the grand visit

 Granddaughter Samantha baked sour dough bread and brought me a sample yesterday afternoon. She is always such a breath of fresh air. Before this I did my Turbo Tax thing and am relieved to have that done. It is good to lead the simple life in so many respects. 

goodbye 2025

 After leaving all the paperwork on the dining room table for two clutter-filled days I finally attacked it yesterday afternoon and it is now filed away and I am ready for Turbo Tax in a few weeks. The rain continues, but we soldier on...

the simple life

 I've been using  Turbo Tax for almost 10 years now. So yesterday I took an early nap, then fixed a second cup of coffee and unleashed my "you can do this" self-talk once again. These folks upgrade and change things every year, but I was finished in two hours. I have uncomplicated my life and finances and I think the IRS appreciates this.

a salute to the simple life

 More rain yesterday so I filed my taxes. This is the 7th year that I have used TurboTax and I think it gets easier every year. I did call for help once and the nice woman said that they are already busy and we all know that citizens who get money back file early. Done.

not all that taxing

 A salute to the simple life. Yesterday I buckled down and did my taxes. Every year Turbo Tax gets easier and easier, or maybe I just know which corners to cut? In any event, a great relief. Of course I needed a walk after hunching over the computer and all those papers and DONE might be one of the sweetest words in our language this time of year. 

note to self

 Perhaps in 2023 this woman will file stuff during the year instead of tossing everything into a giant cardboard box to deal with later. Later is now. Annabelle and I spent the entire afternoon yesterday sorting and organizing and preparing for Turbo Tax time. Rainy day work. We can do this.

02/22 x two

 I set yesterday as a wishy-washy deadline to do my taxes because this is the date that I did them last year and because Turbotax, my friend/enemy, has a little sale (save $30!) to encourage us to file early. A few frustrations along the way which I will soon forget. This is when I salute the simple life and even though I probably made a couple of mistakes along the way, I am but one Small Potato to the tax folks.

they have come a long way

It used to take an entire day, ten or so years ago, when we first started
using TurboTax. Yesterday I was done in two hours. It helps to live
a simple life financially, but now they just make everything so easy.
And my philosophy is that if I make a mistake, so what?

back to the kitchen

We returned to Home Depot to finalize the project and that felt really
great. So happy to have Nancy and Scott (and Clarice) working on
this. In about a month the project will probably be finished. In the
meantime, I've been re-organizing the kitchen and getting stuff OFF
the counter. My friend Linda D. writes that I needn't cook just because
I have a sparkling new counter top. Whoosh.

Nancy and Scott left to visit Ceci up north and I sat down (in the kitchen)
and did the taxes. This is our 8th year with Turbotax and it was pretty easy,
all in all. It's good to lead a simple life with very few cover-ups or collusions.

easier every year

The rewards of a simple life. All standard deductions and Turbo Tax
makes it easy for us. It would take all day when we first started, now
it's a three hour job. Of course that doesn't count collecting and sorting
all the papers and junk we've accumulated over the year. It was a
windy day so staying in was easy except for a nice lunch break for
some Chow Fun at Wild Pepper.  Good job, Taxpayers!

rewards galore

cooking our burgers at Joe's

the lake is filled

We finished our taxes yesterday! Easy with Turbo Tax and our simple life.
For the past two weeks we kept saying, "OK, as soon as taxes are done
we will have lunch at Original Joe's in Daly City." Done and yum. Then
an outing at Lake Merced which is full due to all the rain ~ lots of ducks
and I even saw two bold raccoons strolling around as if they owned the
place. They did, I think. All in all, a very nice day after the tax stuff.

our valentine's day

Every year Turbo Tax makes it easier and since our lives are nice
and simple, we finished our taxes yesterday and our refunds are
on the way. Next year I will use MsAir because MsMac is a little
slow and reluctant, but I didn't want to be learning and being a
good citizen at the same time.

done!

