The core accountancy task of auditing can seem dull next to sexier alternatives, and many a bean counter yearns for excitement that the traditional role doesn't offer. As long ago as 1969, Monty Python captured this frustration in a sketch featuring Michael Palin as an accountant and John Cleese as a careers adviser.
"Our experts describe you as an appallingly dull fellow, unimaginative, timid, lacking in initiative, spineless, easily dominated, no sense of humour, tedious company and irredeemably drab and awful," Cleese tells Palin (are you still with me, Des?) "And whereas in most professions these would be considerable drawbacks, in chartered accountancy, they're a positive boon."
Of course, accountancy would have been so much more challenging had we stuck with Roman numbers - try subtracting VDI from MMCDXLIX or dividing CDLXXV by XIX - but thanks to Fibonacci we changed over to Arabic numbers, leaving us with liontaming as the only alternative.
Always ready for a bit of self-flagellation, I have ordered through ebay Richard Brooks' "Bean Counter" which, at $21.75 for 352 pages, or 9 cents a page, seems as good a value as our ABC at 8 cents a day.
There are, on the whole, few ways of spicing up an accountant's day at the office, although Les Dawson and John Cleese make a good attempt:
Of course, in this time of self-isolation, it may take some time for the book to arrive, which gives me plenty of time to watch Simpkins, the typical accountant if ever there was one (I let you off, Des!):
Allow me to point out a bit of detail: when Fishbein asks him how long he's been in the company, Simpkins replies "7906 days net." He'd been there from 1957 to 1981, so subtracting weekends and holidays, 7906 is well within the ball park. You might have thought he'd just plucked the number out of the air, but no, somebody had done some sums.
Astonishing, isn't it? Or is this my accountancy training coming through?
