zoo

Jeff and I took a few hours off yesterday to visit the Toronto Zoo with our niece Brittany on her birthday (she's six). It was Jeff's first time at this particular zoo.

Hefty admission fee ($17 for adults, $9 for children). I think this fee should have been discounted because of all the exhibits that were closed because it was off-season...the girls kept excitedly asking to see certain animals only to be disappointed when we arrived to find they weren't there.





Jeff and I met Rachel, Brittany's friend from school, for the first time. Really cute little kid. Super-enthusiastic, too...she yelled "Yippee!" a lot. She also seemed to attach herself to JBR, holding his hand, dragging him around, asking him questions, calling him "Grampy" just like Brittany did. I asked JBR how long he had known Rachel, and he told me it was the first time he had met her. :-)





I'm somewhat stressed out these days, so the zoo trip was a good distraction. Last week, the CCRA (the Canadian equivalent of the IRS) called me and said that my file had been "randomly selected" for review.

I've never been audited before, and can't say that this one of those life experiences I've been hoping to embrace. I've heard so many audit horror stories, mainly about the attitude and treatment involved. Sad to say, so far I haven't come across anything to contradict these stories.

It bugs me that I'm being made to feel like a criminal even though I haven't done anything wrong and have in fact invested a lot of energy and money trying to do the right thing. I'm sure the Inkspot sale was what triggered the "random selection" of my file.

It's frustrating that this is happening just when I feel like my life has finally started to settle down after the whole Inkspot/Xlibris debacle, when I'm finally able to start focussing on my own writing again.

It's frustrating that bad Inkspot/Xlibris karma continues to follow me despite the fact that Xlibris shut down the site and laid off all Inkspot employees over a year ago.





But let me try to look on the bright side of the situation:

-- At least I'm home for all this, not in Philadelphia.

-- I was bound to be audited sooner or later, because of the sale of Inkspot. At least this way I get it over sooner than later.

-- I haven't done anything wrong. Whatever hassles or attitude I endure over the next while, I'll just keep telling myself that and trust (I can hear the more cynical among you hysterically laughing :-)) that in the end, the CCRA will come to realize that.

Wish me luck. :-)

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Today's Blatherpics:

	At the beginning of the zoo trip, Larkin writes her cellphone number on Brittany's arm, just in case Brittany gets separated from us. She does the same for Rachel.
	Watching the camels. Sadly, the camel rides were not running that day.
	We ran into Andrew and Katy (and Andrew's mom) at the zoo. I met Andrew and Pat Williams at local filks. In fact, Allison and I had our first Real Conversation (i.e. conversation longer than the 2 or 3 minute snatches we got at conventions) at one of Pat's housefilks. Pat also gave me a sampler tape with Dave Clement singing years before I actually met Dave.
	JBR and Rachel and Brittany.
	A cute animal whose name totally escapes me. Looks like a Gund stuffed animal, doesn't he? I bet he'd rip your hand off if you reached down to pet him. No, I didn't say this to Brittany and Rachel. (Thanks to Amanda Snyder for pointing out that this animal is a red panda!)