Susan, before panicking call them.

First of all quite often penalties are note even enforced if you are less than five days late.

Secondly, government offices are sometimes suprisingly understand about missed dealines if you call them before the deadline expires. Even if their normal practice would be to charge a penalty, they may well be willing to waive the penalty if you promise to get it in by the end of the week. This varies a lot from munipality to municipality; call, ask and find out what your situation really is. It may not be anything like as bad as you fear.

OK, I took enough deep breaths to look worried instead of about to explode, showed the form to DH, and said, "Huh?" He looked at the form, looked at the website, and thinks he figured it out. I don't know how he did it, and I feel all stupid chick over it (you know, like a girl who can't think for herself and had to get help from a man), but at least I'll have filled the damn thing out to the best of my understanding and got it in the mail tomorrow, and if it's wrong it'll be an honest mistake.

I don't know how he did it, and I feel all stupid chick over it (you know, like a girl who can't think for herself and had to get help from a man), but at least I'll have filled the damn thing out to the best of my understanding and got it in the mail tomorrow, and if it's wrong it'll be an honest mistake.

Aww. Don't feel that way. Sometimes we're just too close to the thing that's freaking us out to think about it clearly. One of the best things about being married is the extra, fresh brain.

Thanks, Heather. It's weird, though. For some reason stuff like this gives me the exact same reaction I have to mechanical schematics. While I'm not mechanically inclined, I can change a toner cartridge, hook up a computer, work DH's fancy new camera, etc. as well as the next person if you demonstrate it to me while telling me what you're doing and why, then let me do it right away. But I can't read the diagrams and schematics that are the standard way of documenting that sort of thing. They might as well be written in Sanskrit--my eyes glaze over, and if it's something I need to know, I panic. This form somehow had the same effect on me, despite not having a schematic in sight.

I'm right there with you. Financial aid forms for college freaked my shit right out. So much pressure to get everything exactly right. It doesn't help that on every page is a "If you answer this worksheet wrong or fail to report any income, not only will you not get any money, but you will never ever ever be allowed into college. We mean it, not even the ones that advertise on late night tv."- I'm paraphrasing of course.

Aaaaaand, just in case there was the least little doubt over whether or not moving to Minnesota from Arizona would be a good idea, I just got stung by a scorpion. From the intensity of the pain and the way is throbbing in waves, I'm guessing the blasted thing got me more than once.

By the way? Never once have I been stung by sticking my foot into an unshaken-out shoe. Infuckingvariably I am lying in bed, minding my own freaking business, when ZZZZZZZot!!!!

To be fair to the "always shake out your shoes" rule, a co-worker who used to live way the hell and gone out in the desert, ten miles from town, used to find them in shoes and boots all the time. He had a housemate who was missing a leg, and one day the amputee found not one but eleven scorpions holed up inside his prosthesis.

Will not sleep at all tonight.

So glad I didn't read that 'til the morning. Hopefully, my premature senility will kick in, and I'll forget about it, before tonight.

I'm seriously sitting here at my computer with my feet tucked under me.

Hey Cindy! Wanna read a cover letter for me? I'm afraid it falls apart in the last 2 grafs.

holy crap. that's frightening. sadly, i won't get the luxury of forgetting that overnight.