Coffee heat rising

Prerogatives of the Self-Employed

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Okay…hang onto your hats. In about 15 minutes, I’m going to knock off working and take a nap. It’s 11:07 a.m. as I scribble.  And why? you ask? Because I can. It’s a prerogative of self-employment.

Before you go “That’s exactly what I suspected self-employment was all about,” bear in mind that another prerogative of the self-employed is to work from 5:30 a.m. to 10:00 or 11:00 p.m., seven days a week. We might call that, actually, a “definition” of the self-employed.

Last night, as usual, I knocked off around ten o’clock.

This morning, Cassie the Corgi awakened me at 5:00 by barfing all over the bed. I had to leave the house around 6:30 or so to get to my weekly bidness meeting in Scottsdale, so this was convenient in its way: it got me out of the sack a little early. After hauling the comforter out to the garage and stuffing it into the washer, I began the Thursday morning charge-around, by way of getting myself out the door.

The food served by the restaurant where we meet is best described as inedible, and so I usually bolt down breakfast before leaving. After the clean-up activities and given that my hair had to be set before I could bathe, paint my face, and get dressed, and that I hadn’t checked the e-mail yet (always a time suck), I noshed on some leftover soup and slurped down some coffee while flying around the house and office. Poured the rest of the coffee into a travel mug, leapt into the car, and started driving.

Three hours later, I fly in the house, hit the “rinse” cycle on the washer (since the comforter has been sitting there that long wadding itself into a wrinkled mess), and I’m effing STARVED. All the way across the city, I’ve been dreaming of a handful of tiny little red, white, and purple new potatoes roasted in a panful of butter, thinking how maybe that will settle my stomach, which hurts on top of trying to tell me it wants food.

It’s still very early, but craving meat, too, I decide to make an actual meal. Before 10:00 a.m., the potatoes, a small piece of steak, and a fistful of salad have made it to a plate, which now resides on the backyard dining table.

Meanwhile, I’ve sent off two emails to colleagues, reviewed a document in draft, set up two new meetings, and concocted another endless list of things To Do. I’ve checked the website of the distinguished Changing Hands Bookstore’s Phoenix branch and have found, yea verily, a women’s reading group. (I wish to associate myself with such-like because I believe schmoozing in organized groups of women is a fine way to generate interest in the Boob Book.) I add “visit Changing Hands” to the To-Do List. I’ve reviewed some of the work I did yesterday for the Client and considered the next steps. I’ve conceived an idea for the next Writers Plain and Simple post. I’ve checked the stats for that site and reflected that CoPromote isn’t exactly burning up the world when it comes to calling in new readers.

Now it is 11:27 a.m. and I am going to take a nap. So early is it that by 1:00 p.m. I’ll be back in the saddle, riding off into the sunset. And into the dark of night.

🙂

The Costco/AMEX Strategy: It WORKED!

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A month has gone by since I resolved to visit Costco once (count it: 1ce) a month and no more! This, in hopes of keeping the spending more or less under control.

The theory was that Costco is a gigantic hole into which to throw money, an effect amplified by the refulgent impulse buys that call out to one the instant one enters the door.

So last month I flew in said door on the first day of the February/March budget cycle, which begins on the 22nd of any given month (the day after the AMEX billing cycle closes). Being out of just about everything, I dropped $350 that day.

Holy mackerel.

But… As a practical matter, over the course of several Costco trips in any given month, I diddle at least that much away. The idea is, if I could make one monthly giga-junket and then fill in the blanks at grocery stores for the rest of the billing cycle, maybe I wouldn’t spend as much. Because I wouldn’t be entering Impulse Buy Paradise more than once a month, over any given budget cycle I would tend to buy mostly things I need, rather than repeatedly and ecstatically grabbing stuff I could live without. Comfortably.

And y’know what? It seems to have worked. American Express says the bill for the period that just closed was a piddling $1145, which is $55 below the amount budgeted for discretionary spending. I had two extraordinary (unplanned) bills last month, one for a plumber and one for a pool dude, and still came in under budget!

It’s a miracle.

Long as we speak of miracles, today when I went in to stock up on a slew of things that had run out — in specific, meat and veggies to make dog food, an expensive proposition — I spent $240, well under last month’s fling. And that included a pair of pink (!) jeans and a cool coordinating shirt.

Well. The jeans apparently are mismarked — they’re say size 8 but fit like size 6. So that return will bring this month’s Costco spend down to about $225, more than a hundred bucks less than I spent last month.

Last month’s relatively modest AMEX bill included a lot of trips to Whole Foods and to AJ’s, a gourmet-style market that’s a lot closer to my house than WF. I spend a lot more money than I need to in those places — obviously if I shopped in places like Fry’s and Albertson’s, my monthly disposable budget could be less than $1200.

