Happy new year!
The family and I attended an awesome roll-your-own sushi new year's party (thanks guys!), and we're recovering.
We had a year-end flex spending crisis, we used our new all-in-one fax machine, and we have some goals for the new year.
The family and I attended an awesome roll-your-own sushi new year's party (thanks guys!), and we're recovering.
We had a year-end flex spending crisis, we used our new all-in-one fax machine, and we have some goals for the new year.
We didn't spend enough of our flex spending allowance. That whole system is a sham. Any tax savings is balanced by the 'use-it-or-lose-it' mentality. It's like gambling on who's getting sick, only if you don't bet under, you lose to the house. Hey! Federal government! Listen up. You can't keep our money to fund a system that doesn't work. Let's hope, in the new year, we manage to craft a new system where the money is set aside, is rolled over, or is completely covered by the government in the first place.
We were able to put our new epson workforce 610 to good use over the break. Powered it up, hooked it up to the phone line, gave it some wireless settings, and off it goes! It's loud when it's feeding the paper, but otherwise silent. The only trick? Finding out its mac address so I could add it to the filters. Unlike every other networked device I've ever bought, there's no sticker with the address printed on it. To find it, print a network report page. Let's also hope, in the new year, that epson learns to add a mac address sticker to their networked devices.
The fax machine allowed us to send in all our remaining medical receipts, so the annual end-of-year spending crunch won't be so tight this year. We made a series of year end purchases to spend through the surprisingly high remainder. Things like glasses, eligible over-the-counter items, and prescription refills.
I would like to point out that CVS is great about procuring your family's prescription purchase history. We got individual reports per family member from the pharmacy, and were able to verify that we had deducted all of our prescriptions. Dominicks' pharmacy would have required an in-person visit, but CVS had it prepared for us over the phone.
Which brings me to the resolutions for the new year.
Let's do it!
We were able to put our new epson workforce 610 to good use over the break. Powered it up, hooked it up to the phone line, gave it some wireless settings, and off it goes! It's loud when it's feeding the paper, but otherwise silent. The only trick? Finding out its mac address so I could add it to the filters. Unlike every other networked device I've ever bought, there's no sticker with the address printed on it. To find it, print a network report page. Let's also hope, in the new year, that epson learns to add a mac address sticker to their networked devices.
The fax machine allowed us to send in all our remaining medical receipts, so the annual end-of-year spending crunch won't be so tight this year. We made a series of year end purchases to spend through the surprisingly high remainder. Things like glasses, eligible over-the-counter items, and prescription refills.
I would like to point out that CVS is great about procuring your family's prescription purchase history. We got individual reports per family member from the pharmacy, and were able to verify that we had deducted all of our prescriptions. Dominicks' pharmacy would have required an in-person visit, but CVS had it prepared for us over the phone.
Which brings me to the resolutions for the new year.
- keep medical spending records in convenient place and fax them in throughout the year. This will prevent the year end flex spending holocaust.
- eat reasonably. My doctor says that not only is my blood pressure high, but so is my bad cholesterol. I'm cutting out cheese and beer (yikes to both - I'm from Wisconsin originally!), and signed up for Weight Watchers online to track my eating habits and get some guidance.
- exercise moderately. Starting with 30 minutes a day, as recommended by my doctor for the cholesterol. She says it should up the 'good' cholesterol level. There should be great gym membership deals in the new year, but I shouldn't need one.
- get home on time. Then I get to see the kids and help out enough around the house.
Let's do it!
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