Thursday, March 22, 2018

No Titles After 11 PM

I present to you this week's work of art from my family of misunderstood artists:


Maybe we could get an NEA grant?

I know, it's amazing. Especially the way the eggshells are carefully balanced on the empty potato skins - a tangible representation of the fragility of life, contrasted with the earthiness from which it sprung and to which it will return. And yet, despite all, there thrives the delicacy of beauty, as evidenced by the half eaten strawberry perched on top.

I bet you didn't catch all that on your first look, did you?

Today was crazy and tomorrow is worse - I have to drive a few hours to get to our statewide homeschooling conference. Now, I have only one 13-year-old left to homeschool, and I doubt anything I hear from anyone will change much about how I go about it; but I have to go because this year I was dragooned into being on a panel featuring -- let's see...how should I put this delicately? -- a panel featuring experienced homeschooling moms, ones with perspective, shall we say.

We're the gray-haired old bats of homeschooling, essentially. I don't see how any younger mom of younger kids could possibly be reassured by talking to what is essentially the shell of the confident mother I used to be. Maybe I'm on the panel as a cautionary note - you know, a here's what happens if you do this homeschooling thing for too long sort of approach...

So I'm bringing Susie with me and she'll get to see the talent show and partake in the ice cream social, and maybe volunteer a bit at the conference. Really, I see nothing wrong with this plan except that we have to hit the road at 6:30 AM, and who do you think is kicking herself for not going down this evening with the rest of the homeschoolers from my area? I could have been blogging at you from a comfy hotel suite and looking forward to a good night's sleep. I definitely wouldn't have had to spend half an hour this evening carping at the kids to clean up after dinner.

But no, I'm still here at home, and it's late and I still have to pack. And I haven't even gotten to tell you how Larry ruined my snow day yesterday. Remember? I was blogging about how I was going to spend the day knitting and making hot cocoa? And that's just what I was doing until Larry said, "Hey, this is a perfect day to do our taxes!"

I don't know what is wrong with that man. Did I look too happy? Was that it? Probably.

This may look like a melted snowman, but what it
represents (artistically speaking) is a
snow day absolutely ruined by taxes.

So I did our taxes. While the kids played outside, sledding and building snowmen, because kids don't have to pay taxes. And to think I used to believe that being an adult would be fun...







11 comments:

  1. I have two songs for you that are pure Wisconsin goof.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT_q-oNpKrQ

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HC6o33CigLs

    May you live through this day, dear, and have a triumphant return.

    Glori B.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm starting to think of pulling my son out of High School and having him do a homeschool program. He's pretty much failing everything and he's brilliant so IDK what to do with him.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm still working on our taxes. And by still working on them, I really mean, still looking at the file folder with all the paperwork and thinking that I really need to work on them...

    ReplyDelete
  4. I too was in such a rush to grow up, and so often disappointed by what it truly entails. Such a let-down.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Being an adult is not fun!!! My husband reminded me that we need to do our taxes this morning. I responded with "Don't we have until April?" And then he reminded me that April is right around the corner...*sigh*

    ReplyDelete
  6. I hurt for you that you did not get your snow day. I would dread going to the conference too. Maybe you can eat your weight in ice cream to make up for it.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Oh how I hate tax season. I used to do our taxes every year without fail. Even since Coach’s partnership got too complicated, I started giving them to my accountant friend - my best friend since 2nd grade. Fortunately, she is very forgiving because I usually fail to gather all of the correct paperwork the first time around. Crazy to think that I fail at paperwork gathering and I used to be responsible for the whole deal. My dad is an accountant and he used to have my siblings and I sit at the table and fill out tax forms for dividends and stuff so we could learn how to do it. He would holler at me to repeat the equation for cost basis over and over. Just made me hate taxes more. I learned nothing. It always ended in tears. I skip the hotel whenever I can save the money, but oh how a good night sleep away from a messy hosue sounds!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I toyed with the idea of sending our taxes to a paid tax preparer, but the guy wanted $450, and that didn't even include my Schedule C. So I buckled down and did them myself, again. What I despise is the quarterly estimated tax schedule that IS NOT REALLY QUARTERLY. Oy.

    And, by the way, Passover starts this Friday evening, March 30. Same night as Good Friday.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Have fun at the conference! And you will be great on that panel!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Your snowman here looks like a flat duck on its belly. Is that what taxes do to people?
    But what I *really* want to know is, WHY do our family members think it's some sort of game to overfill the compost bin on the kitchen counter? It doesn't have to be full to take outside, does it? ARGH!!!

    ReplyDelete