Six months and a day!

I used to work with a trust-fund baby. Actually, I probably worked with several of them over the years, because a lot of the people I met in the artistic side of the magazine business had to be able to get in through the rich-kid gate, to wit:

1) Graduate from a good college;

2) Work as an unpaid intern;

3) Live in Manhattan on a crap salary.

After getting through those three phases, they could start to make a decent living. You will note that those three phases require something to back said junior staff member, generally Mommy's + Daddy's checkbook. That enabled them to take jobs that paid nothing or next to it, without worrying about student loans or making the rent. 

I'm not saying they had it easy, nor were they bad at what they did; I am saying that it was perfect way to keep out the riffraff. 

I, the riffraff, came up the hard way, commuting from the outermost borough, being broke for a long time, and never following the path that led to the glamorous and creative end of the business. But I made a living. 

The TFB that I mention at the top of this post, however, was a real classic of the type. Nice guy, and very intelligent, probably more so than I. But he was like a friendly alien dropped on Earth who had to try to guess what Earth people were like in order to go unnoticed. He could be a smartass but did not have a rough edge. He was curious about the lives of skilled laborers like my father. He always looked perplexed. He spent days contemplating aloud the purchase of a rice cooker. Should I buy or not? If so, what kind? A cooker or a steamer? Is one brand superior to another? What quantity of rice is proper? It is a puzzlement. 

Just use the microwave like everyone else!

I remember him telling me about his grandparents. Grandpa, the head of the family in a very real, very fearsome, and very financial sense, was from Massachusetts, but for tax purposes he officially lived in New Hampshire for six months and a day. That 50.01% residency kept him from having to pay Massachusetts' high income tax. New Hampshire only taxes interest and dividend income.

I have since learned that "Live Free or Die" might as well be replaced as New Hampshire's motto:

This is one of the reasons why, when politicians set out to tax the rich, the middle class always finds its taxes going up. The poor saps in Boston who can’t declare residency outside the state get stuck with the bill for the big spending plans that "taxing the rich" was supposed to fund.

Now, I have no idea how Mr. Boston Brahmin Grandpa voted, but if he was like the contemporary wealthy, he would continue to vote for the very policies he was fleeing, wherever he went. In doing so these moneybags screw over the state in which they amassed their fortunes and also the state in which they expect to keep them. 

I do not understand why someone, looking at the laws in their home state and regarding them as unfair and unjust, would support those same laws elsewhere. But they do. Thus, New Yorkers have been accused of ruining Vermont, Bay Staters of ruining Maine, and Californians are being accused of ruining Colorado. It's like they can't help themselves. 

I'm not sure why I brought all this up today, except I was thinking of that trust-fund baby and his grandfather. While TFB was studying this strange form of life known as the "middle class," we were studying him. I've never met anyone like him, but I'll bet in his youth he was like everyone else around him. 

Peculiar fellow. I don't even know if he ever got his rice cooker. 

Tax Day, Fredcoin, and You!!!!

Today is the income tax deadline in the United States. Talk about rending unto Caesar -- the whole process leaves you feeling pretty rended. 

Of course, you know what the answer to all your tax problems is: Fredcoin! Not just the only cryptocurrency with the imprimatur of Fred himself, but also the only cryptocurrency with a secret toy surprise!*

Before or on tax day, the teeming hordes of Fredcoin customers always come to me with questions. "Fred!" they say, "we have questions!" And I say, "My friends, I have answers!" But since we're up against the deadline for filing income tax, I figured I'd better give you an FAQ list rather than trying to help each of you individually. Plus, I hate to see a grown man cry. 

FREDCOIN AND TAXES: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

1. Is Fredcoin considered a tax shelter?

Yes, and by that I mean, no. If you leave your cash invested in Fredcoin, then yes, you don't have to worry about paying taxes. If you should foolishly want to reconvert your Fredcoin to worthless U.S. currency, then consider your shelter as firm as Dorothy's Kansas farmhouse.  

