I’ve mentioned before that my husband does laundry (I put it away) and dishes. This is awesome. One thing he doesn’t do is touch a receipt once it leaves his wallet. It goes on the counter, never to see a file folder or envelope or basket. There is no organizational system out there–and I’ve tried a million–that will cure him of his aversion to paperwork. This is not awesome, but hardly worth complaining about in the long run.
I might have let the receipts pile up since summer and then added a hermit crab tank to the mix for that bit of unexpected. Now that I think of it, I should have had him toss the receipts into the hermit crab tank. What an opportunity lost!
Taking away the hermit crab tank made a huge difference (shocking!) and all that was left was to go through all the receipts to see what I needed to keep for our taxes.
One receipt. I needed to keep one receipt.
Pha ha ha! I literally did laugh out loud at least twice during this wee posting! It is marvellous!
Where else could you find such classic (and yes – unexpected!) sentences as “I might have let the receipts pile up since summer and then added a hermit crab tank to the mix for that bit of unexpected”.
Love it. Love the photos. Love and soooo relate – the storing of items that seem significant and then, after the passing of time, really are not. But yay! for the freedom from all that paper work!
Hoping the hermit crabs get the chance to enjoy their improved view!
They better enjoy their new view for all the money I’ve spent on them. ;)
One receipt? Of course. I hope it was an important one.
Maybe. I’m not even sure if it’s deductible. :/
That sounds like my husband. He’s the one who gets pedantic about how it’s supposed to be filed (usually I’m the anal one, but apparently paperwork gets his blood going), so I let him do it. Except he really only feels the need to do it once every year or so when he wants to find a certain receipt or bank statement or EOB. And then heaven help you if you come in while he’s working. I tell him he wouldn’t get so stressed if he’d take care of it more often, but it won’t happen. He is what he is. I am grateful, anyway.
Hahahaha! :)
Hahaha! Of course :-) We recently moved into self-employment and I have this huge, organized binder with sheet protectors and labeled sections and all sorts of goodness. There are no receipts in it. Of course, those are tucked away, in NO order, in a manila folder. About six months worth. Probably time to go through them too!
Do it in front of the TV. :)
Love this. And that is so my husband. I ignore the piles for as long as I can, but I recently collected all the receipts scattered around the house for him to sort during a road trip. The bag is still in the car, unopened. Guess they’re not very important receipts!
Haha! My husband wouldn’t have sorted either, unless it was the night before taxes were due and since he has never, in 13 years, ever even touched our taxes…yeah.
The first year we were married, Josh would come home and empty his pockets (very large, have you seen army uniform pockets lately? They can hold notebooks – easily a 5×7, I’ve even seen a rolled up 8×0): keys, pens, papers, receipts, notes, paper clips, and more pens. I got a nice, solid, sturdy basket to put on the dresser for his “pocket junk.” I showed it to him, it was right where he put his stuff, I did everything to make it fit his normal habits and require nothing from him. Then I actually watched him come home, reach into his pockets and pull out the paraphernalia and put it on the dresser directly. beside. the empty basket. That’s when I realized the true difference between men and women. :) And now, rereading this, I see it has nothing to do with anything. But it’s a good story, so I’m leaving it. And I got over it; I love my husband. :)
I had that basket! I created that system! You can see how it worked out. :) Like you said, I love him and I got over it.
Ha! This is very similar as to why I have laundry baskets/hampers strategically placed around the house – back door, beside the closet door, inside the closet door, next to the dresser, beside the shower – anywhere he normally drops his clothes. I must say he has caught on to it quite nicely though. Except for the pile of I-didn’t-wear-it-long-enough-to-put-in-a-hamper-but-too-long-to-put-back-in-the-closet clothes that are on the floor on his side of the bed. Every now and then I just gather them up and wash them anyway. And I love him. :)
Do you in fact have hermit crabs in the hermit crab tank?
As for receipts, I’m quite positive the United States Treasury loves us – I’m always throwing away ones I really should be keeping. With a background in accounting, I know better, but that’s why I’m heading back to school.
No, that’s the old hermit tank. The hermit crabs are now in a bigger, better tank. Sigh.
Those thermal receipts are totally awful. I have to keep them for work (and am forced monthly to reconcile, much to my chagrin). But the worst part is that they fade, so if you have something hot against them, like say…a coffee cup, they fade into oblivion, that and they are a source of BPA – as if reconciling wasn’t painful enough, now I have to incessantly wash my hands to avoid death by paperwork.
Whats wrong with me? I thought “that’s a great idea to corral receipts that pile up” . . . . . I like your end plan better though! ;)
Your counter resembles the inside of my purse after a couple of months. I’m not so good with the receipts, either.
HERMIT CRABS IN THE KITCHEN?
I can’t.
They make me hork. Impressed that yours are still alive.
THE AREN’T IN THE KITCHEN! I was carrying the too small tank to the garage and I got waylaid…two months ago.
All of my receipts go into an extra long coupon clutch organized by month. Basically, every day mail and receipts just get tossed into the top drawer near the front door and then when bill time comes around (or the first free weekend) we go through it all. DH goes through the junk mail while I sort the receipts. Takes literally 5-10 minutes if we do it twice a month. This keeps my receipt ready to compare to my credit card bill and also in case of returns. It’s my very best organizing system, don’t think the rest of my life is this slick. lol