I’m trying to work on something right now, so I will not expound on the long and growing list of offenses that the governments within mass have committed, but will restrict my comments to their latest (and greatest) offense.

Long story short, they have decided to “audit” my 2008 income tax return, when I moved to Massachusetts in July. They have just sent me a notice telling me that I owe them income tax for all the money that I made while living in Illinois during that period. That’s right…I was living in Illinois, with no intention until the last moment to move to massachusetts, but they think I owe them money for the six months that I was an Illinois state resident.

Then, my options for correcting this error (and if this is not an error, I am going to sue) are to call their call center, which has the amazingly convenient hours of 1000 to 1300, and 1330 to 1600, Monday through Friday. And I guarantee that if this is the standard of their auditors, that call center is going to be EXTREMELY busy. So, I can tell you how much I’m looking forward to THAT hold time.

Once again, Massachusetts, I love living here…but fuck you.

I should get on that.

Anyway, the new gallery. Also available from the photo galleries page.

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The room itself is really nice. AND! free nets on which to blog. :-)

We’re here in München for Neuschwanstein, (the Cinderella Castle), which is one of those “must sees”. We’ll head out there tomorrow morning. Today, we walked about München’s marktplatz, and the plan for the evening is to go find food and then beer, and then if we’re really feeling frisky, someplace to dance.

Two cool things about wandering about here that set it apart from other areas. First, we hit a permanent market that was really cool…lots of food and butchers and SOOO much fresh fruit….and a bavarian oom-pah band. It was awesome. Then, walking back, we ran into a group called “Balkan Connection“, playing jazz influenced classical with a violin playing frontman who was a true born showmen (and a damn good violinist, too). We watched them for probably at least an hour. Anne got the cd. I dropped like 6 euro into their gimme case. They were worth it.

Anyway…more tomorrow after the castle.

Anyway, the pictures from that (and a number of other things) are up at my picasa. I’m going to need to buy more web space for pictures if I keep going nuts with the SLR, so now I have to decide whether I want to go through bluehost or picasa. Yay, more research! ;-)

Anyway, the personal update…I should be moving into my house this week, although I’m not sure when my internet will be finalized and installed, so I may be a bit out of touch for the next couple of weeks. Well, more so, for those of you who I’ve been talking to via skype and whatnot.

More soonish!

I went to bed early last night, around 2300, and got up early this morning, around 720. I even had time to go drop something off at the apartment (and check for the much-desired DSL installation report!…nothing.) I then headed towards base. Before I even reached the first round-about, I saw that the snow showers had plugged up traffic badly…and presumably, the base entrance as well.

So I came back to the hotel, and watched snow fall whilst eating breakfast. Now, I’ll just watch the snow fall and think of you. (yes…YOU. ;-)

I went for a 52 km bike ride. Now that I actually have a computer on my bike, I know how far I’m going and how fast (not fast enough, yet), I know exactly how far I go.

It was a lot of fun. It’s beautiful…my ride took me through small towns, a fairly big town, through woods and through open fields. It was great.

I also learned A LOT about the german bike trail markings. I still maintain that there were a few gaps in the signs, and sometimes the direction that they’re pointing you in is…lacking. However, they do have road signs explicitly for the bikes so that you can stay on the bike trails if you so desire, and that is wonderful.

I’m so glad I decided to do a cyclocross bike. I can’t maintain a fast enough speed on it, yet, but I’ll push it up. Right now I top out at about a 29 kph cruise, which roughly equates to a glacially slow 15 mph. I’ll get that faster.

I didn’t eat enough before I started, and so I hit a brick wall at around 40 km in. I had nothing left. The last 10k was pretty much excruciating. I haven’t been that tired since my boxing match. Now, I used to ride longer distances faster back in the states after no breakfast, but I generally at fairly big dinners fairly late the night before, and then got up pretty early to ride. This time, I ate a moderate dinner fairly early the night before, then drank a few beers, then got up late to ride. So I need to be aware of that kind of scheduling. The second major mistake that I made was forgetting my ID and credit card, which if I’d remembered I could’ve stopped and tanked up on some food in one of the villages. So I think I’ve learned that lesson very well.

All in all a great ride. Now I’m going to take a nap.

1129: I have no deep thoughts here…I’m just enjoying the spectacle. I’m almost even enjoying the talking heads. And I keep tearing up when they do the closeups on the crowd.

1131: Chris Matthews: Still a tool, after all these years. “MSNBC is the network of change…” Jackass.

1132: Bush looks terrified. And he’s getting booed. And he actually looks like he HEARS it this time, unlike the previous times. I gotta say…I don’t think this is the place to boo him. Boo him at his war crimes trial.

1138: Dick Cheney was just smiling. Somewhere, a good thing died.

1140: Barack already looks like the weight is bearing down on him. I should add, it’s not all negative. I can’t even sit DOWN right now.

1152: Had to take a break to get my laptop out so I could sit in front of the TV. Also ordered pizza for jess and me, because I’m about to break my tv because of this preacher. I really wish they’d at least done a effing non-denominational speech . I hate that guy. Yay, Aretha Franklin!

1154: Yay for not over-ornamented songs. Her voice is weird, but will you look at those damn crowds. And the tears. And, as jess says, wow…look at that hat.

1156: Yeah, I lied about that ornamentation thing.

1157: had a comment, but my headphones showed up. Something about boring old white men. BUT BIDEN TOOK HIS OATH! FUCK YEAH!

1159: Yeah, yo yo ma. Nice! Simple Gifts! John Williams! Aaron Copeland! Yeah!

1203: Wish I knew whether other presidents had had this kind of class of music and entertainment. My gut says no, and that’s good enough for the other side…

1205: I’m umm…tempted to stand here at home. Chills chills chills.

1206: FUCKING W000000T!

1208: Starting right off with the burden. Good. Buzzkill, but good.

1209: Brings up the “founding documents”, aka the constitution. Also good. Not so good with the far reaching war thing.

1212: Somehow, Barack’s rhetorical techniques would sound cheesy coming from a lesser man.

1214: Shout out to science. YEAH!

1216: We reject the false choice between our ideals and our safety. YEAH YEAH YEAH. Jess says: they’re showing bush. {laughter}

1219: SHOUT OUT TO THE NONBELIEVERS! THANK YOU OBAMA!

1224: Tearing up again.

1227: Good speech. Jess caught an admiral stepping out of the crowd behind barack to snap a photo on his personal camera. :-) Nice.

1240: That felt good. Now I want my damn pizza.

Life’s been busy.

But here’s a fun picture from lunch today. :-)

An Ode To His Noodliness