Friday, April 5, 2013

I messed up my taxes.

Taxes are dumb anyways. I have a lovely rant in store about the justice of taxes, the percentage we already pay, why I suddenly have to pay more taxes (never a problem in the past - I always got money back), and how the government is growing more and more irresponsible with money. But, I'll spare you the rant. Just know it's there.

Anyway, there was good news. Apparently, even though I didn't take any classes in 2012, the year I graduated, I did finish an independent study class, so - for tax purposes - the tuition for that counted for 2012.

The bad news is that I just assumed that since I hadn't gone to school in 2012, I wouldn't have any tuition to deduct, and didn't even look at my 1098-T when I was filing. In short, I paid taxes I didn't have to pay.

The better news is that there's a form to fix that.

Hopefully I'll get back the money I paid.

We'll have to see. It's not much, but the IRS is notoriously stingy.

Update: The fee for changing my tax return would be twice as much as I would have gotten back. 

The IRS sucks.

Sunday, March 31, 2013

Spiritual Thought for Easter

As I dug the knife into the whole pie, cutting out a slice for myself and my husband, I had an interesting thought.

Here I was, preparing to eat a slice of pie.  I had absolutely no room in my stomach for this pie.  In fact, this was going to be taking me from "uncomfortably full" to "why do I do this to myself?" agony.  This was after pineapple-glazed ham, Hawaiian sweet rolls with butter, herb red potatoes, Caesar salad, and apple-passion-mango juice.

But... I couldn't not eat the pie.  I mean... it's Easter!  How can you pass up dessert?  You're not celebrating right.

So, I ate the pie.

I now regret it.

As I was eating, it occurred to me I did the same thing at Christmas.  This is what most people do.  Eat a feast to celebrate the holiday.  It's tradition!

The two holidays we have devoted to Christ - Christmas and Easter - have a long standing tradition of being celebrated with gluttony... one of the seven deadly sins.

We Christians are a funny lot.