Death and Taxes - Predictably, I Forgot One Piece of Paper

DH did point out to me yesterday that May 31st isn't a hard deadline, that, if needed, our closing can move into the first part of June. That's going to impact the plans that Chickie has been making, so I texted her last night that she might end up having to work those first two weeks of June. I suspect she wasn't very happy about that - she's already been planning a trip out West with some family members and I might have just stomped on those plans, requiring some shifting. I know I wouldn't be happy to get a text like that, so I suspect she'll be quite crabby today. Nothing to be done about it, though. DH is correct. The close date isn't set in concrete, it's moveable depending on what remains to be sold. 

I suspect Chickie is not happy with me right now. 
She's been busy planning this trip out West for 
a couple of weeks now, and I completely forgot 
that we might still be open into June. My bad, but 
I'm going to need her help to get things locked down 
and closed. 

We met with out accountant last night for our personal taxes. I had everything together, except for a single 1099 which I forgot to print out. I've quickly done that and will have DH drop it off on his way in to the shop today. Then we'll be set. I asked my accountant if he knew any good attorneys he could recommend to help me with this whole identity issue I'm having, and he recommended a firm he does business with. He said they have about 25 lawyers on staff, so hopefully someone there will be able to assist me. I'll give them a phone call today. 

Our accountant is great, and very close to where we live 
so he's also very convenient. I usually forget at least one 
piece of paper, and this was no exception. I'll have 
DH drop the papers off on his way in to the shop today. 

Except for the usual - death and taxes (LOL) - everything seems to be moving along - a bit slowly, but steadily. I got everything done that I needed to yesterday, and even had a bit of time to relax - something rare on my Wednesdays. I got my next batch of fruit baked, and did six boneless pork chops for my upcoming dinners. Yummy! I still have a bit of leftovers that need to be eaten first, but I'm set up. I also had 10 audio book credits that needed to be used by the end of the month, so I bought the next ten in the next series I'll be listening to. It takes a LOT longer to listen to a book than to read it, so I'm probably set for the next year now. 

I've been listening to audio books while exercising for more 
than 25 years now. I can't imagine being in the pool without 
my books to listen to. I sometimes listen on the treadmill 
too, but often will stick to rock music on that equipment. 

So I'm heading out to the pool for my final swim of the week. I hope you have an excellent Thursday and I'll be back tomorrow. May life be kind to you today. Slava Ukraini. 

Happy St Patrick's Day!

Happy St Patrick's Day to one and all. I celebrated the day when I was a child, but nominally. On the sidelines. Sometimes Mom would make a corned beef, but only because it was on sale, not because of any special holiday. Then I married into an Irish/German Catholic household and things changed - radically. My in-laws celebrated and were involved in St Patrick's Day in numerous ways. They didn't march in the parade, at least not when they were getting older. But they were involved in a lot of the different events, etc. 

This is a prior year's St Patrick's Day Parade in downtown 
St Paul. I forget how many miles they walk, party and 
celebrate, but it's quite a few, making their way from downtown 
towards Minneapolis. 

I enjoy the holiday - it's always fun to have a good time, and when we have good weather, it's even better. Up here in the Frozen Northlands, it's been everything from really warm Spring days to days with heavy snow in the years I've been living up here. You never know what St Patrick's Day will bring, but the parade will go on. I recall seeing the signs for parking and alternative ways to get to the clinic last year when I was doing Radiation Therapy at this time of the year. Ov course, at the hours that I had my appointments, there certainly was no parade - LOL. 

I totally realize that Corned Beef & Cabbage is NOT a 
traditional Irish meal. But it is the meal most associated 
with St Patrick's Day in my part of the Universe. I'm not 
making it this year, no real time to cook. But, we might do 
it on Sunday. Just because it's pretty tasty. 

But yes, this nominal German Jew ended up marrying into an American Irish/German Catholic family - it caused a lot of people to go a bit ballistic on both sides of the family. But here we are ... lots of storms behind us, and probably a few in our future, but still together after more than 45 years. 

Tomorrow night we have an appointment with our tax 
accountant for our personal income tax returns. That 
usually goes pretty easily - we have our financial information 
in pretty good condition and I think I've remembered to 
print out everything necessary. But, I can always drop paperwork 
off to their office later in the week if I've missed something. 

