Taxes

I received some good news from my accountant at McMillan & Associates (http://www.mcmillancpa.com/). I was expecting to pay around $2,000 total in Federal and State taxes this year. To my delight, I'll have to pay half of that. I suspect 2 things caused my lower tax bill. First, I didn't make as much money this past year as I did the year before. It's been over a year and a half since I worked at Medieval Times at Arundel Mills Mall. Also, the Post Office has gotten really tight about overtime. Lastly, when given the choice of delivering Express Mail and getting 2 hours or delivering mail on rural route 10 which I hate and racking up a 9 hours, I chose delivering Express Mail. I know that cost me money there. Second, I put more money in my Individual Retirement Account (IRA). I was able to put $5,000 in it vice $4,000. I know that made a difference. So, I won't have to give as much to the socialist government of Maryland or the spend happy clowns in D.C. I hope to take my accountant's advice and pay some of the 2009's tax in advance so my bill will be even lower next year. We'll see on that. I still have a number of other things I need to pay off. I still owe over $2,300 on my future scooter and another $2,300 on my future U.S./Canada trips. Also, I hope to buy a new laptop. Knock on wood, the one I have is still going strong but, it is coming up on 5 years. I don't want to push my luck with it and have it unexpectedly die on me. So, we'll see on the idea of paying some of my future taxes in advance. Cheers all!

Cluck-U

I've been hankering for some chicken wings for a while. There is a chain called Cluck-U that specializes in the things. They used to have one in the town that I live in but, for some reason, that store closed. While driving back from church one day, I saw a person in a chicken costume promoting a Cluck-U restaurant in Lanham, Maryland. Today, I decided to see if I could find the place and satisfy my hunger for some chicken wings.

I didn't know where the restaurant was in Lanham. However, I remembered that my Garmin GPS unit has names and addresses of restaurants. I decided to see if it had a listing for the Lanham Cluck-U. To my delight, it did. I clicked on the listing and, my GPS promptly figured out how to get me to the restaurant. Within a minute, it had the directions. I subsequently followed and found the place with no problem.

I decided to try their family pack which is 30 wings and four 8-ounce sides. They have a number of different flavors of wings going from super mild to super hot. I wimped and went for honey mustard. For my 4 sides, I decided to try their yellow corn, cole slaw, black beans and rice and mashed potatoes. The total cost with tax was $27.55. I believe it took them approximately 10 minutes to prepare my order.

The wings had a decent amount of meat on them and, the honey mustard flavor was all right. As I didn't want to make a pig of myself, I ate the yellow corn and mashed potato sides. Mashed potatoes tend to taste lousy cold and, corn goes with mashed potatoes. Both sides were all right. Overall, I was pretty pleased with the food and, I'll definitely buy some more wings from the Lanham Cluck-U restaurant when I'm out that way sometime. Cheers all!

Nice News

I got some nice news yesterday. I decided to call the travel clinic to find out the results of the chickpox blood test I had done. To my annoyance, they kept telling me they'd call me back with the information and never did. Finally, I got ahold of someone who was able to tell me the results. It turned out I still had enough chickenpox antibodies to where I don't have to worry about catching it while I'm travelling in Egypt. So, I won't need a chickenpox shot. As I don't like shots, I was delighted with the news. I just wish I didn't have to call them 4 times to find out. That takes care of that item on my checklist.

Not Much To Tell

I haven't been blogging much because, I haven't had much happening at my end of the woods. To my surprise, I've been getting a number of hours at the Post Office. That was a mixed blessing as I had to work on 2 routes I didn't know at all. I saw my Periodontist this past Tuesday for a cleaning. He wasn't pleased with me as I haven't been doing my homework i.e. flossing. I knew I had a fair amount of tartar build-up since the last cleaning. One of the reasons I've been seeing him every 4 months vice the normal 6 is to keep it from getting bad. The most annoying thing about tartar is that once its formed, it can only be removed by a dentist. You have to floss daily to keep it from forming and, I haven't been.

I continue to count the days down till my Egypt trip. I found out Avalon Waterways offers 3 sound and light shows during the tour. I think that's too many and, I asked my travel agent which of the 3 was the one I should definitely see. Visa wise, I'm going to do like so many others and get it when I arrive at the Cairo airport. This will be easier than driving down to D.C., trying to find the Egyptian consulate, hoping I arrive when it's open and hoping I get my passport back in time.

I continue to play scratch off lottery tickets. My luck has been great at times and crappy at others. I hit the $108 prize for a second time and won $172 total that time playing. Right after that, my luck turned to crap and I ended up losing $60. So far, it looks like no one is hitting the big prizes. The number of those still out there hasn't changed in 2 weeks at least. I wonder what's up with that. Did the Maryland lottery make it so only a bunch of the small winners would come up? That way, they wouldn't be stuck with a lot of tickets once all the big prizes are gone. I don't know. I continue to dream of hitting the $80,000 top prize on their Lucky 8's game.

The weather finally started getting warmer. Hopefully, this is a sign that winter is nearly over. I can't say I've been a big fan of winter. I'm less of a fan now that I have to work in it. I'll be glad when spring arrives though that'll have it drawbacks too i.e. rain.

That's all to report for now. I hope any readers I have out there are doing well. May you have a fun President's day weekend. Cheers!

Documents

I received my travel documents from Globus earlier this week. I've been waiting excitedly for them. I'm definitely ready to go on my upcoming trip to Egypt. It should be really awesome. The temples, tombs and history are fascinating. Plus, I'll get to cruise on the Nile River for 3 days. The only down side to the trip will be the long flights to and from Cairo. The flight from New York JFK to Cairo will be 10 hours 45 minutes alone. Plus, I know the flight will be delayed getting out of JFK. I think all flights out of there are now a days.

A different kind of travel bag came with the documents. The Nile Tour/Cruise is run by Globus affiliate Avalon Waterways. Their bag was blue and looked more like a messenger type bag. One pleasant surprise was the guide to the Nile that came with the documents as well as tips for cruising on the boat. I'll be curious to see how cruising on Avalon's boat differs from cruising with Royal Caribbean. Hopefully, Avalon won't try to milk me like Royal Caribbean did. If nothing else, I'll be on the boat 3 days which isn't too bad. It's sort of like an introduction to river cruises.

That's all to tell for now. Stay tuned for further updates. Cheers all!

Shots

Last Wednesday, I made it to the nearby base immunizations clinic to get the shots I needed for my trip to Egypt. I found out I missed out getting the inhale flu immunization by a week. The supply they had on hand expired then. So, I ended up getting 3 shots. One for the flu, one for typhoid and a combination tetanus/diptheria/pertussis shot. I thought the typhoid would make the arm I got it in sore but, it turned out the tetanus did that. It's felt like I had a big knot in my left arm from that shot.

Thankfully, I haven't suffered any flu like symptoms from the flu shot. I was dreading that. I've had that happen previously.

Now, I have to wait for results to come back from the chickenpox blood test. I found out from the immunizations folks that if they come out low, I'll need at least 1 shot though the procedure calls for 2 30 days apart. Hopefully, I won't need either. We'll see. If nothing else, it's nice to have these done and out of the way. I should receive my travel documents by the end of this week. I can't wait to get those. Cheers all!