Summer, 2001

Income Tax Extensions
By Iona Hoeppner

You probably already know that you can file for an automatic extension and set back the deadline for filing your income tax return to August 15. You don't even have to give a reason, just fill out Form 4868. It doesn't even require a signature! Voila! You now have an additional FOUR months to put your return together.

There is only one hitch... If you will owe any taxes, you must pay them when you file for the extension, so the deadline for payment is still in April. Since you have not yet prepared the return, you probably don't know how much tax is due. If you're not sure how much, if any, you will owe, try to make a rough estimate based on the figures you already have.

If mid-August arrives and you are still unable to prepare your tax return, you will need to file Form 2688... but this time you'll need to sign the form and offer a good, valid reason why you can't file. Frivolous excuses won't fly. If the IRS approves the extension, you will have another THREE months to get your returns in the mail.

Letter to the IRS
Submitted by Mary Ann Crum

Internal Revenue Service State Processing Center
Holtsville, NY 01150-0115

Dear Taxmen/women:
Enclosed is my 2001 tax return & payment. Please take note of the attached article from the February 8, 2001 USA Today newspaper which serves as my Year 2000 Tax guide. In the article, you will see that the Pentagon pays $171.50 for hammers and NASA has paid $600.00 for a toilet seat.

Please find enclosed four toilet seats (value $2400) and six hammers (value $1029). This brings my total payment to $3429.00.

Please note the overpayment of $22.00 and apply it to the "Presidential Election Fund," as noted on my return. Might I suggest you the send the above mentioned fund a 1.5 inch screw. (See attached article...HUD paid $22.00 each 1.5 inch Phillips head screw.)

It has been a pleasure to pay my tax bill this year, and I look forward to paying it again next year.
Sincerely,
J. Smith

Hand-Me-Downs
By Athena Hoeppner

I've taken quite a load of hand-me-downs.

Give me your used, your worn,
Your muddled clashes yearning to clothe me,
The wretched unused of your teeming drawer.
Send shoes, the trousers, fashion-tossed to me.
I lift my hanger beside the closet door.

BTW, in order to play off the poem on the Statue of Liberty, I looked it up:
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

I think we've had a national change of philosophy.

It Takes Courage to Be a Christian
Submitted by Phyllis Coats

It takes courage to refrain from gossip when others delight in it, to stand up for the absent person who is being abused.

It takes courage to live honestly within your means, and not dishonestly on the means of others.

It takes courage....
to be a REAL man, a TRUE woman, to hold fast to your ideals when it causes you to be looked upon as strange and peculiar.

It takes courage...
to be talked about, and remain silent, when a word would justify you in the eyes of others, but which you dare not speak because it would injure another.

It takes courage....
to refuse to do something that is wrong although everyone else may be doing it with attitudes as carefree as a summer song...

It takes courage....
to live according to your own convictions, to deny yourself what you cannot afford to love your neighbor as yourself, to follow the example of our risen Lord!!

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Author: Iona Hoeppner
Copyright © 2001 Handmaidens4Christ. All rights reserved.
Revised: April 20, 2006.