Tomorrow we have an after-hours appointment with our accountant for our personal income tax return preparation. I think I've finally finished printing out all of the possible paperwork he might need, and if I am missing anything, one of us can drop it by his office later in the week. I don't think we'll have any surprises pending, but one can never know for sure until the numbers have been crunched. 

So, if you're celebrating St Patrick's Day with a toast of 
green beer, lift one for all of us who can't celebrate today. 

So, enjoy your Green Beer and celebrations today. St Paul will be celebrating alongside you, and the parade will go on, as always. It's going to be cold, but I don't think we'll be getting any snow, so that's at least one positive thing. Hopefully everyone marching will dress warmly. I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini. 

Today Will NOT Be a Great Day

Today is a really long day, and I'm not really sure how I'm going to manage. It's a usual work day, and I think I'm able to work - not at full efficiency, but I can be there for Chickie. After work, however, DH and I have an appointment at our Accountant's for the corporate taxes. I have no idea why DH wants me along, but he does, and he's insistent. I'd rather crawl back into bed. 

I feel absolutely awful right now. I don't want to go to the 
breast center today when I have an appointment already for 
tomorrow, but it's really tempting. 

I felt so awful and in so much pain yesterday that I "stormed the doors" of my breast clinic. They plugged me in right away, though, had several people see me, eventually doing an ultrasound and a fluid biopsy. They pulled almost 30ml of fluid from under my armpit. No wonder it was hurting. I was wrapped up and told to keep a compression bandage on it at all times until my checkup on Wednesday. 

These guys are great! Really! My cancer seems to want 
to make itself known in many different ways, however. 
It's a problem child. LOL

Well, the first person who wrapped me up in a stretch bandage did a horrid job - it didn't even stay put for the drive back home. I re-wrapped it then, and thought I had done fairly well, but this morning, everything is pure hurt again. But today I have to work, and then I have an appointment with our tax accountant for our corporate taxes. I can't miss that. I re-wrapped it better, and hopefully that will work for a long day. 

Today is NOT a good day. I've got shooting pains 
from my shoulder to my wrist, and the hematoma that 
they drained yesterday is back full-strength today. I have 
an appointment tomorrow am, so I'll hang on until 
then, but I'm not a really happy person right now. 

I'm losing a lot of weight because I simply don't feel like eating anything. That's not really conducive to healing, so I have to try and work on that. But if I don't feel like eating, it's hard to force myself - you know? I'm just trying to hang on until tomorrow morning when I'm back at the breast center. But today ... well today is not going to be a great day. Take care of yourselves and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini. 

Friday, Skating and Hockey - All's Good in the Frozen (Melting) Northlands

It's Friday, which is always a great day in my week. It's a day for making my next week's "Ogre Juice", a day for grocery shopping, cooking, and catching up on things that didn't get finished on Wednesday's "day off". The weather is turning colder for the next two weeks, but it should be dry, at least until the end of next week. We're actually going to drop into the "teens" for our temps on Sunday - rather shocking in this Non-Winter we've been experiencing. This year is going into the record books as one of the warmest winters on record, if not THE warmest winter on record. I'm totally behind our winter, even though our outdoor skating rinks never really had an opportunity to be used at all this year. 

We have neighborhood outdoor ice skating rinks throughout 
the Cities. I can think of at least three within two miles 
of my house, and there are probably several I'm not aware of . 
These rinks are maintained by the Parks and Recreation 
board, they all have ice houses so that you can switch from your 
boots to your skates easily, and most of them have lighting 
for the early winter nights. I've skated on several of them, 
and it's fun, if not quite as smooth as an indoor rink with 
a Zamboni machine. I doubt they've been used this year 
at all, though. We've been too warm for a good freeze. 

So today I'll go grocery shopping, blend my alkagizers for the upcoming week, clean house, work on the computer and roast/broil my salmon for dinner. There's only three more Fridays before Easter, then I probably won't have salmon again for dinner for another year. 

In the USA, everyone who earns money of any kind needs 
to file a form 1040 with the Internal (or Infernal) Revenue 
Service every year. It's a PITA, but necessary. I had all of the 
information the accountant needed for this year's taxes, 
though, so I was happy. I went through my donations, and 
donated more than $1000 to licensed charities last year - 
that makes my heart happy. 

