Too Much Digital?

I admit it: I like technology. And I’m probably too into it, but I can justify it. 

I used to have a Palm Z100, which kept my calendar and my contact list. Except, as you can imagine, it was starting to age, and I knew it was going to flame out in epic fashion (I knew that because my previous Palms had done the same thing) soon. I had to find something new, but no one had anything like that—small, kept things in order, just ran itself, I could plug it in every couple of weeks and charge it. While trying to figure out what to do, I went out to Denver to visit the kids for a few days. At lunch, I was complaining to the younger one – and by younger I’m talking my late-20s tech guru child – and she just looked at me and said, “But mom, your phone is due for renewal, and if you get a smartphone it can handle both the phone stuff and the other stuff.” A light went off and when I got home I went looking at smartphones. The salesmen were fascinated by the Z100, which I still carried. They had never seen one. And ultimately, I did buy a smartphone, which I have a love/hate relationship with.

For a lot of my work, especially from home, I use a laptop, to which I have attached a second monitor, bigger than that on the laptop, so I can compare documents. Plus, the larger monitor is just easier to read. But when I need to print I usually send the document to myself and then print off my husband’s PC. What can I say, I don’t keep a printer on my system. I don’t print that often so I use his technology, which does things I don't have, to fill in the gaps. I think I need to work on how to send things wirelessly to the printer so I can skip that middle “mailing” step. It would so suit my need to be digitally up-to-date.

The Tablet Rules Things 

And then there’s the tablet issue. My husband and both of my daughters own iPads. They love them. But I work in a Windows world most of the time. I didn’t want an iPad. Plus, I suspect I’m just anti-Apple (my smartphone is not an iPhone). I’ve worked with Macs in the past, but not recently, and they’ve changed a lot. Plus, I work mainly in Word, PowerPoint, and PDFs. I really didn’t want to deal with programs that have to be converted back to what I actually need, or have to set up a mirror site that would allow me to work more easily with programs that don't run as well on Apple technology. Plus, the iPad seemed a bit addictive. My husband is always carrying it with him from room to room, and checking it for odd trivia all the time. I didn’t seen an iPad coming into my life.

But Microsoft came out with the Surface. It’s a little bigger than the iPad, but thinner. And it had real versions of those programs I needed. And my birthday, a major one, was coming. Plus, Sandy had just hit and the mall, with its Microsoft kiosk, was open.. So we started to look at that. We went back to the kiosk at least 3 times, and finally I broke down. After all, the rest of the world had apps, why shouldn’t I? So, I have a Surface (yes, I’ve had it for a while).

I took the Surface with me to a client’s office one day because they don’t have a computer for me to use and sometimes I have to check references. I took it out, put in the codes to hook into their servers, and the next thing I knew I had a crowd around me. No one had ever used a Surface, anywhere, or even tried to use one--they actually hadn't even seen one in the "flesh" so to speak. But, they were fascinated by it. Plus, there were a couple of people who won’t buy Apple, and they wanted to know how it worked.

I’m not sure I was right to get it, but the Surface, over which there have been numerous online comments for and against, has definitely fulfilled a need I didn’t know I had. First, I took it on the plane with me and was able to work while traveling, with no problems. I even wrote a couple of blogs in the air. Then, I had more entertainment for when I was tired of reading. I downloaded apps that I actually use; and for the ones I download that I find I don't use, except in my dreams, I can remove them really easily. If I have questions, I just stop by that kiosk in the mall (which is now a big store with even more technology offered) where I bought it. They’ve been doing a booming business, and their people are very helpful. I don’t need an appointment in the back for everything. I’ve even called the online tech staff and they have been pleasant. It’s been a nice change from some of the support personnel I’ve dealt with. And for all of you who are upset about the Start button…really? It’s not a big issue. Once you learn where it is, you’re fine. Get over the issue

Is there too much digital in my life? Probably. Do I enjoy it? Definitely. And can I put it down when I have to? Absolutely—or maybe not. But the question is: Do I want to?

Starting to Build a Business

I’ve been working on building my client base so I can do more editing from home, and don’t have to think about going back to a staff job. If I can do that, I’ll have more freedom to travel with my husband when he has business trips, visit the children—and grandchild--and just plan my own hours. Plus, I can approve my own vacation time and not have to rely on others to “allow” me to go. I’ve been lucky in that I know people who like my work, and recommend me to their friends. Networking has been good to me, but I also need to find more clients.

This morning I read an article by Richard Branson  comparing parenting with business. I couldn’t agree more. There were a couple of paragraphs that really appealed to me. Time management is always key. Years ago, when I went back to work full-time, I did it without “breaking back in” to the business world. On Friday I was a stay-at-home mom. The next week, I was working full time but essentially trying to maintain everything I did as mom. Fortunately, my children were a little older and could take care of themselves a bit more, especially in getting home from school. After a while, I started to ask for help. There was no reason they couldn’t throw in the wash, or get something started for dinner. They knew how, and were old enough to handle hot items.

