Ah...my first blog outside of my English 101D class! Now I am blogging all on my own, footloose and fancy free (what ever that may mean! :-). Here it is the end of the first week in April and there is still patches of snow hidden here and there. My beautiful fuchsia baskets (purchased just a week ago) look like old rags and my slim hope that they will somehow rally and come back to the world of the living is starting to fade...I am not sure what part of me that offends the worst, the gardener or the budgetor!

I am so glad that I decided to take this Spring Quarter off from college. Having Brynne's wedding to help plan for in July and Cait's possible wedding in September on top of having to really get things rocking as far as my business expansion plans means that time is limited...extremely limited! It is a good time of the year to look forward and cross things off the proverbial "to do" list with the time to actually do them. I can't believe how much I've accomplished this week. Two dog's papers transferred, OFA X-rays taken and sent, an official BUSINESS LICENSE application completed and paid for (oh yeah!), kennel plans finalized and materials being gathered for that undertaking. It just feels good to get rolling!

Of course, my other big accomplishment was visiting the CPA that Marlene referred me to and getting the taxes completed with his stamp of approval! That was a relief, because my portion of the retirement account was paid in a lump sum and must be claimed this year...that is a lot of taxes to pay. Jim was demanding that he should get all of the deductions, but he didn't qualify for 80% of them, and the 20% that he did sort of qualify, we gave him straight away. He wanted to fight about it,though I figured that it wasn't about a dispute, but rather about who qualified for what. That is why I was willing to go to the expense of a CPA (as opposed to a tax preparer) as I needed to know that facts and not an opinion.

I do believe it is possible to create, even without ever writing a word or painting a picture, by simply molding one’s inner life. And that too is a deed.-Etty Hillesum