Keeping or Closing the “Distance?” You Decide!

Aside from remaining COVID-19 free, one thing that I’m grateful for is that my children are grown up and on their own. Well, in full disclosure, they’re not completely weaned off the family payroll, but that’s fodder for a future column.

It’s claustrophobic enough when you have an additional person working from home as I do currently, but I can’t begin to imagine what it must be like to have several children under the age of 10 becoming bored and restless while under quarantine to such a degree that parents strain to resist transforming into the Jack Nicholson character in “The Shining.”

Let Them Eat…Unemployment?

In full disclosure, I enjoy eating out – period. I can say with some assurance that the rare times my spouse and I agree to “stay in tonight” will be pretty much a thing of the past once this pandemic quarantine eases.

But on the other hand, I have no desire to go to a restaurant, have my temperature taken and remove my mask every time I sample my appetizer or entrée, would not be my idea of a relaxing night out.

But as someone who has worked in the restaurant industry and later covered it for 12 years, I have a kindred sympathy for both the owners and employees affected – some permanently by this crisis. It pains me to see once thriving establishments functioning with a skeleton crew to compile take-out only orders or in a worst-case scenario, boarded up for good.

The other day I read an interview with the chef/owner of one of New York’s top seafood restaurants, who lamented that even when they are given the green light to reopen, he would have to maintain social distancing restraints, which essentially means reducing the number of tables. So, with his fixed costs, including the stratospheric rents commanded by Manhattan landlords, coupled with the platinum prices of having exotic fish flown in daily, he doesn’t see how his establishment can come within three area codes of turning a profit with a diminished customer count.  

Insult to Injury

Insult to Injury

Over the weekend, I found myself shopping for cat food at one of the local pet stores and happened to overhear a mother and daughter lamenting the fact that save for the little metal wheel, a cage of hamsters lacked a variety of activities to keep them occupied.

“What do they do all day?” asked the girl.

Beneath my COVID-19 mask I managed to muffle a laugh, but when I got to the car, I realized that my current situation, along with millions of others was not all that different from those pint-sized rodents.

Basically, home-bound with a break here and there for a walk, I sort of related to their plight. It’s amazing how three people telecommuting from home can shrink the size of a house to claustrophobic proportions. Wires and power strips now occupy much of the open floor space and to my surprise, folding snack tables can serve adequately as desks.

The noise level between regular Zoom meetings and my spouse and daughter shouting at often ineffectual co-workers has, on occasion, reminded my eardrums of those long-ago KISS and Ted Nugent concerts.

But the real kicker regarding my home-bound status came this week courtesy of the U.S. Post Office.

Death and Taxes – Meet Stimulus Fraud

Over the past eight years, I’ve used this space to regale you with my financial scam encounters, fraudsters either demanding I pay off thousands in back taxes or risk hard prison time. Or, with “official security” inquiries to determine if the routing numbers on my checking accounts are accurate.

I won’t lie to you.

I often enjoy pretending to be a panicked and pearl-clutching consumer dreading the thought of becoming a guest of the government for several years and then suddenly putting them in an uncomfortable position by asking them questions that only employees of the IRS or Bank of America (my lending institution) would know.

That usually results in a quick hang-up along with me signing off and telling them that I hope they’re enjoying the weather in Bangalore or Estonia.

And thus, it was only a matter of time before similar scams surrounding the COVID-19 economic stimulus payments inevitably began to surface. So, this week I received an email warning me about the methods currently being used to separate deserving citizens out of their stimulus checks.

Sadly, Chez Carlino will not be receiving the government largesse this time around although in a selfish bit of full disclosure we could have used it. Our cranky dishwasher is literally operating on rubber bands and the brakes on my Volkswagen would have trouble stopping a baby carriage.

But I digress.

So, in my latest public service announcement, below are some caution flags associated with this latest scam to be aware of:

Any communication that uses the term “stimulus check” or “stimulus payment.” The official moniker is “economic income payment.”

Anyone asking the taxpayer to sign over their payment check directly to them.

Requesting by either phone, email or social media for verification of banking or personal information – claiming that it will speed up payment to them.

And my personal favorite, mailing the taxpayer a bogus check and then tell them to call a number to verify the routing information online in order to cash it.

For most of you, the payments are automatic, and no further action is needed.  In most cases, the IRS will deposit the money into the direct deposit account taxpayers previously provided on their tax returns.  If the IRS does not have a taxpayer’s direct deposit information, a check will be mailed to the address on file. So, if anyone calls or emails you about it, quickly delete it or simply hang up.

Some 231 years ago, in a letter to Jean-Baptiste LeRoy, Benjamin Franklin mused about the certainty of death and taxes.

In 2020, perhaps a stimulus check saved from fraud is one earned.

A Virtual Feast

Being of the Italian persuasion, food has been and continues to be a crucial part of my lifestyle. From my earliest memories of Sunday “gravy” (that’s red sauce to you regular folks) at my great grandmother DiBiasi’s home while in grade school, to my one of my current specialties – linguine with white or red clam sauce, I’ve never been one to under-appreciate a good meal.

Holidays were a time when you routinely overate and then spent the next six weeks trying to work it off.

To that end, I never understood why some people’s interest in food is so minimal that they simply “eat to live.” They would have never survived a month in my extended family.

I clearly remember one Thanksgiving when my aunt rolled out an over-sized tray of lasagna accompanied by meatballs and sausage, that conservatively, could have satisfied the entire offensive line of the New York Giants. That, I learned, was the starter course.

The turkey and stuffing came later.

Easter too was a special time. The scope and quantity of the menus for the annual Paschal observance among various relatives would have had Henry VIII scrambling for Pepto-Bismol.

This year though was a bit different for us as I imagine it was for most everyone.

With most of the nation quarantined as a result of COVID-19 virus, observers had to get a bit creative including of course, hosting “virtual” Easter dinners. I can honestly say this was my first and hopefully last, Zoom Easter celebration.

In between courses of lamb, pork tenderloin, homemade gnocchi and a sinful carrot cake for dessert, we “Zoomed” with a number of relatives, comparing menus, exchanging stories of our isolation and for laughs and nostalgia, reviewed decades old photos of long ago birthdays and holidays.

Even my spry three-year-old grand-niece got into the act by remarking that “Uncle Bill I didn’t know you had hair.”

Lovely girl. Good thing she’s so adorable.

But though the holiday is over, the Zoom push is far from it. Since the quarantine mandate, I have had no less than six virtual meetings. in full disclosure, it takes a while to adjust to seeing people that you heretofore had only spoken with by phone.

As counter-intuitive as it sounds, I currently have two firms proceeding with merger talks. And hopefully when this crisis is happily in our rear-view mirror, they can make it an official union. In the meantime, we have a ton of leftovers from Easter and not to sound selfish, I’m not going to Zoom share them with anyone.

Inspector Gadget

When I was roughly 12, I offered (technically was ordered) to help my father with a home improvement project. When he spotted me trying to use a screwdriver in what was obviously a job for a pair of slip knot pliers he in his own patient way (a swift smack to the back of my head) explained why pliers were needed and not a Phillips head screwdriver.

In full disclosure my working knowledge of common household tools has not expanded much since then. I was once told that not only would I have trouble changing a flat tire, I would be hard pressed to tell which one it was.

Which brings me to today’s missive, which again in full disclosure has nothing, repeat nothing to do with the accounting profession. Instead, I wanted to share the continuous streams of email product offers I have received since the COVID-19 quarantine.

There are far too many to list in this space, but to keep it lighthearted in a time when comic relief is at a premium, to wit here are my favorites.