~Saturday~ I filed my federal taxes electronically this morning. This is the first time I’ve ever filed electronically, as it’s the first time I’ve been able to do it for “free.” Well, with the cost of the H&R Block software, you’re allowed five “free” submissions.
As I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned here before, I am adamantly against paying any kind of fee at all to file taxes, and so it was with a little skepticism that I selected the option in the software to do it. To my pleasant surprise, it was completely free, but before I hit the submit button, it said something to the effect of, “Your federal return might get filed before your state return if you don’t submit both of them electronically at the same time. For just $19.95, we will submit your NC State tax form for you.”
What a crock! While what they say is true, so what??? When you mail both your federal and state taxes in at the same time, there is no guarantee whatsoever of any one of them being received before, after, or at the same time as the other. It also noted how much faster you would get your refund back in an attempt to hook today’s instant gratification culture. I clicked no faster than a fly lands on a pile of turds.
In the afternoon, I spent a couple of hours starting the process of filing those piles of paper on my kitchen floor
and I say “the process,” as I have three steps to the task this year:
- Go through and organize the previous year’s paperwork into chronological order and bind them together somehow (staple or paper clip), while throwing away anything not likely to ever be retrieved
- For the particular pile, retrieve its respective folder hanging in my file cabinet
- Place last year’s bounded papers in the file, while discarding anything over 7 years old
I started off with my investment paperwork from Ameriprise. I’ve been working with Nathan and Ameriprise (American Express Financial before it became Ameriprise) for over ten years now, and I had two hanging folders that bulged open about three to four inches wide, and needed some serious paring down.
I put those papers in order by year, and had statements, trade confirmations, and tax information for every year from 2002-2009, and then I took the piles from 2002-2008 and put them in a labeled box so as not to clutter up the hanging file, and just stored the 2009, 2010, and the one or two I’ve received so far in 2011. The good news is that the paperwork is getting less and less as more and more of it is now being handled electronically, and I have everything I possibly can be delivered that way.
I violated the “older than 7 years throw away” rule here, as a lot of those old statements have cost basis of investments I’ve made that I just want to have a printed record of “in case” for tax purposes.
I was going to walk around the lake, but the weather was a little ominous and I didn’t want to get caught in the rain halfway through a three-mile walk, so I went to the gym.
I did a mere 30-minutes on the treadmill machine, but convinced myself it was better than nothing. That’s my story and it’s sticking to me.
After the gym, I stopped to get my hair cut. LaToya cut it, and feeling a little bold, I asked her to have a go at trimming my eyebrows at the end. She actually did it without cutting me. Progress.
I finally made some deviled eggs that I’ve been wanting to make for about a month now. I used my sister’s recipe, and it took all I had in me not to eat one before I headed out for the evening.
I wanted them to chill first, and I had intentions of eating a few when I got home after the bars. I did lick the fork that I used to mix the filling, and the taste was a good sign of things to come.
I met Joe out at Flex between 10:00 and 10:30, where it was “Mr. Flex Contest” night, which I hate, hate, hate watching. We stayed on the side of the bar away from the stage, and at some point after it had started, Curtis, Chris (a friend of Curtis’), Joe and I went over to “the new” club, 313 (a.k.a. ThreeThirteen), where I paid the too-high $5.00 cover charge to get in, most likey for the last time.
After managing to be totally “over-served” there, the four of us made our way to The Diner in Glenwood South, where I had their club sandwich, which was yummy, yummy, yummy!
And I’ll say the same about the one deviled egg I had once I was home. Had to taste them.