This is what I wanted to post Sunday night at the old UB Blog.Tax Day is almost here. That day this year is Tuesday, April 15. Whenever the tax deadline landed on the same Monday as Patriots Day, there was an extra day for filing. However, Patriots Day 2008 is on April 21. Time is running out.
Contact the Internal Revenue Service and the Massachusetts Department of Revenue for extension forms and file them by midnight Tuesday if you don't have all your W-2 forms and other required tax documents that you have to file with your tax returns. If you are expecting a refund, apply for the direct deposit option on your returns because it's a lot quicker to get your money.
I'm saying this because I used to work for the IRS. The office I used to work in was located in the John F Kennedy Federal Building at Government Center (for a few years it was located in the offices above Copley Place Shopping mall during the mid-1990s). I worked there from 1987 to 2000. It was most dysfunctional office I ever worked in. Some of the managers and co-workers were abusive towards me.
Here's one story I'll share:
Ond morning in 1997, I was on the phone with talking to a customer about his tax problems. One of my co-workers stood right behind me talking very loud to another co-worker making it difficult for me and my customer to hear ourselves. After I put my customer on hold, I asked him to be quiet or go somewhere else to talk.
My co-worker turned around and shouted at me, "Shut up! You have no business sitting here!"
"Don't talk to me that way or I'll get my manager over here!" I shouted back.
"I don't care what you do!" he yelled.
"Okay! I'll be right be back!" I yelled back.
I got and walked over to my manager's cubicle. When she saw me, she got mad.
"What the hell are you doing off the phone and not at your desk!" She shouted.
I told her the situation with my co-worker. She walked back to my desk with me and had an argument with my co-worker. It lasted five minutes before I could get back on the phone and help my customer.
Why was my co-worker so mad at me? He didn't like where I was sitting even though my desk that was just like all the other desks in the office and was situated in one corner of the office. To this day, I still think that my co-worker was just a nutcase.
I would like to write a memoir about my experiences there. I only hope that Governor Deval Patrick can help me shop my book proposal around New York and find the right literary agent. I'll bet my former co-workers will be shocked to learn that I have Asperger's Syndrome. I was diagnosed two years after I left the IRS.
