What you did today

[LadyCrimson]

Sitting around, noticing it's April, and wondering how we're going to manage to pay our exorbitant self-employment taxes again this year. March-June has been quite the squeeze since we bought this little house, what with the economy being in the pits for so long.

 

Oh wait, I'm supposed to be positive because we made an investment into our future. Which I'm sure will turn out to be grand in the long run. Assuming I live that long.

 

...time for some of those LOLcats.

[Gorgon]

You don't pay the same taxes if you are self employed ?. or is it that you don't have them deducted from your check so you have to set that money aside to pay at the end of the year.

[Gfted1]

I believe its the latter. At least that what one of my self employed friends is always complaining about. And he has to pay it quarterly.

[LadyCrimson]

You pay more Social Security/Medicare, because you don't have an employer who matches your contribution (ie pays half or at least part of it). You are the employer and the employee so to speak and must pay in the full amount. You can use that "employer donated half" estimated amount as as a deduction I think, but it doesn't amount to some kind of big savings, at not least in our case.

 

State taxes aren't much.

Edited April 6, 2012 by LadyCrimson

[Gorth]

Just sitting and wondering how Tarna's treatment plan worked out...

 

[Raithe]

Spent half the night awake, then finally managed to fall asleep sometime around 5am.

 

Woke up in the midmorning from a rather odd dream that seems to have included some vaguely supernatural/gothic ruined castle and dungeons turned into an archaeological dig, whilst I tried to find some lost item...and dodged a pseudo police/paramilitary anti-magic extremist group and flirted with the female officers in Han Solo type manner... then getting hit with an obviously supernatural cursed super-storm to the area...

Was a little..bizarre and groggy when I woke up from that. Firmly glad to have that first cup of tea of the day..

[WDeranged]

You're not the only Englishman having screwed up dreams at the moment, some of them can be quite enjoyable but they leave me feeling stretched quite thin

[Rosbjerg]

I'm tired of being sick.. Ever since I came back from Japan I've had a cold which has decided to develop into asthmatic bronchitis.. I almost suffocated today because my air ways decided they didn't like me coughing.. Luckily my roommate has a spare inhilator .. this sucks..

[WDeranged]

Ouch, hope you get over it quickly mate, nothing gets me down worse than a chest infection, apart from a fortnight long bout of toothache maybe.

[LadyCrimson]

I hate Fox-tv mlb blackouts etc. I wanna see the Red Sox, not the Giants.

Oh well...WEEI audio on one PC, video game on the other. Plus, it's a nice day, may do some spring gardening.

 

(edit)

Just sitting and wondering how Tarna's treatment plan worked out...

Yes, I'd like an update as well. I hope Tarna's doing ok.

 

Edited April 7, 2012 by LadyCrimson

[WDeranged]

Just got home at 3am after suffering six hours of vapid ****, sometimes it's worth wheeling out my corpse, not tonight though, what a waste of life

[Labadal]

We're in April but you'd think we're in the middle of December. I hate snow and cold with a passion. I have a cold and my throat hurts.

[Raithe]

Just to add to the collection off odd dreams... I woke up from one where I was trying to escape an event organised and hosted by the mother of a friend. The woman who happens to be one of the most annoying, irritating, small-minded, mean-spirited, soul-destroying people I have ever met in my life. And she has such a horrible, grating laugh that just claws its way through my mind.

 

It wasn't a nightmare, but damn was I glad to finally wake up.

[Malcador]

Decent day, nothing amazing but am enjoying being awake and no work. Took the dogs for a nice walk, met a neighbour, Arsenal won, set a new record for time needed to iron a shirt. Pretty good all around.

[Walsingham]

Kicked back, ate beef, drank booze, watched The Wire. Relaxed.

[LadyCrimson]

Watched Red Sox game (lost in extra innings...), pestered spouse, ate meat, cleaned house, played old games, indulged my pet's catnip habit, ate more meat, watched some TV. Now time for bit more old games, then some zzzz's. Or maybe just the zzz's.

[Rosbjerg]

Feeling a lot better today.. Hurray! also found this site .. WW2 live on twitter, actually pretty cool.

[Nepenthe]

Grats, the first step is the hardest.

Thanks. Well, went again on Saturday and then again today. Saturday workout was hell, probably didn't fuel myself enough after the first workout as also had a splitting headache for most of Sunday. Feeling a lot closer to normal after today's. I hope I'm gonna bust most of my gut before I realize what my ex leaving and two years of hammering on the dissertation did to me physically.

[Gfted1]

Since your trainer is a sprinter I assume you are focusing on running. Thats a really excellent way to drop weight so you should see results beginning very soon.

 

My dog and I are both getting a bit round about the middle so the last few weeks Ive started taking her on walks around the block. One lap around is exactly a half a mile so we go twice. In a few weeks I hope to get both of us up to trotting speed.

[Raithe]

I started up regular running again.. and after about 3 weeks developed a really nice case of tendonitis that didn't settle down for about 3 months. I really should try to get back in the focus to start it up once more...

[tarna]

Just sitting and wondering how Tarna's treatment plan worked out...

Yes, I'd like an update as well. I hope Tarna's doing ok.

