Last we heard, Congress has let the 3-year moratorium on Internet access taxes (Internet Tax Freedom Act) expire. That bill prohibited taxes on Internet access and banned any tax that singled out the Internet (that's sure open to interpretation, and probably will be!). The good news: There's a general consensus that state and local governments won't rush to impose various taxes, but as Sen. Ron Wyden said, "there's an opportunity for considerable economic mischief." But stay tuned, all that could change overnight.

Nope, that's not it. It's email! 42% of email users check their business email even on vacation (you don't do that, now do you?). 23% check it on weekends (that's me!), and 34% check email regularly throughout the day.

There are many programs that allow you to access one computer, called the host (such as your office computer) from another computer called the remote (such as your home computer). Most of these programs (pcAnyWhere, LapLink, Carbon Copy, and products like Citrix for multiple simultaneous users) require you to set up and install software on both the host and remote machines, and will work over any kind of connection, such as modem-to-modem or DSL. So what happens when you're at a friend's house, or traveling without your laptop?

Well, you can try GoToMyPC (www.gotomypc.com). It is a solution that requires you to install software only on the host and allows you to access the host from any remote via a secure session over the Internet using a web browser. Their servers become the link between the host computer and the remote. To connect to your host from a remote, you first log into GoToMyPC servers. One caveat: Your host computer must have an active connection to the Internet at the time you want to connect. Thus it won't work unless the host has some type of "always on" Internet connection, such as DSL/cable, or a dial-up ISP that doesn't care how long you stay connected.

GoToMyPC has a 30-day free trial, but you have to offer up your credit card as collateral to download the free trial software. That way, if you forget to cancel within 30 days, they start billing. Monthly fee is $19.95, but they offer annual and corporate (10 or more users) rates. Also, no Mac version is available (they're working on it), and there are other minor issues that I'm sure they'll fix in a future update or patch.