Ohhhh, woe. Invitation to a Pity Party.
I really do need to get to grip with my accounts. When I suggested to the accountant that I should be able to claim a proportion of my rent (just because I wanted to!) he said no.
Now I read in the Writers’ and Artists’ Year Book that if work is conducted at home, a deduction for ‘use of home is usually allowed …. Reasonable …. Appropriate proportion of the totals … costs of rent, light heat ….’
Rewind, rewind, did I just read rent there??
So I read on. It had been suggested to me by a colleague that ‘computers’ could be claimed 100% in the first year for someone doing what I’m doing. Accountant said no. However this ‘ere book says: Expenditure on IT for the purposes of the business now benefits from a special 100% allowance in the year of purchase.”
Rewind, rewind. 100% allowance, eh?
I already know my rent wasn’t apportioned. Do I really want to look at my last submitted year’s accounts and see if my computer was 100% allowed? Could anything be done in retrospect anyway since the IR paid back all the tax I’d paid the previous year.
Or will I just get very, very annoyed thinking of the amount I paid the accountants last year, which was 3 times the previous year’s amount because I didn’t make the time (didn’t have the time) to put the various expenditures in Excel in columns, pre-added up.
If I’d just dumped a box of unsorted receipts on ‘em I could understand it but they were all sorted chronologically and attached to the statements and highlighted as business expenses.
Should I have taken someone who wears Mickey Mouse ties seriously?
No I don’t want to look at the accounts again, I didn’t want to look at them the first bloody time!
All they’ll tell me is that I need to get a proper job! That somehow, very likely through dint of hard work and not having a life (where does one ‘get a life’?) that I managed to break even.
Now I’ve got my lovely new camera I don’t even know that I want to carry on taking pictures!!! But I do know that though I could brush up my secretarial skills that I don’t want to be within the confines of four walls 9-5pm.
My last career change just happened. I wonder what’s going to happen next.
I’ve never really planned much in my life, except to have the babies, which eventually happened.
I did apply for teacher training as a ‘mature’ student aged 22. The kybosh was put on that by my confidence being undermined by my boss at the time, who didn’t want to lose a good secretary (whom he fancied the pants off) so he wrote in his reference for me … “is not suited to working with children.”
Now, you wouldn’t think he’d tell me that, would you? No, he didn’t. What he did do was put the reference in the out tray for mailing – so I read it!
Which did, at least, stand me in good stead for the interview.
Interviewer: Do you think you would be suited to working with children??
Me: Yes, I would be suited to working with children because ….
(that’s how one was taught to reply for examinations)
What happened? I was offered a position at Teacher Training College J
Did I take it up???
Noooooooo, cos da boss worked on my mind … how OLD I would be, how I would SO out of place …. Etc etc.
So that was one plan that went awry, huh?
This ‘career’ just happened by default.
So now I’m doing something that I don’t actually have ANY qualifications for .. on paper. Hang on … I’ve got tons IN the paper.
I’ve made the job my job … but can I ‘port’ my job elsewhere? This is my pond.
Now, ‘my ladies’, bless ‘em all have held my hand and doled out ‘purple power’ by the bucketful and been supportive but where to from here?
My genes are ‘outing’ maybe. My maiden name suggests that writing is in t’blood. Rimmer from Middle German Rhymer (or some such, I forget) meaning poet or writer.
So I’ve got these genes trying to burst out of me, which makes a change from me bursting out of my jeans and I’m not sure where to channel it.
Here’s a good a place as any to talk to myself.
AND when is my bodyclock going to get normal and I’ll sleep when others do and not be going to bed when the birdies are waking up?
I feel bright and chirpy … untrue … I feel wide awake, forget bright and chirpy, cos I feel grouchy and confused and frustrated.
And ohhhhhhhhhhhhh, how good it would be to put my head on someone’s shoulder and just share this and get a hug and a cup of tea. Not answers, because it’s not that easy.
I was told tomorrow’s another day.
It won’t be like yesterday and it won’t be like tomorrow (which we know never comes) but I suppose I can look forward to one day the light dawning?
Have you read Homer’s The Iliad? The phrase: “And dawn came with rosie fngers,” fascinated me.
Made me think of a couple of gals turning up at a party.
I think the above has been a pity party. But it was mine and I enjoyed it!
Now I read in the Writers’ and Artists’ Year Book that if work is conducted at home, a deduction for ‘use of home is usually allowed …. Reasonable …. Appropriate proportion of the totals … costs of rent, light heat ….’
Rewind, rewind, did I just read rent there??
So I read on. It had been suggested to me by a colleague that ‘computers’ could be claimed 100% in the first year for someone doing what I’m doing. Accountant said no. However this ‘ere book says: Expenditure on IT for the purposes of the business now benefits from a special 100% allowance in the year of purchase.”
Rewind, rewind. 100% allowance, eh?
I already know my rent wasn’t apportioned. Do I really want to look at my last submitted year’s accounts and see if my computer was 100% allowed? Could anything be done in retrospect anyway since the IR paid back all the tax I’d paid the previous year.
Or will I just get very, very annoyed thinking of the amount I paid the accountants last year, which was 3 times the previous year’s amount because I didn’t make the time (didn’t have the time) to put the various expenditures in Excel in columns, pre-added up.
