August 20, 2013

On Again, Off Again

The PayPal donation button is back. Sad to say, this doesn't mean my troubles with the IRS are over. To the contrary, after my telephone conversation with them last Friday, they're probably just beginning. More about that another time. I'm still not certain what I'm going to do about the various deadlines they gave me for providing tons of crap to them.

But I questioned them several times about whether I could use the PayPal account "safely." They assured me that I could, and they said it in enough different ways that I might (possibly) (perhaps) (if I squint a certain way and the light's just right) believe them. (Background here, here and here, if you're just joining our delightful little melodrama.)

So the donation button is there for those generous souls who would like to use it. (Do I need donations at the moment? Hell, yes. I always need donations. I'm poor.) But I'm going to be very careful about using it, in the following way. When donations reach several hundred dollars ($400 or $500 at the most, here's hoping), I'm going to delete the button again -- until I'm able to withdraw the funds that are there. In this way, there won't be too much at risk, in case the IRS swoops in again. They insist they aren't going to do that for now, but I'll still play it on the safe side. And I'll do my best to get to the corner store promptly to withdraw the funds, my horrible health notwithstanding.

And then, once the account balance is zeroed out again, I'll put the button back up. So we'll see how that goes.

At least, the IRS didn't threaten me with jail if I didn't "cooperate." Of course, and as I know all too well from their little raiding expedition, they'll simply take all my money. And if they do that enough, I'll die soon enough.

Don't you love the smell of freedom? Kind of like the stink of a huge pile of shit on a very hot day.

Meanwhile, the writing. I thought this was pretty good. Almost no one agrees with me. It's been read by very few people and, just several days after publication, it's well on its way to oblivion. (In fairness, four people wrote me lovely notes about it. Four people.) I was going to write a second article about Manning and related issues, because there were several important points I wasn't able to include in that first one. Now, I don't think I'll bother. Maybe I'll change my mind. Probably not.

What hurts when an article like the latest one is almost completely ignored -- and it hurts very deeply -- is that I think there might well be a larger audience for a post of that kind. But I'll never be able to find out, because so few people link to it that almost no one even knows that it exists.

So I think about that, and then I remember all the shit with the IRS, and I want to ... never mind.

Thank God we live in the United States, right? Where anything is possible, if you just work hard enough. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

I'm going back to bed.