Anyone notice some electronically, disturbing geek news about our storage media ---  I mean, those CDs and read/writeable DVDs? A few articles in the LA Times have raised my fear about the archaic media we use every day that will be replaced by “minis” --- also known as flash or thumb drives.

You see, these new improved storage devices are not little file suitcases like I pretended 5-inch floppies, then 3-and a-quarter floppies, then CDs and DVDs were. No, this newest technology is self-contained mini hard drive computers with 4 gig of memory. Well, almost. The development is coming on fast and furious. It will replace all the fragile CDs and DVDs. Be prepared to reuse them as fancy coasters and garden spinners to keep birds from your fruit trees.

I got to thinking. Dang. I haven’t even converted all of my VHS tapes to CDs yet. If this fast-track tool replaces all of disc-style media, then what is a collector to do? How about all those boxed photo discs under my bed, tax prep, college prose, 6-CD boxed movie or music sets, and anything else we’ve hoarded away for posterity?

I’m a writer. Dang. What about those CDs full of unfinished story gems that I’ve dutifully re-recorded based on the medium of the month? This is just too fast for most of us.

So do you see a trend coming? Do you see the trailing smoke as the future train whizzes by?

I admit I was grousing about how often computer upgrades have sucked my wallet dry. I earnestly saved up for almost every model change, then without a whimper, lost data due to a new version. The industries that want to force us moving forward are not really cognizant of how alarmingly fast they produce upgrades. If they do know, they’re over-producing to a market of fat-fingered seniors or a future market of acne-laced automatons. Either way the chasm is widening.

Yes, there still are people who grumble every time faced with changing the clocks four times a year. Older clocks and alarms don’t have the auto correct features like the newer models do. Do you know how many clocks, timers, and alarms are in your house waiting to be upgraded?

Now I’m in a panic: do I wait until these new fangled minis are less than $15 each or do I go ahead and copy all of my VHS tapes to CDs now, at 5 cents apiece, so they can be eventually moved to the new mini format?

What are YOU doing?

Rusty

“One of the worst pieces of career advice, that I bet each of you has not only gotten but given, is to do what you love. Forget that. It's absurd.” Advice from Penelope Trunk another blogger at http://blog.penelopetrunk.com  

 

Her comments got me thinking about how our career choices can adjust and change for the times we are living in. No one can just plan to be a writer, for instance, and not do anything else. There are always contingency plans: to bring in money to buy necessities, like food; fall back on service jobs while the economy bounces back; or, taking a training course that has potential in supplementing your income. Planning to be a writer without having alternate plans is like buying tickets to the second sailing of the Titanic… you’ll be on the pier waiting forever.

 

My dad always told me to roll with the seas.

 

I love writing and interviewing but it never came as my dream job in every case. When I was a newspaperwoman, interviewing opportunities didn't happen when I wanted it, yet editing, photographs, and design layout was needed. I found I had a good eye for that, too. So, as jobs shifted and I changed with the times, the siren’s call to interview was still seated in the background of my mind. Graphics and design layout now becomes second place to the newer trend of business and social marketing. I am still a writer and I love to write but I also know I am not in the top ten percent of the professional writers who claim the lion’s share of the writing community.

 

However, it all ties together in the process of getting the right balance of photos to content in a web site layout, or a well-written business profile to go with a nice close up of the business owner. It will all come full circle... if you let the passions of what you enjoy bubble up through the process of having a flexible career; you receive the benefit of doing what you love.

 

  

You may not believe this but I still own a working word toy from the 1990s. It’s called a Scrabble Express, running on two batteries than seem to last for five years before fading in energy. It’s been a constant companion while travelling or even waiting in a doctor’s office. The game board is classic but reduced to a fraction of the full sized game. The design is durable with spongy button matrix, pixilated letters, and thick plastic body encasing it, perfect for tossing in a suitcase, glove box, purse, or backpack.

 

Sure wish Hasbro would bring back something like it. I know it could never be like the old version but I’d open my arms wide for such a handheld. There was a whisper in cyberspace a few years ago that the new improved version would be out by Christmas. Imagine how cool the new version would be. I hope they go for a touch screen or stylus pen to select virtual tiles. Even better, voice activated. I ‘d buy one. I’d sleep in a tent in front of the store that carried the first new release just like fans waiting for first release tickets to their favorite rock star.

