A Belated Christmas Gift...

The other day, Justin and I received a... well...err... we'll just call it a belated Christmas gift.  Want to guess who it was from???

That's right, the IRS.  Don't you just "love" them.  This is an organization whose employees don't know the regulations they're suppose to enforce, but God help you if you dare try and point that out to them.  I sometimes wonder if they send their employees to other countries (like Russia, China, Iran and Venezuela) for training in "customer service".

Think I'm being too hard on them?  My family has a long sordid entertaining history of fighting the IRS... or maybe I should say my dad has the history!  He's never lost a fight  but I remember one that took 10 years for the IRS to admit they were wrong and then another 5 years for them to waive the "interest and penalties" on the money that had never been owed!!!  Is that not insane!  Did I mention that my dad loves this sort of thing?  If you've ever met him, you know.  He actually ENJOYS audits!  Last time they tried to come after him was post Katrina.  Katrina hit in August 2005... and as a result the tax deadline for Katrina affected areas was extended.  The problem is the same people that don't read the healthcare bill before passing it, didn't read the revised tax code for 2005 before issuing it.  SO, instead of extending the taxes to February 2007... it "extended them to February 2006.  Did you catch that?  Yup, it moved UP the deadline 2 months.  Typos happen but try getting someone in the IRS to apply logic and figure that out.  Even once they recognized the problem, they couldn't do anything about it and told him to go to tax court!  It probably took 2 years for everything to get straightened out... and then, my dad sent them a bill for the time he had spent resolving the issue with them.  I don't know if he ever collected (I wouldn't put it past his ability)... but I love the thought of sending a bill to the IRS, don't you?

I love getting the mail in November and December... but come January... ugh.  Things like this

keep finding their way into our mailbox.  I really must talk with our mailman about this.  Sigh.  And yes, we did get 2 Form 1098s... for house 1 and condo 2.  Can you say "tax write off"??? 

How is it "the most wonderful time of the year" is followed by tax season?!?