And I agreed when it talked about learning things “on the fly.” I try very hard to never say that I can’t do something, or don’t know how to do things. I might say that I have a little less experience with something, but I know how to do research, and can almost always find a blog or a board, or a site that tells me the basics of what I need to know. In that first job, I knew how to edit, and had minimal experience in Quark (yes, I go far enough back that magazines were being laid out in Quark), but knew almost nothing about article acquisition or making contacts that would get me to who I needed. I was lucky to have editors-in-chief who pointed me in the right direction, but they were all really doing those jobs as sidelines to their main careers so their input was limited although well intentioned. (Yes, it was not how you normally hear of a magazine being run, but then again it gave me huge experience in dealing with all kinds of people and problems, and I managed. I think I only really fell apart once and started to lose it in the office. After that, I learned to hold on until I could go into the ladies’ room and hit my head against the stall for a bit so that I didn’t lose it in the office, something that is never a good idea.)

That job taught me to just deal, and after I left there, I was able to handle a lot of problems without missing a beat. To this day, I’m not afraid to deal with whatever is thrown at me. The worst that can happen is that it will take me a little longer to figure it out—but I’ve never missed a deadline, even when a client is late on their end, and I don’t intend to do so. I may have to stay up most of the night to finish something, but it gets done.

The other topic that struck me is sleep deprivation. Yes, when they were small, the kids kept me up. Now I have trouble emptying my mind at night, so between that and the arthritis, I don’t fall asleep well. Then again, some of my better ideas also pop into my head at 3 a.m. Unfortunately, I can’t turn on a light to write them down, so I have to trust that I’ll remember them at 8 a.m. Most of the time I do, and I take the view that if I can’t remember an idea, it either wasn’t that good or it will come back later. I’ll probably be up another night anyway and can rein it in then.

Sneeze, Sniffle, Stay Inside

Ah, the first round of allergy season. The time of the sneeze, the sniffle, the sinus headache, the runny eyes. You know it . . . staying inside to try to feel better. Waving to the nice spring flowers that you really do love from inside the glass door. If you spend much time outside, or go to handle the flowers, that’s it—an allergy attack.

Yes, I have allergies, particularly the pesky pollens and molds. And I mean mainly the molds, such as those that breed in piles of leaves or grass. Oh, and there’s the dust allergy, which of course occurs indoors too. I’ve been known to dust between visits from a cleaning service because I see the dust piling up, but afterwards I fully expect to have breathing problems. But then again, sometimes I just think breathing is overrated.

Should I mention the incident a week before one daughter’s bat mitzvah? I dared to have the carpets in my room cleaned. Woke up the next day almost totally unable to open my eyes. My husband couldn’t break a meeting appointment so a friend drove me to the allergist, who had agreed to see me whenever I could get a ride. One look at me and the assistants were running for the doctor. I almost left when I barely saw him coming at my eyes with a needle. Turned out it was the easiest way to get medication in so things would calm down. Suffice it to say, we figured out that not only had the carpet dust settled on the bed during the cleaning, but the pollen had come in early in the morning because we had the windows open. It was not a good week. Fortunately, I recovered in time. Since then, if I have the carpets cleaned I make sure everything in the room is covered so I avoid the dust; and, if it’s in my room, I sleep elsewhere. We won’t be repeating that one.

Plus, I was president of an organization for which I was in the same building at least four times a week—and that was without the religious service attendance. Turned out the building, as should be expected, had allergen molds in it. It was a long term of service, and I tried to cut time in the building back as the years went on. I’m thinking I was the only president to have that kind of issue.

You know those shots that are supposed to help you get over your allergies? Not so much. I went to be retested after the requisite 7 years of needles—usually 7 to 10 shots a week—and it was a wonderful result. I had developed new allergies. After a while I stopped the shots and just went to taking pills every day. I made a deal with the doctor, since I really hate to always take pills, that during the winter, when things calmed down a bit, I could cut the pills back to every other day. That seems to work. It turns out that most people never recover completely from allergies and go for shots all their lives. I wasn’t into that idea. I do have a friend, though, who is considered a model of what can be good; she goes for maintenance shots every 4 to 6 weeks and is considered “cured.”

Unfortunately, the doctor and I had a disagreement over something totally unrelated to the allergies, I felt he behaved like a 5-year-old, and I fired him (as in, I asked for copies of my records, including the last set of tests, paid for them, and never went back). But my pills had moved to the generic category so now I buy them over-the-counter in a big-box discount store and everything is pretty much the same. I can go to my primary care provider if something goes wrong, but on the whole things just hum along on an even keel so I can’t complain a lot for the moment.