Doing alright. Started to post around the Holidays and decided against it. Let's see...remaining kidney function swings between 56 and 72 percent. Anything below 60% forbids a CAT scan. Doc got the insurance co to approve a PET scan. PET scans are far better ( and expensive! ) but only about 10% or less of patients with my of kind of kidney cancer actually shows up on a PET scan ( something odd about this flavor of cancer ). Luckily mine showed up and my Doc says that if it showed up once then it will always show up. Since the PET and CAT scans are radically different in format and quality, my Doc had to have the Radiologist read the scans and compare the info for him. Looks like a 'no-growth' at present. I'll believe it more when they do another CAT or PET scan near the end of this month.

 

Got to visit my daughter about the middle of last month. She lives in another state and I had not told her yet. She laughed and said "Finally! Good riddance old man!" :wink: We talked about keep-sakes and whatnot. Some made sense while some others caught me by surprise. One thing she asked for was a pendant. She and a close friend of hers had matching pendants of half a heart. Her friend was killed in a car accident nearly two years ago. During the funeral arrangments my daughter got to be very close to the girl's parents. When her friend was buried, her parents buried her with the heart pendant she shared with my daughter. She wants something similar with me. Since I plan to get cremated ( as does she ), the materials are very limited. I decided to make it out of jet. Jet is a very hard form of coal that was used as cameo jewelry in the early 1900s. Being that jet is also one of the jewelry materials indicating Wiccan priesthood, I just happen to have lots of it on hand and am familiar working with it. It has a hardness of around 3.5 ( and takes a very glossy shine ) while wood is probably somewhere around 2. I'll make a flat disk, carve something appropriate into the jet, groove the pendant so that it may be broken easily. When she comes out at the end of this month, she and I will go somewhere peacefull in the mountains and break it. I'll already have some silver chains so we can wear them from that point on. Kinda novel and I look forward to it.

 

Let's see what else...Hmm. Made up another ridiculously large lobster meal for the wife last Valentine's day. See attachment. That lobster tail in the middle is 1.25 pounds. Other items are lobster medallions on saffron rice ( Saffron is expensive and has little taste. I only used it to add color to the rice so that it showed up against a white plate ). Lobster and angel hair pasta with a lemon cream sauce. The one new obnoxious addition ( required for each of these meals ) is lobster chowder. Didn't turn out too bad actually. I forget the weight of the steak. Various other sundry items.

 

Working as close to full time as I can get. Still tire easily but I'm not getting my endurance and strength back by sitting on my ass. Still taking morphine and percocet. Every so often I'll stop taing my pain meds for a day to try to estimate my internal 'situation' by the pain level. I generally only quantify pain by...I can ignore this...I can work with this...I cannot sleep with this...and ...this really F**king hurts! :wink:

I still seem to be in the "I can work with this" pain level.

 

Oh...I'm also going to make talking scrapebooks for my wife and daughter. I will use artists' sketch books ( I'll show you guys when I get them finished ). I found several sellers online that sell blank greeting cards with ten second recordable circuits for 2 for a dollar US. The circuits will go into the scrapbooks and will narrate each page as turned. I'm also going to use specially embossed leather covers. The artist is being a problem so if it doesn't got worked out very quickly I'm just going to buy a couple of samples and back-engineer her work. I would rather pay her for her talent and creativity but one way or the other, this is going to happen. Going to work my wedding ring into the cover of the book for my wife and my ring from my previous marrage into the cover of my daughter's book. Both will have a copy of my pentagram also worked into the leather ( my kid gets the original ). Various other crap like amber and whatnot also worked into the leather.

Daughter already has my Athame, Wand, Cord and Measure ( a Wiccan would understand ) and she willl also get my Book. Normally Books are burned at the death of a Witch but what are they going to do to me for passing mine on to my daughter, take away my birthday?

Screw 'em. In the ear. :wink:

 

That's enuf for now. I expect to see quite a few tl;dr

Add yourself to the line above that starts with Sc :wink:

Later folks. Hope good fortune upon you and yours. tarna/scott

[Gorth]

tl;dr

 

No mate, good to hear from you, a good read and thanks for sharing. The world needs a bit of that fighting spirit

 

Strange paraphernalia... you guys do ritual virgin sacrifices?

 

How long did you enjoy lobster leftovers for after that food orgy???

[tarna]

Strange paraphernalia... you guys do ritual virgin sacrifices?

 

How long did you enjoy lobster leftovers for after that food orgy???

Hard to say. Virgins are so difficult to come by these days. :wink:

 

After about three days the remaining lobster started to smell untrustworthy. I have no interest in lobster so it's entirely on my wife to finish the plate before her. I'm more of a fried this and that kind of palate. Not terribly sophisticated. I can't tell the difference between mayonnaise and miracle whip.

[Nepenthe]

Since your trainer is a sprinter I assume you are focusing on running. Thats a really excellent way to drop weight so you should see results beginning very soon.

Nah, just gym to rebuild my core and kick start my metabolism, for the moment.

[LadyCrimson]

Ack, wall of text! Stopped reading after the first sentence.

 

...no, seriously, it's great to hear from you tarna. I love the jet pendant ritual, the idea behind it. Creative and touching.

And man...that lobster dinner. Just looking at it gives me heartburn. What a ginormous feast, and gorgeously displayed too. She must have loved it. Mad skillz.