2. Which IRS form do I need to file to lay out my Fredcoin investments? 

You need to file a Schedule FRD, form 8712-P, with a side of pickled beets. 

3. Are my vast Fredcoin profits taxable income?  

Yes, I certainly believe they would be. 

4. Can I buy Fredcoin if I live in Austin?

I'm sorry, this is a "Fredcoin and Texas" question; that's a different FAQ.

5. Is Fredcoin a form of money laundering?

No, no, of course not! Now, it's possible that some unscrupulous characters might slip some ill-gotten gains into their purchase of Fredcoin -- how would I know? And it's possible that they might convert their Fredcoin back into some crummy U.S. currency, minus a large fee, to claim it was all Fredcoin profits and totally legit. Ha! Ha! What a funny little totally fake scenario. No, we never talk about money laundering here at Fredcoin. We much prefer to call it money fortification.  

6. Why is Fredcoin the best cryptocurrency out there, bar none, hands down, hands none, bar down?

You have to ask? Look at it! No other currency of any kind has Fred on it. And I think that says it all. 

🪙🪙🪙🪙

*Secret toy surprise offer may not apply. See side of box for details. Do not use Fredcoin internally. Some patients reported that Fredcoin caused dizziness, nausea, and elongated nostril hairs. Fredcoin is a registered trademark of Fredcoin Inc. LLC LLP MNOP. All Rights reserved. Lefts are up for grabs.   

Crypts and Cryptos: Or, Death and Taxes.

Greetings, friends! It is I, Fred Key, your friendly neighborhood cryptocurrency tycoon, with another exciting update about Fredcoin, the Crypto for the Smart Set!

I know what's concerning you, my clients and prospective clients. I always have my ear to the ground. I was taught early on that keeping your ear to the ground means money. And sure enough, I got up and there was a nickel stuck in my ear. 

This is a nickel that has seen things.

But that's not important. The thing is, you're worried about taxes on your cryptocurrency earnings. And you have reason to be. As reported on Monday in the New York Post, the only American newspaper with any integrity, the Internal Revenue Service is stepping up efforts to collect earnings on cryptos:  

The Internal Revenue Service is going to court to get its hands on cryptocurrency transaction records as part of its continuing efforts to collect more taxes from Americans who fail to report profits from digital coin trades.

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan announced that they had successfully obtained a court order allowing the IRS to obtain information from M.Y. Safra Bank about American taxpayers who did not disclose crypto-related income.

Your first instinct may be to feel alarmed. Or perhaps to take a deep breath and let the calmness slide over you. Or to stick your head in a bucket of sand. I say thee Nay! None of these are necessary. I can assure you that none of this will affect Fredcoin dealers and traders this year.

"Why Fred," you ask, "how can you possibly know this? Our institutions have gone insane, prosecuting people for political thought and freeing people for violent action. Who knows what the IRS will do?"

You see, friend, there's a magic word in that story I quoted that should put your mind at ease. And that word is: profits. Fredcoin customers haven't had to worry about any profits! In fact, that other word, income, is further assurance that there is "no problemo," as they've had none of that stuff either. See? As they say, Mo' money, mo' problems; no' money, no' problems!

So just take it easy and put more of your money in Fredcoin, where the IRS won't have any reason to look. 

Fredcoin! It's the ultimate tax shelter!

Kafka IRS.

Just over a week ago I ran what I called a work of art in Pointillism, designed to reflect my frustration while on hold with the Internal Revenue Service. 

I would like to point out that the United States government, through its collection agency, is proving to have that incredible combination of malice, inconsistency, and incompetence that makes for the worst kind of authority. Their stupidity has now cost me money and is likely to cost me more that I don't really owe, just to make them go away. 

In a nutshell:

1) I got a return for tax year 2020, but huge bill for 2021. Hmm... what changed between 2020 and 2021? Note that my wife was unemployed a good hunk of 2021 but was not collecting unemployment insurance or any other compensation in that time. We figured we'd be getting a return again, but no. In fact, with the money we'd paid out for various emergencies at the end of 2020, we were unable to pay the tax in a lump.  

