The Return of Taxpayer #2

This week I received another (smaller) check from the UC Regents and a letter that claimed that this was the last of the class action lawsuit money. I'm still not sure what the lawsuit was about, but the check gave me a bad feeling.

See, when I got the first (rather substantial) check last year, a bunch of people were grumbling that we might have to declare it as income on our taxes. That didn't really make a lot of sense to me, since the lawsuit (as far as I can tell) was because we were charged too much for tuition, so theoretically that money had already been taxed. But since logic and taxes don't hang out together, I made a mental note to add that to my taxes.

And then that mental note went through the laundry and became little pieces of fluff in the mental dryer.

So, yeah, I got the second check this week and immediately thought "Crap!" It was hard enough to file taxes the first time. But I figured it would probably be better to file an amendment before the IRS noticed, rather than after.

And then two days later I got a letter from the IRS. I get a letter from the IRS pretty much every year. Obviously this is a sign that I should just pay someone else to do my taxes, but I just can't do that.

Anyhow, I opened the envelope quickly (sort of like ripping off a band-aid -- it's better to get it over with right away) and scanned to find out how much extra I owed.

Apparently I somehow claimed zero dependents on my taxes this year, so they're sending me a refund. I'm not really sure how that happened. I suspect that the amount of the refund is roughly the amount of money I'll owe if I really did have to declare the lawsuit money as income.

Maybe I should seek professional help...