For those of us who read the Abbott Family Blog once every four days know that we have a full fledged music business. In this business, Luke is the president*, Mama is the social director, Papa is the Grand Mufti (who bring good advice and reminds us from getting to caught up in details), and I am the finance manager, which fulfills my two great passions in life: money, and siphoning (though this time, it’s not gas).

*After this post was written, Mama became El Presidente, because she was the only one who took notes beforehand and during the meetings.

Last year, our Abbott Family Meeting would run 2+ hours. Why? Finances! No, no… It was nothing I did wrong. You see, one of Luke’s great opposite-of-failings* is that he can read instructions (unlike us, who choose not to) and follow the rules.

*Somehow, the word just isn’t coming to me, no matter how hard I rub my chin in a “pondering” manner.

Luke also reads what people have gotten in trouble with. Usually, the recorded cases are about the big boys. In this case, Enron. Now, the clincher is that Luke usually takes the worst-case scenario to be what can happen to him. This keeps him sticking to the rules, even if nobody else does. (I mean, who shakes the bottle before pouring? Puh-leeze!)

So, after he read all those horror stories, he strove to be more accurate with finances. This was good, as we tended to be a little unorganized there, like a couple of times I never entered checks ’cause I never saw them. So, things like that was remedied. However, in this strive for accuracy, two main issues he got in a hissy-fit over conflicted with Papa’s (and my) conscience.

• We lost track of a few receipts. “Big whoop!” I thought. Luke said this was unacceptable. Pa figured, “Hey, we’re making so little, it all balances out in the end”.
• We charged my shamisen-making tools as business expenses. All the wood and tools I used to make the shamisens came to about $400. He was arguing that it shouldn’t be expended because he wasn’t the one using the tools and wood. Papa and I argued that it was for music purposes and since it’s a music business, it applies. Plus, I’d be making a book about the shamisen (which’ll make business income) and those tools were necessary in completing the shamisen and thus, the book.

Luke held firm. Basically, he was worried (though he didn’t really admit it) that he would be sent to prison for the accounting . . . rationalization. [Oh, come on, I didn't go that far... —Luke] When it comes to both health and rules, Luke tends to be a bit of a hypochondriac and Papa to be the opposite, not worrying about the rules. Both of them respectively, to a fault, possibly. Such opposite viewpoints meant the AFM meetings would drag out an hour longer. I, fortunately, used that time for doodling, something I haven’t done in 4 years or so.

The discussion would usually come to a close when Papa put things in perspective.

• The companies that have gotten in a lot of trouble are multi-billion dollar companies that have done millions of dollars worth of accounting errors. Compared to those companies, $400 of questionable expenses of our little $6000 company is peanuts compared to the multi-million dollar companies who have done millions of dollars of accounting errors.
• Our expenses were at least related to the business, whereas the president of Tyco used company money for giving his wife a million dollar birthday party.
• If we ever did get in trouble, we’d just get a fine. Nobody would go to jail… most likely. [Yeah, I knew that, Kyle... —Luke]

This calmed Luke down . . . until the next meeting, where practically the same discussion was made. We’d then have to bring out the doughnuts to put in perspective the real reason we have these meeting.

Even though Pa had his years of wisdom on his side, his carefree attitude with the rules didn’t win Luke over. I obviously had to bring in some extra ammunition to our argument. So I loaded up a second opinion, being my Karate buddy, Josh, who is the head stall of hospitality management at the UCSC Inn. I told the issue to Josh. He asked me how much business revenue we expected to get this year. When I said the measly amount of possibly $7,000 (which turned out to be $3,000), he patted me on the shoulder, smiled, and said, “Buddy, you’ve got nothing to worry about.” The opinion from Josh, who knows the rules, solidified the point. At the time, the second opinion still didn’t ease Luke’s mind much. But fortunately, this over-accuracy in the finances was just a novelty in Luke’s conscious that, like a kidney stone, passed.

Through all this, some protocol went out and some protocol went in. Ironically though, the “out” and the “in” converged, as both were fairly neurotic. We blew a whistle when Luke went to extremes by wanting to take a picture of a $100 check to put in the records in case we got audited (mind you, this was along with the written record we put in Quicken). [It's about discipline! —Luke] That was neurotic and went out. But somehow I found myself having to enter in $0.35 receipts (which I’d assume throw away) which was for Officemax copies. Go figure.

What the funniest part about this is after all his worry and wanting to be completely accurate, we found that with all the expenses (“real” expenses mind you) entered, he didn’t make enough to make his full contribution to his IRA. So he told me to remove some of the business expenses so the income would be more. Ah, the sweet stench of irony! [Hey, you know the IRS wouldn't complain about someone paying *too much* in taxes... —Luke]