Taxation With Insultation

Is it any wonder I have turned into this shower-dwelling, assault-rifle equipped nutcase by now?

While the clock on my Microsoft © Windows ™ XP ® Pro SP1 ©™ Turbo Type-R ® continues to tick away, I am constantly reminded that it is past 2:00 AM and I am sitting alone in a bedroom, listening to banjo Christmas music and drinking steel-brewed beer in my underwear. I'm sure this should be depressing and sickening to me in some way, but thanks to the advances of medical technology and my ability to swallow pill-shaped pills, I have developed a gorgeous sense of apathy which coats my body like the noxious green slime from "You Can't Do That On Television." This detachment from reality has been my preferred method of dealing with the stressful events currently transpiring in my life, which include but are not limited to:

1) Buying a new house,
2) Moving into the new house (see above for more details),
3) Having to fuck with the forums every hour of every day or else they'll explode and take out a major section of Detroit, which I can't allow to happen because then Reid "Frolixo" Pascqkeweitsz will be dead and I therefore won't be able to ask him how the hell to spell his retarded name anymore,
4) Paying taxes.

Although many people might not have yet experienced the feelgood sensation of the first three items, almost everybody in the US has had to deal with taxes in one form or another. For example, when you buy gum from an Iranian who either doesn't know how or refuses to speak English, you must pay a state sales tax. This tax can range anywhere from like, jeez, I don't know, 0% to a 1,000,000% or something. It all depends on where you live; like if you live in New York, then the sales tax percentage equates to roughly the equivalent of your body weight. If you inhabit the moon, then the sales tax drops significantly lower, although you face slight problems such as a lack of oxygen and a lack of Iranians to purchase gum. I don't even know why you'd want gum on the moon to begin with, but that's your lifestyle, and as Captain Planet has told me time and time before, "it's okay to be flamboyantly gay and buy gum from Iranians on the moon." Wait, that was Captain Planet, wasn't it? I'd hate to be confusing him with one of the band members from Jem and the Hologram's rival band "The Misfits."

This man died while doing his taxes. Why? Probably because he was trying to use that gay Casio watch on the bottom. What an ass.

I'm sure most of you readers can see where I'm heading with this: it's 2:26 AM, I'm in my underpants and drinking beer alone in my bedroom while listening to Christmas banjo music. Obviously, this article naturally revolves around the exciting invention that some British / English / French / Aztec guy came up with: taxes. Way back in whenever the hell this event occurred, some guy said to some other guy, "now that I'm the ruler of whatever land we're living on, I should really start charging people money to live here and buy things and do stuff" and the other guy replied in whatever crazy Martian language they spoke at the time, "hey, good idea" and then they raised their rifles / knives / spears / rocks in triumph. After announcing their discovery to the eager townsfolk, they were immediately lynched and their individual body parts were sold on a primitive version of eBay.

Unfortunately, their nefarious plot caught on and soon countries all across whatever planet we live on began taxing people. If I recall my history correctly, and I sure as hell don't ever recall being able to do so, some assholes founded America in a futile attempt to escape "taxation without deforestation" or some bullshit that Miss Conrad made me memorize in fourth grade. God I hated that lady. She took away my Garbage Pail Kids in the middle of class even though I had them under my desk! Can you believe the nerve of that bitch? Hey Miss Conrad, if you're reading this now, who's the washed up fourth grade social studies teacher and who's the webmaster drunkenly listening to banjo Christmas music in an empty apartment full of cats and underpants? I had originally intended for that previous sentence to be an insult, but now that I look back I realize that it sounds kind of pathetic, so please pretend that I just zinged the unholy hell out of Miss Conrad and she's either furious or rolling over in her grave (if either dead or buried alive). You took my Garbage Pail Kids and now Jesus Christ took your worthless life, you rotten old hag.