We had our appointment with the Accountant on Wednesday, and actually had everything needed, so he's working on the tax forms, and we're busy with our lives. There's no activity with the ants - it's as if a magic wand came and wafted them away. The poison was supposed to follow them back to the nest where it would spread throughout the colony. It seems to have managed that within 24 hours. Phenomenal! We'll keep it up for a month or two, in case there are any stragglers, but I'm hopeful that they are now dead and our of my life. Nasty things indoors, absolutely amazing and wonderful critters in the outdoors. 

Marat Khusnutdinov is our new center, playing on our 
third line and wearing #22. In his first game he skated 
well, even scored a point. The team is on a road trip 
now, so he'll have a chance to bond with the guys. 
Having Karill Kaprizov around for translation help 
will also be a plus for the young man. Welcome to 
Minnesota, Marat! 

The Minnesota Wild have a new player - Marat Khusnutdinov. I suspect we're going to enjoy watching this young man on the ice. He just got signed and moved here from St Petersburg, and within two days was centering our third line. He and our star Kirill Kaprisov have bonded really well - I think it's helpful to have someone else who can speak the same language when you're coming from a new country and thrust into the limelight immediately. He's centering our third line, paired with Foligno and Gaudreau and played very well for his inaugural game. Now the team travels to St Louis, beginning a three-game road trip. That will give him time to settle in and start to feel really comfortable. There's nothing like a road trip to bond players - LOL. 

There's nothing like a road trip to bond hockey players. 
A lot of the season is spent on the road, going from 
one game and location to another. We have three road 
games in a row now - St Louis, Anaheim and Los Angeles. 
By the time the team returns in a week, Marat should be 
feeling pretty comfortable playing with his new team. 

So, that's all I know today. I have a pile of things I should do on my mental list, we'll see how many of those tasks actually get accomplished before I settle down for the evening. Have an excellent Friday and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל.

*Sigh* - Taxes and Ants - They Never Disappear

DH laid down some ant traps yesterday in hopes of catching those micro ants that we had in the pantry. He put them into the pantry as well as into the yellow bathroom that is adjacent to the pantry - the one that Sharon uses when she's in town, and that I've taken over for my own over the past few years. I had seen a few of these micro ants in that bathroom before, and had made sure DH was aware of that. 

So, this is the pile of ants clustering around the one ant 
trap in the yellow bathroom. The small circle below is one 
of the small rubber bands for my braces and it measures 
1/4" (7mm) from edge of the circle to the other edge. So 
these ants are SMALL. They're hopefully taking the poison 
back into their nest. That's what the ant traps are supposed 
to accomplish because if they're inside the walls, I'm 
not deconstructing things to kill the suckers. 

When I got home from work, I checked out the ant traps in the bathroom. Two of them were pristine, but the third was "Disco Club Gone Wild". It was teeming with the crazy micro ants. DH thinks he knows where they are coming from, but I'm not sure we're going to be able to do much about that - it's an inside the walls thing caused by some plumbing fixes from a decade or two ago. Still, we're at least a bit more aware and on top of things now, and he'll tackle things again on Thursday. 

Tonight, right after DH gets home from the shop, we head 
over to our accountant for our personal income taxes. I hope 
I've got all of the paperwork together - I've spent the last week 
accumulating the various reports and printouts. I'll have to 
double-check my charitable contributions and make sure I haven't 
missed any of them. The monthlies usually aren't the problem, 
but I do occasional off-the-cuff donations now and again and 
have to make sure I've got those listed. Just one more thing to do 
on a busy day. 

On the other aide of ants is another annoyance - income taxes. We have an appointment with our accountant late this evening for our personal taxes. I think I've gathered everything we need - I'm pretty good at that. DH is responsible for his own reports on his investments, etc., but I gather all of the household stuff, my own financial things, and other banking materials. As we've gotten older and certain funds have been merged together, it's become a bit easier, but it's always a chore gathering the paperwork and making sure we have everything together. I'll be making sure during the day today, before I chat with Aearwen. 