2) When my accountant filed my taxes, he instituted an easy payment plan that the IRS will allow. You can pay whatever you are able per month, as long as it's paid up in a reasonable time. Downside: It requires a processing fee of $225. When you file your taxes, he told me, the IRS reviews the application and lets you know in 30 days if it accepts the plan.

3) So I waited to hear whether plan was accepted. I waited through April and May and most of June. 

4) In mid June I received bill from the IRS with penalties and fees and threats, demanding the whole amount. I sent an anxious text to my accountant, who failed to get back to me for a couple of days, so I texted him again. He assured me I must have misread the letter, so I emailed him a copy. Then he told me he could not help, because maybe the IRS screwed up, but he is not allowed to discuss my return with them. I thought the main point of having a CPA do your taxes was to have someone to act as an interlocutor with the IRS if things went sideways, but apparently not. 

5) I tried to deal with it by phone, but could not get through to the IRS. I'm sure my call is very important to them, but after spending almost an hour running into telephone trees like George of the Jungle, I decided to try the online contact option. Isn't that always easier? If you want help from Amazon (for example), you're much better off contacting them by email.

6) BUT, to deal with the IRS online, I had to prove my identity with driver's license, birth certificate or passport, Social Security card, a phone bill with current address--at least two serious forms of ID and one not-so-serious. All this to access ID.me system that they use, in a country where requiring an ID to vote is considered the equivalent of murder. I mean, I appreciate the IRS trying to keep scammers from getting my information, but I had trouble finding my birth certificate and my passport has expired. When I finally got it all scanned in, entered, and done, I had to wait for a video callback on my computer. Wait time was almost two hours. I hung around working for an hour and change, but had to take the junior dog out to pee (40 minutes left on the clock). We were outside for five minutes, and when I came back the call had bailed for "unknown" reasons. 

7) Back to the phone! I tried to call and after half an hour of weeding through branches got thrown off phone tree for call volume. How about that.

8) And I just gave up. I called the banker and arranged to have money removed from my piddling IRA to pay the bill. Four days later it was set, and I paid the IRS online immediately (that didn't require proof of identity). I didn't even try to fight the penalty and interest charges at that point. I was afraid they'd keep rolling up the charges and ruin our credit rating. 

9) Two days later I got a letter from the IRS that claimed to contain a payment voucher (although it says nothing about how much to pay or how much is owed) and/or an inquiry voucher (to mail in if I have a question, because it's 1920, I guess). I have no idea if this means that they have now approved the payment plan although I just paid off the balance in full. However, it may mean that even though I have just paid it all off, the IRS may think I also owe them the $225 fee for the payment plan I did not use. I would bet that whole $225 that I will get a bill from the IRS for $225. 

The IRS is like some kind of pagan god. It is inscrutable, it has a bad reputation, it may be appeased with massive sacrifices but it may not accept them as adequate anyway, and it can easily destroy a human being -- or at least a middle-class sucker with no resources to fight them--and that's when it's just being stupid, not actively evil. 

A sane country would have adopted a flat-tax plan, which would require a simple form and probably 1/100th of the employees, but that would leave no room for graft and political favors. The Internal Revenue "Service" should be abolished, the empty buildings destroyed, and the grown sown with salt so nothing can ever grow there again. 

Philately.

In a way, we are all philatelists, because according to Britannica, the word comes from 

the Greek philos, “love,” and ateleia, “that which is tax-free”; the postage stamp permitted the letter to come free of charge to the recipient, rendering it untaxed.

Who doesn't love anything that's free of tax?

And yet, my attempt to be a brilliant philatelist failed, sometime around my tenth year.

I certainly did like to collect things in my childhood -- comics, Hardy Boys books, Matchbox cars, G.I. Joe stuff, bottlecaps, baseball cards, and so on. So, no surprise that at one point I responded to an ad like this: 

I had heard about the value of really rare stamps like the Penny Black and the Inverted Jenny, and I'm sure that piqued my interest. I was quite excited when I got a big sack of stamps in the mail, from foreign destinations of which I'd never heard, some very colorful and pretty. 

