Common Tax Errors to Avoid

Common Tax Errors to Avoid

Some things to remember before you sign the check

Include your Social Security number on each page of your tax return so that, if a page is misplaced by the IRS, it can be reattached.

Check that you have claimed all of your dependants, such as elderly parents who may not live with you.

Recheck your cost basis in the shares you sold this year, particularly shares of a mutual fund. Income and capital gains dividends that were automatically reinvested in the fund over the years increase your basis in the mutual fond and thus reduce a gain or increase a loss that you have to report.

Fill out Form 8606, Nondeductible IRA Contributions, for your contributions to an IRA account, even if you don’t claim any deduction for the contribution.

Be sure that your W-2s and 1099s are correct. If they’re wrong, have them corrected as soon as possible so IRS records agree with the amount shown on your return.

If you are married, check to see if filing separate returns rather than a joint return is more beneficial.

If you are single and have a dependant who lives with you, check to see if you qualify for the lower tax rates available to a head of household or surviving spouse with a dependant child.

Beekman street in New York. Photo by Elena

If you worked for more than one employer, be sure to claim the credit for any overpaid Social Security taxes withheld.

Check last year’s return to see if there are any items that carry over to this year, such as charitable contributions or capital losses that exceeded the amount you were previously able to deduct.

If you did not pay enough taxes during the year, complete form 2210, Underpayment of Estimated Tax, to calculate the underpayment penalty. You may come up with a lower penalty than the IRS would.

Don’t miss deadlines: December 31, to set up a Keogh plan; April 15, to make your IRA contribution, file your return, or request an extension.

If you regularly get large refunds, you’re having too much withheld and, in effect, giving an interest-free loan to the IRS. Changing the number of allowances you claim on a W-4 form will increase your take-home pay.

Sadness

Sadness

By Timons Esaias

My clothes illustrated the loss of culture. I had been raised a Congregationalist, in Little Falls, New York. I wore American suits and ties at work, and jeans and Pendleton shirts at home, until the New People decided that the ideal attire for human beings must be the robes and burnoose of Persia in the sixteenth century. My Amy Vanderbilt manners have been replaced with the extreme formalism of second century Shansy, with touches of fourteenth century Japan, and with completely invented New People additions thrown in. I have learned court poses, and formal mudras, and my native English has been replaced with the Sanskrit the New People decided was our best language. I am proficient in sign-speech; Not because I, or a relative, needed it, but because they don’t care to listen to our gabble; and so we must sign whenever more than three of us are together.

My religion had been replaced with the Wisdom, which seemed cobbled from Islam, Zoroastrianism, and Buddhism.

For years I had thought of myself as a highly cultured person, an artist and an intellectual. As each challenge, each adaptation had been presented by the planet’s nwe owners, I had risen to meet it, to exceed the standards required of us. I had been willing to commit murder, and commit it that very day, as part of my coping, my rising to meet a difficult and awkward transition. Standing on that Wall, that day, I lost my persona. Lost my reinvented, carefully maintened, safe, obliging self. I looked across the Fish with the eyes of a caged animal.

Sadness. Photo by Elena

I fought down the urge to push the visitor off the Wall, but only because I knew the attempt would be futile. Human reflexes are not fast enough to touch them, much less knock one over, and their boidies far too easily repair themselves.

Perhaps it sensed some part of my feelings, for it chose that moment to gesture in the direction of the cornfield and utter two full minutes of discordant four-theme lyrics. I was surprised to find myself following the gist of the speech, even though I found the meaning too bizarre and too awful for words. Still, I let the minder repeat the contents, while the visitor took a brief stroll down the battlements, awaiting my reply.

Science Fiction and Fantasy 2015, edited by Rich Horton, Prime Books, 2015.

Digital Art: Fantasy Worlds

Digital Art: Fantasy Worlds

Many 3D digital artists are taken with the design of virtual worlds. Naturally, these online, game and other worlds often take elements from fantasy and science-fiction scenery and backgrounds, while more rarely centering on the real world. While mostly seen in Web based, interactive, multi-player (multiple, simultaneous users) games, such artificial, sot to speak. Societies are likewise visible in other segments of society. For example, the Goth subculture or Medieval-character themed undertakings such as the Renaissance Fair are other examples. The Middle-Ages have very often been the main historical context in fantasy tales, just as the Victorian era is associated with Gothic art and literature and apparel.

A world full of fantasy. As can be seen from the picture. Image: Megan Jorgensen

Star Trek presents a series of worlds, including even additional dimensions and continuums (such as the one inhabited by the alien race in Voyager or the Q from The Next Generation). Middle Earth from The Lord of the Rings trilogy, as well as the surrounding of the Nibelung accounts and the legend surrounding not only knights of the round table, but also as it applies to magical actors, such as the Lady of the Lake, Morgan le Fay and Merlin. Another view of virtual life is in such Websites as SecondLife and its of use of avatars. Just as in Cameron’s movie, Avatar, avatars allow one to vicariously experience (as one’s own) an entity’s existence in an alternate world.

