Snips and Snails and Puppy Dog Tales

Tax season.
The time: Last week.

I kept putting off doing my taxes, then said that I'd do them on the coming weekend for sure. But it was Thursday and suddenly I felt like settling in and getting them done, and yay getting them done early, so I did them.

No surprises, owed money to federal and state.

Wrapping up them, TurboTax asked for my driver's license number and expiration date. I fetched my license. Entered the number. Checked the expiration date...

What the hell? "Why does it have 2017 as the expiration date? Isn't this 2018?"

It did. And it is.

I had been driving with an expired license for three months.

In a panic, I checked the DMV website. It let me renew it online, which I thought was odd but hey. Worried though, I kept reading.

"Licenses can only be renewed online up to 60 days after they expire." It had been 90 days on the nose, so why did the site let me do it..? I kept reading:

"Licenses can only be renewed up to 90 days after they expire, must be done in person." Bolding mine. I was reading that on the 90th day. Oh my god, was I going to have to completely retest? Take the book test? The driving test?

With a thin hope that maybe they would count it at midnight of the 90th day, I got dressed, jumped into an Uber, and went to the DMV.

The line was literally out the door. It took an hour of waiting just to get in the door, at which time they told us it would be a FIVE HOUR WAIT from that point.

But what choice did I have?

Eventually I got through the first check-in line (the line before you even get a number to wait to be served). The woman laughed at me. "People come with a ten year expired license and can renew!" What the hell? So was the website totally wrong?

I don't even know. I didn't have to retest at all (YAY). I did, however, pay twice now, once online and once in person, and I have no idea how I will get that straightened out.

Why hadn't I gotten notice about my license expiring? Because I had moved and they had an old address for me.

But the government knows where I am. I get voting registration and election mail. How does one part of the government know where I am, but not a different part?

Blah. Thankfully I hadn't gotten into an accident or anything when I hadn't had a license...

(Crossposting by hand from LJ.)

At first I was sad about people (again) jumping ship from LJ, but now I'm more annoyed by the situation than anything else. I've put way too much time and effort trying to figure out how to keep reading journals and not losing contact with people, but came up with no good solution.

There's no way to not lose quality in my posts. If I post on DW and let it crosspost to LJ, I lose icon selection, plus there's the whole locking issue. (Not that I often lock posts, but I darned well should be able to if I want.)

If I read my friends list on DW (using a RSS feed to bring the posts from LJ to DW), again I lose icons, but also formatting and other things. Plus I wouldn't see others' locked posts.

So sorry people who are leaving LJ. I like you all, but the best I can do is try to read my DW circle (or whatever the hell term they use). I can't promise I'll remember to on a regular basis, but that's the best I can do.

As of this morning, I think half of my active friendslist is gone to DW. Many of them (more than half?) aren't crossposting to LJ. I'd really rather not lose contact with people, but I barely keep up with my friends page on LJ, I don't think I could keep up with a DW circle(? is that the right term? Circle?).

Ugh. I don't blame people for leaving if that's what they want to do. I just wish there were an easy way to pull all the posts I want to read on LJ, DW, and elsewhere into one big feed.

You can make an RSS feed of your journal on either site, I wonder why you can't get a feed for your friendspage/circle? That would solve this problem.

Ah ha, hmmm, LJ DOES have a feed for your friendspage! http://user.livejournal.com/data/rss_friends (But that works only if you have a "professional" level account, which luckily I do.) So I suppose I could read on DW and pull my LJ friends list in there...

Well how do you like that. I made this post to complain, and by the end of it I solved my own problem.

I suppose now I have to somehow set up crossposting to both places...

Just to be confusing: I'm thistlechaser there (no underscore). Follow me here for the most likely chance of seeing my new posts. Follow me there to see them if I get this crossposting thing worked out.

Random LJ people: If you're going to defend the alt-right, if you're going to insult me in my own LJ, save yourself the effort of typing out your comment.

To save others from googling it, here's the link for banning folks from your LJ if anyone needs it: http://www.livejournal.com/manage/banusers.bml

Now especially, using "you liberals" and "a hater" as insults against me is especially funny.

My friendslist is all the same this morning. Almost without exception, every post on it is expressing sorrow over the US election results. I'm right there with you.

But this morning I woke up with a small positive thought: We're now one day closer to Trump being out of office. And tomorrow we'll be another day closer.

I just have to try not to think about the damage that will be done before he's gone.

I heard the saddest quote on the news yesterday. Some woman said, paraphrasing:

"They always told me I was wrong for not believing in gay rights. But Republicans hold the House, Congress, and now the presidency, and that's telling me I was right all along. Blah blah back to traditional values, things the country "should" believe in, the quote went on and on.

It makes my heart ache.

I try to focus on the positive things. Hillary won the popular vote. So there are more good, kind people in the country than there are people who support that abusive, racist, bullying piece of crap.

I wish we could address the issue of why it's not the popular vote that counts, but as Democrats keep winning the popular vote and yet losing the election, the Republicans won't ever let that happen.

All summer I was in an apartment with AC. I used it three times. Two of those three times I could have easily done without it. Once was necessary because I had used the self-clean on the oven and didn't realize it would heat up my apartment by literally 20 degrees. So, weather-wise, I didn't need to use the AC even once.

Move to a new apartment with no AC. Less than a week later, heat wave. 90 outside (which is also 7 degrees hotter than where I used to live ONE TOWN OVER, five minute drive away). Evening and it's still hot outside, and way hotter inside. And it's going to be even hotter tomorrow.

The one plus side to this is that, since I'm in the temporary apartment, it has a bedroom window and is on the second floor, so I can leave it open at night. (Leased apartment has no bedroom, let alone bedroom window, and is on the ground floor.) If I couldn't get a cross-breeze going, I'd be really miserable.

Next summer is going to be fun...

In hopes of getting my deposit back, I've been cleaning my apartment from top to bottom for a couple weeks now. I've cleaned the ceiling (really, I dusted it and made sure no cobwebs were on it). I cleaned the floor. I cleaned every little thing in between.

And yet I still won't be getting my full deposit back. Not unless I pull out the fridge and the range and clean under/behind them. Seriously. How am I supposed to move the fridge? And I wouldn't think the range could even be pulled out! It must be hooked into the cabinet/counters somehow...

Plus, since I have a cat, they're going to use a blacklight on the carpet to look for pee. That's fine with me, as she's never once peed outside of the box... except google tells me it picks up saliva as well, which means it will show where she had hairballs. They told me if the blacklight picks up anything, they'll have to replace the carpet and do some kind of treatment to the floor.

Sigh. I really feel like this is a scam. I've lived here two years. How can they not expect there to be some wear and tear and some cleaning needed? It's probably stated in that 55 page lease I signed that you have to give it back in the same condition you got it in.

I'm tired of being an adult.

My back isn't broken yet, but I'd really appreciate it if the world would stop piling straw onto me.

[Rereading this post, I decided to add something positive to each point -- the other side of the coin. I'll add it in brackets.]

Weight: Two months ago I had hit my lowest number ever (200.2 SO CLOSE to being under 200!) and I never was able to get below it. I've gained seven pounds as of this morning (though this morning is unofficial, five pounds gained from official weighing date). It's just so amazingly frustrating as I'm not cheating, I'm not eating badly. [On the plus side, I'm off my high cholesterol medication, which means I'm down to one single prescription. As I used to be on four different diabetes meds and two other ones, that's a wonderful thing.]

Exercise: With my toe still not healed (seriously, I've had an open wound on my toe for months now, and I've been on antibiotics just as long) I can't do my usual exercises. There are still hand weights and pushups, but that's not the same as aerobic exercise. Which of course adds into the weight problem... [The good part is I'd be ready to do knee-high pushups if only I were willing to try. I worry that the position might put too much stress on my healing toe though. SOON! And then next will be doing pushups on the floor!]

Running: I decided there's no use waiting. Once my toe heals (if it ever does...) I'm going to try to start running. I wanted to use that "couch to 5K" app... but apparently my phone is too old to run it. An iPhone 4 is NOT that much older than an iPhone 6! It's utter BS that I cannot run what appears to be a simple app on my current phone! [All my life, I've wanted to be able to run. It was the one thing I felt like I was missing out on when I was heavier. I'm not sure if it will work for me, it might kill my knees, but I'm excited to try. SOON! As soon as my toe heals!]

Money: Adding into all that, money is still really rough. As in I'm living on my savings even though I have a full time job in the tech industry. This adds into the other issues, as in constant doctor bills for my toe ($250 per visit, weekly visits, even with insurance) and being unable to splurge and upgrade my apparently-ancient phone... [Hard to see a positive one on this point. At least I'm not homeless?]

Toe: I'm really so sick of dealing with it. My toenail was removed over a year ago, and it's never healed up since then. It reopened/re-got infected a couple months ago, and the infection is resistant to all antibiotics other than one. The pills cost $250 per pill, and I have to take them twice a day, and I'm on my third 10 day renewal of them, so the insurance company is being an ass about it. It's a constant fight with them to get my renewals, and they won't even cover a full renewal at once. I have to pick up 5 days, then the other 5 days on the day I run out of them, and the insurance has to approve it every time. It's nonstop calling, stress, and worry that I'll run out before the renewal is approved. [At least I do have insurance, so it's not all out of pocket?]

Vacation: I had the "good" idea to get a mileage credit card so I could fly home to visit my mother for free. I spent enough on it (and paid it off) to get the miles I need, but apparently it takes EIGHT WEEKS to credit the miles to you. Add to that the EXTREMELY limited number of seat options, and I doubt I'll be able to go home in June. (Seriously, a month ago, when I checked what was available in June, there were six seats for the whole month.) [Blah.]

