The Partial Employment Chronicles, Chapter 20

Long time no blog. I've been spending a lot of time lately trying to find clients and projects — and not enough time attending to the ones I've got. So after a morning of networking, the afternoon is for actual working.

A few more developments on the employment front:

• The Grail job is no longer available. That company decided to hire from within rather than contract with someone outside (like me), so I guess I won't get that one after all. Bummer.
  
• A two-week assignment from the staffing company has also fallen through due to the client flaking out. Sigh. The staffing lady says she'll keep trying to find me something, but I've got enough part-time work lined up right now that I'm not sure I could accept another assignment. It would really depend on the scope and duration.
  
• I had my first meeting at the U this week and got keys to an office on campus.
  
  An office? D'OH!
  
  Yep, looks like I'll be working on-site, on campus, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, at least for a while. I'll also do some work at home, probably more and more as time goes on and I become more familiar with their systems. So . . . cool.
  
  I have to admit, however, I was a little disappointed at first, since I've gotten really, really used to the idea of working from home pretty much all the time. Yes, I'm spoiled. Or working on spoiling myself, anyway.
  
  Super not cool is the parking situation on campus. The U will not supply me a parking permit, nor cut me a price break for parking on campus, nor get me a discount on public transportation, nor anything else. If I choose to park on campus, I will pay through the nose for it — an immediate penalty for finding a job. So I need to figure out whether I should take the train, or where I'm going to park the car so I can walk to the office, and whether I should consider parking far enough away that biking from car to office would be a good idea, or whether I should take my bike on the train . . .
  
  In the meantime, I have a large U document to read and mark up in beautiful red ink — one of the tasks I intend to begin today.
  
• Speaking of red ink, I'm considering getting some red pens with my name and contact info printed on them to use as promotional freebies. Good idea or not?
  
• I've designed and printed some very pretty business cards. If you ask nicely, I'll send you one.
  
  I've been printing the cards myself on card stock bought at Office Max. That's convenient, but the card stock ain't cheap, nor is ink for my printer. Today I tried to upload my design to a website where I could get vast quantities printed for pennies, but it didn't work. Something to do with the dimensions of my PDF. I'll spend some time later figuring it out.
  
• As I mentioned a post or two ago, my website, www.kimhusband.com, is up and running. Check it out. It's still more of an online resume than a product/service-marketing site, so amping up the sales factor is another thing on my to-do list.
  
  There's also a page on my site for the Lemonade Factory, an organization I'm starting for people whom corporate life has handed lemons. We'll get together and make lemonade. How? Get yourself invited to a meeting and find out! Hint: E-mail me directly from the website.
  
• Next week I'll have my first meeting and probably get my first assignment from Online U (different from the U).
  
• The U and Online U between them account for 30 hours' steady work per week — but not at quite the hourly rate I'd like to be getting. This means I need about another 15 hours' work at that rate, or 10 hours at my preferred rate. Hence the continuing search for clients and projects to fill that gap.
  
• A friend said last night that she might be able to hook me up with some work for her employer. Cool! Thanks, Lynne!
  
• I came away from today's networking meeting with a referral, too. It would be nice if that one panned out, too.
  
• This morning I had a coffee chat with a woman I met at a networking thing last week. She'd said she wanted to learn more about me and my business, since she's also an editor, and maybe we could trade tips. Sounds good, right? But it turned out that what she really wanted to do was introduce me to the marketing company she's part of. I hesitate to cast aspersions on this scheme without knowing all the details, but if I were to assign a shape to it, I'd say "pyramid."
  
• Obviously I've been doing a lot of networking, and I'm thinking of becoming a full member of the organization whose meetings I've been checking out. I need to find a chapter in my area that meets at a reasonable time of day — i.e. not 7:00 a.m.. I've got a few more chapter meetings to visit, and I've been asked to substitute for regular members a couple times already, so that's in the works. I'm still hesitant to fork over the dough for dues, but members assure me the volume of referrals I'll get from the group will more than pay for my membership.
  
• On the advice of my career coach, I've been working on applying for a business license, tax ID, and bank accounts for my editorial services company. It is not going well. I can't find the relevant information on the websites she pointed me to, so I'll have to do further research to find what I needed.
  
  I hate it when I make up my mind to jump through some bureaucratic hoops, only to find that the hoops are not where they're supposed to be, nor have any useful signs been posted to help me find them. This is one of the monumental pains in the ass the Lemonade Factory will help ease — once I learn what I'm talking about.
  

OK, time to stop talking about work and start doing some.