I love cooking ribs in the slow cooker. Since 
DH and I use completely different Bar-B-Q 
sauces, I actually have a dam set up in the 
middle of the crock pot, and use a roasting 
bag to keep the two racks completely separated 
(and make for REALLY easy clean-up). I curl 
them into their sides, pour on the BBQ sauces, 
put on the lid, and cook them for six hours. 
They fall off the bone. So good (and so easy)! 

So it's a busy day today. I really need my time in the pool to decompress before diving into it. I have my first load of laundry already in the wash, and I need to survey the refrigerator at some point to figure out if I need to cook anything for the upcoming week. We're doing ribs again on Sunday - they were BOGO at the store so DH picked some up. At least that's an easy cook, and several days for eating. I'm off to the pool - need to work out some of this stress. Have an excellent Wednesday and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל.

Stuff, Thoughts, Cleaning - Maybe Cleaning the World Again?

Looking at my computer desk, I think Wednesday will require a serious clean-off of the top of the desk. When my stacks of papers and projects and "stuff" gets higher than three inches, it's time for a serious clean. However ... Wednesday night is also our night for personal income taxes with our accountant, and I will be making sure our bills, etc are in order and ready for whatever he asks when I get to the shop today. That's another hour or two, but at least at the shop I have counter tops - lots of counter tops upon which to spread and stack invoices, grouped by kind. 

Our personal income taxes are far more complicated 
than our corporate taxes. DH actually keeps the corporate 
stuff under control, but personal stuff is a hodge podge of 
my charity gifts and donations, various other stuff, and 
investment statements. I'm not sure I have the year-end 
statements from my two brokers, so I'll have to double-check 
that today. 

It must have been easier in past times when all you had was word-of-mouth. Of course, given the "flexibility" of memory, inaccuracies were built in to that system. But, the "taxes" were demanded by the property owner, the town Mayor, the provincial Governor and the King. If you were at the bottom of the stack, you just did what you were told to do - easy, peasy, and lots of room for complaint - silent complaint, since you didn't want to be whipped, imprisoned, or conscripted into the armed forces for whatever war was then current. 

Medieval peasants had it quite a bit easier in many respects, 
than we have today. We have the conveniences, and central 
heating and high levels of cleanliness are wonderful things, 
but they didn't have the world-wide issues that we're facing 
now. They might have had megalomaniacs, but they didn't 
have nuclear armament to back those idiots up. They could 
destroy a small part of the world, but not the world as a whole. 

Isn't that the way of humanity? Times of peace followed by oppression and times of war? We're on a precipice in the USA now - so many, many things can go wrong and plunge us into the darkness that is spreading across the world right now. All I can do is think about the dinosaurs - the most successful species Mother Nature has ever come up with. Dinosaurs managed to make it a LONG time. If you include birds, they ruled the earth for 233.3 MILLION years, knock the birds out, and it's only 167.3 million years. Humans ... well, we're not doing as well. Even if you include the ancestors to humanity, we've only been around for 3 million years, and if you're just including Homo Sapiens, it's actually 200,000 to 300,000 years. We're babies, and we're destroying our planet so good on us? Not really. Mother Nature really needs to step in and start again. She needs another success story. Maybe the cockroaches? 

Dinosaurs were incredibly successful, appearing on 
EVERY continent and landmass throughout the world. 
We're also spreading, but we're nowhere as successful 
at living within our environments. We want to change 
everything to suit us, rather than learn to live easily within 
the land we're inhabiting. We're also extremely 
warlike and aggressive towards our own kind. That's 
not a recipe for species survival. 

So, I'm heading off to the pool. I think I need a swim to clear my head of all of this extraneous junk. After all, it's not very uplifting to realize that the new kids on the block are bringing in the heavy equipment and getting ready to raze every structure on the block to the ground. I think I need a swim after that mental image. Have an excellent Tuesday and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל.

A Storm is Coming - Are You Ready?

As soon as I get into the shop and type a shipping label for the Federal tax forms, I'm done with that task. It's been the usual nightmare, but we pulled through. This is all of the end-of-year payroll numbers and forms that have to go to the government as well as the individual forms for each employee so that they can file their own income tax returns whenever they get around to ti. So they're rather important, and there's a time deadline of the end of the month according to Federal law. 

There are so many taxes to be dealing with, and payroll 
taxes are just one type. However, it's an important one, 
and can't be messed up, so we double and triple check 
everything. 

