Good afternoon, Residual Readership!
How's life been treating you? No little disasters or traumas or roadblocks on your path to a happy life, I hope?
Now that we're into the holi/holy day season, with various new years, days of atonement, days of dedication (Hanukkah, right?), Thanksgivings, Christmases, etc., I wish you and all your loved ones peace and prosperity.
--Sometimes I forget these little gestures that mean so much. Remembering that people, for instance, have their own lives and priorities.--
In the category of "random fun stuff," we have Old Friendships Renewed.
A friend I haven't seen in something like 20 years contacted me last week--she was in town and wanted to meet up. We got together for dinner, I got to meet her daughter for the first time, and her daughter's fiance, and then we had some one-on-one time to catch up on old acquaintances and each other's lives.
She has some health issues for which the prognosis isn't good. Terminal, in fact, but considering they gave her 2 years about eleven years ago, she's doing remarkably well.
She was in town to see another old friend's newest grandchild, born a couple of weeks ago. (Sadly, that friend passed away last year--a heart condition.)
These things remind us to cherish our friends, past and present.
Sentimental today, aren't I?
In the category of "keeping up with Gidget," there are bits of news you couldn't possibly care less about, so I won't bore you. Suffice to say that, once again, I'm grateful to be childless.
Workwise, she lost two "bankroll" client accounts in the last month and is now grabbing at any project she can find that will pay her money--working for 1/2 or 1/4 of her normal rate.
Oddly enough, she isn't accepting the projects I offer her. I mean, they're all one-off projects but my clients pay and the work isn't that complicated.
Just yesterday, she turned down a project that would have taken her three hours and paid her $500. Why? Because she's in the middle of a 50-hour project she took on that's going to pay her $1k.
The new client I mentioned in my last post, the one she'll rake in a minimum of $1,400 on? She hasn't had a chance to get back with that client yet.
Boggles the mind.
I'm thinking--okay, I'm not sharing these clients with you if you won't follow up with them promptly, because you're not only losing the fees you would have made, you're eliminating my future client base when you blow them off.
I dunno. I'd thought of having this conversation with her when we met for lunch but her Family Crisis story was so complicated that we didn't have time to really get to business subjects.
Anyhow.
Moving on.
Me-wise client-wise, things are--busy. I've brought on one new client since last I posted. I have one more on the verge of signing.
A very good friend who passes me leads is handing my name off to another agency who has the kind of accounts I'm really interested in--the kind where if I had four or five of those, I'd be financially solid as a full time, self-employed person.
Which, of course, brings us to the employment issue. Right now, I'm teetering on the verge of a casual sort of meltdown. I have too much work for the "Saturday morning & all day Sunday" freelance schedule I've been using for the last year. I really need to add one--maybe two--evenings a week to current accounts.
Which is more hours in a single day than either I or my 5(x) year-old eyeballs are really interested in spending staring at a computer screen.
So, I'm clutching my scant supply of courage in both hands and, if this third agency contacts me and offers me even one new account, I'm going to draft up and submit and polite but firm letter of separation from the Argonuts and the Corral.
If I get hungry, I can say so and you'll send me a sandwich, right? I'm not picky--just sustenance to keep life in my wasted frame. (No mayonnaise.) (No rye bread.)
(I like multigrain bread without rye, though.)
(Something hot. I like a hot sandwich.)
As you can see, I'm not hungry yet. I had a very nice lunch today--stewed chicken and mushrooms over rice--so I don't need a sandwich yet. But I might someday.
(Seriously. No rye.)
Pursuant (so long since I had the opportunity to use my favorite word) to the onset of my more frugal lifestyle, I cancelled the preorder I'd placed for the Amazon Fire tablet. (That sounds very financially responsible and mature but the truth is, I had a 80% firm intention of cancelling the order two seconds after I placed it. The idea of a tablet interests me but I have no use for one.)
The R.C. thought we might need to let the Grinch steal Christmas but I've got a savings account and a holiday fund and anyhow, she's only asked for one very inexpensive gift. There are already too few days in a year when anyone feels like giving me a present. I'm not giving up a sure thing for anything as lame as being financially destitute.
It's been almost 24 hours and that agency hasn't contacted me yet, so this is all still pretty theoretical.
_____________
* A "bankroll" client is one of your big ones--the ones who provide enough income to give you breathing space.
posted by AnneZook on 10.19.11 at 01:06 PMAs I write this, a meeting of my departmental colleagues at which they are discussing tenure dossiers is almost certainly coming to an end, if it hasn't already. They were gathering as I left the office. I know they have other dossiers besides mine to discuss, but since they discussed those colleagues as part of the promotion meetings last month, the tenure discussion should be fairly straightforward; I came in at Associate rank (I'd been an Assistant Professor for 9 years already!), so I'm only up for tenure, not promotion.
Bit nervous, yeah. We've got Fall Break this week, so I have time to be nervous... I mean, time to clean up and catch up on the work I fell behind on putting the tenure dossier together (a book, basically, in three binders) before my parents arrive for Max's birthday.
Yeah, life is interesting. Gonna be in limbo for a while.
posted by: Jonathan Dresner on 10.19.11 at 04:05 PM [permalink]Oh, and I'd be happy to fly you a sandwich now and then. My speciality is grilled cheese: sharp cheddar, pepperoni and ketchup on wheat.
posted by: Jonathan Dresner on 10.19.11 at 04:09 PM [permalink]You can send me that sandwich, sans ketchup, any time. :) I love a good grilled cheese. I've never had one with pepperoni, but I can't see why it wouldn't be amazing.
Tenure--the elusive pot at the end of your rainbow! I'll be sitting on tenterhooks with fingers crossed for you until you hear the good (I'm sending the vibes) news.
How are you liking Kansas? Interested in staying there for the long term?
posted by: Anne on 10.20.11 at 08:44 AM [permalink]Kansas is OK. KC is a great town, actually, but it's a bit far for regular day trips (we did a day trip last Saturday, and it was kind of a marathon, but worth it); we have friends living there we can stay with for overnights, though, which helps a lot.
If this state would get its political head out of its cultural arse, it would be a great place to live. As it is, we're just praying our governor (you my remember him as Senator Brownback) doesn't screw up things too much before our neighbors regain their senses. Either that, or we're just going to be a slightly colder Oklahoma.
Don't hold your breath on the tenure thing. It's a year-long process. The departmental decision which is due next Friday is the most important, but not the only one: Department chair, dean (and the dean is new, wild card), Provost, President, then the statewide Board of Regents has to approve. I should know for sure by May. Or June. The tension between wondering what's happening NOW, and that I can't do anything about it either way until the whole process is over (not entirely true, as there are some procedural remedies for negative decisions, but it's ugly), and not wanting to piss off people in high places....
My family's been doing the pepperoni thing for years; not sure if it's a NY thing or just something my mother came up with. It's basically the reason I keep pepperoni in the house, as we don't do anything else with it (well, that and french bread pizza now and then)
posted by: Jonathan Dresner on 10.21.11 at 03:21 PM [permalink]I'm going to the deli down the street to get some good pepperoni, then I'm going to try it.
A year-long process? Sheesh--that's a fair amount of stress. (I'll focus on sending the good vibes for _this_ step of the process for the moment.)
Kansas have "its political head out of its cultural arse" is one of the main reasons I don't live there any more. There is, as I've often said, a level of stupidity that's just more than I'm prepared to deal with....
posted by: Anne on 10.21.11 at 04:07 PM [permalink]