It doesn't add up

A few thoughts on rendering unto Caesar | Margie Haack

I hate doing taxes. I have good reasons: it involves math and forms written in a foreign language.

Several years ago I made a decision that made our tax preparation a nightmare--I began selling personal-care products out of our home. Of course, no one ever told me the IRS would be interested in this also. Hey, all I wanted was to put our kids through college and buy my husband a new car. I planned to pay cash for a silver car to match my hair, drive it home, and hand him the keys. He would be so grateful he would never again complain about my leaving the seat too far forward. As for me? All I wanted was enough profit to cover the products I used.

By April I was ready to see JoEllen, the expert who stood between us and the IRS. I had carefully added up a lot of totals and collected folders full of little papers and notes. JoEllen's nails flashed as she worked the calculator. About 30 seconds into the forms, she looked at me over her half-glasses and said; "Um, these figures don't work out quite right. Can you check them?"

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