I haven't listened to the news today, nor have I paid attention to my phone for anything more than my daily morning meditation and routine, so I don't know for sure. But, I make an assumption that Trump won in the New Hampshire primary last night. I'm resigned to four more years of this geriatric blow-hard, but the thing that worries me is that he sees himself more as a Dictator than as a President. In that case, he might try and emulate Putin to become the "Great Leader for Life" - an essence totally opposed in any democracy. It's worrisome, but there's nothing that I as one individual vote can do about it. 

I never had any great desire to live in "interesting" times. I 
wanted to float below the radar and just live my life to 
the best of my ability, creating small ripples in a very large 
pond. But, despite my best intentions, I am living in VERY 
interesting times, and am finding it very uncomfortable. 

So, that old Chinese curse of  "May you live in interesting times" may well be coming true in the USA over the next few years, and I'll be missing my peace and tranquility. The only question is how will DH and I be doing in four years - well, five years actually?  We'll be in our 70's, and DH doesn't do well with change. He's a Republican, but despises Trump and refuses to vote for him (thank goodness). 

All I ever wanted was to live in peace and 
tranquility. Instead, I've lived in a world of 
war and war and more war, and now we're 
one small step away from fighting in the 
streets. I'm grateful I was adamant about not 
having children. I wouldn't want kids of mine 
born into this world. 

The people I feel sorriest for are the younger people in my country. They'll have to live through this upheaval, and it may well turn out to be the crux of the US Revolution or the US equivalent of Hitler's rise to power. It could be VERY bad, yeah. VERY bad indeed. Between all of those headaches, we're also focused on getting the store closed. We're not in total agreement about how to accomplish that either. It's going to be a VERY interesting year in many ways, and I think I'll be glad to see the end of it when we get to December 31st. 

May we all have our own peace amid the storm that 
is coming. 

However, today I'm off to the pool. I need to work out some of this angst in some serious laps. Have an excellent day. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל.

Minimum Time, Maximum Effect and a Very Busy Day

Today started out as usual - although I was actually able to sleep until my alarm went off at 3:00 am, so that's one WIN. LOL I settled down and did my morning meditation which was breath control and practice today - something I can work on through my day which will be fun. I then did my three daily solitaire puzzles on my phone and started the day off. Not a lot of time, though, so I'm going to let this be short and sweet. 

One of my morning solitaire games is "Pyramid". I have 
played this version of solitaire since I was a small child 
and it was always my favorite. Having it on my phone 
is just that much more convenient. I've played this every 
morning for years now. 

Yesterday's "day off" was packed with cleaning and a bit of kitchen work. I braved the dining room and indeed, he had done some cleaning in there and it was vastly improved. It still has a ways to go, but I was quite happy. He had moved my chair against the wall, so I tackled my stuff - I had promised, after all, to find a home for my blender and my other items. 

The second solitaire game I play on my phone every 
day is this version. My mother-in-law played this 
at her kitchen table for hours every day. I remember 
playing this version of solitaire when I was a child 
and again, I love the convenience of having it on 
my phone. 

I have a large, rectangular, electric fry-pan/cooker/warmer that my father-in-law gave to me decades ago, and it was in the lower cabinet of my kitchen. It's something that I use rarely - but it's handy to have it when needed. Still, it didn't need to be that accessible, so I ended up putting it into the credenza in the dining room, and giving that space over to my blender, which fits beautifully in its' new cabinet. I also took the upper cabinet above my store which I had a bunch of tea in, and reorganized it. I tossed the teas that had any caffeine, and repurposed the space for my various herbal teas and all of the different nuts I use in my nut mixes, as well as the few bags of assorted granola munchie cereals I have. That worked out well, although that side is still a bit more crowded than I would like. 

The third solitaire game I wake up with every day is 
"BlockSudoku". It can be a challenge, and I don't enjoy 
it more than the single game I play in the morning, but 
I do enjoy it. Enough to have been playing it every 
morning for the past several years. 

I had a box of my "brain" medicine that needed a home, and I finally decided to check and see if there was any room under "my" sink in the master bathroom. I never actually use this bathroom - it's freezing cold in the winter and too hot in the summer. It's DH's bathroom. But, long ago I shared it. Looking under my sink, the cabinet had plenty of room for my medicine, so I found that a new home there, and it'll work great in that location. 

