You know what they say. There are only two certainties in life: death and taxes. The former only comes once, and most of us try to put it off as long as possible. The latter comes annually, and it comes due on April 15. And so I can now put it behind me again.
What’s weird, though, is doing it now, vs. in January when I usually do taxes. But this year was more complicated. I changed jobs and states, after all. I left Wal-Mart (yaaaay!), and found work with Food & Water Watch. And I moved from Virginia to Maryland. So for that, I bought TurboTax, and did the whole thing on the computer. Usually, I just sit down with a 1040, a calculator, and a pen, and do it. For the forty bucks or whatever TurboTax cost, it’s normally worth it to just do it manually. But for more complicated years – I was more worried about the state stuff than the federal stuff – TurboTax is handy.
And on top of whatever refund I get, don’t forget that we also get bribe money this year. Bush is sending most of us a $600 bribe to vote Republican this fall, after all, under cover of a “tax rebate” in order to stimulate the economy. That money’s going right in the bank and staying there, and I’m still not voting Republican.
Meanwhile, the one thing I don’t understand about this year’s taxes – how in the hell did Wal-Mart get my Maryland address? I would have expected to see the Wal-Mart tax forms get mailed to my address in Stuarts Draft, and then forwarded to Maryland by the post office. But no, the envelope containing my tax forms came from the gates of hell printed with my Silver Spring address on it. I obviously still lived in Virginia when I got fired from Wal-Mart, and any residual post-termination correspondence (like the final paycheck) was all conducted from my Stuarts Draft address. I never gave Wal-Mart my new address, and frankly, they have no business having my new address. Yet it came with Silver Spring on it. Weird.
But at least taxes are done, and at last, every last bit of business related to my work at Satan’s Playground is finally finished. Yaaaaaaaay!