Finished organizing my tax prep info

A couple of weeks ago I ruminated about my difficulty in getting around to organizing my info so that my accountant could actually prepare my taxes. It only took me three weeks to get around to doing the work. I actually did next to nothing for those three weeks, other than a little pre-organizing in my head. It wasn't until last night that I finally felt that I had the raw energy to start tackling this task.

I resolved to get up early this morning and "just do it" and try to finish it by noon. Well, it didn't quite work out that well, but close enough. I only got about half of the work done this morning, but that was enough to keep me motivated and on track.

When I got back home later in the afternoon, I was psyched to be so close to getting it done. I just finished it all and emailed the  package (fourteen spreadsheets plus a Word document with 21 notes explaining things) off to my accountant. All told, it was about five and a half hours of work. Some of it was simply shuffling numbers between spreadsheets, some was transcribing numbers from paper forms, and some was searching through my paper files for missing numbers. Some of the time was simply sitting and staring at the numbers and thinking for a while to figure things out, or to remember what I might have forgotten. Usually it takes me more than six hours, but this year I had fewer business expenses.

What a relief. Until next year. But, it should be easier next year since I am no longer self-employed with lots of business expenses. And I won't have to file a partial year Colorado state income tax return next year; Washington has no state income tax.

-- Jack Krupansky