Lifestyles of the poor and nameless

I did my taxes (finally!). I even managed to get them out on Saturday as opposed to sweating over them on the last possible day. I've put it off for months. Initially I was shopping for a person to do the taxes for me. I got a few referrals (a couple for people in far off places like Long Island or the Bronx) but even the ones nearby seemed kinda pricey. I finally found a cheap person on recommendation from a friend. My friend said he's actually an accountant at the IRS. Insider tips? Perhaps. Sounds more like a conflict of interest, but that's not my problem.

I called the guy to find out about his service. He said he charges $20. Sounds good so far. Next thing he says is that he uses TurboTax. Well what the heck? I could do that myself. Then he very seriously asks: do you want this done the "straight" way? Or do you want to bend things a little? I wouldn't make anything up, ya know...just use maximum limits where possible. Uh...no thanks buddy. I'm not trying to have you come back and audit me next year.

Since I had to file PA, NY AND Federal, I just kept procrastinating. I finally finished them all and was sealing the last envelope when I caught a glance of an old scratch paper I had used a few weeks ago to do my NY tax....turns out that I miscalculated on the return I was about to mail off....that little snafu would have cost me about $200 in refund money. So I eased the envelope open again and redid the form...only to realize that I needed to fill out two MORE forms to accompany the NY refund....long story short: taxes suck!