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Monday, April 14, 2008

A Taxing Weekend



the taxes are done

the taxes are done

the TAXES are done

the TAXES are DONE

The TAXES are DONE!

Hallelujah. One more year completed just under the wire.

And gee, only 364 more days before TSS hits again (Tax Stress Syndrome).

Symptoms of TSS:

  1. paper in untidy piles
  2. me screaming through the house, "Where's my calculator!" (on the computer, you idiot, I reply to myself).
  3. reams of computer printouts of instructions for schedule C, schedule SE, form 45-something for depreciation, form something-something for whatever, and piles of stuff I didn't need at all.
  4. wadded up paper in the trash can because I forgot to add or subtract
  5. open drawers, files, doors

How to prevent this syndrome?

  1. have all records in neat order (never will happen)
  2. start earlier (I did but things sort of intervened)
  3. get that computer program that does everything like magic, or so I'm told. But I haven't tried it yet.
  4. get my husband to do it. Not a fat chance. It's my storytelling that causes such havoc; otherwise it would be plain sailing.
  5. take it to a tax preparer. Yeah right. They expect #1 above. They are not interested in my messy notes, receipts and file folders. If I keep everything neat for them, I might as well just do the forms myself.
  6. there is no #6. But I'm sure there has to be some other solution that I haven't thought of.

So, be it resolved: I am going to start NOW to organize my records, before it gets any later in the year. I am going to keep meticulous notes in my day diary. I am going to start as soon as the gong stops sounding on New Year's Eve. I am not going to be in this situation again in April 2009.

yeah right...even I don't believe it.

3 comments:

  1. Ha! Just read that last line! I have the same ambitious resolution list, and we stick everything in a box marked TAXES, and then shove it across the desk to the tax preparer THE day after we get the W-2s each year. Then weep, usually, get over it, and repeat the next year :)

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  2. Congratulations on completing the task. I think they make it complicated on purpose to torture us (just as "feminine" shoes are designed by men who hate women).

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  3. Amen to you both! I know I don't get all the breaks I could because I don't keep track well enough. Maybe this year will be the year that breaks my bad habit. I sure hope so.

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