This Monday, April 14th, I sent the United States government a check which contained an awfully depressing amount of digits and numbers that ranged from "zero" to "nine." You see, being a webmaster and running a site like Something Awful isn't exactly the glorious and glamorous job many of you may mistake it as. For starters, when people ask your occupation and you reply, "I'm a webmaster," they give you the same look reserved for stumbling upon a horse's severed head underneath their bed sheets. Additionally, webmasters simply cannot compete in the "drugs and sex" category that have propelled many rock bands to fame, as I haven't been laid since the early 1990's and that opportunity was ruined when "the plaintiff" unexpectedly woke up. However, the American government absolutely loves webmasters like me because they know I'm a "soft target"; I'll hand my records over to any CPA and then proceed to write them a check for whatever random amount they spit back into my face. I go to sleep each night with the fear that if I fail to send the government hefty checks, my front door will be kicked in by a squad of men in black and multiple COPS camera crews all filming me masturbating to foot fetish porn. I certainly can't have that happen, as I want to lose at least 12 pounds before I go on national television.

As you can see by this chart, well, I don't know what you can see by this chart. I like that pink bar though, it looks saucy.

The United States government uses your tax money in a variety of exciting and groundbreaking ways. For example, they spend it. That's all I can think of offhand, but I'm sure there are some absolutely fantastic things that they do with your money, such as produce scratch-off lottery tickets which read "YOU LOSE" under their cancer-causing silver particle coating, and pay for cops to give me tickets for parking my car in my apartment's parking lot. Also, I heard there was recently some war with Iraq or somebody, so I assume our money paid for the bombs which had "HIJACK THIS, YOU FAGS" written across them and the jet fuel which didn't. The government pays for a lot of things that you and I would never directly give money to on account that they're stupid and worthless, like the National Association to Make Sure the Streetlight Poles are Always Humming Outside My Fucking Apartment Window and California Senator Barbara Boxer.

Fortunately, I've recently discovered a way to prevent the jackbooted Federal thugs from invading your bank account and stealing tax money which should rightfully be yours if the government lacked any taxation system. After spending a few weeks crunching the numbers, I determined the government swipes a percentage off the amount of money you collected the previous year. This percentage depends on what "income bracket" you fall under. For example, if you make more than $150,000 a year, you must pay whatever percentage corresponds to the "rich asshole" category, and you're probably some fag who drives a SUV. If you make under $15,000 a year, then the government considers you to be a "poor fucker" and will only bother you if you try to steal bread to sell for crack or whatever the hell poor people do. However, what happens if you make $0 a year? The government could hypothetically collect 1,500% of your $0 and still end up with a big fat zero! The key to being a successful businessman and avoiding taxes lays in your ability to effortlessly lose money and hide what little cash you do make. With this in mind, I have developed some tax-saving tips for the 2003 fiscal year which you may use to become as wealthy and successful as I, a man who is currently drunk, semi-naked, and listening to banjo Christmas music at 3:52 AM:

TIP #1: DON'T ALLOW PEOPLE TO GIVE YOU MONEY. EVER. This is one of the most crucial aspects to keeping a low tax profile. One of the easiest ways to refuse people giving you money is by killing yourself, but some people find themselves uncomfortable with this long-term solution, as it greatly hinders their ability to bitch about upcoming Star Wars movies. On the positive side, this makes tax filing infinitely easier, as zero plus zero will always equal zero, unless you use the Metric System, in which case you'll owe the government something like 50,271 megawatts per kilometer.

When burying your money, make sure to not accidentally bury yourself, a common mistake amongst the inexperienced.

TIP #2: BURY ALL YOUR CASH IN COFFEE TINS UNDER YOUR BACKYARD. I'm fairly sure that the government can only tax you on money that exists, and if your cash resides in a decaying Folger's Crystals canister below the sod in your trailer park's yard, then it belongs to Mother Earth, not the US Government, and they are prohibited from touching it by law of ancient Native American rituals. If a jackbooted Nazi government scumbag tries to dig up your moneycan, then they will be haunted by some Indian ghost chief who will make them sterile and cause them to hallucinate and think their family members are zombies out to murder them. If their family members were previously zombies out to murder them, then the Indian ghost chief will disguise them as 1979 Samsung twin-tub washing machines. If their family members were previously 1979 Samsung twin-tub washing machines, then hey, there's not much the Indian ghost chief can do to possibly make their life much worse.

