Lion EA

A very :bday:

Thank you very much, Eric.

Oh, but in this case the "what's happening" is not what's happening in D.C. or Iraq at the governmental level, but what's happening to individuals touched by this war: families missing a member temporarily or permanently, teen soldiers watching friends die in their arms and then returning to college or work without anyone around who understands what they went through, a service woman told she doesn't qualify for mental health help due to her tour in a war zone being too short, children not knowing a parent for a couple of years, delays in continuing education or career, the economic ripples while a breadwinner is in the service, etc. Mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers and all of us DO know what's happening on our street, in our town, in our work places. I was in high school and college during Viet Nam and remember classmates in wheelchairs, but also dazed and searching for someone to talk to, a few years older than the rest of us and having gone through things that we didn't even see on TV back then. The real letters of real people remind us that our neighbors might have issues we don't, but that those issues will touch us all in some way.

well, that matched my computer time...

Isn't it picking up my computer time -- I ask as a test to see what time this post will say...

One ex will hear something from anyone (teacher, former sister-in-law, whoever) about how much summer camp really cost or any other item and think you're the one who told. Be very, very careful.

I watched Letters Home on Veterans' Day. It's a traveling troupe of actors out of Chicago, so if it gets near you do go see them. In 70 minutes the real letters of soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan and mothers of soldiers remind you what's happening. Very powerful.

Thank you. When I was at the CCH Users Conference in MD, I took the last afternoon to bus into DC to visit the WWII Memorial that I had not yet seen. They happened to be honoring a group of vets from IL, my home. If my father were still alive, he could've been in that group. They performed a nice ceremony for the vets, a fancy dress Marine played Taps, etc. You can see the Lincoln Memorial from there; I walked over there, too, even though I've done that several times -- being from IL. Anyway, I went around saying thank you and shaking hands with our vets and thanking the volunteers. It was very moving. HonorFlight.org I need to go donate some money to keep it going.

Please don't neglect us! We miss you. :(

I'm a big supporter of efile, so I've been trying to convert all my clients for 13 years. I still have a couple of holdouts. With the new MeF, we can file returns at any time, even after 15 October, so that won't let clients -- or me -- off the hook. And, you can attach .pdf files, so there shouldn't be anything that can't be efiled. No excuses. My banker does use cash and checks on his own bank branch, and he's the one who calls in payroll (of course, he receives a paper check and not direct deposit). His wife is a worrier. I don't think I'll ever succeed at convincing them to try efile. My other client is almost as fanatical and even older and more set in her ways. I'm most worried about suddenly having to efile a lot of entities that I never efiled before when no one is around to know what the real title of each trust is (Grandma and her lawyer set it up for grandson long ago and have long since passed away with any paperwork). I tried efiling extensions the last couple of years on some of my entities just to find out if what we had was the real title that matched the tax ID number. Some matched, some didn't. We've begun trying to track down the real titles for the non-matches. I really love and support efile. CT allows opt-out, but doesn't provide a handy form. I had to type up something for clients to sign to COA. I just hope the feds provide an easy opt-out. Last year I had a new client; efiled. Rejected for both her name/SSN mismatch and for one of her two sons. I could call and get info re which son, but she had to call both IRS and SSA to get info re mismatch. SSA wouldn't release info on her minor son to her; however, so we were still doing some guessing. Both sons had multiple middle names (British dad), so I transmitted several times to cover the various combinations and permutations of her names and son's names until return was accepted. Whole experience took days. According to paperwork from prior preparer, prior Form 8879, etc., we were using correct info. I don't look forward to going through that for a dozen clients, mostly entities that I haven't efiled before, all in one season. If I can opt out after one rejections, I'd be satisfied.

Thank you.

I have a couple of clients that refuse to e-file. Not dummies that haven't thought about it. One's a banker and another an editor; both have seen too many things go wrong with electronic transmissions and refuse to have their returns e-filed. They are not going to change their minds. I've tried for 13 years. Do I have to tell them to go elsewhere now? One has two trusts plus her personal return. Both families have very complex, very expensive returns that I hate to lose. I'm not even sure that I could file the two trusts electronically as no one living has the trust papers with the true names. And, CT has some bizarre method for e-filing entity returns that does NOT feed off the federal return. Anybody out there e-file CT entity returns? Willing to give a tutorial? I guess I better learn for this season...

A very :bday:

A very :bday:

If before I'd had my cup of tea, I might've poured the boiling water over his head. I do admire your restraint.

The church pays all the rectory utilities and repairs, now to include the land line telephone bills. The rector does not pay any. His housing allowance is pretty small. I don't prepare his taxes, but the "amount actually spent" is probably his limiting factor and not the voted housing allowance. Fair rental value would be large, but his actual expenses are probably light bulbs and little else. (With a prior rector, back when I was the treasurer, the housing allowance was about $3,000. I didn't prepare his taxes either, but could never see him actually spending that much since the church paid for almost everything. But, it wasn't my problem to police the rector's tax return. Now, I'm only the assistant treasurer who pays the bills and don't see the negotiations that go into budgeting.) He's not going to pay his telephone bill out of his housing allowance since the church now pays his telephone bill. Just wondering if there's any problem with us paying his telephone bills like we pay the electric or oil or garbage bills -- or, if we have to include personal use of his home telephone on his W-2. He has five grown children, 13 grandchildren, a side business manufacturing Bethlehem stars, and the rectory sits on the church property that includes his formal office space in the parish hall. Don't know how many church-related calls get made from his home.

A very :bday:

Gee, the tea scent is about the only rose scent I notice! But, then I always knew I was very different from Jainen. I'd blame it on an East coast vs. West coast mentality, but I lived in Santa Barbara for a decade so that won't explain things.

Our church started paying the rector's land line telephone bill in the rectory, at the rector's request. Do we need to put his personal use amount on his W-2? He felt it's like the other utilities that the church pays for the rectory.

A very :bday:

The VMS guys offer backups, too. Mine goes automatically at 3 a.m. every night. That's in addition to my external hard drive and flash drives and.... One problem with being a home-based sole proprietor is that I had no easy place to store a backup away from my home office. Bank safe deposit box isn't available 24/7. So, VMS up in Maine is great for me.

A very :bday:

CCH scans your documents and put them in tax return order. If you add the Fill program, it loads them into your tax return.

I like the new IntelliConnect by CCH, but you'd have to decide if it's worth the money. For quick research, I use The Tax Book.

A very "bday: