Happy Birthday Me!

23: My age today!

I'm not sure why, but 22 seems a lot younger than 23. I seem to remember thinking the same thing about 21 when I turned 22.

It doesn't really feel like my birthday today. Maybe it's because I haven't really had much time to anticipate it...I spent most of last week buried under a pile of blankets with Nyquil and a box of tissues. I'm feeling a lot better. Just a residual cough.

Anyway, yesterday Kaitlyn and I drove up to Dayton Urban Ministry to help them out with their tax clinic. We arrived a half hour early, made sure we understood which computer went to which printer, and logged in to the OBB Web site, ready to help people do their taxes.

I guess by now I should be used to the fact that hardly anything turns out perfectly, no matter how much you prepare.

There were only four counselors available to help clients, including Kaitlyn and me, and because of computer/space issues, only three were actually able to sit down with people. A line had already formed in the next room over. And the internet was just horribly, horribly slow. It took several minutes just to go to the next page. Everything took twice as long.

Hardly anyone had brought their 2008 AGI or PIN, which you need to electronically sign/file your 2009 taxes, so a lot of people had to make calls to the IRS, where of course no one was answering.

Fortunately, Kaitlyn had the good sense to bring out our laptops, which ran a lot faster. We each helped clients on our laptops, then brought it up on the desktop when we had to print something off, which still took up a lot of time. We were only able to see two clients each. But all of them got some money back, and that's always good to see.

The second guy I saw was like a breath of fresh air. We were still using the slow desktops and I was getting a little frustrated. He just said to me, "Don't worry about it, I don't mind waiting a little!" and then we realized he didn't have his 2008 AGI or PIN he said he would just paper file. He actually said, "I'm in no rush!"

I wanted to thank him profusely for being so rational. Most people are in the biggest rush of their lives to get their taxes done. It was nice to meet someone who realized that it's not the end of the world if they have to wait a few days longer to get their refund.