Monday, June 26, 2006
Money, money, money, money. MONEY!
In case you couldn't guess, I've been thinking about money today. Well, money and rain. I'm thinking about rain because it's been raining pretty much non-stop for the past 36 hours. And I'm thinking about money because I'm right in the middle of the odious process of trying to register my vehicle in Virginia.
My Alabama tags expire at the end of this month. I briefly thought about just renewing them so I could put off this process for another year, but I decided instead to be a responsible citizen. And let me be the first to tell you that being a responsible citizen? Sucks.
Registering a vehicle in Virginia is nothing like registering a vehicle in Alabama, where they'll give any yahoo a driver's license and some tags. No, here it is a very detailed eight-step process, which must be accompanied by every piece of identification I've ever owned and possibly a signed contract willing my firstborn child to the Commonwealth of Virginia.
First, I had to switch over my insurance, which turned out to be rather painless and actually a cause for celebration, as my rates went down significantly. (Probably because Virginia won't just give any yahoo a driver's license and some tags.) Then I had to have my vehicle inspected for safety and emissions standards, which, except for a small snag and a pretty vivid nightmare in which every service station I went to had a week-long wait for inspection, was fairly painless, too. Next I must get up at some insanely early hour to try to beat the lines at the DMV so I can get a new license, re-title my car in Virginia, and get my new tags, all without missing a full day of work.
After that, all that's left is registering my car with the county so it can be assessed for personal property tax. And this is where I start to cry.
Diana had mentioned something to me about the extreme suckitude of Virginia's whole car-as-personal-property tax law a few years ago, but I'd kind of brushed it aside since I didn't live in Virginia at the time. But now I do, and so I've spent the past hour or so confronting the ugly reality. Funny how fast time flies when you're reading about taxes, huh? At first I was nearly in tears, thinking I would have to sign away my firstborn to pay the tax, then I learned about a tax relief act that meant I only had to pay 30 percent, but then I discovered that act had been revised in the past year, so now I have to pay some unknown percent of the tax that is probably more than I would've had to pay last year, but also probably less than I would've had to pay before the whole tax-relief thing.
So now I'm just confused. And I've spent an hour reading about taxes. Gross.
In case you couldn't guess, I've been thinking about money today. Well, money and rain. I'm thinking about rain because it's been raining pretty much non-stop for the past 36 hours. And I'm thinking about money because I'm right in the middle of the odious process of trying to register my vehicle in Virginia.
My Alabama tags expire at the end of this month. I briefly thought about just renewing them so I could put off this process for another year, but I decided instead to be a responsible citizen. And let me be the first to tell you that being a responsible citizen? Sucks.
Registering a vehicle in Virginia is nothing like registering a vehicle in Alabama, where they'll give any yahoo a driver's license and some tags. No, here it is a very detailed eight-step process, which must be accompanied by every piece of identification I've ever owned and possibly a signed contract willing my firstborn child to the Commonwealth of Virginia.
First, I had to switch over my insurance, which turned out to be rather painless and actually a cause for celebration, as my rates went down significantly. (Probably because Virginia won't just give any yahoo a driver's license and some tags.) Then I had to have my vehicle inspected for safety and emissions standards, which, except for a small snag and a pretty vivid nightmare in which every service station I went to had a week-long wait for inspection, was fairly painless, too. Next I must get up at some insanely early hour to try to beat the lines at the DMV so I can get a new license, re-title my car in Virginia, and get my new tags, all without missing a full day of work.
After that, all that's left is registering my car with the county so it can be assessed for personal property tax. And this is where I start to cry.
Diana had mentioned something to me about the extreme suckitude of Virginia's whole car-as-personal-property tax law a few years ago, but I'd kind of brushed it aside since I didn't live in Virginia at the time. But now I do, and so I've spent the past hour or so confronting the ugly reality. Funny how fast time flies when you're reading about taxes, huh? At first I was nearly in tears, thinking I would have to sign away my firstborn to pay the tax, then I learned about a tax relief act that meant I only had to pay 30 percent, but then I discovered that act had been revised in the past year, so now I have to pay some unknown percent of the tax that is probably more than I would've had to pay last year, but also probably less than I would've had to pay before the whole tax-relief thing.
So now I'm just confused. And I've spent an hour reading about taxes. Gross.
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