I did *not*, in fact, throw away the checks from the symposium I just finished planning. I thought I had put them in one envelope when in fact I put them in another, opened the empty envelope to find it empty, and promptly panicked. But I had only put the other envelope in the recycling, which I hadn't taken out, and so I was able to reclaim them.

Otherwise it would have been a fantastic way to wrench failure from the jaws of success, because up until that point I had been a lean mean conference-planning machine, and it would have been just excellent for my last interaction with dean emeritus regarding this to have been "OH AND BY THE WAY I fucked up"

I think Social Security finally got my account straight. They had paid my lawyer after all, and the lump sum they paid me this month is rightfully mine. Plus, I get a major tax break on the SocSec lump sum I received last year -- a congressional bill from the Republicans, no less -- and the money withheld by my private disability insurance should cover what I owe the IRS.