after opportunity.

I get frustrated that she's so good, but she doesn't necessarily get to play a position she wants to play.

The Boy's high school basketball team got into the playoffs by the skin of their teeth, which was very exciting. He didn't start, but the Boy got in pretty early in both games, and was in there until the end. He played great in both games, but they ended up losing the second game in overtime. He was one of two high scorers for that game, so I'm glad he got a little glory in the end.

We had to drive out to Chino for the first game, and back to Temecula for the second. A lot of driving! I don't know how motivated he's going to stay, but we're headed into the home stretch now. It's just a challenge to see him be so good, yet motivate him to be excellent. He's pretty content with just being good.

The Boy is coaching the Girl's basketball team too, and that's pretty fun. He's staying pretty positive, and the girls are getting better. They've won their last 6 games I think, but some of the wins have been very close, so I hope they do well in the playoffs.

This weekend we finally had some time to wind down from all the activity, and it felt great. I got to sleep in!

I was already juggling my two "jobs" and feeling maxed out, when my friend called to say she needed me to work for her. But then it turned out to only be for a few weeks and a little bit of time for each week... anyway, it's fun but stressful to be in demand.

A new tradition I've started, out of necessity, is picking up dinner on Tuesday nights. If I don't cook dinner by 4:15, it's too late! I leave for soccer practice at 4:30 and don't return until after 7pm. So I've been going to Zancou Chicken in Burbank, and picking up a whole chicken for about $8.50. I think that's a pretty good price. I come out with the chicken, the pita bread and garlic spread it comes with, and either batsmati rice or hummus for about $13.50. Yum!!

I took advantage of having time this weekend and started going thru all my tax paperwork. I stacked it into piles on the floor and took a break. Later I was playing with the dog, and accidently threw his bone onto the papers. "Oh, no!" I said, "I threw the bone on my taxes!" and the Girl thought that was funny. She kept saying, "Hey, there's a bone in my taxes!"

Taxing Work

I had a hard day doing taxes yesterday. First I had a really sweet girl who gave lots to charity (as an act of faith in God), but she withdrew about $13k from her IRA and got a stiff penalty and owed nearly a thousand dollars to the IRS and state. And she had to pay me (the company) on top of that! I felt SO badly for her, and did what I could to make her bill better, but felt bad about that later - as in I hope I don't get in trouble for what I did!

Then I had another poor guy who needed money right away to pay his landlord by Sat, but I couldn't get him an instant approval (possibly because I had to put that he was unemployed). So I'm hoping he gets his money in the next few days, plus it occured to me later that I made a mistake on something. It comes out the same, but I feel like a dum dum.

So between feeling badly for people that need money and being worried that I did something wrong, I'm starting to not enjoy this job so much anymore. I was even thinking I should have said that the first girl was a relative of mine and only charged her $20, but I would have been scared that my boss would hear me and know it wasn't true.

Luckily she's pretty cool and there are worse people than me driving her crazy.

I've met some nice people and had some good experiences, tho. One young guy came in with a skateboard. He kept moving his shoulder, and said he'd fallen on his skateboard. I asked if he wanted an Advil or something, and he said he doesn't take anything like that, he just keeps moving it and it gets better. When he left I told him I hope he didn't get hurt anymore on his skateboard, and he said, "I'm pretty sure I will, but that's OK."

Then there was a girl who got 2k back last year, and when I finished with her return she was getting 6k! She had two kids and didn't make all that much money, and fell into a sweet spot for EIC, so that she actually got back more than she paid.

It's just more draining than I thought it would be, and after about 2 or 3 returns in a day I'm getting burned out. Please I have a feeling I'm not going to make much money here, especially if I keep printing out coupons for people.

I'm going to have to stop empathizing with everyone, or I'm going to get too upset to continue. As it is I'm stressing over whether or not this poor guy is going to pay his rent on time, and if not, what will happen to him? It's like you know there are people out of work and people on the edge, I just never met so many of them at one time.

As if I don't have money problems of my own...luckily mine are not that bad (yet).

Oh, I almost forgot another cool thing. I got asked out. To dinner, after doing his taxes. I told him it wasn't that I don't like dinner, but I think my husband would get mad. He said that yes, he had seen my ring. When I asked him at the end of his taxes if he was satisfied with the service he'd received, he said yes, except for that ring. Hah!

One thing I've noticed in the office that I'm in, that a LOT of people are married, but have different last names. I had no idea there were so many. Another thing is that people think they can write off gifts to charity. Well, you can, but it's on the Sched A. So unless you have a house or mega employee expenses (or horrible medical bills), it's not going to exceed the standard deduction.

That's all for now.