Catherine

The bigger problem is that we have nincompoops in Congress without the testicular fortitude to tell the truth about the train wreck awaiting us (or, they are too ignorant of basic economics to see it). Bernie Madoff was a rank beginner compared to the Ponzi scheme of Social Security & Medicare -- $100-plus Trillion-with-a-T of unfunded mandates and a "trust fund" that was raided for general operating expenses decades ago. When it comes to buying their way back into power by stealing the people's money to spend on pork and special interests, nothing beats a politician. And BOTH parties have been guilty. And WE have been guilty as well -- asleep at the switch, not paying enough attention, and not voting the self-serving bums out regularly. The debt, the deficit, the unfunded mandates, and the Fed monetizing that debt more every month, is a recipe for horrendous disaster. It's not enough tax receipts (NOT "revenue" which implies they somehow _earned_ it, which they did not), it's too much spending. The Federal government is only supposed to take care of the big-ticket items - defense, border control, international relations - and everything else is to be done at the state, local, and personal level. Out of control spending must STOP, now. The government must live within its' means - just as the rest of us do. And we have to pressure the new Congress to keep their intentions to stop the hemorrhage. Don't now accuse me of not wanting to help the unfortunate. They are one of the prime reasons FOR limiting Federal power. Who has done more to help children stricken with cancer - the NCI (part of NIH) or St. Jude's Hospital? Which one runs more efficiently? Which one's function can be usurped by another outside group IF they get too big/bureaucratic/inefficient to work well -- thereby giving them strong incentive to stay flexible? If you have $100 to give to one of them, where will your $100 do the most good for the most sick kids? According to the government's own charitable giving guidelines, one should refrain from donating to a charity if less than 85% of funds raise go to the charitable purpose. Is there ANY government bureau/organization where as much as 50% of the funds go to the "social support" service? By their own standards they do not deserve funding. I am a libertarian because I believe in individual liberty and the responsibility of individuals to help those in need. One cannot foist those responsibilities off onto government (or have government usurp them) without seeing incredible amounts of waste and fraud and a worsening of the conditions that were supposed to improve. Every iota of power the Feds take, every scrap of personal responsibility they "relieve" us of, hurts every one of us - the poorest and most needy worst of all. They must be reined back to their Constitutional limits. I can be done -- but it took a hundred or more years to deteriorate this far, and it's going to take decades to fix. Is it worth the effort? YES. Because this is still the ONLY nation in the world founded on the principle that power is sovereign in the PEOPLE, and that the government is OUR servant - not the other way around. I bow to NO man, and NO government, now or ever. Enough with the rant; I have 941's, W-2's, and 1099's to prepare. Catherine

Got mine weeks ago, also the spiral-bound big 1040 book but more recently. They did not come together, nor did they come anywhere near the same day.

All I know is that they do a bunch of things at once.... also figured once there was one response, others would chime in, if only to correct me. I'm in Massachusetts, where a BIG family farm might be 1,000 acres - half of it in Christmas trees. And no one acre flat enough for more than a small tractor.

I just LOVE those commercials! There was another set, too (not discover) that talked about affixing an Amazonian forest secret token to your rebate request and then waiting six months for your $10.... it was a radio commercial, I think, not TV.

I'm not a cowboy, but here goes" 2. glass or plastic paned hose with auziliary heat and ventilation control for starting seedlings. 3. storage (animal, machinery, plant materials, soil amendments 4. big machine that harvests current crop (and can post-process as well, such as sorting) and plows the land to be ready for more seeding at the same time.

Be warned folks, and hope that you do NOT need any technical support from ATX this year, if my experience this week was any indication of this year's "quality". I had quite the two-day adventure with ATX. This year I had purchased the Fixed Asset Manager (since it was _so_ nice of them to delete the asset history in ATX last year, I needed it). But with one thing and another I never installed it until this week. Or I tried to. Despite what the User Guide said, I could not choose the installation location. Since I have a partitioned drive and keep ALL my tax software on one partition, a default installation to the C drive was not acceptable. So I called on Tuesday and the person at support for the FAM had an accent so horrendously thick it was almost impossible to understand her. But by asking her to SLOW DOWN we were plodding along trying to make progress. Eleven minutes into the call, and she still did not get the basic point - which was that I could not install where I wanted to. And then, mid-sentence, she hung up on me. Real slick; real professional. Called back yesterday (Wednesday). This person's accent wasn't nearly as bad (and I do _not_ mean Southern accents) so I could at least understand her. She, however, was utterly incompetent. She kept putting me on lengthy holds (while she tried to talk to someone with a clue?) and after TWENTY-ONE MINUTES she had gotten to the point of understanding the question I called with. Another FORTY (yes, 40) minutes of no progress (but many, many minutes on hold interspersed with her asking a number of _stupid_ questions that had nothing to do with the issue - and then sticking me back on hold) and she said she was transferring me to the technical team. When I protested that a full hour was ridiculous and that should have been done as soon as she knew the question was beyond her, she stated there were "protocols" that had to be followed. "Protocols" be damned. It should NOT take ONE HOUR to get to a technical specialist (who was then able to solve my issue in 4 minutes). This is completely unacceptable and totally unprofessional on the part of ATX/CCH. And it may well be that next year I do what I've been thinking of for several years now and switching to Drake. And you can be sure that I reamed them a new one (politely) in each of the two "customer satisfaction surveys" they sent after each call. Catherine