We've been doing our own taxes for five years now. The first time it took
all day, even though we are very simple people with a small income and few
deductions. Yesterday it took two hours and the refunds will hit our savings
account next week. TurboTax® has improved so much and now allows me
to quickly delete any and all mistakes as I go along.  And of course they just
import information from previous years, making it almost impossible to
forget anything. Always a relief to have those out of the way. Hooooray.

done and...

refunds are on the way. THEY make it easier every year and we didn't
snarl at each other (in a loving, marital way) once today. Now I'm going
to take a read and probably a long winter's nap. Good job, Steins!

rewards work wonders

Actually it was a grueling time yesterday because the CD wouldn't work on
this computer. I spent more than an hour above the spice shop in New Delhi
(thanks for this line, Great Plottie) and here I thought Turbo Tax® was an
American company. Anyway, finally we could get going and Husbando fixed
us squishy buttery grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch and by the end when
we were getting irritable we'd say things like, "they aren't going to check this,
not with so little money, besides we have receipts, etc. etc." and just checked
off a lot of boxes. Sooooo glad that's over. Of course on my s-l-o-w printer
it takes hours to print the returns, so I just left, hoping the printer wouldn't
jam and it didn't.

It was 70º yesterday, so I'm glad I got out for a late walk and the much needed
latte and crumble cake. What a relief, now to type up the notes for next year.
Password, pin, secret offshore phone numbers, update software, etc. My
federal and state governments already texted me (!) that they have accepted
our returns and I do thank them for that. Onward...

Long walk needed at once

We just finished our taxes - about 5 hours and some problems along
the way. Grrrrrrrrr. But small refunds from the Feds and the State, so
all is well and I need to get out of here and MOVE right now.

his, mine, ours, theirs

Our close friends know that Husbando and I aren't exactly GREAT
with money and there have been some actual disagreements (!) over
the years about how to spend/save/waste the stuff. We have always
had separate checking and saving accounts and one general VACA
savings account that we both put money into (equally). It is not a
perfect system, but the best we could work out since neither of us
will budge on certain things. Men can be so stubborn.

Yesterday we did our taxes and all in all, it was a pretty smooth
day. Turbo Tax® is fabulous. This is our second year and it was
soooooo much easier because the program picked up all the
boring information (numbers, addresses, more numbers) from
last year and it would flag some details that would have probably
been forgotten, such as the Union dues I had to pay at the museum.

We have e-filed and await our small but important refunds. And
we are still speaking to one another in civil tones.

I promised you purple

The back deck posies are enjoying the light rain and the rest
of the tiny yard is in serious need of weeding. What a mess!
Maybe next week. Actually I'd like to hire a gardener to
plant things that produce actual flowers for our table, but
that takes a discussion with Husbando and we are about
all talked out after Turbo Taxing for two days straight.

Yesterday I returned to the blood bank to be turned down
yet again. I did get from 12.0 to 12.4, but they require 12.5.
I will keep on eating spinach and raisins, but it was so
disappointing after I concentrated on iron food for an
entire week. Drat.

Today is work. I've forgotten what that is like.

a somewhat taxing day

As a first time user of Turbo Tax®, I'm here to tell you that they
make it very, very easy. But it still takes many hours of paper
shuffling and entering the correct numbers and there were a
few WTF? does this mean along the way. We finished the Federal
part yesterday and it looks like we'll get a nice refund. Today
we will attack the State section and then we will have our
financial guy (Ira 2) check it over for us before we send it
all in. Next year will be a lot easier, I can see that already.

Nice long walk after lunch to clear my head. This glorious
weather will probably be over tomorrow. We have been
spoiled, but we deserve it. And no, we don't miss The
Seasons in case you have been wondering. Tee hee.

it's a first

We met with a wonderful "financial guy" named Ira last Spring
and he recommended that we do our own taxes using this
program. I haven't tried anything new on my computer for
a long time and I'm already practicing my self-talk. "It's
OK, you can do it. Dumber people than you have done this.
How about a little snack, something sweet?" Anyway, we
bought TurboTax at Costco this morning. Step One...