Packing a Suitcase

Packing a suitcase can be very satisfying when you know just what you want to take and everything fits in neatly.  Unfortunately, that's almost never the case.  I tend to get myself all worked up when packing for a trip because I'm always starting later than I should have, usually when I've got three other things I'd rather be doing, or things that I need to get done ASAP.  Agitated as I am, I then grow even more indecisive than usual, agonizing over which shirts to bring or how many extra pairs of socks constitute reasonable backup, and how many are unnecessary weight.  I usually find that I've forgotten to wash a garment that would be the perfect thing to bring, or have forgotten to buy something I'll need, like dental floss.  Typically I'll try for a while to pack, lay out piles of stuff, then take a break to play guitar, eat ice cream, watch TV, or go bother my housemates.  Then it's back to packing.  Eventually it always gets done, but by that time I'm utterly exhausted and unable to properly get excited about the traveling I'm about to do.  It's really too bad, but all the frustration and anxiety goes away the next day as soon as I'm on the road, boarding the plane, or lifting anchor for new adventures!

Taxes

A little more catching up here, as I have again gotten behind in my daily posting regimen.  I blame this activity for Wednesday's derailment this past week: doing my income taxes.  I don't actually mind filling out my tax forms and doing the calculations; it's pretty straightforward.  The part I mind is the way that there is always, always some little piece that I don't quite understand, about which the instructions remain frustratingly vague.  So I spend way too much time looking for answers online, agonizing, and trying different things before settling on what I think is the most correct option.  This year I e-filed for the first time, and the free program I was using did not explain exactly how it was calculating each step of my taxes.  So I got almost all the way through before finding that there was something I thought was incorrect, at which point I was unable to fix it without doing the whole thing over on the IRS's free fillable forms.  I did this, but then the state taxes were similarly frustrating, and I ended up just mailing the traditional paper forms for those.  Seriously, Congress/Department of Revenue, there has got to be a better way to do this.

Trying to Catch Up

Today I've felt a bit like this fellow (who you'll note has borrowed a chapeau from his friend the milliner--such is my explanation for tiredly mixing up the two when I was drawing): late for a very important date!  Or at least running to catch up.  I was working on my taxes earlier and realized that they would be more complex than I'd hoped.  After frustration followed by procrastination, it got late in the evening and I had not made much headway.  I decided to stop for tonight (not early enough, it appears!) and finish up tomorrow.  I'm not feeling too stressed about that, because I'll have time to do them tomorrow evening, but taxes and other exigencies have been keeping me from my duck blog.  I'm sorry to my faithful readers to have let so many days go by without posting.  I'm going to do my best to stay with it, but I've got a hectic month or two coming up, and there will probably be more lapses.  Thanks in advance for sticking with me and this blog.  I hope you are already at the tea party enjoying crumpets with lemon curd, and I will look forward to seeing you shortly!