I used it just this week. I priced out an order with and without it and it was a little less; maybe about 5% (didn't keep the figures with me). Not sure if I'll be a "regular", but it is an option at least.

Increasing my fees in specific areas. There are about a half dozen clients that I want not to return and am hoping that higher fees for their returns will do it. At the least I will make closer to what they "cost" me in terms of aggravation. I've also re-vamped my data flow paths and set aside specific areas for newly dropped-off papers, in-process returns, and finished work awaiting pickup. All those places are off the floor for the first time, LOL! Catherine

And Massachusetts state returns are due on the 19th, since the 18th is a state holiday. Federal returns are still due on the 18th since most of the MA forms go to Hartford...

Thank you for the Google search option! It should help when we're looking specifically for state info or stuff like "AMT". Catherine

Thanks for the link and I'll keep them in mind for the future. What I tend to do with PeachTree is get last year's new, unregistered Accountant's version on ebay for $30 - $40. Just picked up Accountant version of '09 that way about a month ago and really should get around to installing it. Haven't installed QuickBooks 2011 yet, either, for that matter.

Thank you for the reminder!! I backup (on-site and off-site) regularly but have not tested the "restore" feature. Perhaps I should do that _today_ and ensure it works.

I'm with Gail, especially her last sentence! I post on three or four different tax forums (this one being my favorite - shh! don't tell the others, they'll feel hurt), and have never had any trouble skipping the topics (tax and non-tax) that are not of interest to me. As long as things are labelled reasonably well, it's not a big deal to me. This forum has the wonderful position,-color,-and-icon coding showing one immediately which topics have new postings. Yes, the list gets long in the thick of tax season. But during the thick of things, there are very few non-tax posts - we're all too busy trying to keep from drowning in client paperwork! It's mainly in the off-season that non-tax topics sneak in. The one change I'd recommend is to remove the four-letter limitation on searches (maybe you've already done this, Eric - I haven't been searching in a while). Most of us put in states with the two-letter postal code, and if one needs help on a Pennsylvania form, one can't search on "PA" alone. I'd also like to "own up" here are possibly being the instigator of the birthday wishes. There were a number of birthday wishes that went by a couple years ago -- but no one posted on my birthday. And I pouted online. Shortly thereafter, taxbilly took on the task of greeting everyone on their birthday. But perhaps we can agree that everyone has been publicly wished a happy day at least once, and possibly that further birthday greetings be sent as private messages instead. Catherine

Thank you, GeorgeM -- this looks like a useful site! Happy New Year to all.

Let's go back to basics, folks. The blame rests squarely with the Wilson administration and its' co-conspirators in Congress at the time, who wrote and then pushed hard for the ratification of the 16th Amendment. The income tax, according to Wilson & Congress, would only apply to the extremely rich, and only at rates of 4%. Of course, once it was legal, in just a few years the rates skyrocketed to 70% and the citizens caught in its' web became durned near everyone. And it gave the Federal government its' first big hit of spendable cash, to which they are now addicted. And like most addicts, they don't care where their next fix comes from or who gets hurt by them in the acquisition. Unlike most addicts, they can create their own drug - and leave us with the pain of a) enforcing their rules, and b ) becoming enslaved to the government in perpetuity to pay for their insatiable spending. Now, how's _that_ for getting the conversation roiling, chuck?

What a wonderful thing to do -- and what a beautiful job your students did!! You should all be proud of yourselves. Thanks for sharing the video. Catherine

And an early "Happy New Year"!

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Hope you have a VERY

Well, it can also save somebody the embarrassment of "your charge card was declined" or "your download email bounced - did you change addresses?" Just sayin'.....

I "friended" KC on Facebook quite some time ago, and the last time (couple months ago) that folks were concerned I checked in with her there. She stated that she is taking some time away from taxes to rest and regroup, but will be back come the new season, and thanked folks for worrying about her. She's still active on Facebook, so I know she's doing OK. Haven't a clue about jainen, however. Catherine

Hope you have a VERY

Hope you have a VERY

Hope you have a VERY

Hope you have a VERY :bday: