Some days you’re the windshield, some days you’re the fly. Yesterday, I played the part of said fly as the projects around me went from confusing to downright frustrating. One is a long-time regular client and I didn’t get very far in asking for some collaboration so the work process might somehow ease up for…
Zoe’s Christmas List
She’s 6 years old. She loves to draw. She’s a spunky kid who loves cheeseburgers. For Christmas she wants apple juice, orange soda, Dr. Pepper, cantelope… oh, and a new heart. Zoe, adorable niece of Nikki has cardiomyapathy with severe mitral valve regurgitation. What that means is she has a bum ticker, as her mom…
Dead Stuff
At first we thought it was the sewer, so we called the sewer repair company. That was two weeks ago. The smell now is so bad we can’t use the powder room. Just one bathroom, mind you. The others are fine. To be honest, I know the difference between rotting sewage and rotting carcasses (years…
Looking for Work in All the Right Places
It’s that time again – time when clients drop back on their workloads and concentrate on their holiday parties, and time when you and I are left twisting in the wind, wondering where that next job will come from. While two months ago was the best time to consider what you’d be doing in November/December,…
Like Totally
She sat behind me on the train. Each sentence had at least three “like” references, and I found it very hard to believe what she was saying – to paraphrase, that she was like an occupational therapist student and was like totally fried from her internship and she was like telling her teacher how like…
Who’s Your Daddy?
I got yet another interesting email yesterday – this one offering me a DIY paternity test. In an age of spam blockers, junk mail filters and the general wising up of the population, who exactly do they think will click on these links? Yet someone must or they wouldn’t be sent. According to a Wikipedia…
Calling in the Big Guns
I hate doing it. I hate approaching clients with their final notice and I hate reminding them of outstanding invoices. Yet if I don’t, these things would never get settled. So Friday afternoon I flipped through the Current Invoices folder – three are overdue. One seriously. Out went my reminders. What’s frustrating is that I…
Contract Must-Haves
Don’t groan – this isn’t going to be that boring, I swear. But as we’ve talked over the years, I’ve come to the realization that contracts are needing a bit more, well, meat to them so that you and I can CYA. So here are a few things you might want to include in your…
Many Faces of Plagiarism
Jen at CatalystBlogger had a great post nearly a year ago on Shady Writing Projects. On the list was “Rewrite this so we can’t be sued for copyright.” While it’s pretty easy to figure out what to do when a client hits you with that line (run), what about the clients who don’t tell you…
The Case of The Rising Interest Rate That Isn’t
Victory! Proving once again that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, I repeated “Can you help me?” to my bank (the one that was about to raise my interest rates for “nonactivity” in an active checking account), I have prevailed. I was informed by the very same man who first informed me…