Coping on the Drug Allergy 

And then there’s the big allergy: penicillin. This is a humdinger—and could be a killer. I don’t think I was 10 years old when my parents found out I had this one—I was given a dose for tonsillitis and we won’t discuss the reaction. My mother will tell you that I rarely do anything easily on the medical side—starting with my birth when I began choking on the cord and things turned into an emergency c-section. Do you know how many doctors there are out there who say I should just try a little bit to see if I’m still allergic? I usually don’t see those doctors again. Fortunately, there are now alternatives to penicillin, but when I was younger, it was hard. No, I don’t wear a medical bracelet, although I probably should. Maybe I’m just living dangerously but I know a lot of people who don’t use them; they’re not a great fashion statement. I have successfully avoided taking penicillin since that one time, which also put me flat on my back for a month. On the plus side, that’s the summer I read all of the Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, Bobbsey Twins, and Honey Bunch books (anyone else remember Honey Bunch? I really loved her). I pretty much read everything they put in front of me. When you are lying on a lawn chair in the garage or the back yard for the entire day (anyplace that was out of the sun), you tend to read pretty much anything you can get your hands on. Neighbors lent us books in bunches either tied together with string or in bags. Funny how I remember that.

All in all, I haven’t had a terrible life with allergies, but they do make things interesting. And I have found ways to live with them, which is all that matters. 

Apologies… But Work Just Kept Coming         

I know, I know…it’s been a long time since I posted anything, but really, it wasn’t my fault, even if it has to be my fault since I’m the only writer here. I really meant to post, and I meant to write, but things have been very hectic.

Regardless, it’s obviously my fault and I’m trying to better my time management skills. Then again I’m always working on time management. Sometimes it works, sometimes not so much. This was one of those times.

So where have I been? Freelancing. Buried in work. And when I did come up for air I had no brain cells left with which to even think about a blog— mine or reading anyone else’s -- and that gives me great guilt. But as anyone who does it knows, blogging requires effort. Then again, so does working, which pays better. I think I had work 28 out of 31 days in March; almost as much in April; and pretty much as well in May. June has been a little better but every time I think I’ll have downtime…wham! Take this week. I told my family I was going to start to catch up on all those little details we all have to get done. Not the bills or anything urgent—those I manage to get done—but the stuff like cleaning up areas of the house that are just getting cluttered, or figuring out how to take care of some issues. Trust me, I have lists (I have lists of blog topics I want to cover too, but never mind that).

Monday morning, I started; I even got a few things done. Then I had a query on availability. I couldn’t say no; clients pay me to think about their stuff. Then I had another request, and a third. It’s nice to be wanted but once again, I’m feeling stress from a little overbooking. But, I got it done—oh, and then I had a query about a friend referring me to someone else looking for an editor. I can’t say no if there’s the prospect of a new client. Hopefully, Ill hear frm that one soon. Similar stuff happened on Tuesday. The week became a lot more profitable than I thought it would be, which is great but…

Yesterday I went onsite with a major client. Supposedly they were going to have a really big job for me to do. Turned out the job didn’t come in anywhere close to on time. In fact, I left after 4.5 hours and the bosses weren’t happy because the job still wasn't there and they would have no one designated to do it. Plus, I’m not available now for a couple of days (yes, sometimes I do plan ahead and I've made commitments both personal and professional). But, word was I should check in because if nothing turned up the department might/could/maybe would push the job to tomorrow and maybe I can come and do it. I really like big jobs; someone tells me what they need and I get to do it on my own. Yes, if I have a question I can send out e-mail queries, but usually they just let me handle it. They trust I’ll get it right, and if I can’t do something, I’ll just leave a comment box somewhere with a question and the powers in charge will have to get the answers. Just heard, though; I’m not going in tomorrow but maybe I will if they call last minute and I still have time—no one right now is knocking down my door to get something done; that could change at any time. Oh well. But then again, there are still those pesky odds and ends to do so I might clear off a few more items on the to-do list; I just made a new one..

So, freelancing is very time-consuming, although profitable, which is good for the food budget. But I am going to return to blogging now, with this as a start. Please bear with me. There are a number of things I want to get off my mind, hopefully interesting to more than just said mind. My new plan is to post at least one blog a week—until I have a better grip on the freelance issue (and I'm trying to broaden my client base so it could be a big issue). My ultimate goal is to post at least twice a week, and I’m going to try to have some topics in the can just in case. Some weeks I have more ideas than others. This weekend my husband and I will be on the road a lot for a family event. He usually plays CDs on a road trip. I’ll sit in the back seat, where I can stretch out my legs, keep my tablet (a Surface; yes, I’m one of those people) in my lap, and maybe get some blog plans done.

No matter what, I’m really going to try to keep to this new plan. I’m aiming for happy posting!!

I think I can! I think I can!

Wait, is that paying work coming in?

Yes, I’m trying to do it all.

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 [GS1]