Posts from — August 2009
Awww no!
We’ve had crazy nasty winds here recently (no, actual weather, don’t be rude).
According to the news (but who can trust the news?) the winds reached up to 120kms an hour, or about 74 miles an hour for you USA folk. Or about 65 knots for you knotty nautical types.
In any measurement, it was enough to lift roofs off houses in nearby suburbs. Luckily, we suffered no damage, though I did spend Tuesday night awake through fear that the windows were about to bust inwards, or the tiles were about to come off the roof.
The garbage bins did blow over though, and my watering can went on a little adventure around the yard and then made a wonderful effort to get out onto the street and head for freedom.
The only real problem we suffered: MY PLANTS!! My poor, poor plants.
I’ve been out in the yard for day after day, preparing garden beds and planting little seeds. I watered the little seedlings that popped up, mulched with care.
And now, now they’re looking pretty the worse for wear.
I don’t, for instance, think my basil is going to recover (some of it isn’t even dead, it’s actually missing). And the passionfruit vine that had just begun winding its way up the arch I got for it is hanging limp, leaves in tatters.
I don’t know if it will pull through either.
My chives and oregano look pretty beaten up, but I suspect they’ll be ok. I HOPE they’ll be ok.
I’m disappointed.
I’ve put in so much work, and now they’ve copped such a beating.
Frustrating!
August 30, 2009 1 Comment
Talent vs Skill
This is something I harp on about a lot. A lot.
But it’s something that I feel rather strongly about, and I think people need to understand – not just with art, but across the board with pretty much anything.
So here it is:
I am not a talented artist. [Read more →]
August 30, 2009 2 Comments
Oh yes
Just lodged my pain in the arse tax return using the pain in the arse e-tax all by my pain in the arse self (wait…what?). Ha!
And actually, the e-tax thing isn’t as hard as it seemed like it would be. Admittedly, I am sitting up to my chin in papers and receipts and sweat has made my glasses slip down my nose so I look like a granny.
BUT!
MONEY!
Looks like I’m going to get just about all of the tax I paid back. I was expecting some back, but not that much. Ka-ching!
I think I’ll buy me a diamond encrusted toilet seat. Oh yes.
August 25, 2009 2 Comments
Art Weather
I love weather. Any weather, not just good weather.
I especially love hot summers where it’s scalding hot and sunny, then it comes over all dark and stormy and wild. Then, after a downpour and a dip in temperature just enough to let you put your favourite cardigan on and drink hot tea while you sit under the awning and watch the lightning, it suddenly clears up, the trees stop whipping back and forth and it’s hot and balmy again.
As far as I’m concerned, the more weather that fits into a day the better. Err…..within reason. I don’t, for instance, want to wake up up to my eyeballs in snow only to have fireballs rain down and set my snow on fire by afternoon. Thanks for asking. [Read more →]
August 24, 2009 Comments Off
Nights in and BOOKS! (yeah, I’m boring)
I love nights in. Especially nights in alone.
It’s sad and boring but very true.
Tonight, Seth is out at a music thing he has to go to, and I’ve decided to have a ‘girls night in’ solo style.
I love doing this, and really don’t get to do it very often, but tonight I am armed with awful chick flicks and tasty food (healthy food, trying to be careful there), a big cozy hoodie and a sleepy, cuddly (and rather disturbingly flatulent. And I mean really, really bad. We’re not talking clear a room bad, we’re talking clear the house bad) cat.
While I can’t recommend cat gas as an ideal addition to the evening, I CAN say that I picked this up on a whim at the supermarket today, and that despite being low fat it’s really very tasty.
I got the mocha truffle flavour. Oh yum.
And, to top the evening off, I have a pile of books waiting for me in my bed, and the electric blanket just waiting to be switched on. [Read more →]
August 22, 2009 4 Comments
Dreams (real ones, not the Fleetwood Mac song)
It’s a funny thing. It seems that the more work I do on illustration during the day, the stranger my dreams are.
I once read an article (or a book? where did that come from?) by Stephen King where he says that he has his scary ideas because he taught his imagination to misbehave. I rather feel that way about art sometimes.
When I’m stumped for the next idea, I ask my imagination to just go for a run and see what it comes back with:
A reclining nude? Not enough, go further. A still life? No, go further. A rat? Closer. A rat trapped in a bottle too small for it to have gotten into in the first place on the edge of a cliff? Good work, little imagination! Have a liver treat.
This results in really crazy dreams.
