saturday, february 3, 2001
taxes & surgery

it's that time again for us: tax time. i usually haven't received much when i have done my taxes in the past, even when i was working or had a husband who was working a job that made really good money. i've always generally gotten something back as i let the government take more than what it should for the most part. most finance counselors would say this is a bad use of money we could have through the year, but who wants to owe the government at the end of the year? i don't. so whenever possible, i or i and my spouse have made sure we won't owe them at the end of the year by allowing them to take more than they should. (this sounds like a discussion a paranoid would have. i ought to know, my mother is one and the number of "they"s in a conversation with her can be frightening!) last year was the first year i/we have ever received a significant return, a lot of which was my "new" business which wasn't yet making money. we used that money to invest further into the biz so i would have better tools to work with.

i used h&r online last year. it was pretty bad actually, they had so many site problems that i eventually downloaded their tax-cut software and just did the taxes with that. you would think that with a year to fine tune and fix things, a company would have their act together. but no, i go back again this year and, while the site is working a little better, they are still short forms. one form was supposed to be in the 1st of this month. i didn't see it. they aren't ready for tax payers, again, this year. and are charging more money than last year. what's up with that?

thankfully a friend has stepped in and will do our taxes for us. for free. she's a bit swamped so it may take her a few to get it done, but at least we don't have to pay. from what i managed to do on the h&r site, it looks like we are going to get a pretty nice return again this year, although not so much of it is relying on my dead business as of yet (since the schedule c wasn't out feb. 1 like it was supposed to be, i have no idea how much we'll get back because of dd).

this year we plan on a car. we really need one and it certainly is about time. besides, i no longer have any delusions of grandeur when it comes to my business making it, so we don't have to make any investments to for it. however, if we have the extra cash, we are talking about getting me a laptop for school. one of the biggest time wasters i have right now is notes. i have to rewrite the suckers so they are legible and clear each week. considering that everything takes longer for me than it used to, this uses up valuable time. a laptop would allow me to type the notes at school and reduce my time dealing with notes. i would like one, i am not really jonesen for one, but it would be nice. the nice thing i think is that i am not insisting i need it (which i really don't), but that saxy was actually considering it already when i mentioned it. even if i don't get one, which is more likely than getting one, it is nice to know he was thinking about me and trying to think of ways to make the whole uni experience easier on me. (thanks, love, i really do appreciate it.)

next year we won't be getting such a good return, and not only because saxy is currently unemployed. saxy, even if he wasn't seriously considering returning to school, would be unemployed for a lot longer than we had anticipated. the surgery is on. it's currently in its planning stages, more so than before. the doctor who does these things has agreed to do it and is working a few things out with the insurance company. once all that is done it will be scheduled. after the surgery saxy will be unable to work, or at least unable to take a job requiring a great deal of physical activity, for a year. a YEAR! we never thought he would be out for so long! even the doctor thinks it will be a good thing if saxy returns to school. probably to keep him out of trouble when it comes to activity level. we had assumed another 3 month lay up and physical therapy after that. physical therapy hasn't been mentioned yet, but we're both a bit stunned at how long he's going to have to take it easy.

we were also a bit perturbed to discover that the previous doctor may have been negligent. apparently there is something missing in saxy's knee that would have been torn and missing at the time of the accident. so it would have been missing when the first doctor did the original surgery. because it has been missing, even if the first surgery had been 100% successful, saxy would have to have another surgery. yet the first doctor never mentioned that this was missing, never told us he would need another surgery, and discharged him as ok 6 months after the original surgery. did he miss it? did he purposely over look it? we don't know. we DO know that saxy, who has walked to and from his bus stop 3 blocks away or to and from his previous job 4 or 5 block away EVERY DAY, did tell the doctor he was still having problems with the knee. the doctor's response was that he needed to work it out more and he discharged saxy any way. the doctor was a workman's comp doctor who basically works for the company that has subsequently fired saxy for a totally ridiculous reason and is trying to deny him unemployment. it is more than possible that the doctor knew this was missing and chose to ignore it to save the company money. it is also in the back of our minds that maybe the company has REALLY fired him unfairly, getting rid of him because of the injury and trying to cut their losses. there is another employee that literally disappears without a word for a couple of months at a time who has yet to be fired (he has just done it again and we're waiting to hear if he comes back and keeps his job or not). do we have a case of neglect on our hands? so in addition to everything else we're dealing with, we're trying to figure out if we have a case to sue the doctor, the company or both.

if the other fellow returns and retains his job, i think there won't be any question about it.