TIP #3: CLAIM YOU LOST ALL YOUR MONEY WHILE WATCHING BRITNEY SPEARS' "CROSSROADS". Previously today, when I was much less drunk, I decided to sit down and watch my Comcast digital cable, which now has the ability to produce images at 233 x 175 resolution with up to 19 quasi-distinctly similar colors. I ended up settling on "Crossroads," a movie which served as a vehicle for pop sensation Britney Spears' acting career, one which I hope runs her down in rush hour traffic. As far as I can tell, the film revolves around three boring woman traveling from point A to point B while talking about boys and facing insurmountable obstacles such as refueling the gas tank and reciting lines without laughing hysterically. According to my internal clock, this movie lasted roughly six decades (not counting the credits), which left ample time for me to pass out and have my wallet and checkbook stolen by unscrupulous bastards. If an IRS agent attempts to audit you, simply show him a copy of "Crossroads" as proof. Once he's in a deep coma, steal his wallet and move. Oh yeah, screw his wife too if you have the chance.

TIP #4: BECOME AN ANTI-GOVERNMENT NUTBALL AND REFUSE TO PAY TAXES. Out of all options, I'd have to claim this is the most unappealing. For starters, you must purchase a large portion of land in some god-forsaken state like Texas or, god-forbid, Texas. Then you will have to grow a large beard, invest in overall companies, and religiously attend gun and religious shows. Throughout these events and your everyday life, you must randomly scream, "I ain't givin' up my rights to no Nazi American thugs!" You should also hold a protest sign which is mostly incoherent and quotes some parable from the Bible about how a guy was eaten by lions because he refused to build a temple for King Egypt. Once you're holed up inside your compound, you must breed dogs which are trained to attack anything living or dead. These enforcers will provide you with valuable time to run around your house like a retard when the ATF is subduing them with a barrage of gunfire. In the ideal outcome, you will end up dead. In the worst case scenario, you will have to serve a lengthy prison sentence in a jail which doesn't abide by the same rules as your super-ultra-cool compound which has giant styrofoam skulls that open up to reveal a barrage of missiles aimed at Castle Greyskull.

With those four tips out of the way, I can honestly say I'm "taxed out!" Ha ha, I bet that joke is really funny after you've heard it 90,000 times on CNN's 24-hour coverage of "people walking to the USPS to mail envelopes." Bah, what the fuck do I care, it's 4:59 AM and I'm in my goddamn underpants drinking beer and listening to Christmas banjo music. If you think that there's a self-deprecating joke I could write that would make my life sound any more depressing than that, feel free to be my guest. At least I'm better off than that hag Miss Conrad who tried to stifle capitalism by swiping my Garbage Pail Kids. I hope the government raided her house and broke her Precious Moments figurines. Bah, who am I kidding, I'm too drunk and apathetic to care about her. I'll down a few pills in her honor, that crusty old witch.

All Aboard the Hentai Sleeper Car!

Zack "Rice Computator" Parsons here with a scalding hot edition of Hentai Game Reviews straight from the review spigot. This time we take a look at "Private Nurse", or as it's known in Japan, "Private Nurse: Welcome to Nap Time Fat Lazy American!".

An entertaining plot or gripping gameplay would be a great replacement for simple blowjob setups, but what this game lacks in entertainment it totally makes up for with lack of gameplay. This game replaces all of the simple setups for hardcore sex with idiotic metaphors for the healing power of nature, long winded self-pitying monologues, clichéd dialogues, supposedly heart-wrenching sequences, and the deep gameplay of standardized testing. The options menu spared me the torment of the looped piano soporific that they have passed off as background music.

This train is now departing the station, destination: "ADVENTURE!"

– Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka (@TwitterHasBannedAllMyAccountsEver)