Things are plugging along for me, still not at the pace my wildest dreams would like, but I don't mind that so much.
I remember, when I first decided to officially become a freelancer, the super long hours I put myself through. There was a point where I actually started setting one night a week aside and one weekend a month where I had zero plans.
That really helped make a difference for me. It brought a bit of a breathing space into what was turning into a if-I'm-not-working-I-must-be-sleeping blur of a life.
I also realized that while living in the LA area, I did get caught up in that drudgery of feeling like you're a ticking time bomb. Years ago, I had decided that what I really wanted, despite my type A personality, was to live the life of a type B. With all the turmoil that happened around the time I lived in Cali, I lost sight of that. Now that some of the dust is finally settling, I'm starting to make it a constant, even if only one of those things I file in the back of my mind.
In an article I read today, there was a mention that the subject of the article only made her life harder with the choices she made. I very much understand why she did the things she did. I too have made many choices that have made things harder in the long run, but the good news for both of us is that neither of us seem to have any regrets about them.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
finding inspiration
Getting back into business for myself is moving along at a snail's pace.
There are so many things that all too easily eat up time, but they are, none the less, things that need to get done. I am making steps here and there, but right now, I feel like I'm trodding in rice pudding. Not quite rolling rocks uphill, fortunately, but still slower than I'd like.
I know that back then, it was a lot different, mostly because it was all new, and building on the new. Now it's trying to reconstruct the old. I've never been the most patient person, so right now I'm not dealing with the timeline so well.
I have been noticing that lately, the oddest things are inspiring. At the moment, a music video someone created from their own music and a few clips from old Sagan Cosmos episodes, as well as a Hawkings snippet or two. Odd or not, I'm happy to take the inspiration where I can get it.
There are so many things that all too easily eat up time, but they are, none the less, things that need to get done. I am making steps here and there, but right now, I feel like I'm trodding in rice pudding. Not quite rolling rocks uphill, fortunately, but still slower than I'd like.
I know that back then, it was a lot different, mostly because it was all new, and building on the new. Now it's trying to reconstruct the old. I've never been the most patient person, so right now I'm not dealing with the timeline so well.
I have been noticing that lately, the oddest things are inspiring. At the moment, a music video someone created from their own music and a few clips from old Sagan Cosmos episodes, as well as a Hawkings snippet or two. Odd or not, I'm happy to take the inspiration where I can get it.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Cutting the safety net again...but for better reasons.
I've been here before. I'm sure a lot of us have at some point or another.
I currently have a part time job that I took on when the economy went bust and the freelance worked dried up. Well, that's what I told myself at the time. There's more to this story, which it took me a while to realize.
I found what I thought was a flexible job at a small company whose principals and spirit very much reminded me of how I ran my company. The long story short is that although I love the company I currently work for, I'm now glad what I thought I was getting myself into wasn't. I thought it would be a fun and flexible job. There are fun moments, but the flex part of the schedule is to their benefit, not mine. For understandable reasons, but the fact remains that it's hard enough to try to rebuild a freelance business as it is, let alone do it when no matter how open you try to schedule your time, the schedule each week isn't worth the paper you wrote it out on.
The one thing that nagged me from the beginning with the job is how close certain things really were to my own company, which wasn't getting back on its feet, yet that company was doing well. The realization that time I was spending that ultimately helped them I could have done more for my own with even less time required didn't help things.
I kept finding myself asking over and over: what was it that made this company stay together when mine fell apart?
It took me a while, but I finally figured out two key differences.
Opportunity was one huge difference. When I learned more about the history of the company (which had been around for a shorter time than mine by almost half), I realized how many growth instances were spurred by complete dumb luck and the owner being in the right place at the right time. I too had my moments of opportunity, but I let one in particular slip through my fingers. And that let me to realize the other difference.
When the economy first started slumping, so did my business. But at the same time, I lost of my mentor (with whom I was collaborating on a lot of projects with), whose death coincided with the beginning of the first real signs of recession. Yes, the economy still would have hurt, but because of his death, a lot of major changes happened that would have caused a slump anyway. I moved back to the other side of the country; my first living situation was a disaster, which also affected my productivity; a lot of people we had worked with together suddenly shut their doors to me after his death; and due to all the changes, it took me bloody forever to mourn him.
If those things hadn't of happened, especially if I hadn't shut myself down and spent a lot of time moping instead of doing what worked well, and working around what didn't like I always do, things might not have been as profitable, but they would have been ok.
