Not a nest egg

For fun and excitement today, I went off to my dentist appointment and came to a place of peace about the way forward with that little unexpected financial fun news.

And no, it wasn't even nitrous oxide induced peace, just a decision.

Not hearing from the DOE people, yesterday I had another special conversation with my friends at the IRS about whether using an early distribution of the pension and or 401K to settle the little unexpected debt would be considered a legitimate education expense that would not trigger the additional 10% penalty. That got a no based on an interpretation that the debt is not a current education cost.

So I have to go a different way with it.

BTW, I really do like the IRS. I know that sound crazy to people but they are actually remarkably reasonable and fairly transparent compared to many other agencies. I even have an application in with them.

It may well be that there's an accounting error on the DOE end and that I will be making a duplicate payment but I can't prove it and I can't spend the energy when other things need my attention and when everything else is just so raw.

It feels a lot like being sucked back into a very dark time and it is crazy making because I had no clue.

On top of it all, I've been hiding in plain sight and at any point, certainly within the last four years since I buried my mother, there have been many, many opportunities for them to have contacted me, done offsets or even seized assets and we would have been done and I could have long since absorbed the hit.

Coming in as this lovely surprise, it is very different situation but I need to make it go away even if that cuts hugely into what little I have to work with.

So another call to DOE, a different body on the other end and a settlement number.

Rest of the day studying, resumes, and sorting out the phone story.

Photos on the day from walkabout earlier this month. The continuing theme of utility box art and changes of note in the hood.


The shop window snap has quite the story.

In very recent years this storefront has been a vitamin/supplements shop, Amonite Beads, a real estate office, and now it is a boutique that looks to mix new and vintage/resale.

If memory serves, at one point this shop may also have been a retail shop sort of connected with the nearby Corvette Diner.

Other shop changes along 5th come in the form of what used to be The Irish Shop. In its newest in incarnation there's a tattoo parlor. Not entirely sure what Tommy Nolan would make of that.


And no, I still haven't woven in ends or grafted the fish panels and we will not be talking about swatching in Comfort Chunky.