The final game I play on my phone after my morning 
meditation is a version of Mah Jong. This is one of my 
newer games, but it's always enjoyable and relatively 
quick, which is also a positive with my schedule. 

I also do two quick jigsaw puzzles, but on swim days, 
I'm usually doing those in the car while waiting for 
the doors to the YMCA to be opened in the morning. 

All in all, after a lovely conversation with Aearwen, and a zoom meeting with my Living WildFit cohorts in mid-day, it was a successful and quite enjoyable day. I'm hoping today will go as smoothly. Unfortunately, we're supposed to be getting our next snowstorm this afternoon, and I have an appointment with the accountant tonight for our personal income taxes. Ick on both counts. But, it'll be nice to get them over with, so we'll just have to manage. I just hope the streets won't be too icy - at this time of the year, anything's possible. Have an excellent day and Slava Ukraini. I'll be back tomorrow. 

Yesterday - Accomplishment and Space Cadet

Yesterday's orthodontic appointment went very well. Dr DeVoe had a new haircut and new glasses. He looked great - much younger and friendlier (although he's always one with a great attitude and a smile). He changed a couple of things in my mouth and I am now using smaller rubber bands which exert more force. He also changed the actual pattern I use for the rubber bands. It's going to take my mouth a few days to get used to the change, so right now I'm using some Tylenol to take the edge off. I'm sure I'll be able to skip the pain relievers within a day or two. 

I have now graduated to "Elephant" orthodontic 
rubber bands. The previous size was "Tortoise" 
and was 1/16th of an inch larger. It's rather 
amazing what a difference 1/16th can make! 

I am running a little late today, however. I actually slept until my alarm went off - not all that common, even though my alarm is set for 3:00 am (I do 3:00 am in the snow months in case I need to shovel some of the driveway before leaving for the gym in the mornings). Speaking of snow - yesterday was a crazy day. It was clear when I went to the gym, but when I left, it was snowing huge flakes of wet snow. I ended up having to shovel the driveway twice yesterday. 

When I left the gym yesterday, it was snowing HUGE 
snowflakes. Shortly thereafter, they were much smaller 
and stacking up much less (making me much happier). 
Still, I had my fill of shoveling yesterday, and it would 
be nice if I didn't have to shovel today. 

I did have a good day yesterday, although I forgot to pick up the corporate income taxes and will have to get those on Friday instead. That did NOT please DH, but I simply spaced it out between other things on my mind. I won't forget again - I'll pick them up on Friday and drop them off at the shop for him since they are the corporate taxes. He'll look them over, I'll write a check on Saturday, and he can drop that off on Monday on his way in to the shop. Crisis solved (sigh). 

I totally spaced out picking up the corporate income 
taxes yesterday. Totally my bad. I'll get them on 
Friday morning and drop them off at the shop so that 
he can look them over before writing a check for 
the payment to our accountant. 

So, have a great Thursday. Today is cold, but it's the Frozen Northlands - cold is fully expected at this time of the year. Enjoy your day and Slava Ukraini. I'll be back tomorrow - maybe with a bit more time to post - LOL. 

Dancing to the Tune of the Government, An Adventure in Typing

I had a delightful conversation with a Help Agent at the Business Social Security Administration yesterday morning. After establishing that my log-in codes were accurate and functional, she dug a little deeper and found that somehow/some way my account had been "deactivated"! Well. That wasn't (and isn't) really helpful for this year, although I will be sent all of the information and codes I will need to reactivate it. Since I need to have the payroll information to the IRS postmarked by January 31st, however, her time frame wasn't working really well for me. 

Some of you are my general age and will remember the 
long lines at the Post Office on April 15th to drop off and 
have your income tax return postmarked by the deadline. 
That's hardly necessary any more, people file on-line. But 
paper copies are required of a lot of documents, including 
the SSA paperwork I need to submit to the government
by the end of the month. 

So, after re-establishing that it was the postmark, not the receipt, that made the date valid for the IRS, I went onto the website for my local office supply store and purchased a packet of 10 W-2's,  with the corresponding W-3 form. I will be hand-typing these today at the shop, first thing. My major problem with that is darkness. The fluorescent fixture above that area wasn't rewired in our last rewiring efforts, so I'm usually typing in a twilight when I'm making out the weekly checks. 

