Giggles and Grins

Partners

Submitted by: Brian B Smith, CFP® , Bryan M Masten, CFP® & Riley W. Smith

Inherited IRA Rules You Need to Know

You’ve inherited an individual retirement account, or IRA. Now what?

Unfortunately, you cannot leave the money in the original IRA opened by the deceased person. There are several ways you can receive the funds after inheriting either a traditional or Roth IRA, but your options will be narrowed by a few factors. Failure to handle an inherited IRA properly can lead to a significant penalty from the IRS. The first step is finding out the titling of the account, whether it is a traditional IRA or a Roth IRA. In Traditional IRAs, the owner must take “required minimum distributions” or RMDs, when they turn 72. Moving forward, if the original account owner was older than 72 when they passed, make sure the required minimum distribution has been met for the year of death. Otherwise, there may be a hefty penalty from the IRS. If you are the spouse of the deceased individual, you may transfer the funds from the deceased’s IRA account into your own account through what’s called a spousal transfer. Spousal heirs have the option to transfer the assets even if the original owner’s person was over the age of 72 and taking RMDs from a traditional IRA. With your existing or new IRA, you can delay RMDs until you turn 72. You can also complete this type of transfer with a Roth; since these accounts don’t require RMDs, you won’t need to worry about withdrawals. This is a great option for beneficiaries who are younger than the deceased spouse who may still be working or do not need the income from the account yet. However, if you would like to withdraw the funds from the new IRA before you reach the age of 59 ½, you’ll be subject to the 10% early-withdrawal penalty. For non-spousal heirs to both ROTH and Traditional IRAs, the money must be distributed in 10 years of the original owner’s passing, regardless of their age. You do not have to withdraw a certain amount annually, but not having a process may result in a higher-than-expected tax bill. The only exceptions to the 10-year rule are if the heir is a minor, disabled, or not more than 10 years younger than the original owner. This may seem complicated, but no need to stress on it! We have helped our clients navigate this process. We will make a plan on how and when to take distributions, keeping taxes and required income in mind. Please call us, and let us help you “Enjoy More, Worry Less”.

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Q: Why did the bones cross the street?

A:They didn’t, the dogs ate them.

Hear about the new restaurant called Karma?

There’s no menu: You get what you deserve.

What’s a chiropractor’s favorite genre of music?

Hip pop.

What animal has more lives than a cat?

A frog, because it croaks every night.

Why do cows wear bells?

Because their horns don’t work!

Why did the comedian keep telling jokes about chemistry?

He was looking for a good reaction.

Share what makes your giggle! PostcardsLive.com/Share

Jeanne Robertson

Visit Postcardslive.com to read the original story in the June 2017 issue.

With regret, we share that Postcards dear friend, humorist Jeanne Robertson, has passed. We both immediately pause and bow our head in a moment of silence, before regaining eye contact and continuing our conversation (A Southern tradition of respect expanded on by Jeanne in one of her most popular stories, “Don’t Send a Man to the Grocery Store,” which also related her tradition of making 7-Up Pound Cake to take over when a friend was ill or had suffered a death in the family (If you know, you know). The beloved motivational speaker, humorist, and former Miss North Carolina unexpectedly passed away on August 21 at the age of 77. Her team confirmed she had been struggling with a severe illness, not Covid-related, in the days leading up to her death. Robertson is survived by her son Beaver and grandchildren Ryder and Gray. Her husband, Jerry Ray “Left Brain” Robertson, died in June of this year.

Robertson’s words live on as part of her YouTube channel, as well as four books she authored, including her most recent Don’t Bungee Jump Naked and Other Important Stuff. Her team says, “We are sure Jeanne is now telling stories in heaven, all the angels are laughing, and Left Brain is in the back with a big smile.”

In tribute, we share a few of our favorite comments from our prior interview with Jeanne, as well as her famous (infamous) 7-Up Pound Cake recipe.

How did winning Miss North Carolina change your life?

The winner had to either drop out of school for a year or take a sabbatical from her job to travel the state of North Carolina for a year speaking two or three times a day. It took me about a week to figure out if I said something funny, and people laughed, that I loved it! I won on a Saturday night, and I was in Fayetteville on Tuesday for my first appearance. I told my Daddy I had to get up at this luncheon and make a speech. He said, “Well, you know you oughta say something funny.” I said, “Like what?” He said, “From here to the beach, you have to go through Fayetteville, and it’s a speed trap. And everybody gets a speeding ticket. You ought to mention that. We’ve gotten three or four ourselves.” So I got up and talked about that, and they fell out. I said, ‘This is kinda fun!’ So, each town I’d go to, I’d try to say something a little funny, and then I began to develop a routine. The next year, after making more than 500 little speeches, not shows like I do now, I crowned the next Miss North Carolina, and the following week, I spoke at three conventions and the Rotary Club Ladies Night. I charged $50 to speak. One time, I charged $50 to go from North Carolina to Biloxi, Mississippi to speak, and that included my expenses! I had to learn a lot, but I just loved it and kept doing it. Never looked back. I went back to school and finished.

