Thanks . . .but no

I was half jokingly offered my old job as bookkeeper at a weekly newspaper. I know this paper pretty well. My dad used to be the publisher. I had done every job at the newspaper except for bookkeeping when, one day, the bookkeeper quit and there I was. Numbers have never really been my game so I was a lot nervous about doing it, but Dad operated on a cash accounting basis (the "what you see is what you get" of accounting methods) so it was never very hard to tell exactly where we were.

My bookkeeping motto at the paper became, "Pay what you owe -- no more, no less." It did not come as a surprise to me that there would be costumers who failed to pay, but there were customers who would just pay random amounts -- plucked out of nowhere. At first I would try and figure out how they came up with this amount as opposed to the amount they owed, but after a while . . . well, I just didn't care. I would credit them and move on, rebilling them the next month.

When Dad sold the paper I worked another four or five months and left. It wasn't the job for me under the guilt laden eye of my father. No way was I doing it for a stranger. Needless to say today I said, "Thanks, but no thanks."