And then... nothing. I didn't know what to do with them. Sit around and look at them? That was fun for a while. Mount them in a book? Sounded like a lot of work. 

What I did was freak out when the company sent me another bushel of stamps, because that's how the deal worked -- you got the first pack for free and agreed to pay for the next. I didn't have any money, and I would have had to ask Mom to write a check, and she might have told me the truth, that I was a dummy. So instead I wrote the company back and claimed with great anger that I had not received the stamps for which they were billing me. 

I never heard from them again. 

In time, like the rest of the things I collected (except many of the books, which I still have, and all the comics, which I sold), the stamps wound up in the landfill. I conceded that some of us are not cut out for philately, and that included me.

Occasionally I'll see a story in the news that says younger people are developing an interest in stamps, but also stories that say the grand old hobby is on the wane. I hope that the former is true. Stamp collecting, like classical music and Latin, is a thing that I just can't seem to get into but have always thought to be a sign of civilization. I think we need more civilization these days. The haters of civilization have had their way for a while now, and it's not looking good. 

I'm sorry philately was not for me, but I admire and appreciate that it exists. I hope it will continue to do so.

Stung.

Pardon me for not getting up, but I just got my taxes done. 

The problem is, I made too much money last year. It sure didn't feel like it, but when my accountant added up the figures, that was the answer. The thing is, as a freelancer, or I guess any kind of small-business operator, you are always paying your taxes based on the previous year. So, since I did well in 2019, I had to pay a lot, and I paid installments against my earnings in 2020. Then 2020 sucked, and I lost a big client, and got money back, so I didn't have to pay installments going forward. Then I worked my patootie off in 2021, and now this. My wife's earnings were way down, but that doesn't matter because she pays out of payroll like a normal human being. The government likes to get its cut up front, you know, and punishes you if it doesn’t.

For all my personal agony, I could stand it if they weren’t blowing far more than they take in, and on so much imbecilic garbage. 

I guess taxes and death really are inevitable, but while St. Paul could ask ironically, “Death, where is thy sting?” no one ever has to ask that of taxes. 

Snowfall on Sunday, crapfall on Monday.

Sunday night was rather peaceful. I was out for a while with the dogs, and it was snowing, and after they played around and did various and sundry, the three of us sat on the porch. No one was around. It wasn't too cold. It was dark, the white flakes scattering the light everywhere, so quiet and at ease. 

I of course was too worried about things to enjoy it. I'm not the kind of person who finds peace in nature. If I'm completely bollixed up internally, you could put me on a resort island and all I'd think about was the sunburn I was doomed to get and who's breaking into my house while I'm here.

Monday morning the snow had stopped and it was still very pleasant. 

As nice as winter can be, really. The snow only amounted to a couple of inches; warming was due so no need to shovel. And I still was going nuts. 

Why? Money, mainly; why else? Even my new Batman sticky notes couldn't help me out of this jam. Being a freelance editor means surviving on a multitude of small payments, but publishers don't mind if they pay you late. It bothers them not in the least. They can relax and take it easy over the holiday season. However, my utility companies and credit card issuers and mortgage company have a thing about it. It makes them antsy. Furthermore, I faced my desk Monday with no assignments. I'd worked over the holidays to get things done on deadline -- in one case, as it turned out, the publisher who had to have a book in by December 30 hasn't even downloaded the transfer yet. Which means my invoice hasn't been downloaded, either. And no one has been generating anything for me to work on when I need the dough the most. 

Normally this is not so bad, but with last year's furloughs and medical bills it is quite a bit bad right now. Plus, I have a tax bill due on the 15th! Hooray!

