Fiscal Fitness

You know how fitness trainers, aerobic instructors and your fitness freak friends say "Working out is fun!" and you roll your eyes and then look at them like they're nuts? That is the exact same expression I give to my accountant when she tells me "Our tax appointment is going to be fun!!"

Granted, she really tries. She offers cocktails. That in and of itself can make me giddy, but I still roll my eyes (after I have the beverage in hand, of course). She greets me for every meeting with a hug and doesn't let me leave without another one. She LOVES numbers and is the perkiest CPA with a master's degree I've ever met.

Showing up for my tax appointment instills dread in me like doing the Presidential Physical Fitness Test used to when I was a child. You now what? I get it now. I get it now when people have told me how much they hate to exercise and I tell them I'm going to make it fun. I get it now when my CPA assures me that when I understand all the ins and outs of running a corporation that I'll love doing Quickbooks and I think to myself "That will be a cold day", that it's just like the number of clients I've told that "Once you get over the hump you'll look actually forward to exercise." What a load of crap.

I'll never get jazzed about reconciling my checking account in Quickbooks. I doubt I'll ever feel a sense of pride that I can explain why a balance sheet is a great way to show the financial position of a company at any given point in time. But I'm just going to have to shut up and do it, because I have to for the health of my business. Kind of like when you don't want to exercise but you make yourself do it anyway because it's good for you?

I got sent home from my tax appointment today (without my taxes being done) to fix my balance sheet because it wasn't reconciled with my bank statements. HEL-LO! I use "The Jenny Evans System of Accounting" or what my tax preparer calls the JEA. She needs to get with the program.

But just like I never let my clients get off the hook, she's making me fix it and come back for more pain. Oops, I mean "fun". And hugs and cocktails.