And when the business tanked, more big changes followed: a huge out of state move to a lower cost of living area, a complete break from the part time safety net work I was doing, and a really long time period passed before finding a place I both liked and could afford. The latter turned out to be a major influence, because I did something that made sense financially, but was a risk that turned out to be bad. I was in a shared living space which in itself was all kinds of issues (nothing overly horrific--just lots of straws on the camel's back), no small part of which was interrupted communication: internet especially, which is my lifebloood as a freelance.
So when I first got down here, I got knocked down a peg further than I planned to be. Even after almost a year, I still had people contacting me about work, yet I could not get on top of things in that situation. Hence, the safety net job happened because I didn't want things to get worse. I've already delved into that, so no need to get back to it, so moving forward, this is where I am now.
Now I am here, in the wee hours of the morning, set up in a much better housing situation, with the worst of the flood passed, realizing that I need to tell my pretty nice boss (the owner) that I just can't work for him anymore. I'm still not sure how I'm going to do it, but it's going to happen today.
The next step, of course, is cleaning up the mess. It may mean finding a better safety net part time job if worse comes to worst, but it's a step in the right direction.
Here goes something.
I currently have a part time job that I took on when the economy went bust and the freelance worked dried up. Well, that's what I told myself at the time. There's more to this story, which it took me a while to realize.
I found what I thought was a flexible job at a small company whose principals and spirit very much reminded me of how I ran my company. The long story short is that although I love the company I currently work for, I'm now glad what I thought I was getting myself into wasn't. I thought it would be a fun and flexible job. There are fun moments, but the flex part of the schedule is to their benefit, not mine. For understandable reasons, but the fact remains that it's hard enough to try to rebuild a freelance business as it is, let alone do it when no matter how open you try to schedule your time, the schedule each week isn't worth the paper you wrote it out on.
The one thing that nagged me from the beginning with the job is how close certain things really were to my own company, which wasn't getting back on its feet, yet that company was doing well. The realization that time I was spending that ultimately helped them I could have done more for my own with even less time required didn't help things.
I kept finding myself asking over and over: what was it that made this company stay together when mine fell apart?
It took me a while, but I finally figured out two key differences.
Opportunity was one huge difference. When I learned more about the history of the company (which had been around for a shorter time than mine by almost half), I realized how many growth instances were spurred by complete dumb luck and the owner being in the right place at the right time. I too had my moments of opportunity, but I let one in particular slip through my fingers. And that let me to realize the other difference.
When the economy first started slumping, so did my business. But at the same time, I lost of my mentor (with whom I was collaborating on a lot of projects with), whose death coincided with the beginning of the first real signs of recession. Yes, the economy still would have hurt, but because of his death, a lot of major changes happened that would have caused a slump anyway. I moved back to the other side of the country; my first living situation was a disaster, which also affected my productivity; a lot of people we had worked with together suddenly shut their doors to me after his death; and due to all the changes, it took me bloody forever to mourn him.
If those things hadn't of happened, especially if I hadn't shut myself down and spent a lot of time moping instead of doing what worked well, and working around what didn't like I always do, things might not have been as profitable, but they would have been ok.
And when the business tanked, more big changes followed: a huge out of state move to a lower cost of living area, a complete break from the part time safety net work I was doing, and a really long time period passed before finding a place I both liked and could afford. The latter turned out to be a major influence, because I did something that made sense financially, but was a risk that turned out to be bad. I was in a shared living space which in itself was all kinds of issues (nothing overly horrific--just lots of straws on the camel's back), no small part of which was interrupted communication: internet especially, which is my lifebloood as a freelance.
So when I first got down here, I got knocked down a peg further than I planned to be. Even after almost a year, I still had people contacting me about work, yet I could not get on top of things in that situation. Hence, the safety net job happened because I didn't want things to get worse. I've already delved into that, so no need to get back to it, so moving forward, this is where I am now.
Now I am here, in the wee hours of the morning, set up in a much better housing situation, with the worst of the flood passed, realizing that I need to tell my pretty nice boss (the owner) that I just can't work for him anymore. I'm still not sure how I'm going to do it, but it's going to happen today.
The next step, of course, is cleaning up the mess. It may mean finding a better safety net part time job if worse comes to worst, but it's a step in the right direction.
Here goes something.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Balancing need and want while looking for a new place to live.
Now that April is upon me and mine, and the work hours are finally starting to get closer to full time, the concept of moving to a place of our own doesn't seem so impossibly far off as to not be conceivable. Along with that realization, I find myself comparing the places I browse on Craig's List and occassionally acutally visit to where we are now.
The share we currently have isn't the worst place I've lived by far. The house itself I don't find to be anything overly special, but the location is quite lovely. The funny thing is that the owner of the house made a comment to me today about how he'd love to take the house with him if he could when he moves to Florida.