On top of that, a guy rings the doorbell Monday morning and scares the hell out of the dogs. He is standing on the walkway and there are several trucks on the street. He says nothing about his purpose, but I know what it is: These are the men come to lay new cable for the phone company, which is tired of being irrelevant and wants to become a rival to the cable company. This will mean ripping up my front lawn along the sidewalk. I knew the job was going to happen but was given no warning that it would start this week, let alone Monday.

"You have electric dog?" he asks. 

English is not his first language. It may not be his third or fourth.

Electric... what?

After some gesticulating it gets through my pre-coffee mind that he wants to know if we have an electric dog fence. I start to explain that we do, but that the guy who installed it gave big dog Tralfaz a hotspot while shaving his neck, and my wife was disturbed by the fact that junior dog Nipper would just keep ignoring the warning sound from the collar despite the training and getting shocked, and... So yes, we do, but we're not using right now. Sorry.

"Okay," and off he goes. No word on whether they're going to be careful or just chop the circuit line to pieces.

The highlight of the day was rushing out to the mailbox to see if the USPS had delivered some nice, fat checks. They did not. They delivered nothing. I suspect the mailman looked at the crew working on the street and said, "Oh, well, too much trouble to get through that," and drove away. 

I don't want to be mean, though. He may have just had a hangover and called in sick.

Thus, soft white snow, hard dark mood. Hoping for a shinier day Tuesday. Hope your year is off to a better start.

No state income tax, you know.

Furlough.

I got the sack. Partially. It's a semi-sack. A temporary semi-sack.

One of my clients is the small publishing wing of a big media company. How big? Mid-level vice presidents get paid more for the time they spend farting in the office than I get paid to work for them. And yet I'm too expensive.

I'm not really down about it, since it's only one of my regular clients, and the layoff is supposed to end (maybe) when the current crisis is over. But it comes at a bad time. Another client can't send out the money they owe freelancers because they are not allowed to enter the building to sign and mail the checks, lest their accountant stagger in reeking with COVID-19. They've also pushed back their publishing schedule a few months because no one can go to bookstores and no authors can go on book tours, which means all current projects have ground to a halt. Book printers, who usually work around the clock, are going to be in trouble.

(The irony is that the big media company's kiddie books, which require bright colors and even toy-like attachments, will probably continue to go to press, because they're sold in places like Walmart, and the vast majority of those are printed in... Can you guess? Yep, you're right.)

All of which is made worse by the fact that I have to cough up money for New York State's clutching tax barons next week. I owe nothing to the Feds but have to pay the state this year. I think New York needs my cash to pay for Andy "Evil-Eyes" Cuomo's nipple ring polish. I think that's why Sandra Lee dumped him -- tarnished nipple rings. But never mind all that.

Actually, I am not so bad off as many others, even other affected by this very same furlough. A number of people who got the heave-ho work full-time for this outfit. Of course, they'll be able to go on unemployment, but if they never get hired back it could be a problem. Virtually no one is hiring right now.

Publishing is a sucktational business to be in. I always quote a late friend of mine, who said that it's got all the ego of the movie business with none of the money. Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be editors. If this situation doesn't bother me more than it ought to, it's because I have been laid off or otherwise turned loose (companies closing under me, for example) six times. I can smell the bloody ax coming from two hundred yards away.

Still, a furlough is a furlough; if they wanted to sack us they could have straight-up sacked us. What will happen next? No one really knows.

Laid to rest.

The people in my neighborhood are crazy.

At least that's what I was thinking a few days back. Not because of my immediate neighbors, the Hellbound Cable Thief on one side, the Dysfunctionals on the other. Nor was it the fact that every single one of us is constitutionally incapable of following simple rules for recycling. (Whether you believe it's legit or not, if you're gonna bother to do it, at least try to do it right.)

No, I was thinking this because someone seemed to think this was just fine to leave out for our garbage men.

This photo of the mountain of home furnishings does not begin to do it justice. There was a second, bigger TV and a huge iron frame and an entire sofa, for example. TV sets are not considered appropriate for trash pickup; grills, sofas, and bureaus probably cause consternation as well. I couldn't believe someone would just put this enormous pile out as is.

I should have known there was more to the story.

