My relative was also an attorney, and he related this story to me, because it reminds me of the futility of taxes, complexity and tax preparation.

He had two class finals in law school.

The first was tax. He stated after the final he thought he had aced it. It seemed clear to him.

The second was Con Law. He felt so awful, he was certain he failed. He enrolled in a neighboring university's class to retake the class.

When it was all said and done, he barely passed the tax class and wrote the high exam on the Con Law case. His explanation was, he couldn't understand why the IRS would characterize so many things as income and disallow so many deductions while he saw all of the issues with Con Law.