Here’s a bit of irony:
When I’m really procrastinating about writing, I might even decide it’s time to clean up my desk. Which is no small matter, let me tell you. My desk is a giant magnet that draws everything to it. That sock you’re missing? Probably on my desk somewhere.
But now taxes loom before me. This means I have to open Excel (gasp), sort through all the accounts, and figure out where I spent Saralaugh’s money this year. Because my accountant is waiting for all this stuff. Because the IRS wants to know, in detail, what money came in and what money went out and where and why and how. You’re thinking I should have been keeping track throughout the year, and yes, that would have been a good idea. Every year at this time I think just that, but then I don’t.
So here’s the odd thing. I’m procrastinating about writing, but what’s sitting front and center on my desk? Tax stuff. Now, I want to make clear my personal stance on taxes: I want to pay them. I want to pay what I owe, no shenanigans. I’m not nuts about the hunk of that money that goes into Bush’s war, but I close my eyes and imagine all my tax dollars are going into social services and infrastructure.
But first I have to sort through tons and tons of receipts and notations and bank statements… or I could go write another few pages.
There’s no place to hide, I tell you. No place at all.
You've stumbled across my official website and landed on the front page of my weblog.
My husband I just finished our taxes, which are always a pain. This year at least we only had to deal with Federal Taxes. The year before we moved from Illinois had to file for Illinois state taxes as well as deal with the capital gains tax of pulling out of the stock market. So this year was a little less stressful, but we are getting a lot less money back since we both worked last year. Oh well, I should be thankful that because we moved into a different bracket that we didn’t have to pay back anything. I also try and turn a blind eye to where my HARD EARNED tax dollars are going. It’s like giving a small child money, you know they are going to spend it on something frivolous instead of things they need.
OK, I’m not proud; I really want the ARC (signed by you, of course). Howsomeever, I’m an Excel whiz and have taught it and other computer junk for ages; so if you need help and the Mathematician doesn’t want to/won’t help, I’ll be glad to offer my 2 cents on your Excel stuff.
I have to do the taxes soon – not something I’m thrilled with doing – so right now it’s a war between hiding from those and hiding from my WIP.
So today it’s been…
“blogs – I need to check on blogs…”
“a blog for the pre-schooler! That would be fun…”
“reviews – I still owe one back to my review site…”
ummm
ummm
“shopping! I need to go shopping!”
(Mind you I HATE shopping!)
Getting desperate now….
I had all day Friday to write, but what did I do for half the morning? Sort through a huge pile of crumpled receipts I’ve been either collecting at the bottom of 3 of my purses, on my office sideboard, or in a decorative can, and type up my writing expenses of 2005.
Oh yeah, I’ll get this book finished in record time…!
Wow. Seems early to be worrying about taxes, but then, my husband HAS been waving papers in front of me from time to time this week, demanding to know where my eerily similar versions of those papers are. Time to clean off my “desk” – the top of my dresser in my bedroom. Strange how my mother had an identical dresser. We kids (not sure about my brothers, but for sure my sister and I) were always drawn to it. On top there were socks, a mismanaged “jewellery” box, framed pics of our cousins or us and a couple of vases of dried out flowers (were they ever real? we don’t know). Dust. A top drawer full of papers and spent greeting cards, much like my own now. And my daughters are attracted to the minutiae of their mother’s life as I was to my own. Whenever I clean the top of the dresser for company (or in desperation for T4 slips (income statements in Canada) or birth certificates, let’s say, my eldest remarks on it – as if I’ve cleaned it up just for her pleasure. A nice reward for the work.