Personally, I'd love to have a property very much like what we have here (want). The only thing missing is a nice small pond. So far, most of what we've seen advertised within the range we will soon be able to afford more readily isn't like here at all. Some of it probably used to be, but then they went and cleared out all the woods and wrecked it. (In my opinion, anyway.) So you have these largish plots of land that look naked save the lone house plunked on it somewhere. Sometimes they've done some token landscaping, but it's not the lush woodsy feel that we have here by far.
I realize that the smarter thing to do (need) is just find a decent sized place at a price we can afford for a year and just save like mad while we pay down the debt we have. One year is such a short time in the big picture, and later on down the road, a place more like what I love about here may open up.
On the other hand, I do hope that something a little more akin to what we're searching for does suddenly show itself--it doens't even have to have a pond. So every day I duitifully do my check of what's available in the areas that make sense, and hope.
The other sticking point I've had lately is the size of the places that we're looking at (need and want). Currently, we have most of our stuff stashed in a storage space. This has been very counterproductive to continuing certain pre-planning business attempts I was making before the move (comics in particular). But even though the house within which we are living is quite spacious, we are mostly relegated to two small rooms (our queen sized bed barely fits with meager walking room in the one), which is why so much is in storage. Some of the nicer sized properties for rent are rich in land size, but small in living space, others are a goodly sized living space, but if you trip going out the front door, your head hits the street. I find the large gap of medium sized lot and living space telling and confusing all at the same time. I know some people are still clinging to boom pricing, and the newer properties we look at are definitely built with the boom times in mind, but the dearth of medium/medium, even in properties not for rent or sale, is a curious thing to me.
Here, we originally were supposed to have enough room set aside for us that we could get a very small storage space which wouldn't make the rent that much more costly in the long run. Instead, give when space we do have, the storage costs have made this place quite costly.
So as the month trudges on, and the money is stashed, it will be interesting to see if that elusive medium/medium shows up. If not, there will be much weighing of which end of the spectrum we're willing to cope with for a year. The balance of which, of course, will also be weighed by how much extra we might have to pay for continued storage for whatever won't fit in a four room cottage style home. It's part of what's driving me crazy now.
The share we currently have isn't the worst place I've lived by far. The house itself I don't find to be anything overly special, but the location is quite lovely. The funny thing is that the owner of the house made a comment to me today about how he'd love to take the house with him if he could when he moves to Florida.
Personally, I'd love to have a property very much like what we have here (want). The only thing missing is a nice small pond. So far, most of what we've seen advertised within the range we will soon be able to afford more readily isn't like here at all. Some of it probably used to be, but then they went and cleared out all the woods and wrecked it. (In my opinion, anyway.) So you have these largish plots of land that look naked save the lone house plunked on it somewhere. Sometimes they've done some token landscaping, but it's not the lush woodsy feel that we have here by far.
I realize that the smarter thing to do (need) is just find a decent sized place at a price we can afford for a year and just save like mad while we pay down the debt we have. One year is such a short time in the big picture, and later on down the road, a place more like what I love about here may open up.
On the other hand, I do hope that something a little more akin to what we're searching for does suddenly show itself--it doens't even have to have a pond. So every day I duitifully do my check of what's available in the areas that make sense, and hope.
The other sticking point I've had lately is the size of the places that we're looking at (need and want). Currently, we have most of our stuff stashed in a storage space. This has been very counterproductive to continuing certain pre-planning business attempts I was making before the move (comics in particular). But even though the house within which we are living is quite spacious, we are mostly relegated to two small rooms (our queen sized bed barely fits with meager walking room in the one), which is why so much is in storage. Some of the nicer sized properties for rent are rich in land size, but small in living space, others are a goodly sized living space, but if you trip going out the front door, your head hits the street. I find the large gap of medium sized lot and living space telling and confusing all at the same time. I know some people are still clinging to boom pricing, and the newer properties we look at are definitely built with the boom times in mind, but the dearth of medium/medium, even in properties not for rent or sale, is a curious thing to me.
Here, we originally were supposed to have enough room set aside for us that we could get a very small storage space which wouldn't make the rent that much more costly in the long run. Instead, give when space we do have, the storage costs have made this place quite costly.