Fantasy Worlds. Photo by Elena

Cimmeria

Cimmeria: From the Journal of Imaginary Anthropology

By Theodora Goss

«Cimmerians don’t recognize twins,» said Lisa. «That has to be the explanation. Do you remember the thirteenth-century philosopher Farkosj Kursand? When God made the world, He decreed that human beings would be born one at a time, unique, unlike animals. They would be born defenseless, without claws or teeth or fur. But they would have souls. It’s in a children’s book – I have a copy somewhere, but it’s based on Kursand’s reading of Genesis in one of his philosophical treatises. Milw would know which. And it’s the basis of Cimmerian human right law, actually. That’s why women have always had more rights here. They have souls, so they’ve been allowed to vote since Cimmeria became a parliamentary monarchy. I’m sure it’s mentioned in one of the articles – I don’t remember which one, but check the database Mike is putting together. Shaila must have been a twin, and the Cimmerians don’t recognize the second child as separate from the first. So Shaila is one girl. In two bodies, but with one soul. »

« Who came up with that stupid idea? »

« Well, to be perfectly honest, it might have been you. » She leaned back in our revolving chair. I don’t know how she could do that without falling. « Or Mike, of course. It certainly wasn’t my idea. Embryologically it does make a certain sense. Identical twins really do come from one egg. »

« So they’re both Shaila ».

« There is no both. The idea of both is culturally inappropriate. There is one Shaila, in two bodies. Think of them as Shaila and her shadow. »

Cimmeria. Photo by Elena

I tested the theory once, while walking through the market with Afa. We were walking through the alley of the dog-sellers. In Cimmeria, almost every house has a dog, for defense and to catch rats. Cats are not sold in the market. They cannot be sold at all, only given or willed away. To sell a cat for money is to imperil your immortal soul. We passed a woman sitting on the ground, with a basket beside her. In it were two infants, as alike as the proverbial two peas in a pod, half-covered with a ragged blanket. Beside them lay a dirty mutt with a chain around its neck that lifted its head and whimpered as we walked by.

« Child how many in basket? » I asked Afa in my still-imperfect Cimmerian.

« There is one child in that basket, Pati, » she said. I could not get her to stop using the diminutive. I even told her that in my language Pati was a woman’s name, to no effect. She just smiled, patted me on the arm, and assured me that no one would mistake such a tall, handsome (which in Cimmerian is the same word as beautiful) man for a woman.

« Only one child? »

« Of course. One basket, one child. »

Shaila’s shadow followed her everywhere. When she and her sisters sat with me in the room wit the low divans and the large-screen TV, studying American slang, she was there. « What’s up! » Shaila would say, laughing, and her shadow would stare down at the floor. When Shaila and I walked through the gardens, she walked six paces behind, pausing when we paused, sitting when we sat. After we were married, in our apartment in Arizona, she would sit in a corner of the bedroom, watching as we made love. Although I always turned off the lights, I could see her : a darkness against the off-white walls of faculty housing.

Once, I tried to ask Shaila about her. « Shaila, do you know the word twin? »

« Of course, » she said. « In America, if two babies are born at the same time, tey ar twins. »

Twins. Photo of Elena

The Building of the Long Serpent

The Building of the Long Serpent

By Michelle Knowlden, excerpt

While Robyn read over his shoulder, I inspected the nearly stocked shelves against the walls. The room smelled of varnish, thick iron nails, graphite dust, turpentine, and wood shavings. The middle of the shed was crammed with worn worktables. Half-shewn oars lay in the shavings on the tabletops. The door had a heavily padlock, and the one small window was barred. I leaned against a worktable and wondered if the long serpent of Robyn’s investigation would interfere with dinner.

My pager jangled loudly, interrupting my thoughts. On the screen I read: “’Michaela. Call me immediately at 909-555-0444. Helena.”

I accidentally pressed the erase button. “Robyn,” I said. “I’m going to the ladies’ room. I’ll be right back.”

It was difficult to turn the double-wide trailer’s doorknob with gloved hands, but I managed. The first door I opened led to a room where a gray-haired man and a plump blonde woman stood tightly clinched together.

“Excuse me,” I said as they sprang apart. I closed the door.

Building of the long serpent. Photo by Elena

At the third door down the narrow hall I found the ladies’ room. I was washing my hands when the blonde woman eased in, breathing heavily and pink with embarrassment. “It’s not what you think,” she began.

I raised the finger that I was gingerly drying off.

“None of my business,” I said and carefully put the surgical gloves back on my hands.

“No, please, let me explain. You’re one of the fire investigators, right?”

I shook my head. “That would be my cousin, Robyn Cardex. I’m just her assistant. My name’s Micky.”

She frowned.

“Micky Cardex? That sounds familiar. Have we met?

“I don’t think so.” I wound the cellophane tape back around my wrists.

“Well, it’ll come to me. I have a knack with names. I’m Gwen Stockard, the office manager. Don’s my husband.”

“Ah?”

“Yes, that’s right. The man in the office with me was Arne Ruskilde. Don’s partner.”

“Ah.” I said again.

“This has nothing to do with the fire. Don and I are getting divorced, but not because of Arne and me. Don doesn’t even know about us. We’re just waiting to tell him after the boat’s launched.”

“Shame about the delay,” I said and tried to edge past her to the door. She didn’t budge.

“Darn tootin’ it’s a shame,” she grumbled. “This is killing me and Arne. That boat better launch next month because by God I’m not waiting till spring.”

“I’m sure they’ll find the arsonist soon,” I said and tried another sally out the door. She stood like Gibraltar in the straits and her eyes narrowed.

Published in September 2000, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery magazine.