I am both the best and the worst Bookkeeper.... ever

I'm a Bookkeeper. You may know that. Or not. At any rate, you know now. I've been doing this for more than 20 years, with a few breaks in the middle to pop out some spawn, and I'm not ashamed to say that I'm damn good at it. I mean, I just am. Really, though, if you've been doing something for more than 20 years and you're not damn good at it it's probably time to start doing something else, don't you think? Because at this point I doubt you're going to get any better.

So, I have all these clients, and they love me; because I'm damn good at my job and I'm a nice person and I make them laugh. They are business people who mostly work out of a home office, and financials are.... let's say... not their friend. I always say that's nothing to be ashamed of; we can't all be good at everything, right? They are good at what they do and bookkeeping is not high up on their list of preferred activities. No problem! That's why they hire me.

So, I instruct them all to make a folder, or a box, or a bin, or a section of the floor... with my name on it, and when financial type things pass by them, they are to put it directly into my folder or bin or drawer and forget about it. Then, I will come once or twice a month, go through my chair or my section of the desk, pay all of their bills, deposit all of their checks, and just keep them up to date.

They're thrilled, to say the least. Keeping organized financials can be a huge problem for a lot of people and having me come in for just a few hours a month is a huge load off. For me, it's super easy, and I always whip through it quickly and accurately. They're amazed.

So, as a professional bookkeeper? I'm awesome. Seriously. You should hire me.

For myself, though? For the finances in our house? OH MY GOD I'M SO HORRIBLE. It's probably because I spend so much time doing this stuff, when it comes to my own bills my brain just shuts off, I guess. I've got piles of unopened mail in various locations around my house, many of them bills that I haven't paid. I overdraw the checking account all the time, I'm late on all my credit cards pretty much every month; it's pretty bad! One would think that bookkeeping should be the absolute last thing I should be doing professionally, I mean.... I'm awful. I'm apparently leaving all these things for MY bookkeeper to come and take care of for me, like I tell my clients to do, except... I'm leaving them for myself. And I guess since I don't get paid to pay my own bills, or something, I just forget about them.

Maybe I should take a class in bookkeeping, so I can figure out how to do this. But you should still hire me, though. No, really.

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