You’ve been speaking for years, but you’ve said the Internet changed everything for you.

When you are a professional speaker, you go to a convention or meeting, and you don’t have to sell tickets at all. We’ve always said to young speakers, ‘Don’t think people are coming to Las Vegas because your name is on the program; they’re coming because that’s their yearly convention.’ But in the same vein, you don’t have to sell tickets. A few years ago, in my 60s, I embraced the Internet. I’m on Sirius XM, iTunes, Facebook and I’m now approaching 41 million views on YouTube. You can’t do it all. I don’t Tweet. Some people came to me and said, “We think you can sell tickets.” I had only marketed to meeting planners, but because of the Internet visibility, they thought we could do it.

Your “Don’t send a man to the grocery store” video was the first thing I ever saw of yours. I was rolling!

When I taped that story, it was right under 8 minutes. When I tell it live, it’s about 14. There’s a saying among speakers that, “You get better, but any tape you do stays the same.”

What’s the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to you on stage?

(Laughing) I’ve had so many things in 54 years! I used to emcee pageants during my early years, and they were run by local volunteers, not professional theatre people; at one, I remember I had given them the cue to shut the curtain. Nothing happened, so I told them again. Still nothing. I went and pulled the curtain. Pulled it straight down—everything fell off into a heap on the floor. I’m out there kicking it out of the way, and two or three people are trying to pull it off the stage! But see, if you are a humorist, and that’s what I am, you go to the meeting prepared, and then you HOPE the banner falls off the wall! You hope for things to go wrong. A comedian’s main goal is to get the majority of people to laugh no matter what. You might make a certain group feel very uncomfortable, but that’s the reason a comedian is there. The humorist is there to make the meeting planner, or person that brought them in, look good. Even since I’ve switched to doing theatre shows, I still want there to be a tiny point people take home while making them laugh.

What legacy do you hope to leave for your family and grandchildren and fans?

I truly try to find the humor every day, and I think that we DO find what we’re looking for. If I can have my grandchildren, and anybody that’s heard me speak, approach life by saying, “Well, you know if this (funny) stuff is happening around her, it’s happening around us, too.” It’s a whole different approach to living.

I started looking for humor for speech material. Period. But then in the airport one day, I looked…and the flights were grounded, and the people in my gate area—their body language just told you how upset they were. I pulled out my pencil, sitting there ready, just to see if anyone would say something funny I could use. That was when I realized, ‘Everybody in here is angry but me.’ I was so busy looking for the humor in it that I didn’t get upset, because there wasn’t anything we could do about it. If you’re telling stories everybody can identify with—we’re all gonna get arm flab, it’s coming—everyone can laugh about that, no matter who you are or what religion or race or background you have. You realize we really have a lot in common, and people have been dwelling on all the stuff we don’t have in common. But everybody wants their children to be happy. Everybody wants the best for each other, and most people really don’t want to hurt anybody. It’s like going to a ballgame. Color is very important to me. Not skin color. I want to look around me and see if they’ve got on Auburn. I don’t care who they are, what they are, what they believe in, or anything else. We’re gonna be high-fiving, because we have found something in common. You can teach your children how to approach life either way—by getting upset about everything or by saying “Isn’t this funny?”

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Jeanne Robertson’s 7-Up Pound Cake

Can be frozen until someone you know is sick… or has passed.

Ingredients 2 sticks margarine (room temperature) ½ cup shortening 3 cups sugar 5 eggs 1 ½ tsp lemon extract 1 ½ tsp vanilla extract 3 cups all-purpose flour (measure before sifting) 7 oz 7-Up (may use diet to reduce calories) Directions Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Cream margarine, shortening, and sugar. Add lemon and vanilla extracts. Add eggs one at a time. Alternate adding flour and 7-Up, beating after each addition. Finish with 7-Up. Spray 10” tube pan with cooking spray (or split the batter and use 2 8” tube pans). Cook for 1 hour or until it “tests done.” Remove from oven. Let sit for 30 minutes before flipping over on plate.

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