 

“Wordsmithlng” is what it’s all about. Keeping the writing mind sharp with word game challenges. We shared some awesome, cutthroat games and I won fair and square. Even adjusting to the challenger skill level… I have never down-graded… we met head-to-head with tie games nearing 200 points. A tough feat in itself.

 

Words we parried like smaze, fice, trug, meetly, and the killer jezail. But lately the words have taken on a sinister bent to them. I’m beginning to question my opponent’s integrity. Wonder if the machine is truly playing to win. Have you ever heard or seen the word brock, coft, updry? Or how about hern, ywis, or milneb? Seems that I’m losing more games to my Scrabble buddy every day.

 

I looked up some of these foreign-looking words. I found many of them to be archaic, so foreign that I question the inner dictionary of having an Alzheimer brain. Some I can’t even locate. I even used some of them that he had used like zebu, yena, jambe, and edile to defend my score but the game device laughed and wouldn’t accept them.

 

Hey, you know, after all of these years, I think my Scrabble game is a cheat!

 

 RUSTY

Ever had one of those days where you want to crawl back in bed and hide under the covers so that everyone will leave you alone? Sure you have . . . we all have had at least once. This week I had several. For me it usually happens when the different roles I am balancing (wife, mother, author, entrepreneur, friend) start competing with each other for my time, energy and attention. I usually end up feeling exhausted and not wanting to deal with any of them. I know when that happens that it's time to sit back and have a quiet moment. It's recharge time.

The best part of being my own boss is that I get to set my priorities, establish my boundaries and decide how I want to spend my time. The worst part of being my own boss is that I have the responsibility of setting my priorities, establishing my boundaries and choosing how I will spend my time.

The double-edged sword can get a bit tricky to balance at times.

So this week instead of crawling under the covers (as tempting as it was), I began re-establishing my boundaries and made me-myself a priority. I said "no" to several people and several projects, Made a working list of things that had to be done.

But the best thing was, I took time to get out in nature and I started to set time aside for leisure writing again. It took a few days, but I finally began to feel in balance again. Life is messy and situations happen. We get to choose how we respond to them and that makes all the difference in the world.

Rusty

This time of year many of us sit near a window and watch the trash can lids fly by. It's windy in the desert between seasons. We curl up with a hot cup of cocoa or the latest latte blend and consider where our lives are going, and how long it will be until summer finally arrives. It's a time to chart a course or change course. I'm doing an assessment of how my skills can help other solo business freelancers.

Finding clients has always been a challenge for me. I'm trying different tactics but nothing seems to be making a change. I could blame it on the economy but I think something else is happening. So it got me thinking of the many skills sets I've learned and adapted over the years. I write business content for marketing, such as brochures, sales letters, presentations, and web content. But I also have a graphics background so I can offer creative business logos, design elements to give a web site a facelift, and even design bookcovers.  And with that, I also have been a ghostwriter.

Speaking of bookcovers, I'm currently in the final phases of writing a book about interviewing, another skill that comes easily to me. The book's title is: "A Microphone Is Not the Muzzle of a Gun -- How To Get the Most From an Interview Without Breaking a Sweat." It came to me last year, that so many business people shirk from microphones jammed in their faces, avoid cold calling, and even stammer through sudden meetings in an elevator just because they haven't tackled the skill of interviewing or being interviewed.

Interviewing is really a detailed conversation with an outline of questions that you have researched to promote a quality conversation with your subject. Sometimes self-serving, sometimes promotional for your subject, either way, information is being shared with a large audience, whether you can see them or not. Talking is what people do to share their concepts and ideas. From elevator pitch to interviewing for a new job, we need to remember how to talk to people who we work with or work for.
 
So, as I was considering my options, I came across this informative newsletter from one of my favorite freelancers, Ed Gandia. Here's an excerpt from his article: "Improve Your Business By Taking a Broader Look at Your Skills."

Take it away, Ed.

If you're currently going through tough times as a freelancer,
you basically have two choices.

One is to try and make improvements in key areas of your
business -- things such as your marketing, work habits, pricing
and so forth. These adjustments can certainly have a very
positive impact, and it's what we discuss at length in The
Wealthy Freelancer.

But sometimes even the greatest efforts in these areas won't do
much to improve your situation. Either because the market for
your services is drying up, or your services are being
commoditized faster than ever before. Or maybe you're offering
the wrong services to the wrong market.