Part of the reason I'm not seeing well in the dimmer 
light of the back room is my eyes in general. The 
left eye, my worst eye, looks more like the left eye in 
this picture. Ideally, after surgery, it will look more 
like the image on the right - clear and crisp once again. 
But today, I can't see well, so I'm bringing my light 
along to the shop with me. 

Making an error and a correction on a check isn't a major deal. If I really screw up, I can void the check and start a new one. (Yes, I know it's old fashioned to do paper checks, but DH prefers it and I really don't care. For my personal checking it's all debit cards and electronic statements and on-line bill paying). So ... I'm bringing my standing Ott light to the shop with me today so that I have light where I need it. I can't afford mistakes and I don't want to spend the majority of my "day off" typing governmental forms. 

I have a standing Ott light like this (minus the 
casters because I wanted a stable non-mobile 
base instead). I got it for free from JoAnne's 
when I had some credits to apply on their 
website. It's my go-to lamp in my crafting 
area and I love it. It's not super portable, but 
I'm taking it to the shop with me today to 
give me light in the nook where the typewriter 
site. Without good lighting, I'll be making 
errors on the payroll reports for the IRS. 

Eventually I'll get the rest of my day off, and can do my grocery shopping and relax for a bit. I'm not sure what I'm going to do, I have an open schedule after my task is completed. It's rather nice to have a bit of time to just do whatever occurs to me. Have an excellent Friday and I'll be back tomorrow to wrap up the week. Slava Ukraini. 

I Can't Seem to Access the Web Right Now - No Photos Today

I'm screwed in so many ways. I went to my eye doctor appointment. I left REALLY early, and it was a good thing that I did because I got totally lost on the West side of the Cities and it took an hour+ to manage to find the building. However, as the saying goes, "She Persevered". I got there, was seen quite quickly, and spoke carefully to the doctor about everything. 

Bad news, though. My eyes are getting worse and will need surgery, but I also have a genetic condition (thanks a LOT, Mom - whoever you are) called Fuchs Corneal Dystrophy which makes a standard eye surgery a bit more dicey and complex. So instead of simple cataract surgery, I'm going to need quite a bit more, probably including a corneal transplant. Oy! 

In the meanwhile, my prescription is accurate, my glasses were made properly for that prescription, and I'm just not seeing well. Joy, joy! I've got an appointment near the end of March to see my regular eye doctor (who is a cataract expert) and get a "cataract evaluation". Hopefully surgery can be scheduled and my vision will improve, but that's two months away! 

I'm also having difficulty getting onto the website to fill in and file my W-2 and W-3 forms. The government has instituted a new policy that requires a secondary code to be entered, a code that they supply to you. Unfortunately, it appears they only supply the code via US Mail, and I have five days in which to submit the form. They say it can take up to a month to get the code. ARGH. I'll be contacting my accountant today, I'll also speak to the SSA, and I'll probably have to purchase paper forms and hand-type them at the shop. I'll have to bring an extra light from home before I type them, because I can't see well enough at the typewriter to do it without more light. 

So, that's my tale of woe for the day. On that note, I'm going to plug in some photos and get going to the pool. I certainly have frustration to work out in the water today. Have an excellent Thursday and Slava Ukraini. 

Today Will Be a VERY Busy Day - A Long List of Things To Do

I'm hoping today will go a bit smoother than yesterday, which was stumbly from the time I awakened until the time I went to bed. It was a crazy, busy day and I was fighting the clock all day. I won, but it was by a hare's whisker. But, on to today, which is packed tight with two zoom calls, grocery shopping, getting the first Etsy grouping live - trade beads for today - and getting things arranged for my appointment with my accountant tonight for our personal income tax return. I'm still fighting for access to one piece of information he needs - the website changed platforms and isn't accepting my sign-in information. I'll have to phone them and try to get a new log-in established that way *sigh*. 

I'm all in favor of passwords, etc, and use a 
LOT of them. But ... when they require me 
to renew things every three months or so, 
I can lose track of that. I try not to have that 
problem on federal websites, but there are 
some lesser ones that I miss. This is one of 
those, and I need the information for my 
tax appointment tonight. 