So as the month trudges on, and the money is stashed, it will be interesting to see if that elusive medium/medium shows up. If not, there will be much weighing of which end of the spectrum we're willing to cope with for a year. The balance of which, of course, will also be weighed by how much extra we might have to pay for continued storage for whatever won't fit in a four room cottage style home. It's part of what's driving me crazy now.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
the past shaping the now vision of the future
While out smoking in the rain the other day, I was once again trying hard not to focus on this displaced and stuck there feeling. Out of nowhere, I suddenly thought of the words "I've already made and lost fortunes in my lifetime." I can think of at least one person I know that said something along those lines, and I'm fairly certain some famous person or other said something similar to it in regards to how continued effort even in the face of failure will yield rewards of one kind or another. But it definitely got my brain reeling in another direction.
I cannot recall, and couldn't then either, of ever hearing much about the in between times in circumstances like that: the making and losing of fortunes. (I'm realizing as I write this that it's hard to define exactly what I mean by in between times, and I'll get to that in a bit.) There is one person in particular I did actually know before he passed who certainly lost one fortune in his life and had to rebuild, but it wasn't so much of a cycle for him. Although with him, I definitely heard the tale of what happened in between the fall and the start of the next rise.
And that led my brain to thinking about how we can and sometimes do break down parts of our lives into chapters or scenes with nice little headings that summarize, well or otherwise, what can be found within that encapsulation. And that's where I was trying to figure out when the upswing actually got recorded as a part of the process, or the bottom was recognized as whatever part of the curve, etc. etc.
As much as I try to think outside of the so called box, I know that I often view my life in relative terms to what my memory recalls of my past. It's part and parcel of the idea that Utopias never work because if there is no bad, how can we appreciate the good?
Right now, when the concept of hand to mouth isn't even giving justice to how we're living, I feel that I am at a dead low of sorts. I know that things could be worse. We could be homeless. We could have no jobs at all. We could have no food at all. He could be dead and I would be that much more dismal on top of everything. But, my memories of what I perceive as better times are still quite strong, and therefore are dictating to my neural spaghetti that right now I am not happy because of how different they are in the lacking sense of what made the happy as happy as it was for me overall.
Three things of note that I read today that relate to this for me are:
"To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle."--George Orwell
"I think, is the perception of my Gen Y e-mailers that they dutifully set up their lives based on assumptions that suddenly no longer apply. "--Emily Bazelon "The Real World Threw Up All Over Us" http://www.slate.com/id/2214712
"It’s easy to feel that one isn’t working hard enough, that one should try harder to save money or take on additional work. To rebel publicly, even to engage politically, would mean exposing your own inadequacies, so most people just hunker down and keep plugging away at those monthly payments." -- Sudhir Venkatesh "Feeling Too Down to Rise Up" http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/29/opinion/29venkatesh.html?pagewanted=1
The reason I find these three quote significant right now is because they all reminded me of the other day when I realized I wasn't exactly waxing nostalgic so much as I have been struggling to figure out what's realistically next on the agenda of my life--what will be the formative aspect of my next life chapter.
There are definitely rules that have changed, some of which happened well before the final realization that we weren't surviving anymore, we were perilously close to becoming tenants in a type of tent city if we didn't take serious action. The first one that comes to mind at this moment is that we no longer fight about money. And as simple as this may sound, realize that according to some statistic that I'm too lazy to look up right now, money issues are the number one reason for divorce by such a wide margin that you have to say it's not a horseshoes or grenades comparison moment.
But despite the changes that have already come, even those accepted without a grudge, we both still feel stuck. When I try to do something with a spare hour or so I find myself with, I once again realize how the contents that need tending to from the move are primarily in off-site storage in mostly not marked boxes, and we are still in the process of taking the few boxes we still have here that aren't very helpful right now for whatever reason back to there so we will have room to bring a few that might be relevant back to here. This of course, is when I start calculating driving time, what time of day it is, gas that will be used even with our hybrid, and then how many more days until we are supposed to be moved out of our temporary housing and then I find myself yet again coming to the conclusion that it's not worth it. And then I waste time trying to find something else I can do with my available time that somehow seems more meaningful rather than blowing time playing a game or once again browsing my usual web haunts. (Oh, like writing here--and obviously this isn't much of a usual web haunt, so you figure it out.)
And this is the point where I find my original clear thought muddled and unresolved as I want it to be before I need to take care of something else. I may come back and try to wrest this better later, or time may not allow it.
I cannot recall, and couldn't then either, of ever hearing much about the in between times in circumstances like that: the making and losing of fortunes. (I'm realizing as I write this that it's hard to define exactly what I mean by in between times, and I'll get to that in a bit.) There is one person in particular I did actually know before he passed who certainly lost one fortune in his life and had to rebuild, but it wasn't so much of a cycle for him. Although with him, I definitely heard the tale of what happened in between the fall and the start of the next rise.