These situations call for a different, more creative and more
detailed analysis of your business and what you bring to the
table. They demand that you look at your skills at a deeper
level and really examine what you're offering, whom you're
targeting ... and why.

Skills Inventory Exercise Leads to a Profitable Solo Business

A couple of years ago, Jennifer Campbell decided to take such an
introspective view of her skills, passions, aptitudes and
potential markets. It paid off in a big way.

At the time, Jennifer had been recently laid off from her writer
and editor job at a local TV station. She asked herself if
looking for yet another job in the corporate world was what she
wanted to do. She wondered: maybe this was the time to go solo
and start doing work that was more meaningful and rewarding.

So she took the plunge and launched a solo business. But rather
than taking one of the more predictable freelance writing paths
(writing articles for print publications or doing commercial
writing), Jennifer decided to try something different. She
created a business based on something she'd actually been doing
on and off on the side since 2003: writing life stories and
personal history projects for friends and family.

Up until then, most of the projects she had worked on were done
free of charge. But as she thought about which direction she
wanted to take with her solo practice, she began to realize that
there was a strong demand for these types of projects.

Jennifer had a background in interviewing, writing, editing and
book publishing. These skills would not only be transferrable,
but would also lend themselves very nicely to a personal memoirs
business.

Motivated and excited about the idea, she began a long process
of extensive self-education on the topic, studying the fields of
oral history, personal history, memoirs and family histories.
Finally, she began offering her services.

Today, Jennifer (www.heritagememoirs.ca) interviews and guides
people (generally age 70+) through telling their life stories.
She records their sessions and then transcribes, edits,
rewrites, proofs and produces a print-ready manuscript. From
there, she can also publish a limited-edition book with
photographs and in her clients' choices of covers and styles.

Not only is Jennifer booked solid working on projects that pay
anywhere from $5,000 to $25,000 each, but she also finds her
work to be extremely satisfying.

Plus, she feels that the market is huge and growing. In fact, as
the baby boomers age, she believes that more and more people
will want their family histories saved for future generations.

As if that wasn't enough, Jennifer recently landed a book deal
with Self-Counsel Press. Her upcoming book is titled Start & Run
a Personal History Business. Which means that now she can help
others start their own solo businesses while developing a
secondary income stream.

What She Did Right
Rather than entering the cutthroat markets most of her
journalist colleagues continued to pursue, Jennifer took a
different approach. Specifically, she:

• Conducted a full inventory of her core skills and determined
  other ways to apply and market those skills
• Brainstormed ways she could use those skills to provide a
  service she loved to a different market that was willing to pay
  the fees she wanted to earn
• Figured out how to package these services in unique ways

The Lesson for All Solo Professionals
What's the lesson here for solo professionals? If you're
struggling to get the fees you want to earn, it might be time to
take a step back and think about your business on a deeper
level.

Take a closer look at your core skills, just as Jennifer did.
List all of them, even those that seem insignificant. Then, ask
yourself the following:

• What other services could you offer that are natural
  extensions of these skills?
• Are there other industries or markets that are willing to pay
  high fees for those services?
• How could you package your services so that they stand out and
  enable you to command top fees?

Don't rush through this exercise. It should take you a few days
to complete. And the answers won't come to you all at once. In
fact, the best ideas will come to you when you least expect
them.

Start today. You never know what will come of it!

  Thanks, Ed.

And that leaves me with a bit of work to do: judging my skills, adapting my findings, and just maybe lifting the doldrums that tend to hover over me at this time of year.

Rusty

Ed Gandia is the co-founder of TheWealthyFreelancer.com and
co-author of The Wealthy Freelancer: 12 Secrets to a Great
Income and an Enviable Lifestyle.  To download 3 free chapters of
his book, visit www.TheWealthyFreelancer.com.

I just returned from a weekend of camping in one of my old home bases. I lived in Pionteertown CA, during the 70s. It was a rip roaring town back then. A dirt main street called "Mane Street" set the theme as you walked the old Western B-movie screen location site. Yes. It was an active film location back in its early years of 1946 Hollywood heydays... through Gene Autry and Roy Rogers and reels of classic Russell Hayden co-starred serials.

Abandoned several times, but never forgotten, the town now is coming back to life. Some of the old buildings have new old faces on them, keeping with the old flavor of the west, of course. Chaparrosa Saddle and Leatherworks is prominent as a full-time shop, the Pioneertown Motel, Pappy and Harriet's Cantina, and a few others.

