I got my state and federal tax refunds today.
After I got over the initial delight of soon having money in my checking account, I realized that something was amiss. My tax returns were huge. When the two checks were combined, they were half of my actual income for 2009.

That ain't right, or else I have been grossly misinformed about how taxes work.

So I went to talk to my dad, who actually files my taxes. It turns out that instead of getting these returns every year, he was rolling the money forward to be applied to the next year's taxes. I guess there are some large investments in my name, and he thought that I'd have massive capital gains taxes to pay up. HA. NOT IN THIS ECONOMY, BABY. Since I'm officially filing my own taxes starting next April, Dad told the government to just give my brother and I all our withheld returns.

So now do I do the responsible thing and sock away the money into savings somewhere? Or do I go nuts SPENDING my happy little heart out on travel and fun and games and books?

Decisions, decisions...