Easy come, easy go

I logged on to our bank's website this morning to see how much money I was going to have to pull out of our home equity line of credit to get us through the weekend and was pleasantly surprised to see the U.S. Treasury had come through with our tax rebate.
Of course, it's money that's already been spent. We'll use the $1,200 to help pay off the new lawn tractor.
BTW, the lawn tractor has a 4 gallon gas tank. It's a helluva note when it costs $15 to fill up your freaking lawn mower.

Doh!

Clearing all of the tax-related papers from my desk, I discovered that I overlooked the interest on a home equity loan we took out last spring in support of our tragic garage debacle.
We paid about $1,100 in interest on the loan, all of which is deductible under current tax law.
So I fired up the TaxCut software and plugged in the new data to determine if it's worth it to file an amended return. Turns out it means another $200 or so on our return, so I guess I'll go after it.