By: A.J. Cook

Some expenses are so inherently personal, you wouldn't want to discuss them with the Internal Revenue Service or your mother.

This was the case with Ralph L. Vitale Jr. of Arlington, Va., who researched his new book by interviewing numerous women in Nevada. The IRS disallowed his deductions saying this was just a hobby and many expenses were inherently personal.

Inherently personal expenses are not deductible - most of the time. Here are examples of non-deductible inherently personal costs:

• Glasses for an accountant, shoe shines for an airline pilot and haircuts for a TV anchorman.
  
• An Accountant's exercise equipment he said he needed to maintain high productivity during busy season.
  
• A worker's commuting cost even though the civilian technician, working at Vandenberg Air Force Base, could not legally live on the base and driving was the only way to get to work.
  

In an unusual ruling, a court allowed a professional blood donor to deduct some inherently personal expenses.

Margaret C. Green had a rare blood that enabled her to earn $7,000 one year. The court allowed her to deduct the cost of special drugs and high-protein diet foods, which enhanced the quality of her blood.

Now back to Vitale and his manuscript research. Before retiring from his job of 35 years at the Treasury Department, he started writing this book, titled Searchlight Nevada. It was about two men who travel cross-country to patronize a Nevada brothel.

To authenticate the story and develop characters, he acted as a customer while interviewing numerous prostitutes. In a journal he described what he learned: house rules, the manner of negotiating price, their religious background and level of education, the names and ages of their children. Payments to the women totaled $9,140. While doing a little crusading on the side, he convinced 10 to change professions.

The court allowed all the expenses except the $9,140 paid to prostitutes, considering them inherently personal. It agreed with Vitale that this wasn't a hobby. The facts showed he intended to make a profit.

He had writing experience in his government job and researched and kept records in a businesslike fashion. Granted, Vitale enjoyed the work, but this doesn't mean it wasn't a for-profit proposition – except when he was propositioning prostitutes.

The Moral: Originality might score points but not deductions.