A few weeks after the stuff was carted off -- and it was, although it took the trash men a couple of different collections -- the people in the house disappeared. The driveway, which had had a boat and a plateless car rusting away for years, was suddenly empty. Closer examination a couple of days later showed a notice on the front door that appeared to indicate the property had been secured for nonpayment of debt (or possibly taxes). In which case the town may have arranged to have the stuff hauled away by the company that does our garbage collection.

None of this should have come as a surprise to me. I'm sure it didn't to people who live closer and are even nosier and more likely to notice than no one in the place ever seemed to go to work.

The house is in very sad shape. It needs paint, but that's like saying the Titanic needed to be patched up a little. God knows what the inside looks like. Whoever takes the property over may just flatten it and build anew. Although they ought to know that it may be haunted.

Yep -- no lie; a man was murdered in that house. That's 100% true. One night when we'd been here a couple of years, the police came stopped by to ask if we'd seen anything. We hadn't, but the killer was caught, so rest easy, citizens.

It's a sordid tale for another time.

I suspect most or maybe all of the stuff that was dumped had belonged to the dead man. It looked old enough.

As for the person who moved in, a distant heir of the victim, I guess he never had the dough to do upkeep, let alone pay his taxes. Or perhaps the ability. One of the things left behind when the rest of the trash was hauled away, along with some broken glass and bits of cardboard, were a couple of Tramadol in the blister packs that expired in 2013. Probably got lost in the sofa. I found them while walking one of the dogs and flushed them down to Davy Jones's locker. Glad I got them and not one of the local kids.

What does this have to do with me, aside from providing me with the plot for my next book (The Haunted Garbage Pile)? Nothing, except I have a mattress to dispose of, and if the garbage truck will take that giant pile, I guess I can leave my mattress out. Nothing in the town's notice on trash collection that prohibits mattresses, just the usual dangerous stuff like refrigerators. And TV sets.

I got a new mattress to replace the old one in the guest room, where I love to take naps because the dogs can't find me. Following the advice of Lewes and others from the comments section of the site of the Great Lileks, I got a bed-in-a-box type mattress from Amazon (I was at the tail end of a free Amazon Prime trial, so what the hell). If you've never gotten a mattress this way, I recommend it. It's amazing. The mattress comes in a box that's way too small for a queen-size mattress, rolled up and pressed as flat as a respectable potholder. As soon as it is unrolled and unfolded and the plastic cover is cut, it begins to inflate. It's like a slow-motion version of an emergency inflatable raft going off. Laura Petrie would be fascinated.

I haven't tried out the mattress yet, as you have to let it sit in place for 48 hours to recover from the smush-down it got in the factory. But it looks pretty good.

Trash day is tomorrow, so the old mattress leaves (I hope) in the morning. Do not worry, trash collectors: my garbage is free of all tormented spirits. I'm the only tormented spirit that ever laid on that mattress.

Appreciate or else.

The first full week of May is Teacher Appreciation Week. It is Thursday and I haven't blogged a thing about it. Well, I often handed assignments in late.

I don't want to make it seem like I don't appreciate teachers. Heck, no! Where would little Johnny and Janie and Gender To Be Named Later be without teachers? Home making Mommy and Daddy nuts, that's where!

Teacher Appreciation Week and the more specific Teacher Appreciation Day seem to have been cooked up by the National Education Association, which is like if I came up with Fred Appreciation Day and stood around shaming everyone who didn't appreciate me. Hmm... maybe they're onto something.

So I've come up with some memes to show my gratitude for the teachers of our idiot children.

Ooh, that seems kind of bitter, doesn't it? It's not, after all, just teacher salaries and generous benefits that cause my school taxes to be more than a third higher than my local taxes for all other services combined (government, cops, fire department, EMTs, roads, social services, trash removal, etc.). No, it's also... um... well, I guess it costs a lot to run a school, is all I'm saying. And just because I'll never be able to retire because of all the money I pay in taxes? Hey, I remind myself that they're churning out a smart citizenry ready to take the lead in society. And then I look at our college students. And then I wonder if I should start taking powerful narcotics.

