ATTENTION ALL BUSINESSES: You Stink, You Lose! No Money for You.

Blood...Sweat...Tears

It's tax time! For the past eight years I've gone to the same tax man, felt too much worry, and paid too much money. I really like my tax man. He is very personable and free with advice. He makes his own homemade wine. Every year the IRS sends me a notice of correction and an extra refund because he missed some kind of write-off, but still he's nice and the IRS is efficient. I've always considered maybe I should find someone a little more competent, but most importantly, his office is fragrance-free and his receptionist doesn't stink...

...until this year. Unfortunately his former receptionist has moved on to another job. As I pulled into the parking lot I notice the silly, little girl through the window posing at her desk. I entered the building cautiously. The smell was faint, but detectable. On the desk sat a bottle of disinfectant hand gel. She had the crazed look of a chemical addict afraid to touch her computer. I made an appointment for an hour later, but as I exited my headache was building and my lungs were hurting. On the way out the girl hollered after me, "Are you SURE you don't have a phone number?" I grumbled to my car feeling massive amounts of irritability building with my discomfort.

What is it with the fanatical need to chemically disinfect everything these days? We are now expected to wipe down every surface in our lives with toxic chemicals. How did we get so paranoid wiping down a shopping cart has become standard practice and a requirement for grocery shopping?  I get it people don't wash their hands after they use the restroom, or they drip salmonella from their dead chickens, or maybe that package of bloody ground beef is contaminated with E.coli, or that snotty-nosed little kid just sneezed all over the cart handle, but hasn't all that been going on for centuries? Why do we need to sterilized our lives with toxic chemicals in order to feel safe and secure? Is it any wonder our immune systems are so screwed up?

As I drove away from tax man's office the pain and nausea continued to build. What to do? On the way home I visited and sniffed around two other accounting offices discussing cost with women wearing excessive amounts of make-up. No one can give a price or even an estimate and all of them said the cost is limitless. Great. The closer I got to home the more my irritation mounted right along with the growing pain and nausea.

My taxes are a pain especially if I'm forced to go into smelly offices to get them done. And they are expensive due to all the forms I need to use. The good old days when I did my taxes with an easy form are long gone. Now I must calculate profit, expenses, deductions, depreciation, amortization, exemptions, interest, and then figure the actual taxes. Can I use the short form or do I need to use the long form? Do I use 8829 or 4562? Schedule C or Schedule A? And MATH. Holy cow, the math overload is enough to bring on a headache. Since we are required to pay taxes, the powers-that-be should make the process a little more user-friendly.

What are my options? Or rather, option. Singular. Do it myself and feel thankful I have one option left. I became determined to do just that and use every free resource available if need be. I reviewed all eight years of my professionally prepared tax forms, followed several sets of instructions step by step, used the IRS website for information, compared the old forms with the old documentation, compared the new forms with the new documentation, and the new forms with the old forms...four hours later my taxes were DONE! You can't imagine how many times I wanted to skip steps just to hurry it along. But I didn't. I stuck to it. I am a proud American.

I do hope I won't go to jail for doing them wrong.

Ten Ways I Would Change the Health Care System

1.)  Change the nutritional mindset of the country. Most people have been conditioned to depend on processed food. The convenience of meals from a fast food window and junk food snacks designed to eat on the go replaced time-honored homemade traditions. The public needs to be re-educated on the benefits of fresh foods and home-cooked meals. Require health and nutritional education for children and adults and get everyone back on track.

2.) Support organic and local farming and wholesome nutritional foods that are not grown in factory farms or with chemicals. We need to understand where our food comes from, how many chemicals it takes to mass-produced food and how many animals need to be drugged and slaughtered because millions eat at McDonald's every day.

3.) Give tax breaks to people who exercise and eat nutritiously. Reward them for good health and for not overburdening the health system.

4.) For those who still want to keep their bad habits, charge incredibly high taxes for  junk food, caffeine, tobacco, recreational drugs, and alcohol.  These people also don't get free health care like the rest of us - they pay.  I doubt very much if charging more for these habits will eradicate them totally, but it would finance a better health care system.

5.)  Give tax breaks to people who have two children or less.

6.) Charge massive amounts of taxes to those who have more than two children. (I'm talking about birthing children, not adopting them. If you have more than two children, even if you give them up for adoption, you pay.) Overpopulating the world overburdens our limited resources and forces the system into factory farming and genetic modification in order to produce enough food for the population. We need to start eliminating the overconsumption. It starts with social responsibility. No one needs more than two kids, let alone fourteen. What are people thinking?

7.) Fire everyone at the Food and Drug Administration and reform the whole department so chemicals and chemical products are actually regulated for a change.

8.) Implement a universal health care plan so it's available to everyone. All those extra taxes I'm proposing go toward financing free medical care. Let those who would bring it down with their overconsumption and social irresponsibility pay for it.

9.) With a free, universal health care system, health insurance becomes obsolete. If no one has insurance, then patient care becomes fair and equal. I can't count how many times I've been denied services because I don't have insurance and I've heard of many who were turned away from hospitals for the same reason. Health care shouldn't be focused on making money; it should be about wellness.

10.) Change the focus and job description of doctors. (See previous post: "Ten Ways I Would Change Doctors")

Obviously, I believe a health care system overhaul involves much more than providing free public health care. For any plan to work, there needs to be a health reform movement designed make society as a whole less unhealthy or the free plan will squash under the weight of desperate need.

Did I forget anything? Add your ideas to the comment section.