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Most years I just use Turbo Tax, but last year it was annoying having to pay for state e-filing for the kids, so I did theirs with Free Tax USA (AKA FTU).

Then this year I decided to try a different service for the oldest, due to being misled by the state of Michigan website, so I ended up using Cash App Taxes (AKA CAT) for him. It was one of the recommended services both there and elsewhere.

I couldn’t buy the Turbo Tax (AKA TT) software to install anymore, because they don’t support Windows 10 and I don’t support updating software that’s doing everything I need it to do. So I had to switch to the online version. It worked pretty much how TT normally does, except every third screen is an ad for you to pay more for their extra services, and the online version doesn’t tell you the cost until you are at the end, just before filing. It used to be I’d pay $40 for a TT CD, install it, and get free federal e-filing and one state e-filing. Now you don’t really know what they’re charging you for. My total was about $110 this year, and that was with a discount from my credit union.

So I am slightly disillusioned with TT, and will be trying some other options out there next year.

One option I will not be trying again is Cash App Taxes. They have free filing if your AGI is low enough, like many other services do, but there are a lot of things they do not do.

For example, for Alpha’s taxes, he had to file two different state tax returns. CAT did the federal file but when it came time for the states, they just said “Nope, can’t do it. We can’t handle multiple states” So we logged into FTU and they said “Sure, no problem, we’ll e-file two states for you for free.”

Another example was he also needed to amend his federal taxes after they were filed. CAT said “we can do that, but you can’t e-file an amendment so you’ll have to mail them.” Again, FTU to the rescue – not only do they let you e-file an amended return, they’ll let you do it even if you e-filed through someone else initially.

If you’re keeping track, that’s only two strikes against CAT, but I don’t need to wait for the third strike when FTU is getting hits each time. Be sure to use the special “freefile” link when signing in, if you think you’re eligible. If you just sign in at the main page you can miss the savings.

I had to call customer service last week (can’t cancel any services easily online, must give someone a chance to talk you out of it first) and thus spent some time on hold.

It was the standard stuff – a bit of music, then the music stops and gives you a rush of hope that you will be speaking to someone now, only to find out the music stopped so they could play you a recorded announcement, then the music resumes.

In this case, half the announcements were the line “Your call is important to us” and then something about the order in which they take the calls.

I got to wondering about the phrase “your call is important to us”. And I think that is the wrong priority for a company to have. I don’t want them to value my call, I’d rather have them value me. It’s like they’re causing trouble just so I have to call them, because my call is important to them.

I want a company that prioritizes my satisfaction as being important to them.

I want a company that prioritizes getting things right so that customers don’t have to call them.

I do not want a company that prioritizes my calling them as being important to them.

What I would rather hear is “we are sorry you had to call us”.

But the worst thing to hear is information about how I should be using their app or website instead of calling them. Dear companies, my calling you is the last resort. I have already tried your online services and they told me I can’t do whatever it is online and I must call. Or my thing is not an option. Or I got an error. All the people on the phone fall into either that category, or the category of not liking online things or computers in general and so they’d have to call you anyway to have you walk them through it. Don’t pretend that your call numbers will go down if you just tell people about your website – put that effort into making your online options better.

Here are some more mini reviews of books. I’m going in order of when I read them.

First up: A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

This was recommended to me by someone who said it was one of his favorite books, or one of the best books he’d ever read, or something like that. Highly recommended. I dont know where I’d place it on my rankings, but it did not disappoint.

I have not seen the movie Forrest Gump, but I have seen Mr. Holland’s Opus which I think is the same style of story. And I would put this book in that category. There is the style of story that is a “slice of life” but this is not just a slice, we follow the main character through the majority of his life. There is not really a plot, until later in the book. I’ve seen Napoleon Dynamite, so I know how sometimes a thing without a plot might be annoying or useless, but in this case it is not missed.

Next up: The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle

I had read one of Mr. Beagle’s later books last year, and I quite enjoyed it. I was browsing the library and found this book by him, which happens to be one of his earlier works.

This was a bit different in the writing style, but it is the only book I can think of where I kept reading it for the writing and not the story. The story was fine, but it was secondary to the writing. Two bits stood out to me, then one more caught my attention.

The first one was the phrase “wind that tasted like nails”. I thought it was a good way to describe things. Made me stop and think about it, what the air was like. I have inadvertantly tasted nails, via the standard method of holding a nail in one’s mouth whilst arranging the nailee in place.

The second phrase was about a lady who was no longer in the flower of her youth, and Mr. Beagle described her as having “gone to seed”. That one also made me stop and think about what flowers do after their blooms are spent.

And then one more that caught my attention, not because of how it made me stop and think – because it didn’t – but rather because it had been used (albeit slightly modified) as the title of a recent movie.

“Everything,” he answered her, “everything, all at once.”

And I searched the internet for “everything everything all at once” to see this book is credited as the origin of that phrase, and the internet seemed intent on showing me only results for the movie. And then I put quotes around the phrase so it would search only for that phrase, and it said there were no results. So I’m putting the phrase “everything, everything all at once” here in this blog post so that the internet will be able to report that the phrase originated in the book The Last Unicorn.

And the Red Bull is a character in this book, years before there was a company by that name. But I’m not going to try to take on the internet for that one.

Next up: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Given the hype around the movie, I knew approximately what the book was about. But having seen only the trailers and not the whole movie, I didn’t know much about what actually happens in the story. It was generally fine, but it was more adult-oriented than I expected, and also darker in some parts. Certainly not recommended for kids.

Next up: The Icebound Land by John Flanagan

I was a big fan of the original Ranger’s Apprentice book, and would recommend that to just about anyone. The sequel was similar. In this third book, however, I noticed some worse language creeping in, in the form of mild oaths and epithets. And some other things made me peg this as a PG-13 rating, compared to just PG for the previous two.

And just like book 2, this book also ends with a non-ending, so that you’ll have to read book 4.

Last up: The Unwanteds by Lisa M. Mann

I don’t remember how I found this book, but I liked it. It was almost the perfect middle-grade fiction book, as it had only a hint of romance and cartoon-type violence. The “almost” comes into play near the end of the book when the violence changes from cartoon to actual.

slight spoiler alert
There are two deaths on screen
and two off screen
end spoiler alert

It is a series, but I am not starting book 2 because book 1 ended well enough that I can leave it there.

That’s it for this review. More book reviews coming up later this year.

Some Wife has a variety of kitchen tools, some more practical than others, and some more useful than I thought, especially when I didn’t know such a tool existed (e.g. lettuce knife).

But the topic of today’s is not such a tool.

It is a tool that is impractical.

It looks like this – side and front views.

It is a cucumber scorer.

I don’t know what exactly it is called, and Some Wife doesn’t know either. The only thing I’ve seen her use it for is to score (i.e. fancily peel) cucmbers.

But it is oddly shaped, and the shape reminded me of something.

And the cucmber tool is vaguely shaped like Wallace, but only in the protruding cheeks. The top of the head doesn’t match. So I thought about it and came up with a match for the top of the tool.

That was better, but Dilbert doesn’t have protruding cheeks so to me the main feature was lacking and this was not the answer.

But inspiration hit me, and I realized the tool was upside-down. So the bumps are not the top of the head but the bottom. If we flip it, it aligns much better with Wallace.

I propose that we call it “the Wallace”. So far it hasn’t caught on, mainly because no one ever asks for the tool.