Honestly, though, I admire teachers, especially ones in the inner cities. There's probably no harder job on earth than to try to teach something to kids who are not just not getting support at home, but who are getting pressure from their peers to remain ignorant. I used to work with a guy who got all excited with a mission to leave the publishing game, get his education degree, and teach in the inner city. I don't think he lasted a year. Seriously, he's working for another publisher now, probably making less money than he used to.

And isn't that true? Maybe being a teacher of sweet little children in a suburban kindergarten seems like a piece of cake, but teaching surly teenagers in Detroit? Not so much. Corrections officer seems like a better gig. You can pack heat, or at least a truncheon.

Teachers used to be able to count on Mom and Dad standing behind them, but that's not even the case anymore. Poor kids in fatherless homes, being raised by grandparents or exhausted single moms or fosters or whatever? Upper middle-class kids whose parents demand that their child get an excellent grade, even if they have to take it out of your hide? Seems like everyone either ignores or has it in for the teacher who wants to actually teach and grade fairly. Sure, these are stereotypes, but that doesn't mean there is no truth to them, sadly.

You can only outsource your children so much.

So maybe teachers deserve to be proud. Like librarians, they seem to honestly want to impart information and drive out ignorance. I guess I'd be less grumpy about it if they weren't so often engaging in politics or social engineering. And always, always tooting their own horn. Ever been to one of their conventions? I have. Sheesh.

Yeah, you scientists and doctors and nurses and popes and things, you're just a bunch of lazy skells compared to teachers.

Oh, the heck with it. Maybe if I ever thought I could retire I would be more cheerful.

Send in those box tops, kids!

I'm a little fascinated by the Box Tops for Education program, run by General Mills. If you have a kid and you live in the United States, you probably know that it's a program by which the public is encouraged to buy products with the Box Tops for Education logo (called Box Tops Clips), and cut them out for collection by the schools. Each Box Top Clip, which despite the name may be found anywhere on the box, is worth a dime. A school can cash in up to $20,000 worth per year.

"Your school can use the money for anything it needs!" says the Web site. "Computers, books, and playground equipment are just some of the ways schools have chosen to use the funds raised through Box Tops for Education."

Here's a whopping collection I got from a wholesale-club size box of dishwasher detergent:

This collection is worth 80 cents. Just $19,999.20 to go for our parish school to max out.

Schools really do encourage this stuff. They have collection drives and get parents to participate, and get kids involved in gathering and entering the Clips.

Since General Mills started the program in 1996, it's grown to include sponsorship by companies such as Pillsbury, SC Johnson, and paper giant Kimberly-Clark. One day in the cellar I was surprised to see a Box Top Clip on a box of Scott rags that I'd had down there for ages.

Uh-oh -- the Clip expired in 2012. Hope the rags are still good.

I think it's a nice thing to do, and it's always good to get people to do things together to support worthy causes. That's why when I see these things (and they haven't expired) I clip them out for the parish school's collection box. Always enjoy making a donation that doesn't cost me money.

On the other hand, as I look at the budget for our regional public school system ($165,000,000 in the current year), and divide it by the number of students in the system (6,900), I see that it costs $23,913 to educate just ONE student in the current year.

ONE KID.

So go ahead and collect enough box tops to max out -- if you can get hold of 200,000 Clips for the $20,000, that won't even pay for one child. There are seven public schools in the district altogether, and each school can cash in 200,000 box tops for 20Gs each, so try to get 1,400,000 Clips (each person in the region -- person, not family -- would have to come up with 39 Box Tops; most participating packages have 1). And that would educate 5.85 children.

So it's kind of depressing, especially when I get my school tax bill for the year. We'd better be turning out freaking Einsteins by the score, is all I'm saying.

Angry letter to the IRS.

Dear {so to speak} IRS:

My name is Frederick Key. What's yours? Never mind; I'm sure you'll lie about it anyway.

