04/26/2008: ""

Have I ever mentioned how much I like Scooby Doo? I'm sure most people who've known me personally and for an extended period of time have probably heard of this by now, but I don't believe I've ever mentioned here anything about my penchant for the Scooby. I suppose it's really not all that strange, nor even very interesting, but I really do like the series (shy of the live-action movies and the current iteration, but do I really need to mention that?).

I think it's something about how they take something so indescribable, something that deviates the norms of your day to day life and then somehow manage to not only fix it, but break it down into something much simpler. I think most of us can readily agree that ghosts are indeed 'not good', nor something that we have experience with and any idea about how to deal with them. But behind all that magic, mysticism, and general ghost-i-ness, we find projectors, trap floors, floating ghost costumes, and some mean old guy who just wanted to own his own gold mine. Of course, I don't have my own talking dog, but it is still somewhat reassuring to see things just work out, and be able to understand it all when it's done.

That was the random for the day. The practical stuff's a little less fun.

I learned yesterday that the IRS has absolutely no clue where my tax return went, or what's wrong with it. All they know is that they have something from me, but who ever has it hasn't done anything to process it. Considering I sent this thing in back in February, I'm a little miffed. I also learned that the department in charge of resolving this little oversight on their part can take up to 30 days to resolve it. Keep in mind that I have over thirty and less than forty days left in America. So! Somehow, all my paperwork's in limbo and there's nothing I can do about it for now. Obviously this will eventually get solved, but I may have to submit documents from across the globe, which isn't fun.

What also makes this more aggravating is that I was expecting a fair bit of money back on this, which will not sit in my bank account stateside for a year until I come back to visit. Fortunately, I'm paranoid by nature and didn't plan on having this money for my budget getting to and living in Japan (living expenses, traveling expenses, and other one-time purchases until I get paid after the first month), but that doesn't make it any less annoying. Seeing as they had my paperwork (I assume, seeing as they DID have something from me, but no return), the least they could've done was contact me...

Alas, that's just how things go, so it doesn't pay to be angry about it. I assure you, though, that the first 45 minutes after I figured it all out was full of colorful uses of the English language that'd make a swarthy pirate blush. Go me.

The semester's winding down, and I'm pretty much done with homework entirely. One more paper, one assignment this weekend, two presentations (one 5 minutes, one 10, both in English), two tests, one take home exam, and two finals. Pretty exciting, huh? Busy, busy, busy.

Alas, tomorrow I need to go out and do a formal/professional picture with my siblings. I should mention that I really, really, really dislike going out to have pictures done (there's a long story behind this) but I suppose I should go out and do it before I leave the country. For the memory of it, if nothing else.

I should get going and do something productive, though I'm not sure what yet. The highlight of my day so far has been weighing t-shirts on a little 5lb postal scale. Kinda funny how the weight of clothes suddenly becomes important when you're going to mail them across the Pacific.

Off I go..!


Jason