If I’d just dumped a box of unsorted receipts on ‘em I could understand it but they were all sorted chronologically and attached to the statements and highlighted as business expenses.
Should I have taken someone who wears Mickey Mouse ties seriously?
No I don’t want to look at the accounts again, I didn’t want to look at them the first bloody time!
All they’ll tell me is that I need to get a proper job! That somehow, very likely through dint of hard work and not having a life (where does one ‘get a life’?) that I managed to break even.
Now I’ve got my lovely new camera I don’t even know that I want to carry on taking pictures!!! But I do know that though I could brush up my secretarial skills that I don’t want to be within the confines of four walls 9-5pm.
My last career change just happened. I wonder what’s going to happen next.
I’ve never really planned much in my life, except to have the babies, which eventually happened.
I did apply for teacher training as a ‘mature’ student aged 22. The kybosh was put on that by my confidence being undermined by my boss at the time, who didn’t want to lose a good secretary (whom he fancied the pants off) so he wrote in his reference for me … “is not suited to working with children.”
Now, you wouldn’t think he’d tell me that, would you? No, he didn’t. What he did do was put the reference in the out tray for mailing – so I read it!
Which did, at least, stand me in good stead for the interview.
Interviewer: Do you think you would be suited to working with children??
Me: Yes, I would be suited to working with children because ….
(that’s how one was taught to reply for examinations)
What happened? I was offered a position at Teacher Training College J
Did I take it up???
Noooooooo, cos da boss worked on my mind … how OLD I would be, how I would SO out of place …. Etc etc.
So that was one plan that went awry, huh?
This ‘career’ just happened by default.
So now I’m doing something that I don’t actually have ANY qualifications for .. on paper. Hang on … I’ve got tons IN the paper.
I’ve made the job my job … but can I ‘port’ my job elsewhere? This is my pond.
Now, ‘my ladies’, bless ‘em all have held my hand and doled out ‘purple power’ by the bucketful and been supportive but where to from here?
My genes are ‘outing’ maybe. My maiden name suggests that writing is in t’blood. Rimmer from Middle German Rhymer (or some such, I forget) meaning poet or writer.
So I’ve got these genes trying to burst out of me, which makes a change from me bursting out of my jeans and I’m not sure where to channel it.
Here’s a good a place as any to talk to myself.
AND when is my bodyclock going to get normal and I’ll sleep when others do and not be going to bed when the birdies are waking up?
I feel bright and chirpy … untrue … I feel wide awake, forget bright and chirpy, cos I feel grouchy and confused and frustrated.
And ohhhhhhhhhhhhh, how good it would be to put my head on someone’s shoulder and just share this and get a hug and a cup of tea. Not answers, because it’s not that easy.
I was told tomorrow’s another day.
It won’t be like yesterday and it won’t be like tomorrow (which we know never comes) but I suppose I can look forward to one day the light dawning?
Have you read Homer’s The Iliad? The phrase: “And dawn came with rosie fngers,” fascinated me.
Made me think of a couple of gals turning up at a party.
I think the above has been a pity party. But it was mine and I enjoyed it!
posted by Pykspeeks Rides Again at 7/20/2005 04:19:00 am
8 Comments:
Hello Mum. Not much seems very fun at 4.19 am in the morning when you have been up all night.... The daytime will be happier. Love you. TC xxx
Ack, the light of my life ... fruit of my loins ... a shoulder from thousands of miles away. You sprang out of nowhere! Put t'kettle on love!
Thank you, darling. Love you, too xx
Ok - first rule of life: never, ever look at the accounts after midnight.
Second rule - if you love children, stay out of teaching - love will only stand so much!
You should be able to offset about £500 a year of the cost of running your house against tax if you also use it as your place of work. This only helps if you make enough to pay tax in the first place! I can fill you in with more detail of this another time, but this isn't the place for it.
by the third line or so I had completely forgotten about the title.
"So I’ve got these genes trying to burst out of me, which makes a change from me bursting out of my jeans and I’m not sure where to channel it.
you rock.
Oh I love a good party!!! Thanks SM ... and for letting me blow yer whistle last night ... NB readers it was a whistle that made whistley sounds and had holes in it for fingering. Does that leave any doubt about it's purpose??
SC .... I rather like being a rocker!!! I haven't got a motorbike though! But I know a man who has!
Pyk...aren't you glad that with age comes widom, self worth and confidence? You have passion and if you are making ends meet...all the more power to you. The real job is living.
Sues
I hate all that financial stuff, too, Pyk. I always feel like I could be making more of what I have, too, and it makes me crazy just thinking about it. And I work for an investment company! Seems like it takes all my time and energy just to get from day to day, and like Sue said, if I can do that, I should be content. Hard to keep from thinking about what the future will bring, though. And yes, definitely don't try to do your accounts after midnight! Or even 10:00!
I suppose little and often with the accounts is the best thing but I tend to start and them and keep going until I've finished! The first time I worked from noon until 8am, phoned the IR, the minute they opened, held my hand up and was on their doorstep 10 mins later!
Glad I'm not the only one for whom the day-to-day is a pain!
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