Taxing times. If you haven't yet rounded up your calculator, pulled that shoebox of receipts from the closet shelf and done your tax returns, it's crunch time. You've got exactly one week to get them in the mail, while contemplating how 1,048 people avoided owing any taxes last year. You'll find all the help you need -- except for the money to pay what you owe -- at Essential Links' Guide to Taxes, which is a great resource. It provides the links you need not just for federal taxes, but state and international taxes, too. Also tax law, tax tips and so forth.

Plastic payments. This is the first year you can charge what you owe Uncle Sam to your American Express, Discover or MasterCard (but not Visa). Naturally, this being the government, there are some complications. First, you don't just pull the plastic from your pocket and say, "Charge it." You've got to go through the Official Payments Corp. Second, it will cost you a fee of between 2.5 and 3 percent of your total tax bill.

Help! How to cut your taxes? Tax Help Online and the Guide to Reducing Taxes have helpful suggestions for individuals. And the Small Business Help Center does the same for entrepreneurs.

Grin and bear it. You might as well smile -- otherwise you might cry, right? 123 Greetings makes it easy to chuckle on April 17 with its funny selection of income tax day greetings.

Sophmoric silliness. Any adult who's a fan of The Three Stooges will find it fun to get rid of tax frustrations at Poke Alex in the Eye.

Money, Money, Money. You gotta figure the Treasury Department is singing the old Abba song about now. Once upon a time, garden hoes, shells and grain served as currency, according to the Comparative Chronology of Money. This interesting but plain-Jane site also reveals that banking was originated by the Babylonians, the first coins appeared in Lydia in 687 BC (the Lydians also had the first retail shops -- we aren't told which came first, the coins or the shops), and that the Incas of Peru managed without money.

According to the U.S. Treasury's Paper Money FAQ, 22.5 million "paper notes" are printed daily in this country. It also explains the significance of the pyramid and eye on the back of the $1 bill.

Interested in what the money of Azerbaijan or Georgia (the country, not the state) looks like? Ron Wise's Geographical Directory of World Paper Money lets you see by clicking on any country.

Something for nothing. Usually that's worth exactly what you "paid" for it. But Qualcomm has an offer you shouldn't refuse. They're giving away Eudora, which I consider the best e-mail program available. And if you're broke after paying Uncle Sam, how nice to be able to obtain the best for free. Bestfreebies says it links you to 2 million pages of free things (I didn't count!). It also rates them.

Got any money left? Might as well invest it and make some more. Invest-O-Rama links you to hundreds of investment resources on the Net. The idea behind Whisper Number is that quarterly earnings and economic indicators are the driving force behind the up-and-down movements of the stock market, and that's what they give you access to.

Get them started early. Designed by kids, for kids, Investing for Kids offers a financial quiz, two stock games, a learning center, and information tailored to the amount of information or experience a youngster already has. Especially handy is the goal calculator.

A European vacation. If you -- or the kids -- make enough money in the market, why not take that vacation you've been talking about? A couple of Dutch brothers have put together a site that makes researching every aspect of a trip to Europe much easier. At Eurotrotter, you first click on a country -- Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland or the U.K. -- to be presented with links to culture, maps, history, traffic, national parks, weather forecasts, restaurants, currency exchange rates, events and much more. The information is also available in your choice of six languages.

Good sports. Once upon a time, boys and girls, there was baseball season, followed by football season, followed by basketball season. Now the beginning and ending of each season have so morphed that it seems they're all playing at once. Keep up with whatever sport your prefer at Sports Page.com.

Ask a physician. Recently we mentioned a reader who was looking for answers to her questions about a recently diagnosed medical condition. Maybe Ask the Doctors or Web MD Health will help.