'Tis the season to be fleeced...

So PreZ did his taxes this weekend. We initially thought we'd end up getting raped by the IRS as he'd worked as a contracter (i.e. self-employed) from mid-October until the end of the year for his new job, before they hired him as an employee. We expected to have to cough up a few grand, instead calculations came to a few hundred bucks... I guess that's the upside of being unemployed for several months, it changes the financial landscape a lot.

As a matter of practical timing we *finally* got 2001's state tax return cheque in the mail, which pretty much covers what we owe the IRS. So all of that works out nicely.

I submitted my order for the corset pattern, so that ball is now rolling. Next up to do: set up piercing appointment.

And the quizzes keep on coming...

Spark


Which Tori Amos Song are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Piercings and Bugs

I'm slightly disappointed. The piercer I wanted to go to is on a hiatus. I've been considering going to him for some time now, mainly as he's highly regarded in the community. Upside is that we don't have to trek out to Brooklyn to go get pierced now.

So, now Cherie and I will go elsewhere. I asked him for a recommendation and he named one of the 2 studios I had on my short list. I fired off something like a 20 questions email to that studio asking all kinds of stuff about their jewelry selection, materials, threading and such and some other things. Hopefully that will get a relatively speedy response. They take walk-ins as opposed to the piercer I'd selected previously who did everything on an appointment only basis so we can pretty much pick a date and go.

On a completely different topic... I'm glad to see that the ant traps are working. We occasionally get ant migration through the kitchen and bathroom, sometimes it only lasts for a few days before they leave again (mainly as there's nothing for them to forage) but they've been more pesky this year, perhaps due to the winter being much colder. So I settled for ant baits. Occasionally I'll now find little corpses or ants twitching in their death throes, so that seems to be working swimmingly.

I have to say that I'd much rather it be ants than cockroaches. Ants are annoying, roaches are completely gross. An apartment I had in Sydney had a roach problem, which was futile to combat considering they'd just run in under the front door from whichever other apartment on that floor *shudder*. Granted, my Sydney roach motel was nothing compared to the roach colony that lives in PreZ's aunt's house. YUCK! loads of the little bastards. And what's worse is when you hear those statistics, that for every roach you can see there are hundreds or thousands in the house that you can't see.

And now I must go continue reading my Storm Constantine novel, Calenture.