And the worst bit half the time is that I imagine them so vividly that waking up doesn’t fix the problem. [Read more →]
August 20, 2009 6 Comments
Working from home
Fig1: How to bankrupt yourself in mere days
Most of the time when I tell people I work for myself, from home, it’s met with an extreme enthusiasm followed by the words that must irk freelancers the world over:
“I’d LOVE to work for myself and be my own boss! I wouldn’t have to work so hard! I could do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted! Do you work in your pajamas?”
Yes, truth be told, I often do work in my pajamas. The reason being that some nights it’s past 1am and I’m still plugging away in front of the screen. I should be sleeping in my pajamas.
It’s hardly surprising that people would assume that, as a self employed person, you really could do whatever you wanted whenever. After all, if there’s no boss breathing down your neck it really is up to you to make your own choices about what work you do and when.
The big difference is that the choice of what you do and when is also the choice of what money arrives in your bank account, what client will or won’t work with you, what you can or can’t afford to do.
I see it as a case of smaller wants versus bigger wants – I want to lie in bed all day and read interior design magazines….but I really want to get a mechanic to give my car a service.
I’ll get out of bed and get to work.
Now, I’ve had to work very hard in the ‘normal’ jobs I’ve had. The work was certainly more physically tiring, and constant social interaction takes a bit of a toll on me. I swear, some nights I lay on the lounge massaging my twitching cheeks, having over-exerted myself in a long day of over the top, manic looking “HI AND HOW CAN I HELP YOU TODAY?!?” smiles. I’m sure I scared more customers than I welcomed…
My feet ached, my back ached. And my head…
It’s certainly more comfortable at home, but the one major thing that makes it so hard:
IT. NEVER. STOPS.
In freelancing circles, they say this is a disaster. That one must find a way to switch off and simply switch off.
Personally, I’ve never managed it, and it’s this exact problem that sent me scurrying to other employment for a while.
Before I jumped ship, I’d find myself working on a project (say, making a business card for somebody) by day, then thinking about it settling down to watch a movie with Seth. Then awake in bed, tossing and turning, wondering if they’d prefer this colour or that colour, if I’d done a good enough job. If I’d make the deadline.
Eventually I’d get up again in the small hours of the morning and keep working.
Not only this is extremely not healthy, it was actually detrimental to my productivity.
I got so sick to my stomach every time I sat down to work that I avoided it like the plague. My house was never cleaner than when I had a commission to work on (oh, I could start working on this picture….but the bath needs scrubbing. I’ll scrub the bath. But the carpets look awfully dirty. I’ll clean them first….) as I was constantly looking for any excuse to relieve the enormous pressure I felt.
Working alone, it’s all pressure on you. You can’t refer an unhappy client to a manager, dusting your hands as you stroll away, knowing that your weekly wage will be there in your bank account simply because you turned up in uniform and did what they asked you to do.
It’s all you, all the time.
If you want repeat customers, you have to go above and beyond to please them. Even difficult ones. You have to fight for every dollar.
Sometimes, you’ll even have to remind people that you, actually, should be paid please, because, sorry, you don’t actually work for free and uh…didn’t we sign a contract? How is this happening?
It can be hard, lonely work. You don’t get to gossip with coworkers at lunch about how Joe Blow threatened to quit this morning if Mr Entity didn’t give him his holiday leave, and did you know he’s sleeping with his assistant!?!
Nobody claps you on the back and says “Good job! See you Monday, enjoy the weekend!”
And the office ladies certainly don’t bring a cheap supermarket sponge into work and lovingly decorate it with candles and gummi bears in a gesture so sweet it makes you get kinda teary (you pretend it’s just the candle smoke bothering your sensitive eyes, naturally. What, it isn’t bothering anybody else? It must be that I’m standing so close to them).
For me, a lack of peer support makes it easy to lack motivation.
It’s so, so easy to go get that extra cup of coffee and lie down on the lounge to ‘let ideas brew’ (you’re not even kidding yourself there) and oops! No work got done today!
But naturally, this lifestyle it has its perks.I wouldn’t be here if it didn’t.
My work is for me. I judge how well I’m doing, I control the quality, I pick which direction we take next.
I also pick what time of day I work, what projects I will and won’t accept, and how I approach them.
And the payoffs are mine and mine alone.
Having tried both now (having a boss and being my boss), I’m in no doubt about which I prefer.
I am converted. I have seen the light.
Where once I didn’t, I now believe the sacrifices are well worth it.
August 19, 2009 4 Comments