I had a great swim yesterday, and I'm already looking forward to my swim today. But, I lost my wall locker key. I hope someone found it and turned it in, but if not, I'll have to switch over to a different wall locker which would be a PITA because I'm short and had been using one that was good for my height. 

I'm not talking about the larger locker I use for my 
coat and clothes. Just the little one where I put my 
keys and cellphone for safety. These are key-operated 
with the key on a large safety pin. I don't know where 
my key went after I removed it from my swim 
suit, but it was nowhere to be found. 

The wall locker is not the main locker in the locker room. It's a small, key-operated locker where I keep my cell phone and car keys. The key has a pin attached to it, which I pin to the inside of my bathing suit. For some reason or other, between the time I removed it, and the time I was leaving, it moved into another dimension. Even though I spent almost 30 minutes looking for the key, I never found it. I had to ask the Gate Gargoyle to please use the master key to allow my access to my phone and keys. Problem solved, he was able to do that, but I'm hoping the key turned up and is back in the usual position today. 

The larger locker where I put my coat and clothes 
while I swim is fastened by my own combination 
lock. That one doesn't get lost - LOL. It's either 
in the lock or in my bag. The only problem with that 
one is remembering the combination for the lock, and 
I have a GREAT combination for this lock. 

OK, that's it. Short and sweet on a VERY busy day. I hope all of you have a wonderful Wednesday, I'll be writing, reading, cleaning, organizing, and listening to lots of things on the laptop. I'll also be shopping, making ogre juice, making my chicken for tonight (which will have to be put into a warming oven while we're at the accountant's tonight), talking with Aearwen, and generally being BUSY today. I'll be back tomorrow. Peace! 

Paperwork and Hoops To Jump Through

We had a meeting with our accountant last night for our personal income taxes. While DH sat next to me fussing and organizing his paperwork, I went through the stack I had prepared one-by-one with Paul, handing him the receipts for banking, specialized accounts, charitable donations (all mine, of course), and other detail paperwork. I handed over my stack and I was done. DH was still organizing. But he got things together quickly, handed Paul the rest of the paperwork - investment information, his own banking information, etc., and then we were done. Easy, peasy. We got back home and the chicken I had taken from the oven just before we left was still toasty warm. 

The IRS pushed back the filing dates for corporations 
and now have also pushed back the filing date for 
personal income tax returns. Will the state follow suit? 
It would certainly make things easier, but we're 
already almost ready to file anyway. 

The IRS has pushed back their deadline for income tax filing. Of course, we have no idea if our state has also decided to follow the federal change. All too often the state does what it wants, despite or in spite of the federal guidelines. But, at least we're ready to go. 

I like my local appliance store, generally they have 
pretty good people working there. This repair has 
been dragging out, however, because of snafus and 
mix-ups on both our ends. We're working to get 
things back on track and I hope I'll have a repaired 
dryer by the beginning of April, or sooner. 

I also finally talked to someone intelligent enough at my appliance store, to follow the numbers with me and come up with a total still owed for my dryer repair. We both, independently, came up with the same dollar amount, so bravo for us. I authorized it, paid the remainder, and as soon as the two additional parts come in, we'll get the repair scheduled. I estimate I'll have 1-2 more weeks of laundromat trips - NOT my favorite thing at all, but I've met some interesting people and had some fun conversations while folding my dried clothing. 

I like my local laundromat. I've met some very interesting 
people over the weeks that I've been going there, and a 
few times, it's been almost empty. Yesterday, however, 
it was hopping. I still got my favorite dryer, though. 

The past few days, Dreamwidth hasn't been reposting to LifeJournal, so I've had to actually copy and paste to get my daily posting up in both locations. I do hope they get that cleared up soon, it's a bit of a PITA to have to do the extra work. Of course, I'm not going to skip posting in both locations, I have on-line friends who only read in one or the other place, friends I value and enjoy commentary from. 

I'm not as fond of Dreamwidth as I 
am of LiveJournal, and many of my 
on-line friends are on both servers. 
But, I have some friends who are distince 
on one or the other, and have no intention 
of losing friends just because cross-
posting has become a PITA once again. 

On that note, I'm off to find photos for today's blog and get it posted. Have an excellent Thursday and please, be kind, stay safe and wear your mask. I'll be back tomorrow.