And that led my brain to thinking about how we can and sometimes do break down parts of our lives into chapters or scenes with nice little headings that summarize, well or otherwise, what can be found within that encapsulation. And that's where I was trying to figure out when the upswing actually got recorded as a part of the process, or the bottom was recognized as whatever part of the curve, etc. etc.
As much as I try to think outside of the so called box, I know that I often view my life in relative terms to what my memory recalls of my past. It's part and parcel of the idea that Utopias never work because if there is no bad, how can we appreciate the good?
Right now, when the concept of hand to mouth isn't even giving justice to how we're living, I feel that I am at a dead low of sorts. I know that things could be worse. We could be homeless. We could have no jobs at all. We could have no food at all. He could be dead and I would be that much more dismal on top of everything. But, my memories of what I perceive as better times are still quite strong, and therefore are dictating to my neural spaghetti that right now I am not happy because of how different they are in the lacking sense of what made the happy as happy as it was for me overall.
Three things of note that I read today that relate to this for me are:
"To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle."--George Orwell
"I think, is the perception of my Gen Y e-mailers that they dutifully set up their lives based on assumptions that suddenly no longer apply. "--Emily Bazelon "The Real World Threw Up All Over Us" http://www.slate.com/id/2214712
"It’s easy to feel that one isn’t working hard enough, that one should try harder to save money or take on additional work. To rebel publicly, even to engage politically, would mean exposing your own inadequacies, so most people just hunker down and keep plugging away at those monthly payments." -- Sudhir Venkatesh "Feeling Too Down to Rise Up" http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/29/opinion/29venkatesh.html?pagewanted=1
The reason I find these three quote significant right now is because they all reminded me of the other day when I realized I wasn't exactly waxing nostalgic so much as I have been struggling to figure out what's realistically next on the agenda of my life--what will be the formative aspect of my next life chapter.
There are definitely rules that have changed, some of which happened well before the final realization that we weren't surviving anymore, we were perilously close to becoming tenants in a type of tent city if we didn't take serious action. The first one that comes to mind at this moment is that we no longer fight about money. And as simple as this may sound, realize that according to some statistic that I'm too lazy to look up right now, money issues are the number one reason for divorce by such a wide margin that you have to say it's not a horseshoes or grenades comparison moment.
But despite the changes that have already come, even those accepted without a grudge, we both still feel stuck. When I try to do something with a spare hour or so I find myself with, I once again realize how the contents that need tending to from the move are primarily in off-site storage in mostly not marked boxes, and we are still in the process of taking the few boxes we still have here that aren't very helpful right now for whatever reason back to there so we will have room to bring a few that might be relevant back to here. This of course, is when I start calculating driving time, what time of day it is, gas that will be used even with our hybrid, and then how many more days until we are supposed to be moved out of our temporary housing and then I find myself yet again coming to the conclusion that it's not worth it. And then I waste time trying to find something else I can do with my available time that somehow seems more meaningful rather than blowing time playing a game or once again browsing my usual web haunts. (Oh, like writing here--and obviously this isn't much of a usual web haunt, so you figure it out.)
And this is the point where I find my original clear thought muddled and unresolved as I want it to be before I need to take care of something else. I may come back and try to wrest this better later, or time may not allow it.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
sixteen days--day fourteen
Yes, it's quite a jump from one to fourteen, but with good reason.
In two weeks, major leaps of faith were made, patience wore thin, and a flu bug took us both down like a huge heavy rock.
I believe I had mentioned that I had sought advice on one of the multitudinous debt reduction sites, and if not, the overall response to my post was move to a lower cost of living area. After much hemming and hawing, and unfortunately some more (and hopefully last) borrowing of funds, that is exactly what we aim to do. One day ahead of schedule, we will be driving down to the Raleigh area of North Carolina to a shared house rental and starting Monday will be embarking on an interview intensive week that hopefully will yield employment before the week's end, even if it means yet another minimum wage job for the time being.
The main reason behind this is that we can clearly see that short of a miracle call, things are not going to be that much financially better just because we move to a place that's $400 less a month, especially when it increases my hubby's commute to 46 minutes longer each way. Instead, we're now moving to a place that is just over $400 a month, and also includes utilities, which means we'll be saving more than $1500 a month from what we paid for the place we're about to leave. Yes, the numbers are right, and no, we weren't living in a place beyond what basic living and still being connected by phone and web costs. It's just that darned expensive here, and that darned inexpensive there. So even if only one of us finds a minimum wage type job right away (hopefully full time), bills will be paid and there will still be money left over.
