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March 20, 2006
Selling Out: A Rambly Late Post
No, really, it's just my new haircut that makes the page look different to you. No? Ok, look. I'm not crazy about the new look either, and yes, I know, advertising's the devil's trade. It's just that I'm just kind of, well-- comment vous dites? ah, oui!-- poor. I'm not as indigent as I was a couple of months ago when I was out of work, but I'm still just barely scraping by, and things are about to get even tighter.
No, I'm not about to get fired again. Well, at least I hope not. God, I hope not. That would blow. I actually like the work I'm doing-- it's researchy work that I can do from home on my own schedule. Its not in a field I have intention of hoeing-- or whatever it is one does, metaphorically, in one's metaphoric field-- but that's ok. I dig up general-interest interesting info, which is pleasing enough in itself, and besides, I'm not interested in a jobby job job, if you know what I mean. Like, a career-track job. I just want work that will fund my writing time-- something that isn't so draining and time-consuming that I just want to smoke drugs and die when the I clock out. If I can use the time to learn about a world I don't spend a whole lot of time engaged with, all the better. Lately I have been under pressure from my employers to get the project done faster, which means working more hours. It's been cutting into my sleeping time (I'm too stupid/ stubborn to give up my writing time) and stressing me out. I'm going to have to step up and ask to cut back my hours. I hate to do this because I 1) feel like a shmoo and 2) need the money. But on the other hand, this was just the kind of job one takes to support things like writing and if it's stressing me out and cutting into my work time, then the situation probably needs to be reevaluated.
Oh, and writing. This is the best part of my life right now. I mean it always is-- I think this is how I know I'm going to always have to be writing. I just feel so useless when I'm not doing it. I'm so anxious all the time, worrying that I ought to be somewhere else, spending the time differently, living my life in a better way. When I'm writing well it's like I'm just doing what I'm supposed to be doing. It's just what I'm supposed to be doing (even when it's not. . . like, for instance, now. I should be working. Or sleeping. Or washing dishes.). I can't think of another activity I feel that way about.
Anyway, I've sort of gearing up to do more freelance writing over-- well, a long time-- but in the last month or so, I'd say steam has been gathering. That's another reason I want to cut back on my work hours. I know I was all about grad school last month. I still am, kind of. But I'm not going to be ready to apply until 2007 at the earliest. And I took my GREs in 2003 (don't ask)-- ha ha I am so going to have to take those again. It's not that I'm having any, like, material success as a writer. God, no. Nothing like that. Don't get the wrong idea. This is more just about how much time I'm doing to get my work out and how much I am putting out there and just being serious and committed and grown-up in the way I approach my work.
So in the meantime, I have bills to pay. If you happen to be planning on signing up for DSL with Speakeasy as your ISP (I actually do recommend them, esp. if you live in San Francisco and your alternative is crappy SBC), you can do me a kindness by clicking the Speakeasy button at the bottom of the page or telling them the refferal code. I'll get a credit towards my DSL. And if you happen to be signing up, or thinking about signing up for Backpack, it'd be neat if you'd use me as your referral. I spend $9 a month to keep my shit organized on that site, so a credit towards future bills would be cool, if it's no trouble to you and you happen to be signing up anyway. If I suddenly become filthy-- or even scuzzily-- rich I'll take down the ads.
I tried to make the ads as unobnoxious as possible, but if you have any suggestions, feel free to leave them. Also, tell me if you have any issues in browsers other than Safari, since I'm lazy as hell and don't bother to check. Or, if you just feel like calling me a money-grubbing Jew, greedy whore, etc., feel free.
Posted by hissycat at March 20, 2006 03:09 AM
Comments
Two things:
One, if you hadn't pointed it out, I wouldn't have noticed. This is because (1) I normally read via RSS, and (2) the ad isn't on your individual post pages, and (3) it's very unobtrusive. If you want to make more moolah, those might all be things to fix. On the other hand, this confirms that you're not irritating readers (not this one, anyway).
Two, I've considered slapping some adsense on my own modest blog for approximately similar reasons and with little actual expectation of results. This is another reason I fully support your decision to try to partially support yourself with your blog.
I'm not on the verge of buying DSL, so I doubt that I'll be helpful in a way you can take to the bank, but hopefully a little thumbs up is still welcome.
Posted by: Kyle Hasselbacher at March 20, 2006 09:17 AM
I completely agree with Kyle. The ads are not obtrusive at all, and in fact, I wouldn't have noticed them if you hadn't pointed them out. That being said, maybe you should make them more obvious.
I don't think anyone should be ashamed for putting ads on their blogs. I think we should promote the culture of blogs and blog advertising. I think google ads are great because they tend to be relevant to the site audience. If I'm on yahoo, I never click on ads for match.com, but I might click on an ad for cameras on Flickr, for example.
On my Flickr site, I posted some pictures of people playing with a nerf ball, tagged the photo with "nerf", and talked about how raggety the nerf ball was. Well, sure enough, an ad for nerf balls appeared. If it had been MY raggety nerf ball, I just might have clicked on that link.
As for balancing your job and your writing, I'd say try to push your limits with what you can do within a day. If you think you can get away with lessening your load, without upsetting your employer or losing too much money, then do it. But if you think that plan might backfire -- for example, free time doesn't ALWAYS equal increased productivity -- I'd say keep the hours for now.
Posted by: Karin at March 20, 2006 12:16 PM
Looks fine in IE & Firefox. Your dotted borders are different widths in Firefox & IE, but whatever.
Posted by: Ben at March 20, 2006 01:39 PM
they're planning on changing the GRE's format and content sometime soon. it might be a good idea to figure out which format would be more of a booster to your score....
Posted by: margaret at March 20, 2006 04:43 PM
hah... i know what you mean about the job that is so time consuming and draining that all you want to do after clocking out is to smoke drugs.
that job is called grad skool and I've been smoking drugs for the past three weeks, like, every night. most of the time it's awesome. the time when it isn't awesome it's when you experience withdrawal symptoms, like vivid and stupid dreams, inability to fall asleep and restlessness and anxiety that's always fun to deal with.
Posted by: Amelia at March 21, 2006 07:32 PM
I live at 46160 Commonwealth in Seattle. Been up here before?
Posted by: Mike Flacklestein at July 24, 2006 02:57 PM