However, I can afford that much and think I do without quite enough:  never travel, rarely eat in restaurants, buy my clothes at Costco or off the second-hand and surplus racks , drive a 15-year-old junker… There’s a limit already, with the asceticism.

Anyway, whether you live like a monk or not, consider: find the purveyor that consumes the largest part of your monthly budget, cut the number of visits to that retailer, and substitute purchases from other stores. See if that helps to bring down overall expenditures.

Monday Morning Mountain Walk

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Early this morning the dogs and I walked about a mile and a half through the neighborhood. And once again I was left thinking, This is not the kind of exercise that’s gonna take the flab off the belly. Wrestling a half-trained dog around a park and up a few sidewalks does not, alas, fill that bill.

We got back to the house early enough, however, that I realized that I could lock up the puppy, throw on a pair of boots, and head over to North Mountain Park for a short hike over at least some terrain that offers a little up- and downhill walking. It’s been a year since I’ve been on the mountain. It’s a time-sucking hassle to get over there, and so not something one readily does without the impetus of a companion who wants to make the hike, too.

Entered by way of one of the south-side entrances, having no intention of actually climbing either Shaw Butte or North Mountain. There’s plenty of rolling terrain that will serve to get you started before you try for a stroll on the highway to heaven.

On the south side of Shaw Butte there’s a low rise, a hill with a trail that takes you to the top of the mound and then, if you follow it further, up a pretty steep incline to the main trail on the butte’s backside.

What the hell, thought I, and proceeded up the rise.

Well. It’s not very far. And when you’re on top of that thing, you’re almost halfway up to the junction with the Shaw Butte trail. So naturally, I kept walking.

It’s a less than perfectly pleasant place to walk, especially when the weather’s nice. The park has become very crowded, largely with stupid people who haven’t got enough sense to keep their yaps shut as they’re hiking. Apparently they think everyone within a quarter-mile of them wants to hear about the intricacies of their office’s politics or their boyfriend’s behavior. Yakity yakity yakity yakity yak yak yak yak!

More kindly, I expect that most people don’t realize how far their voices carry across a desert landscape. In the county’s mountain  parks, you can hear people talking a half-mile away — especially women, but a tenor male voice will carry a long way, too. I find that annoying…but I suppose it’s because I’m the rara avis that happens to relish solitude. And I’d really rather hear the doves cooing, the quail hooting, and the thrasher calling than to hear a human’s voice babbling on.

Oh well.

Before long, I’d hit the main trail. Decided not to proceed to the mountaintop, figuring discretion was the better part, at least for today. The southside trail has two or three fairly steep sections — one of which I’d just traversed — and I’d just as soon not be crippled tomorrow. Considered following the main trail down to its starting point, but that would put me on the flat about a mile and a half from my car. To get back to the car, I’d have to walk along a main drag through a dangerous district: Meth Central, we might call it. Since that didn’t seem like the brightest of strategies, I turned back down the trail I’d come up and before long, voilà! arrived at the trailhead parking lot.

The other reason these trails are less than perfectly pleasant for hiking — besides the ubiquitous yakkers — is that all the trails in North Mountain are paved, at least in part, with loose scree. This debris turns into roller-bearing rocks when you’re walking downhill. It’s pretty dangerous: real ankle-twisting terrain.

It was 10:30 by the time I got home, soaked in sweat: half the morning was gone and now I had to bathe and wash my hair and wash my clothes, and that burned some more time. It’s now after one p.m. and so far I have not done a SINGLE ONE of the several things I really need to do today: read 25 pages of the client’s magnum opus, ride herd on the course that starts today, read and mark up notes for the Boob Book, or even write this silly little blog post.

And therein lies the problem: getting enough exercise by hiking, while it’s a quintessentially effective way to build health and shed flab, consumes a lot of time. It often doesn’t leave enough time in a given day for me to do the other tasks I need or want to do.

I guess I could take the attitude that dedicating a couple of hours a day to moderately strenuous hiking is something that I need to do, as much as I need to do paying work. For some reason, I find that difficult to do. Don’t know why.

Amazing Little Dog

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…and amazing countryside. Check out this spectacular post at MyCorgi.com!

These little sheep dogs are so amazing! Given how small they look, you’d never realize how much speed, energy, and endurance they possess.

People certainly dote on them. I’m afraid that won’t be good for the breed. These days instead of asking me what kind of dog Cassie or Ruby is, passers-by instantly recognize them as corgis and then go on about how much they want one. {sigh} I fear the corgi will be the next breed to be ruined by love. That seems to happen every time a breed becomes popular.

Problem is, admirers see Cuteness(!) but have no idea what’s entailed in living with Corgi Cuteness. Cassie ended up at the dog pound, so her former humans noted, because she “barks.”

Well. Yes. That is what we would call an understatement.

Cassie does not bark. She converses. Her conversation consists of a series of loud yaps. She likes to talk with humans. A lot.

