Death And Taxes

Last year, I wound up beating death by living through a pretty bad bout of neck cancer that had spread extensively in my lymph glands. That has continued into this yea so far - that is me managing to stay among the living and beating out death. When it comes to taxes, I have not been so lucky, seems they are inevitable every tax season.

I just got our annual income tax returns finished. Actually, I had them finished about a month ago but lallygagged, hemmed and hawed and just plain procrastinated until today before triple checking them and submitting them electronically. I found one or two minor things that needed correcting, got myself about a buck more back in our refund due to that. While we are getting a refund, ad  do consider that a plus because while it gathered no interest for us and did for the government, it is money I would not have otherwise saved up. Since I am recently retired, I am on a very limited income right now consisting mostly of my annuity which is for now coming to me as partial payments. I figure I am getting around 58% of my actual pension which works out to about 43% of what I had been getting paid in salary. It can take many months for the government to get it right. Funny how that works because when you go to work for them, they know, in the first 2 weeks, how much to deduct for everything but when you retire it can take up to 8 months for them to get your pension right!  That is so funny it friggin hurts because it is not easy living on a sudden reduction to about 45% of what my annual pay had been over the past 3 years. I still have to pay all my bills and none of them have been reduced, for example I just paid the 2nd half of my school taxes and that was well over a couple of thousand. Local village tax is coming up soon too and medical and other bills are piling up fast. I will get them paid though but it ain't easy right now. Sooner or later, OPM will figure out my actual finalized pension payments and it will start sending me the correct amount. OPM will also send me a lump sum payment for what it owes me because of the partial pension payments. That should be a help to make things easier but I have to say, these friggin taxes are just about beating us into the ground but we are managing to hang in there.

The job search is continuing. I have put in for about 25 jobs over the past 3 weeks. Probably more than people on unemployment are required to put in for in order to keep benefits. I have thought of applying for unemployment but am hesitant. I never have received it and am pretty proud of that fact but if I do not find a job soon I may do so. It is my understanding that since I retired because I had cancer, I may be eligible for unemployment as opposed to had  just retired voluntarily with the cancer factor in there. Hopefully I will not have to find out and I will find a job soon. I have a telephone interview scheduled, for one job, this Tuesday. It is not a great job and is only part time and probably temporary but I figure why not go for it until something better comes along. That is, of course, if they select me after the interview.

All the best,
Glenn B