2016 Spring April 17 Sunday

2016 Spring April 17 Sunday

61 degrees this morning.  Rain/threat of rain, no walk.

There was a “100% chance” of rain this morning, so i decided not to take the chance and walk.  Of course, other than a brief shower, it hasn’t rained yet!  In actuality, the thunder and lightning would be enough to keep me from walking or being outside!

I have to take the weather predictions with some allowance for error.  Even seeing the rain clouds on the phone in “real time” doesn’t always mean it is going to rain. 

It seems they shouldn’t use “100% chance” if indeed there is a small chance (and there always is) that it won’t rain at that particular time.  

Obviously the weather forecasts are a lot more “predictable” that they used to be but they still aren’t perfect!

Finished income taxes yesterday, tried to see if I could “itemize”, but it just wasn’t there.  Next year it will be.  

I use “Turbotax” and it quite frankly, hasn’t kept up with other tax programs.  Probably what is most irritating is the way they try to sell you “upgrades” or other products frequently by trickery or trying to scare you.

As an example, my chances of an audit (since I  didn’t itemize) are near “0” % and they still were pushing their “audit protection” as I “needed” it even when their own figures showed I didn’t need it!  

Of courses one of the parts of the “”audit protection” was “fast help service”, which kind of told me their “normal” service must stink1

Actually, I had to use  their phone “help” service and it was excellent. The first time there was a  45 minute “wait” to talk with an “expert”, the second time I call, a very helpful and knowledgable persons answered my question. 

Also, for the State Income Tax, there was actually no way of finding out the cost until you actually paid for it!  Talk about underhanded and sneaky!

Anyway, it is done this year.   I promised myself I was going to keep detailed records and file them so I could just do my return next year, but….. dream on!

Speaking of sneaky I find many of the newspaper web sites have this silly question that you have to “answer a survey question” before you can proceed.  Even worse are the newspapers that have a headline (or numerous headlines) on Twitter etc. and all it is is an ad for a super expensive “subscription”.  

I assume the survey  is some way to prove the number of people accessing the site, or just an attempt to harass you into paying for access.  I either refuse to answer, of if I do answer, I just mark “undecided” or something like that.  

I used to like responding to requests for “how are we doing” surveys, until I realized they just view it a a marketing tool, they don’t really care what you think.  They just want to get your e-mail address etc so they can spam you with advertisements or probably sell the e-mail list.

Of course, unfortunately that hurts the business who really does want your feedback,so I still respond to some surveys where I feel like they really want my feedback.

Went out to get the newspapers, it is now actually raining, a  relatively soft, nice rain.  I don’t mind missing my walk occasionally, but I hate to miss it two days in a row or more!

That’s it for now, Sunday, April 17, 2016,