Death and taxes

This year, AGAIN, I've put off doing my taxes until the very last minute. "WHY?" I ask myself. "I don't know," I shrug and tell myself.

I do have a lot of screwy stuff, like property taxes from multiple properties, mortgage interest including a refinance, capital gains and losses, and all kinds of medical expenses. . . But still, that's no excuse!

Alas, here I am, working at my return, just a day before the due date. And, it's not like I have to pay! No, I'm getting a refund, a BIG one, two actually, if you include the state. I really need it to buy hay this summer. I guess that's the real reason that I keep putting it off. Once I get it, it will be spent and then I have no more money coming in. Silly, huh?

I remember when my father died on April 9th, many years ago. He was always the one to work on the taxes and he had not yet prepared them. Along with going to the funeral home to make arrangements for his burial, we had to visit IRS to explain the situation and ask for an extension. The IRS agent expressed his condolences and then said that, sure, we could file for an extension, but we had to send in the money that was owed by the April 15th deadline. WHAT? How were we to know what was due? I remember sitting at the table with my mother and working them out for her. That way, she could pay what was due and send in the tax return too.

Taxes. There is no escape. Unless, of course, if you are due a refund. Then you don't have to file at all. Theoretically, I don't need to do my taxes. But, I want my money back. So, there it is. I have every intention of changing my W4 so the government gets less every paycheck, giving me more money to spend throughout the year...but I probably won't. Meanwhile, with the deficit the country is in, I'm doing my part to help out, by lending the government interest-free money, until I ask for it back.


Here are some witty quotes about death and taxes, taken from Yahoo!

"The only things certain in life are death and taxes." --Ben Franklin

"The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax." -- attributed to Albert Einstein

"If Patrick Henry thought that taxation without representation was bad, he should see how bad it is with representation." -- Farmer's Almanac

"The avoidance of taxes is the only intellectual pursuit that carries any reward." -- John Maynard Keynes

"Death and taxes may be certain, but we don't have to die every year." -- Unknown

"If you die in an elevator, be sure to push the UP button." --
Sam Levenson

"Optimist: Someone who sets aside two hours to do his income tax return." -- Unknown

"I wouldn't mind paying taxes -- if I knew they were going to a friendly country." -- Dick Gregory

"Income tax returns are the most imaginative fiction being written today." -- Herman Wouk

"Tax reform means, 'Don't tax you, don't tax me. Tax that fellow behind the tree.'" -- Russell Long

"The way taxes are, you might as well marry for love." -- Joe E. Lewis

"I don't mind dying, the trouble is you feel so bloody stiff the next day." -- George Axlerod

"It used to be that death and taxes alone were inevitable. Now there's shipping and handling." -- Bert Murray

"Be happy while you're living, for you're a long time dead." -- Scottish Proverb

"I never see the prettiest thing -
A cherry bough gone white with Spring -
But what I think, 'How gay 'twould be
To hang me from a flowering tree.'" -- Dorothy Parker

"Indoors or out, no one relaxes
In March, that month of wind and taxes,
The wind will presently disappear,
The taxes last us all year." -- Ogden Nash

"The income tax has made more liars out of the American people than golf has." -- Will Rogers

"The report of my death was an exaggeration." -- Mark Twain (after reading his own obituary)

"The taxpayer -- that's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination." -- Ronald Reagan

"People who complain about taxes can be divided into two classes: men and women." -- Unknown

"The United States is the only country where it takes more brains to figure your tax than to earn the money to pay it." -- Edward J. Gurney

"There is a difference between a tax collector and a taxidermist -- the taxidermist leaves the hide." -- Mortimer Caplan

"Death and taxes and childbirth. There's never any convenient time for any of them." -- Margaret Mitchell

"On the plus side, death is one of the few things that can be done as easily lying down." -- Woody Allen"

I was surprised to read that Ben Franklin died on April 17, 1790, this year's income tax due day. How fitting, no?

Anyway, I better get back to preparing my tax returns...