A taxing endeavor
Mar. 28th, 2011 11:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pbrayIn a perfect world I would have an assistant who kept on top of these things for me. In the real world everything gets thrown in a folder on the theory that I'll deal with it when I have to. That time finally came, so this past weekend I excavated the folder so I could enter the numbers into spreadsheets and then fill out my taxes.
There were dozens of slips of paper to go through, but taken together it's pretty clear that a writer's most frequent destinations are office supply stores, bookstores and the post office, with the occasional trip to a convention or signing.
Advertising expenses are where things get interesting, whether it's a receipt for two pounds of candy for a book signing, or an order for several dozen lizard keychains. I've contemplated other ideas-- like renting the Goodyear blimp to circle San Diego during Comic-Con, or commissioning our own brand of Gilgamesh sanctioned UR-BEER, but the theory that advertising expenses should not exceed the advance tend to rein in my more extravagant fancies.
Then there are the things that aren't tax-deductible but should be, such as massages to relieve tension in shoulders/neck from being hunched over the keyboard, or the awesome jacket I bought to wear at WFC. And I'm pretty sure my critique partners qualify as dependents, or should that be co-dependents? I may need to give this more study.
There were dozens of slips of paper to go through, but taken together it's pretty clear that a writer's most frequent destinations are office supply stores, bookstores and the post office, with the occasional trip to a convention or signing.
Advertising expenses are where things get interesting, whether it's a receipt for two pounds of candy for a book signing, or an order for several dozen lizard keychains. I've contemplated other ideas-- like renting the Goodyear blimp to circle San Diego during Comic-Con, or commissioning our own brand of Gilgamesh sanctioned UR-BEER, but the theory that advertising expenses should not exceed the advance tend to rein in my more extravagant fancies.
Then there are the things that aren't tax-deductible but should be, such as massages to relieve tension in shoulders/neck from being hunched over the keyboard, or the awesome jacket I bought to wear at WFC. And I'm pretty sure my critique partners qualify as dependents, or should that be co-dependents? I may need to give this more study.