Whenever I return I can't help reminiscing about the town I knew in the 70s.

Russ Hayden and his wife Mousie used to live in the memories of their film years, collecting an assortment of highly-prized decoration sets, props, and one-of-a-kind memorabilia. Before his eyesight failed him, Russ used to putz around in an old flat fender army jeep without a rag top. He'd cruise down Mane and stop for a beer or go get his mail at the post office. If you waved at him you'd have to yell "hello" too, so he knew you were waving. He always waved back. That was his big outing for the day.

Down Mane Street you'd see the Red Dog Saloon, the huge wooden sound stage built like an historic red barn, the Clip 'n' Curl salon where the stars got there hair done while on location, and the Pioneertown Motel where I rented a room until a house was available. I dived on the chance to rent the house made of railroad ties, once used as a photography shop now a main residence, right downtown across the street from the Pioneertown Bowl. Since the town was always open to the public, I'd often have tourists walk into my home thinking that it was part of the scenery. Some buildings were unlocked and unoccupied then. I must have spooked a dozen camera-wielding tourists caught off guard when I walked out in my robe and told them this was my home. Red faces and apologies always followed. It was part of my rural entertainment. And I didn't mind too much.

But now I was back in Pionteertown to share my Rusty's Children's Traveling Museum along with the western-themed re-enactors who filled the dirt street with gunfights, high-stepping horses, and skillfull falls creating huge dust clouds. It's a step back in time. Tourists who arrived with children staring wide-eyed from under cowboy hats enjoyed good food, smoky shootouts, and walk through vendors lining the street. The weather threatened to shut us down but we're the hardy type, ready to adjust for anything.

We were there for the Ronald McDonald House children's charity for Loma Linda Hospital. Raised money and spirits. Raised the kind of spirits that linger with you, the taste of the old west that was, a memory of days spent riding trails around Black Mesa, and a spirit of adaptation for a town willing to get up off its knees and dust itself off with a flick of the hat.

 

Last December, I cruised the same shopping aisles as the year before looking for stocking stuffers. I stopped at the kiddie toys and noticed price tags didn’t seem as high as before. Generally, most items throughout the store had been reduced drastically. The high price tags had adjusted to the present pocketbook reduction we were all experiencing. I was relieved to know my money shortage would go a long way for the holidays.

That was then.

Now as I reduce my shopping excursions to the bare basics, I am noticing more cutbacks on general merchandise items. For instance, cosmetics have leveled off to what they were a few years ago. And more packaging is smaller to keep the price tag lower.

My gas tank still needs to be filled but now I can do it at the rates of about three years ago. In California, as the price creeps to over $3.15, I notice that useage falls. Less cars on the road, and fewer motorhomes on the off ramps. The Memorial day weekend promoted lower gas prices... that was a big surprise.

The only thing not going down drastically is food pricing. Once in awhile I see an old price level from about 1980s or so but the basics remain high. And more packaging is smaller to keep the price tag lower. Remember the dozen torillas in a bag? Now they are eight for about the same price as a dozen. I doubt if we will ever see 50 cent loaves of bread or 99 cents a pound for ground hamburger. We can wish. I still dream of candy-coated chocolates ...mmm good...at 25 cents a bag.

I recall decades ago when my Dad groused about the price of cigarettes and coffee, his two mainstays. It was over 20 cents a pack and $3.09 for a two-pound can of Folgers. I think Dad would be tossing stones from his grave at the extra rise in his two addictions. I never smoked or drink much coffee so they’re not on my price radar anyway. In fact, I just bought my very first home brewer this year. Now I get to stroll down the coffee aisle and decide if the grinds are worth the exclusive prices.

Other price tags that will not drop are the automotive industry’s standard family cars, SUVs and trucks. They can option out the detailed packages, and offer crossovers and some fuel efficient models but overall the prices remain high.

One area of price hikes that affect all parents is the average babysitting charge. It’s up to $2.50 per hour or more depending on the services provided. I do remember when I saved my 50 cents per hour babysitting charges to buy a sweater or a pair of dress shoes that my parents could not afford. Saving up $25.00 dollars for a pair of shoes took me all summer. Now it’s just a few evenings to rake it in.

