Why don’t you …

Tax return. I usually spend from around 6th April until mid-December thinking about doing my tax return, how I should just get it over and done with “today”, “tomorrow” … But I find it faffy, tedious and not something I want to spend free time doing (I know I am not alone thinking that), so the todays and tomorrows pass remarkably quickly, without the filing of my tax return, and December starts to loom ominously. Then I do it and feel an enormous sense of relief and achievement for having done so.

So, today (as in today not a “today” in early December), I am going to complete it. I feel stressed already.

Some of my recent activities, for example my home spa day, have ended up with my doing a clean, tidy and make-nice of the area I am focussed on. Last night, already dreading tax return day, I decided to tidy my “tax zone”, which is basically my messy and cluttered desk area (which I was so enthusiastic about untidying to tidy – my way of tidying – that I forgot to take a photo until the job was partly in motion).

Ignoring the messy-looking table of wires and cables to the right of the photo below, my surroundings are ready, though I can appreciate from the above/before and below/after photos it doesn’t look as improved as the time spent achieving the supposedly better set-up would suggest it should look. It is significantly better though, really.

It’s not necessary to say, but I can appreciate that the “tidy your work space” is not good advice for anyone whose dreaded task is actually the tidying-up element. Maybe if that’s your dreaded chore, you should prepare by baking or buying a treat to reward yourself on completion.

Now there’s an idea, I will indulge in a treat-fest after I finish my tax return.

But before I start, maybe I should make a cup of coffee, stroke the cat, wash the dishes, clean my bathroom wash basin, Google cheese boxes (a future treat), check the post, search online for a nice folder with dividers to make next year’s tax return more organised, give the cat a pedicure and manicure, have a snack, “oo, lunch time” … I. Must. Not. Procrastinate.

Right, I’m going in … but, honestly, I NEED a coffee first … (it’s 10:10am).

It’s now two days later and I’ve been so busy basking in the glory of having completed my tax return on the day I set out to do it that I kind of forgot to update this post. I finished the tax return at 6.30pm, though, probably maybe definitely, I could have been finished by around 2pm.

As a series of bonus extras, as envisaged, I also managed to stroke the cat (who also appreciated the ribbon-ties around my paper filing system), make two coffees, make a fairly elaborate lunch, do a clothing wash, maintain a messaging chat with a friend about varying degrees of crush between Keanu Reeves c1995, heroine-crush with Emily Maitlis now and a Google search to establish whether Adam Driver is crush-worthy (for the record, I’m yet to be convinced). The cat had a full pedicure and manicure, my bathroom wash basin gleams, the snack zone was raided, I found a nifty way to make plant pots for all the seeds I still haven’t sown, I have so successfully Googled “rubber finger paper turners” and “handheld counter clicker” that I am being sent relevant adverts for them and I had a video chat with a friend (I needed a break).

So, all in all, a massively successful day, loads achieved, some virtual socialising AND my tax return is done. It took it out of me though, I tell you; it’s exhausting overachieving on this scale. I was so tired and it was so almost dinner time that I didn’t even have time or inclination to reward myself with cake or cheese.

The moral of this “project” is that chores you really don’t want to do are probably best done now, to get them out of the way and not niggling you for days, weeks, months … it’s also a delightful bonus to intersperse the big chore-event with the completion of other tasks and more enjoyable activities. Plus, I now have a work area that is much more efficient and I’m on course to set up a more effective filing system (including the purchase of rubber finger paper turners, a counting clicker and a document box with dividers to improve my paperwork pile “situation”).