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Even when you've been preparing tax returns for what seems forever but in reality is almost my entire life (!), there is still that moment of anxiety when you've pushed the button to electronically file a client's tax return where you're wondering if you've forgotten something that's going to cause it to be rejected by the IRS or Department of Revenue. It happens to us all, even those of us compulsive types who reviewed the…

Nothing's the same anymore. Commander Sinclair --- "Chrysalis" --- Babylon 5 Three household goods lorries positively stuffed to the ceilings and it's now time to start the early morning procession to Miguel and Jessica's new home in Wendell for his Permanent Change of Station (PCS). It's been a whirlwind of frenetic activity these past few days to finish the packing and loading and we're literally in the home stretch with the hopes of getting finishing…

One thing you learn after you've moved round a fair bit is that the day of packing and loading the household goods into the lorries is an exercise in patience amongst the chaos. The best defence against letting the moving process get to you is to latch onto any opportunity for humour. Who knew it'd be not terribly long after I wandered next door to help schlep the neighbour's stuff onto the first of what…

I believe that when we leave a place, part of it goes with us and part of us remains. Go anywhere in the station when it is quiet, and just listen. After a while, you will hear the echoes of all our conversations, every thought and word we've exchanged. Long after we are gone, our voices will linger in these walls for as long as this place remains. But I will admit that the part…

It’s not where you start but where you finish that counts. Zig Ziglar Of all of the things I have to be thankful for this tumultuous year we've had in 2023, finally making it to this last day of the year in a much better place than I was a couple of weeks ago is probably one of the most meaningful. It most certainly didn't come easy but then nothing in this life worth experiencing…

Understatement (n): a statement that describes something in a way that makes it seem less important, serious, bad, etc. than it really is, or the act of making such statements. Cambridge Dictionary These past couple of days, it's been a real struggle trying to find the theme for this year's story marking the eighth anniversary of getting the phone call I really could have done without for a few more years. And *THAT* would be…

Today I got the news that I'm sure is totally going to shock zero of my dear readers...the Traverse failed in her attempt to thwart the debugging process and the brand-new transmission that failed downtown will be replaced by an even newer transmission that will hopefully last more than three days! At least it's under warranty which means the new transmission and labour are covered which is a good thing because that bill was already…

As I was at the house waiting to head out to Enloe to collect Katie and Alex, the doorbell rang quite unexpectedly. In a manner of confession after the week I'd had up to that point which involved a brand new transmission refusing to transmit torque properly and a bait-and-switch for a hire car and a looming date that is just the cherry on the top of the calendar year, I really wasn't in the…

After getting the update from my oldest where he was on his journey back from playing outdoor hockey in downtown Charlotte (which was his first true long-haul solo journey and I do believe he rather enjoyed the experience), the garage rang me up to give me the latest news on the Traverse. Well, what the kind gentleman said first was to reassure me that they were actively trying to diagnose the problem and that they…

After a weekend of having the Traverse back home where she belongs with a brand new transmission (and a new serpentine belt and oxygen sensor aft of the catalytic converter) and not doing anything particularly exciting to the transmission to test what passes for my luck, today's mission of stopping by Sam Jones BBQ and then Sam's Club after dropping Katie off at school seemed simple enough. I should have known everything was going to…

The very nasty weather predicted for today got to be a bit more exciting than we planned when the phone started going nuts with the raucous emergency alert sound indicating that a tornado warning had been issued for our area. One of the nice things about no longer using the satellite dish is that the signal is no longer susceptible to rain fade so over to WRAL we go to see Mike Maze doing the…

Oh, Carl! One could dare to dream but your estimate is off by an order of magnitude! Well, the estimate of what the bill is likely to come to but the estimate of what will be left over is depressingly much closer to the reality of it. I just got the lovely news from the garage that the Traverse's transmission decided it has had enough of converting torques and moving the rest of that SUV…

Hands down, one of my favourite stand-up comedians is Gabriel Iglesias who is better known by his nickname "Fluffy" which is where he ranked himself on his "Six Levels of Fatness": Big Healthy Husky Fluffy DAMN! OH HELL NO! All it takes is one picture and I think you can see where he and I would have a very definite thing in common. (I was talking about a mutual love of food fool! What did…

Did you ever have a conversation with someone that you were absolutely certain as to which way that conversation would go and how it would end? As in no doubts whatsover! And then it goes in a completely different direction than you had imagined possible? Yeah, me too! :) This tale actually started a couple of weeks earlier when I started noticing some hesitation in the Traverse whenever I'd put my foot down. After considering…

Over the past week, it had become increasingly clear that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was going to do what pretty much every minister in Whitehall fears and is one of the main reason to actually be Prime Minister: the cabinet reshuffle. This political game of musical chairs is often instigated by the Cabinet Secretary (a career civil servant and generally the Head of the Home Civil Service which makes them arguably the most powerful person…

I've been thinking long and hard all day about what I wanted to write about for Veteran's Day. As I was running a couple of backups after the hard drive recovery operations earlier this week, I happened to stumble upon this picture that came from a set of slides that my father had taken whilst he was serving in his first of two deployments to Vietnam in 1967. Local man (VC?) Works for himself during…