So, do I sound like a wrinkled, blue-haired, old lady? …hhmmm… perhaps. But, rest assured I am not old, very wrinkled, or sport blue hair. The only blue I sport is my mood when I'm trying to cover my bills at the end of the month. That trick is still as difficult as any search for the elusive low-priced stocking stuffer.

Rusty

 

I've been gone for awhile doing things that take my time away from me but now I'm back and hope you'll join me once again.

I drove through a quiet neighborhood that I don't normally enter and happened to see a family building a wondrous and well-thought out treehouse. The boys ran to get nails and hammers while the daughter appeared to be painting a sign for it. Massive limbs held up the deck and the father was measuring the roofline of the framework. It reminded me of the one person in my small neighborhood in the California  redwoods, nearly 50 years ago, who invited me to climb up into his new treehouse where no girls were allowed. I was about  age 6, blue-eyed blonde with long braids, and liked playing with dolls and making mud pies topped with acorns and pinecones. Climbing opportunities weren’t available across the gravel road where I lived. But I did have a cool moss-choked creek behind it. Tall rough-barked redwoods towered over the creekbed and made hunting frogs much easier in the cool shade. That was my playground.

Anyway, I got to play army with his GI Joes and antique cloth dolls, catch bees in our hands from the central fountain in the manicured front yard, and pretty much hang out a few days in the cool grass before he had to go back east to school. He was the first boy I ever met who played with dolls but he didn’t act like a sissy. He liked catching bees with me and putting them in a jar, and didn’t cry when he got stung. We walked down to the neighbor's logan berry farm and gathered a wicker basket full of the juicy treats, carrying about half of what we ate. He offered me peanut butter and jelly sandwiches as we picnicked on the thickest limb of the old sycamore tree. I don’t remember his name...maybe it was Peter...  but I fondly remember his summer kindness and how a treehouse pulled it all together. I held the boards while he showed his developing muscles against the heft of the job at hand. He said summer was fun with me. And I agreed.

When life gets me frustrated and I start thinking of other better places, I let my mind drift to the old sycamore tree and a flimsy attempt at wedging three old boards together for Peter's treehouse. I sit on the gray limb and nibble on a peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich, hoping that some day I can aspire to build my own Swiss Family Robinson-esque treehouse.

Back in 1981 when I went into work one morning, there was a lot of whispering going on. I heard short utterances of “no, really?” and “can you believe it?”, “I never thought he would do that”. I felt like I walked into a funeral parlor and one of my relatives must be the deceased no one mentioned out loud. It was an eerie feeling.

Coming from a journalism background, I was getting perturbed that no one was willing to fill me in. I sat at my position as a long-distance telephone operator in one of the last “cord board” offices in the nation. On a busy Monday morning we often had 30 girls, and one gentleman, working the calls coming in. So you can imagine, mixed in the conversations of what someone had done over the weekend, and the whispering gossip that continued incessantly, I was only catching a few pieces of information as I took calls.

Two ladies came in to relieve their station operators, so now I was flanked by the office’s most excellent gossipers. I cringed when I heard, “but doesn't’t Erica know what a mean guy he is?” And the other going on how “his brother-in-law was the start of all their lies.”

Then it dawned on me. “Are you all crazy?” I blurted out. “All of this is about a stupid soap opera?”

Well, the world came to a screeching silent stop. No one said a word but they all had time to look at me like I grew green hair or had sworn in a foreign language or something. Their busy sad lives were all wrapped around the emotional roller-coaster of a love triangle that never happened. They shared the news like they were hustlers on a street corner, sharing odd bits of informant nuggets worth a saw buck. I received glaring eyes all day. It’s true. Even if I had said something articulate and endearing that day, no one would have heard it because it came from my mouth.

It was weeks before some of the gals would even talk to me. Sad but true.

We are word mongers. We want emotional meat in our diet. We want to suffer with the fisherman, smell the fish market, commiserate about the prices, and then complain how bad the market smells at the end of the day. We can place someone on a pedestal in the morning and bury him under a monument at night.

If we could just focus on reality, true reality, not just someone’s idea of how our reality should be lived, we would be a better society. If we could just care everyday like we cared for the pilot who was trained to do his job, and did it well, then maybe we could temper the swings of our emotions and get the stock investors and brokers to steady their hands and move forward.

If we could just aim our passion to something that means more than a soap opera story, there may grow true hope in our hearts.

I’m hoping.