Taxes: My mother's tax guy offered to look at my taxes and see if he could do better than the $1,000 TurboTax says I owe, but it's been about three weeks and I haven't heard back from him, even though I've emailed him multiple times since then. It's less than ten days until I have to file... [Well, I'm prepared for the worst. If he can't do any better, I was already mentally prepared to pay that $1,000...]

Life isn't supposed to be like this, you know? I work a full time "good" job. I have health insurance. I live about as far from an extravagant lifestyle as you can get. I have no children and no debt. [Hopefully things will get better soon... Money is unlikely, not until my lease is up and I can move to a smaller/cheaper place, but hopefully my toe will heal up soon and I can get back to exercising, which will help with the weight issue...]

This post was like talking to myself! :P

Know what's worse than doing your taxes once? Doing them twice.
Know what's worse than doing your taxes twice? Doing them three times.
Know what's worse than doing your taxes three times? Doing them four times.
Know what's worse than doing your taxes four times? Doing them five times.
Know what's worse than doing your taxes five times? Doing them six times.

That's right. I did my taxes SIX times today. Part of it was TurboTax's fault, part of it was TurboTax's fault (again), part of it was mine(?), and who knows about the rest.

First time I did it, it looked perfect. I didn't have the issue I had last year: Somehow, though I LOST money on a retirement account, I had to pay $1,000 more in taxes -- I did my taxes without the retirement account form, did it with it, and the difference was $1,000 more I had to pay. However, I got all the way to the end before I noticed TurboTax now starts you in Premium (paid) even when you select free (you have to jump through a couple hoops to stay in free mode). The only way to downgrade to free was to clear your taxes and start over... So I did that.

And then last year's problem returned: That retirement account, which LOST money again this year, increased my taxes by nearly $1,000.

Thinking it was the free version of TurboTax that made the differences, I sighed and went to do it again. $60 to pay for TurboTax premium is still better than $1,000 higher taxes... But that didn't change anything, I still owed $1,000 more with that one form, even though I entered everything exactly the same.

So why stay on Premium if it wouldn't help? I cleared my data and started over again in free...

Then I started questioning myself -- why, when I entered the exact same data couldn't I reproduce the original results? So I switched back to Premium and carefully (so carefully) went through it all again. Yet I still owed the $1,000 more.

So... back to free once more for the final time.

During my first time doing it, when it was doing the final check before you can submit, it told me I had to check this box. Box 6, a:



And somehow checking that box made almost $1,000 difference. Notice the number listed ($5.35), somehow deducting that on Schedule A could make $1,000 difference? So I think maybe that first time I did it, I ran into some kind of a bug... So I'm trying not to kick myself for not just submitting it that first time, since maybe the IRS would have noticed the difference and that would have lead to trouble. Still, maybe it wouldn't have...

(It doesn't let you edit the forms directly unless it wants you to, so there's no way for me to just go back and check the box now.)

I'm so annoyed at that darned retirement account. It's done nothing but lose money -- I would have more money now by a lot if I had just left it sitting in a saving account. Hell, I'd have more money now if I kept it under my mattress. My mother pushed me hard to invest it, so finally I just gave in. While I know she was only trying to help me, that damned retirement account has been nothing but trouble since then, and if I take my money out now, I'll just lose even more...

Grump, grump, grrrr.

While Netflix has serious and major issues, at least their support people are wonderfully helpful.

It all started with Luxembourg. I live in the US (California). Their HQ is in the US (California). Something about their servers or code or something was sending my payment through Luxembourg instead of up the road, so I was getting charged 50% higher monthly rate and a foreign transaction fee from my bank.

So I contacted them. An hour dealing with various support people (they kept passing me higher and higher, not because I was angry (I wasn't), but because apparently this was some issue they had never seen before). But eventually they "fixed" the issue and gave me four free months to cover all the overcharges and fees.

The next month, the same thing happened. So I got a fifth free month, plus nearly the whole sixth month free.

The next month, the same thing happened...

You can see where this is going.

Last month and this month were a different issue: I was being charged the right amount, going through the US payment center, but I was supposed to still have free months left.

At least this time it didn't take an hour dealing with support. Every other time, the shortest amount of time this issue took was 75 minutes.

This time they gave me half the months in refunded money and the rest as free months. (I would have rather had it all refunded so I could stop paying attention to if they were charging me or not, but they couldn't do that.)

So let's see if this issue happens again next month. While I'm not holding my breath that it's fixed, at least the Netflix support people are very good to work with -- some of the best I ever have.

Edit: And sadly, I didn't win the 1.6 Billion dollar lottery tonight. I feel stupid as hell for entering a lottery, but I guess if it's over a billion, I suppose I can make an exception. I didn't even match one single number. :P

Edit2: Sigh. Maybe Netflix support should focus less on being nice and more on getting things right. I just got the credit email from them. They refunded me ONE month, not half of the due. Now I'm going to have to contact their support again. This is really, really getting old.