And as Ruby attains adulthood, she’s also come into her own in the communication department. She doesn’t bark, either: she bays. Not quite  like a hound, though. The sound she emits combines a bark and a bay: ARF-A-ROOOOO! It’s used for alerting the world to every cat, dog, coyote, neighbor, and bum who passes by in the alley, for harrying the teenagers across the street, and for conversing with distant barking dogs.

While I would say that raising Ruby was far less difficult than coping with a young, high-drive German shepherd, it certainly hasn’t been easy. House-training a corgi can be quite a challenge. I’ve had quite a few dogs over the years, and I think I’m pretty good at house-training. So…I kinda doubt that my fumbling was the reason it took a good six months to house-train this dog. Other corgi owners say the same: expect to spend half a year to get your puppy reliably trained.

It really is a powerful, energetic dog — so much so that in spite of the dwarfed legs it’s classified as a “large” breed. The corgi needs a “job” to do, many daily dog walks, plenty of training…and it can’t be left in the yard or house to entertain itself or sleep the hours away. Believe me. A corgi will not sleep the hours away.

Here’s Ruby’s idea of mountain-climbing…

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Kinda have to click on the image to actually see it, in WordPressland…

Ruby can jump onto M’hijito from the floor. Cassie, on the other hand, does not climb on anything except her mattress.

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Kicking Off the Boob Book

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Last night I finally started the introduction to the Boob Book — the proposed magnum opus on navigating the world of DCIS and breast cancer. Between grading papers and trying to overcome inertia, I’m getting a slow start on this project.

Today I went over to the FedEx office and picked up the photocopies of all the research materials I’ve gathered since the Late Great Adventure began, some nine or ten months ago:

P1030429Two fat binders, chuckablock full!

No, I haven’t counted the pages, and I’m not gonna. Some things, you just don’t want to know. But I’d estimate several hundred. It’s nowhere close to the mound that writing the dissertation required me to plow through. On the other hand, most of that wasn’t technical stuff — unless you consider deciphering late 16th-century handwriting to be technical.

Thanks to the Internet, so far nary a word has had to be ordered through InterLibrary Loan. LOL! When I wrote the dissertation, I estimated that before I went to England, I’d had to order about 3/4 of my print resources through I.L.L.

At any rate, I have a rough outline for the introduction and seven chapters, some of which may end up being more than one chapter. I doubt if the thing will come to ten chapters, but it could end up being eight or ten.

Finding time to write this magnum opus is going to be the trick.

I did learn that the college has assigned me only one comp section next fall (they must have gotten wind of Adjunctorium and Slave Labor), so that means that if the magazine-writing course makes that semester, I’ll have just two sections to hassle with. So that will free up a little extra time.

Meanwhile, it looks a lot like this spring’s maga-writing course won’t make — only 8 people are enrolled, and the District requires 12 to let a course fly. So I may be relieved of a great deal of work and a small amount of income this semester, as I certainly will be next semester.

Fortunately, my 2014 earnings were so paltry that I got a large tax return — I owed nothing on the federal gouge and $33 to the state. Effectively, the federal government returned all the funds that had been withheld from my various piddling sources of income. This is more than the net on one section, and come to think of it, almost as much as net from two sections. Unfortunately, I had intended to set the money aside to defray the cost of the next vehicle, which I’m going to have to buy soon. Obviously that’s not going to happen. But beggars can’t be choosers. Or drivers, apparently…

I’m hoping this will free up a number of hours each week to work on the Boob Book. I’d like to have an introduction and at least once chapter in hand by mid-summer, so I can send out a prospectus to whomever I can importune, and with any luck at all to have the thing done by the end of 2015 or, at the very latest, by this time next year.

Meanwhile, in theory the diet book and the novel are about ready to turn into Kindle books. I’ve been too distracted to track down a PoD publisher but should do that soon, too.

Ah, the life of an author…

😉 😆 😉

I expect I’ll post updates and meditations on the process at Writers Plain & Simple, since I’d like to keep the site’s thousand or so subscribers entertained. Will let you know, over here, whenever anything of passing interest goes up — or just watch the feed in Funny’s right-hand sidebar.

Meanwhile, speaking of the which, I’d better go over there and show a sign of life.

A Nice Little DIY Personal Finance Guide

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 CutCrapOver at the westside writer’s group, I met an interesting live wire who’s thinking about writing a second book, after having self-published a handy guide to save money, get straight financially, and have fun on the cheap.

The book is Cut the Crap and Save 30% of Your Income, and its author, Ruth McCormick, is a retired home-ec teacher. The home economics teacher training shows. In addition to the classic advice on getting out of debt, saving your pennies, and living well on less, she provides worksheets, charts, and “assignments.” It’s like a hard-copy PF blog with interactive features.

Great way to get your act together, if you’re not already there. Check it out!