I am writing to complain about one of your idiot compliance Nazis, or whatever you call them. "Auditors," is that the euphemism? One of them was kind enough to pay a call following my filing of my 2014 tax return, and let me say that I am furious---furious!---about how rudely we were treated.

If this so-called auditor had just been rude to me, or even my wife, I would have been able to bear it with equanimity, as one does the ravings of some poor lunatic. But the fact that he was rude about my son has left me outraged.

This "auditor" failed to even try to understand the special circumstances regarding my boy, Tralfaz, and his peculiar condition. To start, your goon should understand that despite his large size, Tralfaz is severely developmentally delayed. He has never been able to walk upright, and continues to go about on all fours. He has developed a great deal of speed and strength by doing so, which is a blessing, but try as we might we cannot teach him to stand. It is no wonder that his clothes fit poorly. And it was cruel of your flunky to make fun of him for it.

Further, Tralfaz's developmental delay has rendered him incapable of speech, something else your thug should have been more sensitive about. We find that Tralfaz makes his needs known, however, as one may to kind and loving parents. No wonder your lunkhead could only get vague sounds in response to his prodding.

Finally, it was completely uncalled for when your punk began ridiculing our boy's overgrowth of hair. It is well known that hirsutism is linked to such developmental delays as a tragic circumstance of his form of genetic disease. Had we had a moment's kindness from your snarling creep we would have explained that we head the local chapter of the charity to benefit similar victims, and we might have solicited a donation from him. But now, we're not even inclined to tell you what the charity is. We're that mad.

All this said, can it be any wonder that Tralfaz defended himself from your ruffian in the only way our poor, helpless boy could? I have no doubt that the bite marks on your idiot's leg will heal long before the emotional scars he inflicted upon us will. And we're not paying for his pants.

Poor Tralfaz is still traumatized and will only touch his food if we coax him with treats.

All that said, I am sure that after this unfortunate bullying session by your assassin, you will accept our donations to Tralfaz's charity as deductions, as well as our son's dependent status and the extra healthcare costs involved (doctors, medicine, squeaky toys, etc.). We are as honest as anyone who works for your organization, and we expect you will treat us as you would expect to be treated yourselves.

And feel free to pound this up your refund hole.

Yours etc,.

F. Key

Taxing.

Spent a bunch of time today getting all my tax stuff together.

"But Fred," you say, "don't you big-time writers have people for that?"

Well, imaginary person who is so good for my ego, I scrub my own toilet, so you tell me what a big shot I am. I do spring for an accountant, but that's a sacrifice I'm glad to make. I used to use TurboTax, but they had a problem with the New York returns a few years ago, and I had enough of going it alone. It's not that my accountant is perfect, it's that he does something TurboTax cannot do---sign the return. If the IRS or the New York Comptroller comes after me, my accountant has to come with me to explain.

I do not want to cheat; it's just that the tax codes in the nation and my state are so preposterously complex that every taxpayer could probably be indicted for a felony just by accident. Everyone hates our tax code, but everyone's afraid to do anything about it. Parents are afraid to lose dependents deductions; homeowners are afraid to lose the mortgage deduction; politicians are afraid to the power to grant favors and punish enemies. The corrupt IRS, clearly incapable of dealing honestly with citizens or even telling the truth, certainly doesn't want to lose its privileges. It's become a horrible, snarled mess, and the entire country is so paralyzed with fear of what could replace it that nothing gets changed.

This is unbecoming to a supposedly great and free people.

In The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody (published 1950), Will Cuppy wrote about George III that "George once said wars were useless. The news from America didn't seem to upset him greatly. When he heard of the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, George said: 'It's nothing.' But Lord North, his Prime Minister at the time, resigned. George sometimes forgot what all the fuss had been about. The colonists, it seems, had to 'pay taxes to which their consent had never been asked.'"

Then in a footnote, Cuppy writes, "Today we pay taxes but our consent has been asked, and we have told the government to go ahead and tax us all they want to. We like it."