I know that some folks might shirk at the idea of shared living, but it's only a month to month because we had a devil of a time renting a place out of state that we would hope to call home. There were too many risks involved, and the week we were hoping to go down to do interviews and look at places was the week the flu hit. And when you have a fever one degree shy of what requires a hospital visit, you don't travel 9 hours by car. So we were lucky to find the share which will allow us more time to gain both employment and more permanent living arrangements. From what we've been told by folks from the area as well as seen for ourselves, once we move to a house of our own, we might be spending about $6-700 a month for COL (cost of living) expenses, which is still a little more than a third of what we had to here.
Other things we did in the meantime was continue to use freecycle to try to narrow down what we would take with us, which has had some successes, some not so successes, as well as have a list of jobs we will be applying for as soon as we get there, and making sure that we have something to live off of just in case it takes more than a week or two to secure something.
The truck is now parked outside, we're packing it up, and we will be leaving on Saturday instead of Sunday to give ourselves a day to breathe and, if necessary, stash some things in storage that there may not be room for at our shared house before hitting the interview week.
It's going to be chaos for the next few days. But at least we now have a much better plan in motion to seriously move for the best reasons.
In two weeks, major leaps of faith were made, patience wore thin, and a flu bug took us both down like a huge heavy rock.
I believe I had mentioned that I had sought advice on one of the multitudinous debt reduction sites, and if not, the overall response to my post was move to a lower cost of living area. After much hemming and hawing, and unfortunately some more (and hopefully last) borrowing of funds, that is exactly what we aim to do. One day ahead of schedule, we will be driving down to the Raleigh area of North Carolina to a shared house rental and starting Monday will be embarking on an interview intensive week that hopefully will yield employment before the week's end, even if it means yet another minimum wage job for the time being.
The main reason behind this is that we can clearly see that short of a miracle call, things are not going to be that much financially better just because we move to a place that's $400 less a month, especially when it increases my hubby's commute to 46 minutes longer each way. Instead, we're now moving to a place that is just over $400 a month, and also includes utilities, which means we'll be saving more than $1500 a month from what we paid for the place we're about to leave. Yes, the numbers are right, and no, we weren't living in a place beyond what basic living and still being connected by phone and web costs. It's just that darned expensive here, and that darned inexpensive there. So even if only one of us finds a minimum wage type job right away (hopefully full time), bills will be paid and there will still be money left over.
I know that some folks might shirk at the idea of shared living, but it's only a month to month because we had a devil of a time renting a place out of state that we would hope to call home. There were too many risks involved, and the week we were hoping to go down to do interviews and look at places was the week the flu hit. And when you have a fever one degree shy of what requires a hospital visit, you don't travel 9 hours by car. So we were lucky to find the share which will allow us more time to gain both employment and more permanent living arrangements. From what we've been told by folks from the area as well as seen for ourselves, once we move to a house of our own, we might be spending about $6-700 a month for COL (cost of living) expenses, which is still a little more than a third of what we had to here.
Other things we did in the meantime was continue to use freecycle to try to narrow down what we would take with us, which has had some successes, some not so successes, as well as have a list of jobs we will be applying for as soon as we get there, and making sure that we have something to live off of just in case it takes more than a week or two to secure something.
The truck is now parked outside, we're packing it up, and we will be leaving on Saturday instead of Sunday to give ourselves a day to breathe and, if necessary, stash some things in storage that there may not be room for at our shared house before hitting the interview week.
It's going to be chaos for the next few days. But at least we now have a much better plan in motion to seriously move for the best reasons.
Friday, February 13, 2009
sixteen days--day one
Today was rough.
The good news is that the first thing I posted on my local freecycle has already been picked up and taken home by someone who is very happy to have it.
Strangely enough, apparently one of the folks I called on Craig's List about selling off some of our dupe comics passed my number along and I got a phone call today from a comics wholesaler who basically wanted what I have for less than a song. Now I know the economy is in the toilet, I know most of what I'm trying to move is from the glut era, and that the market is flooded right now because everyone is trying to make a buck anywhere they can, but I'd be insane to hand over the comics to this person at the price they were offering. The main reason I haven't been trying to sell the comics right now is because I know the market is flooded. So why am I going to let a smooth talking opportunistic SOB who doesn't give a darn about the comics other than their resale value when he ships them overseas in bulk have them? A small amount of fast cash would be nice, but I'd much rather enjoy the process of dealing with actual readers who really want the comics I have and don't need. For the price he was offering, I'd sleep a hell of a lot better donating the lot to a reading program rather than selling to him. The worst part is he tried to inquire as to my personal collection. I guess he's been dealing with a lot of desperate folks for him to feel cocky enough to toe the line there when I already made it quite clear that I was only looking to move dupes. I know my feelings towards him are uppity, but I have a hard time with people who deal in any form of human accomplishment that only see dollar signs when they look at it, instead of at least having some respect for the effort behind the endeavor.
