Break the Bank.


I’ve spent much of the day getting together my records for the last financial year, then submitting my Tax Return.

It felt good to have completed it, particularly after my initial false start (which I've already covered here). What didn’t feel so good was seeing how little I’d actually earnt.

It had seemed a reasonably good year, until I'd totted up the figures; not my best, but by no means my worst. I did a fair few Buddy shows and function gigs, as well as a play and six Glad All Over dates (the Sixties show I devised with Glyn). I’d co-produced a play at the Brighton Festival, written and staged a sitcom pilot - and taken mine and Glyn’s stand-up show to the Camden Festival.

On top of this I did a lot of teaching; working for five different companies over twelve months, covering singing, drama, poetry and prose, plus running a god-awful after-school club for a term of which I despised every single minute.

The club essentially consisted of a couple of months' worth of crowd control, with my level of control being a subject of debate.

Somehow none of this was reflected in my bank statement. The content was barely worth the cost of the paper it was printed on. Perhaps after twelve years of self-employment, the time has come to choose a different career. 

I wonder how much cash I could raise if I sold my internal organs. Would that be tax deductible?

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