Just a little (link) love: Goldilocks edition
April 24, 2015
CAREER + MONEY THINGS
Did you know that Donna Freedman launched a new writing course? If you so desired, I’m an affiliate and you can help AGSL keep the lights on if you buy the course through my referral link. For my own edification, I decided that I’m taking the course – self improvement FTW!Ā I’ll blog about my experience, of course.
If you’re married, are you bonused or penalized (interactive thingie)? Does the possible penalty give you pause if you’re considering marriage?
This is why I won’t let PiC or anyone else post identifying information about LB on Facebook. People are horrible.
If you don’t know what’s considered annoying at your work, it might be something you’re doing.
FUN THINGS
I missed the most recent one but National Parks are free these days in 2015. Go forth and wander the trails while I sing “Have yourself a sunny happy hike-day!” like it’s Christmas:
- August 25
National Park Service Birthday
- September 26
National Public Lands Day - November 11
Veterans Day
This is for all my friends who choose not to have kids – I support you.
INTERESTING THINGS
Autism Speaks but does it listen?
Giving after loss: I’m an organ donor. So is PiC. I hope we never have to do so but we are.
I always thought conceiving a second child months after the first was a terrible idea as someone who might have to go through the experience, since mine wasn’t a rose petals and puppies pregnancy, but didn’t know the health risks were that much worse.
Publishing rights aside, if you’re related to a Nazi war criminal, I’m in favor of you never profiting from that relationship.
Uber’s banned in several places and continues to operate anyway. The Dutch have something to say about that.
Be this dog
I can’t embed this for your viewing convenience unfortunately but it’s pretty good.
We would be penalized, more than that graphic says because I itemize single, but not quite enough to itemize married. So right now, we’re getting taxed at the lower single rates and having combined itemized/standard deductions of 3 times the normal standard deduction, whereas we would only get 2 times the normal standard deduction if we were married. It definitely makes me pause about considering marriage, though we’re also both unsure on it regardless, still claiming we’re “too young to consider marriage”, despite the fact that we’re both getting closer and closer to 30 š
Leigh recently posted…Q1 2015 Update
Ouch, that’s huge. I think I didn’t bother to run the numbers too much because I knew we’d get married anyway and I didn’t want to dwell on the hit – but I also didn’t itemize so it wasn’t a huge penalty.
Multiple people have told me we should get married anyway because being married is worth more than the several thousand dollars a year we would save in taxes and we make enough to afford it. In a few years, when my mortgage is paid off, I won’t itemize anyway, so the penalty will be much smaller.
Leigh recently posted…Q1 2015 Update
Sort of feels like comparing apples and oranges, or justifying it the way people justify telling you to have kids if you don’t want them: pay more in taxes but “marriage is worth it”. Well, yeah, I mean, you can always declare something “worth it”.
Which is to say, I don’t think anyone else can really tell you what’s worth paying several thousand extra a year, and certainly not a commitment like marriage š What’s wrong with waiting til you can save it? Nothing. What’s wrong with not bothering? Nothing.
I got your email and see the link here. I don’t know much about the issue with Autism Speaks. I walked with my boyfriend’s sister in law who is the mother of four children– two of which are severely autistic. She herself is very active in Autism education and actually works for an organization right now of people who do one on one therapy for children with Autism. She’s been doing the walk for 8 years. The people she works with also do the walk. I know that at the walk, there were people talking a petition to help further subsidize care and medication.
My feeling is that every large organization has its critics and that’s fine. It’s good to have people keep you focused. But in my case, the people who I walked with adore the organization and have found comfort and support in it and that’s what matters to me. They also appreciate the work Autism Speaks has done in making Autism a focus of conversation and policy discussion. So yea, I’m not surprised someone is unhappy with them but I know the people that I love are very happy with them so that’s good enough for me š
Mutant Supermodel recently posted…Book Challenge: 15 down, 25 to go
That’s totally fair! I just wanted to bring it to your attn once in case it applied to the people in your life. If it doesn’t, great!
I expect most kids who’ve had their identities stolen are victims from their parents mostly. Because, you know, people are awful and no kid is going to report their mom or dad and risk them going to jail. Granted, randoms probably have done it too in larger numbers since internet data all the places all the time. I wonder though how difficult it would be to wipe their credit if they did have someone else using their SSN. I’d expect not very (couldn’t they just verify they were a minor and reissue a new SSN?) but luckily haven’t had to deal with that sort of thing.
Taylor Lee @ Engineer Cents recently posted…Squeaking By
I’m sure that’s also a major set of the stolen identities – I don’t think we’ll know what the real breakdown is since most kids won’t want to report their parents. But from what I’ve read, it’s actually pretty hard to clean up any stolen identity, whether a minor or not. And you can’t protect them from it either.
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