We're still a bit in limbo about the move, because I'm still waiting to hear back from one of the folk we're hoping to rent from. She keeps telling me everything's fine and she just hasn't had time for our next meeting, but I'll feel a lot more confident when I have the signed lease in my hand.
One interesting thing that happened is that I had written in to a debt reduction forum, to seek advice while recounting our situation to see if there was anything I was missing out on that I should be starting to do. In the replies, the most common response was to move away from coastal areas because of the cost of living expenses. On one hand, I completely see the logic in this, but on the other hand, when I've made it clear that we're in a hand to mouth situation financially, how on Earth are we supposed to be able to make the leap? It's one thing to move to an area relatively close to where one currently is, it's a completely different story to research, check out and then move to a completely different area--especially when you know no one from said area you are moving to. (And from actual experience, even knowing people from the area sometimes doesn't help much if at all.) It's something I'm still turning over in my head, because they did have some great suggestions overall and I don't disagree with the notion, but I'm still reaching to find the way to do such a thing.
I didn't manage to pack anything today, although I do have a few more things I'm ready to freecycle. Hopefully tomorrow, we'll be giving away two desks which would be a huge help in the process.
Tomorrow we're supposed to have other possible tenants looking at our place, so I'll be doing some dishes tonight and trying to tidy a bit. Hopefully this won't turn into another reschedule. I'll also call around to try to find an animal shelter that will take the bedding and towels I've set aside that I know some shelters take so I can get them where they need to be as well.
The good news is that the first thing I posted on my local freecycle has already been picked up and taken home by someone who is very happy to have it.
Strangely enough, apparently one of the folks I called on Craig's List about selling off some of our dupe comics passed my number along and I got a phone call today from a comics wholesaler who basically wanted what I have for less than a song. Now I know the economy is in the toilet, I know most of what I'm trying to move is from the glut era, and that the market is flooded right now because everyone is trying to make a buck anywhere they can, but I'd be insane to hand over the comics to this person at the price they were offering. The main reason I haven't been trying to sell the comics right now is because I know the market is flooded. So why am I going to let a smooth talking opportunistic SOB who doesn't give a darn about the comics other than their resale value when he ships them overseas in bulk have them? A small amount of fast cash would be nice, but I'd much rather enjoy the process of dealing with actual readers who really want the comics I have and don't need. For the price he was offering, I'd sleep a hell of a lot better donating the lot to a reading program rather than selling to him. The worst part is he tried to inquire as to my personal collection. I guess he's been dealing with a lot of desperate folks for him to feel cocky enough to toe the line there when I already made it quite clear that I was only looking to move dupes. I know my feelings towards him are uppity, but I have a hard time with people who deal in any form of human accomplishment that only see dollar signs when they look at it, instead of at least having some respect for the effort behind the endeavor.
We're still a bit in limbo about the move, because I'm still waiting to hear back from one of the folk we're hoping to rent from. She keeps telling me everything's fine and she just hasn't had time for our next meeting, but I'll feel a lot more confident when I have the signed lease in my hand.
One interesting thing that happened is that I had written in to a debt reduction forum, to seek advice while recounting our situation to see if there was anything I was missing out on that I should be starting to do. In the replies, the most common response was to move away from coastal areas because of the cost of living expenses. On one hand, I completely see the logic in this, but on the other hand, when I've made it clear that we're in a hand to mouth situation financially, how on Earth are we supposed to be able to make the leap? It's one thing to move to an area relatively close to where one currently is, it's a completely different story to research, check out and then move to a completely different area--especially when you know no one from said area you are moving to. (And from actual experience, even knowing people from the area sometimes doesn't help much if at all.) It's something I'm still turning over in my head, because they did have some great suggestions overall and I don't disagree with the notion, but I'm still reaching to find the way to do such a thing.
I didn't manage to pack anything today, although I do have a few more things I'm ready to freecycle. Hopefully tomorrow, we'll be giving away two desks which would be a huge help in the process.
Tomorrow we're supposed to have other possible tenants looking at our place, so I'll be doing some dishes tonight and trying to tidy a bit. Hopefully this won't turn into another reschedule. I'll also call around to try to find an animal shelter that will take the bedding and towels I've set aside that I know some shelters take so I can get them where they need to be as well.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
sixteen days--day zero
A lot has happened in what feels like a very short span out of my entire life.
Once again, we are moving. This is mostly due to economic reasons, given how little work I've been finding of late, so I'm not exactly contributing much to the household funds. The fact that a certain client still owes me thirty grand and has shown no sign of ponying up isn't helping either.
