The tax man cometh...

It's that time when we writers and artists are (many of us) looking at our shoe box of receipts and thinking, "I need to do this better next year." Many of us creative types are just not as strong in the area of record keeping and that "Type A" sort of stuff. I've learned to do it but it's still not one of my favorite things, especially when it comes to inventory tracking. (And sometimes learning means learning to hand it over to someone that understands the tax forms better than we do.)

But there's hope. An interesting blog by Allena Tapia points out some of the more common financial mistakes creators make on the Wow! blog called "The Five Fatal Finance Mistakes Writers Make." And if you want more information about some of those pesky deduction categories, Sandy Cathcart has available "Totally Honest Tax Tips for Writers." It has forms for record keeping, how to calculate home office deductions, handling things like office equipment and phone calls and more info for tax time.

Until then, though, keep that shoebox in a safe place.