Budgets, bills, reports, myriad numbers in myriad little boxes. It is a monthly, quarterly and annual penance.
I have not been looking forward to these days. It is the annual chore. It is the beginning of July and I am trying to close the books on the year. So I spent the entire day paying bills, and balancing check statements. It is a $257,000 budget to run this place, not terribly large by the standards of the parish I am going to, but there will be a fulltime bookkeeper there.
Well, after all the numbers were in place, I let the computer generate a first draft annual report. The chief achievement is to get the bottom line on the report to match the check book balanced statement. I remember last year spending half of a day looking for $0.35 cents.
Well, everything balanced on the first run. Everything balanced the first time, all the numbers figure out.
Small things like this excite me.
I still have to generate three separate reports for the two provinces and the other religious community. (Did I fail to mention that I was the formation director for the Glenmary Missioners this past year, another Institute of Apostolic Life. )
After the reports are run, filed and the movers come, I am on vacation. Yippee!!!
How do you get to be the formation director for the Glenmary Missioners, as well?
On another note...I get excited each time I balance the check book on the first time every much. I'm sure someone out there enjoys doing that kind of work. I'm not one of them!