Starting tomorrow, I have sixteen days to try to whittle down our belongings, since the new place we'll be moving to is smaller. And, as usual, even though we have gottten rid of a lot of stuff before we came here, new things seemed to made it through our door since then, and we won't have room for it. Since we're not the types to adore cluttered living spaces (well, not too cluttered), and we don't buy into the massive movement that is self-storage here in America, we've got to weed out what's not needed before then, because it's the logical thing to do. At this point in time, logic does help with all the murky gray areas floating around.
I already jumped the gun a bit using freecycle tonight. I posted the first largish furniture item that just can't come with us. Sure, we'd love to try to sell some of the stuff we're getting rid of, but I tried that last time, when no one was admitting yet that this country was in a recession, and it didn't go so well, despite the fact that what we were trying to sell wasn't junk in any sense of the word, nor was it priced with high expectations of profit. So this time, there are a few things I'm still going to try to sell first, but everything else is first getting posted to my local freecycle list, and if it doesn't move by a week's time, I'll be listing it on the free area of Craig's List as well. I'm doing this because there's nothing wrong with what we're getting rid of, and I hate filling landfills with useful things.
I'll lose some time tomorrow in the effort because the landlord will be showing this place, so I have to somehow make a place that is in the midst of packing not look like a tornado hit it. But the rest of the time I have available, I'll be spending working towards my goal.
We're getting a 16 foot POD to put our stuff in, and we only have our wee Insight as well for moving. Since we don't have a time overlap of one place to the other, that means either we're going to have to find a staging ground for some things (even if I whittle down what we plan on, I still don't think what needs to will all fit in the 16 foot POD), or we'll have to let go of more than we care to. I'm hoping it doesn't come to that, so hopefully we'll find a place we can stash some things in between to save on money, because we really don't want to rent a van or whatever for the awkward period of February 28th-March 1st. Money is really tight right now, and with all the things that always crop up near moving time, we just don't want to lay out any more than we know we're going to end up paying for when everything's done.
So wish me luck! I'll be trying to blog each night to talk about what I've managed to do or not do. I don't know if it will make for the most exciting reading, but maybe someone somewhere will find the recant of my experience useful.
Once again, we are moving. This is mostly due to economic reasons, given how little work I've been finding of late, so I'm not exactly contributing much to the household funds. The fact that a certain client still owes me thirty grand and has shown no sign of ponying up isn't helping either.
Starting tomorrow, I have sixteen days to try to whittle down our belongings, since the new place we'll be moving to is smaller. And, as usual, even though we have gottten rid of a lot of stuff before we came here, new things seemed to made it through our door since then, and we won't have room for it. Since we're not the types to adore cluttered living spaces (well, not too cluttered), and we don't buy into the massive movement that is self-storage here in America, we've got to weed out what's not needed before then, because it's the logical thing to do. At this point in time, logic does help with all the murky gray areas floating around.
I already jumped the gun a bit using freecycle tonight. I posted the first largish furniture item that just can't come with us. Sure, we'd love to try to sell some of the stuff we're getting rid of, but I tried that last time, when no one was admitting yet that this country was in a recession, and it didn't go so well, despite the fact that what we were trying to sell wasn't junk in any sense of the word, nor was it priced with high expectations of profit. So this time, there are a few things I'm still going to try to sell first, but everything else is first getting posted to my local freecycle list, and if it doesn't move by a week's time, I'll be listing it on the free area of Craig's List as well. I'm doing this because there's nothing wrong with what we're getting rid of, and I hate filling landfills with useful things.
I'll lose some time tomorrow in the effort because the landlord will be showing this place, so I have to somehow make a place that is in the midst of packing not look like a tornado hit it. But the rest of the time I have available, I'll be spending working towards my goal.
We're getting a 16 foot POD to put our stuff in, and we only have our wee Insight as well for moving. Since we don't have a time overlap of one place to the other, that means either we're going to have to find a staging ground for some things (even if I whittle down what we plan on, I still don't think what needs to will all fit in the 16 foot POD), or we'll have to let go of more than we care to. I'm hoping it doesn't come to that, so hopefully we'll find a place we can stash some things in between to save on money, because we really don't want to rent a van or whatever for the awkward period of February 28th-March 1st. Money is really tight right now, and with all the things that always crop up near moving time, we just don't want to lay out any more than we know we're going to end up paying for when everything's done.
So wish me luck! I'll be trying to blog each night to talk about what I've managed to do or not do. I don't know if it will make for the most exciting reading, but maybe someone somewhere will find the recant of my experience useful.
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