Running for my life!

What a busy couple of weeks.  Most of my time was eaten up trying to stay out of jail.  My bail fund is simply not large enough yet.  Most people save for retirement.  I have to put funds aside for my bail.  Its not simply a case of "IF" I am going to land in jail but "WHEN" it will happen.

I know this is not the usual case for most people but since crap seems to flow in a perpetual motion around me, I figure sooner or later I will simply blow my stack, off the idiot who is currently making my life hell and end up in jail trying to talk my way out of the situation.  I am pretty confident that a Judge will not buy my life story of "crap just seems to happen to me" and let me out without posting a significant sum of money.

Suppose you had paid a significant amount of cash to someone who is supposed to pay particular attention to detail.  This is his job and this is exactly what you pay for.  And then this person totally, utterly and completely caused you to want to poke yourself in the eye with a fork and run screaming into the streets kicking small dogs and children in your path.  I am talking about my accountant.  I pay him about $350 per year to do my taxes and fully expect he is capable of following directions and paying attention.  It seems I hold him to standards above his reach.  What I should have asked him to do is "do your best to come close to doing your job."  My expectations in business appear to be the same expectations I have when dating - too high.

Picture this - a bright, sunny, albeit cool, March morning when I pull up and park outside my accountants office.  I march inside and ride the elevator to the 11th floor and open the door to his receptionist who greets me with a smile and a friendly 'hello'.  I have, gripped in my tight little hand, a manilla file folder holding both my and my brothers tax documents.  On the front of the folder, in bright red ink are the words 'WE HAVE MOVED.  EFFECTIVE FEBRUARY 1/12" followed by our new address.  I also stapled my new business card to the folder with the statement (again in red ink) "NEW EMPLOYER EFFECTIVE SEPT. 12/11".  I also told the receptionist to update our file with our new address and even joked that we only moved 250 feet down the street.

It is also worth noting that both my brother and I went online and updated our address direct with CRA, motor vehicles and the voting registrar.

Lalalalala, off I went pleased that I had my tax stuff all settled with the guy who would take care of my interests.  Off my chest and onto someone else's.

When the documents were ready for signature the accountant sent me an email asking if I wanted to come in and sign or sign the email copy he attached.  I reminded him, I always deal with it via email as he has instructions to NEVER mail documents to me ever since my identity was stolen.  Both my brother and I signed the documents and returned them via email.

Lalalalala - tax time is over and I survived.  So, I owed a little money....so what.  It was over and I was safe for another year.   HA!  Not so fast for those of you who thought it could possibly be that easy for me.

By the third week of May, I had not recieved my notice and my brother had not recieved his refund.  Hmmm, odd.  It is now 2 months.  I should look into this.  I won't bore you with all the details on the investigation as to what happened but will give you the highlights so you can testify on my behalf that I was well and truly provoked.

1)  turns out he did not pay attention to the bright red ink regarding address change
2)  turns out he overrode our online changes with CRA
3)  turns out CRA sent all documents and Kris's refund cheque to old address
4)  turns out accoutant MAILED EVERYTHING to old address
5)  turns out CRA requires an affadavit to correct information and re-issue cheque
6)  turns out Canada Post will not let one back into their old mailbox if they are no longer on the lease
7)  turns out the old landlord and owner of the townhouse has moved back to the Phillipines and is unreachable
8)  turns out the agent for the landlord lives in Montreal and does not speak english
9)  turns out a crowbar and hammer will not get you back into the mail room at midnight (or later)
10)  turns out Canada Post will continue to deliver mail until the box is full at which point they will hang onto any excess until a new owner is registered to the box.
11)  turns out the accountant is not to blame and can do nothing to help "his hands are literally tied"
12)  turns out the new owners (if and when that happens) can decide to just throw the old mail into the garbage and let the dumpster divers have access to a full copy of our tax returns as well as the notice of assessment so kindly provided by CRA
13)  turns out I can go to jail if I call accountant any more names in public
and finally,
14)  turns out I can call my accountant any number of names that I want in the privacy of his office and there is nothing he can do about it except throw me out.
and finally finally,
15)  turns out you can in fact cancel payment to your accountant

On a brighter note - thank you to everyone who supported me in the Easter Seals 24 hour relay this past weekend.  I raised just about $500.

Saturday started off cold and damp with intermittent showers.  By the time we arrived at the stadium those showers had turn to full on rain.  By the time it was my turn to run that rain had turned into a monsoon.

I had picked up the three wee grandkids to run with me.  However, when it came time to run only Xavier was still game.  The girls waited in the tent with my team members roasting marshmellows.  Xavier and I headed out amid the roar of the crowd and made our lap around the stadium before heading to the 4 mile track around central park.  We stayed together until we were out of the line of vision of the stadium when he picked up speed.  I noticed him at the 1/2 mile mark waiting impatiently for me to catch up.  When that was not going to happen he gave up and took off ahead - left me in the dust.  He apparently made a grand entrance back into the stadium to the cheering of our team when someone noticed I was not with him.  When asked where his grandmother was he replied "Not sure.  Think she is back there somewhere."  He did end up waiting for me at the finish line where I was told that he ran the 4 miles in 16min 10 seconds.  Almost half my time of 31 minutes.  There were a lot of puddles and I was weighted down by soaked runners.

I have attached a couple of pictures my friend Heather took of the kids and I in the play tent where the girls made birdhouses.  You can see the wet track behind us.  By the way, in case you are wondering, it is now Tuesday and my runners are still wet.

Stay tuned for the next installment of Holly's "As the stomach turns"......