I have an abscessed tooth in my upper jaw. It hurts like a sonofabitch and my face is so swollen that I look like I stuck my head in a beehive. I have another 40 min or so before I can call for an appointment, and please oh please let me get one today …
See the IRS publication 525 “Taxable and Nontaxable Income” for 2021. Page 4: Employee achievement award.
“If you receive tangible personal property (other than cash, a gift certificate, or an equivalent item) as an award for length of service or for safety achievement, you must exclude its value from your income. However, the amount you can exclude is limited to your employer’s cost and can’t be more than $1,600 ($400 for awards that aren’t qualified plan awards) for all such awards you receive during the year.”
This morning I tuned the radio to the local classical station - hoping to get some music to take my mind off of the events in the Ukraine. The station is playing music from the film Alexander Nevsky.
Good to know! I’ve narrowed it down to two (a Le Creuset dutch oven or a DeWalt miter saw), and they’re both under $400.
I was sort of expecting the awards to be on the cheap/useless side because of a coworker’s experience; he was one of the first to get a catalog as part of the new awards program, and had said the paper shredder was the only useful thing he saw.
Unless you want to walk 5 miles, $20 is a bargain.
A few years ago I was leaving work and there was a car sitting in my lot. The woman told me she was driving home, her car was making weird noises so she pulled off the road, and now it wouldn’t start.
I suggested she call a tow truck, but it was her brother’s car and he was at work. He’d be able to fix it later. I suggested she call a friend for a ride home, but she said they’re were all working. She asked me for a ride home, but I had three dogs and a bird; no room, plus one of the dogs would try to kill her.
I suggested a local taxi service. They mostly do contract rides for schools, but it was worth a shot. She called and they couldn’t help, but one of their drivers was leaving for the day and he’d drive her.
A few minutes later he showed up. He rolled down his window and asked where she wanted to go. He told her it was $25, and she told him that was too much.
He drove off without further discussion. I left shortly after.
Our service award system works out pretty well. You pick a company to get a gift card from. HR person puts it in a gift bag and hands it to you.
Once I picked Amazon but my wife used it before I could. Now I’m smarter and pick places she’s not interested in. Next year I’ll get a $200 gift card to REI (20 years at this place).
I once received a gift card from the company and it did appear on my W2 that year - in accordance with the IRS instructions.
I once read of a person who, upon retiring, asked that he NOT receive any of the usual gifts - especially not a clock. So his coworkers chipped in and bought him a nice model train set. Fast forward a year and his basement was filled with a model train layout.
Last year mice invaded our basement in November and early December as it was getting cold - not entirely unexpected. They were trapped and removed, and the incursions died away during the rest of the winter.
This year I caught very few in November and December - but they’ve been coming on in waves since then.
If this keeps up I’m gonna have to buy a new jar of Skippy peanut butter for baiting traps.
Mice get into our home every winter. I live trap them and my gf releases them in the barn. I have a jar of cheap peanut butter just for mousetrapping that has a skull and crossbones written in Sharpie on the label.
They prefer to live in the walls of our house… skittering around at night when only I can hear them (wife could sleep through a Civil War reenactment on our front lawn).
She’d freak if she heard them, and task me with destroying the invaders. Me, I just smile, because we’re helping keep cute li’l meeces warm… and they’ll move to their summer place (the garage) in a month or so.
Le Creuset makes really nice cookware. I bought one for my wife a few years back and she loves it. It does a great job, it’s easy to clean, and it’s really durable.
I’m also a big fan of DeWalt tools, but they’re generally out of my price range. I’ve only borrowed them in the past.
You can’t go wrong either way.
I stand corrected. Now that you mention it, my own “been there a while” award was not treated as income. My husband’s company tends to do spot bonuses, and those ARE counted as income - but grossed up, so he actually gets the full amount to spend.
Gee, after working for the federal government for thirty years all I got was a huge wood and brass plaque. I left it behind when I moved from Chicago to NC, along with the matching one they gave me when I retired.
Went to make an omelette the other night and discovered the egg had been fertilized when I cracked it into the bowl.
By Nurgle’s festering anus was that smell fowl. I was dry heaving for 5 minutes.
So to speak (“fowl”).
grumble
It pinged that it didn’t look right when I typed it, but I didn’t get the misspelled flag so just ignored it.
One of my aunts cracked open an egg into the frying pan, and out popped a fetal chick. Still in her night gown, she ran screaming out of the house, down the street. I wonder what the neighbors thought was happening.
TIL that some fetal chicks are born in nightgowns, will jump out of your frying pan screaming, and run out of your house and down the street.
And the neighbors?
“Fred, it’s the Jammer house. Another one of those whack-a-doodle ‘Natural’ egg disasters. Honestly, when are they going to buy their eggs at Krogers like everybody else?”
So… Congratulate my kid; he’s got another job! He was actually offered two jobs within the space of two hours. Both pay well.
Company No. 1 he’d have to drive to for a little bit before telecommuting. He’s an employee of the company from the start though, not a consultant or a temp and it makes him happy. He’s taking that one.
But… Company No. 2 seems… disgruntled.
.
Hey, No. 2… I’m glad he decided not to go with you! First, you wanted him as a temp for your company which acts as a consultant (for now) to finance firm. Your contract with them expires in a year and then he’s expected to help you dig up more clients? That’s Bullshit. That’s not what he’s trained to do and he’s just about the best at what he’s trained to do.
Also, I want you to think back to how many ‘interviews’ you forced him to go though. Was it one? Two? Three? Five? No… evidently all you pricks over at Company No. 2 like to circle-jerk to ‘Spinal Tap’… because you turned the number of his interviews that he had to endure… up to Eleven!
“Well, really you were the only candidate we had after interview number five…” < face palm >
And now you have the audacity to try to give him shit when he takes an offer with another company… a job with people there who Actually know WTF they are doing?
I swear, if there is an Og, he’d carve out and off each one of your rectal rings, drop them in boiling oil and powdered sugar, and shove them down your gullets with boiling coffee as your
Krispy-Creme Wake-Up Call of the Day!
Then, when you all get back to shoving your heads back up your asses, you can wonder,
“Hmmm. There’s something missing here. Sally, do we have more in supply?”
< sip>
“No. And the Office Supply place still has to sit through six more interviews…”
That’s the thing. These were actually Walmart eggs.