I hope you all have had a Happy Easter, or a lovely day if Easter isn't your holiday.

My thanks to those who responded to the Happy Easter thread on the message board; please go check to see what was written, and add your own thoughts if you'd like.

Confession time: this year, I procrastinated greatly in terms of doing my taxes. Yes, they're done now, and will be mailed on time. But I deliberately waited till this weekend to finish them. I knew it wouldn't be too complicated, since my income last year was pretty simple to track.

For those of you who would like to complain about how hard it is to fill out Form 1040, hush now. You have not suffered until you do the North Carolina tax return. Some years back, the state redid the tax forms, and in so doing, made them so complicated that it frequently takes longer to fill them out than the federal ones, and you absolutely must go back through them to be sure you haven't made a mistake, like checking the wrong box and declaring that your spouse actually lives on Mars or something.

Make no mistake: I am not objecting to being a taxpayer. And I dearly love North Carolina and feel fortunate to live here. But I would love it if they'd revise the form again to make it a tad easier to fill out.

I would suggest this to the legislature, but they already get to deal with redistricting this year, and that's enough to put on them.

For the curious: I broke even with the feds (they actually owe me a few cents; but don't do refunds that small) and owe the state a grand total of two dollars. I will not be applying for a loan to pay this amount.

I consider that to be a very good thing.