Afternoon Pages: February 21st, 2021

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the D.C. metro region has been in a state of lockdown. To alleviate fear and stress, my writer's group has put together a daily "morning pages" get-together on Zoom in order to touch base before starting the day. Here's some of my brief thoughts.

A polite squirrel.

squirrel

Should give him a hat and $20.

I just filed my taxes for self-employment income and wages and interest/dividends and all that. Man, that took a while. I'm not sure if it's just me but I actually don't mind working through the process of paying taxes. Maybe it's because I'm a masochist and I enjoy the pain of doing paperwork. Or maybe I play around with code too much during the day and not enough with numbers. Or maybe it's just plain fun to see how much you're getting back on your tax return.

Self-employment taxes from being a contractor are hard. Maybe I should talk to a tax person in order to ask whether I get money back by filing 1040ES forms. I guess that's kind of what happens when nothing is withheld up front.

Yesterday was not very productive, but it was decently relaxing. I'm almost finished with Season 7 of House M.D., and I took a walk around some small portion of Arlington and got three salmon rolls with cucumber + avocado in order to celebrate me becoming a homeowner (or really condo-owner) and taking a vacation. It was great.