Sometimes I like my job

Today, with very little finagling, I was able to work the phrase "For those about to rock" into a headline. Not gratuitously, but cleverly and appropriately. Writing headlines, captions and other various blurbage has always been one of my stronger skills as a writer, and one of my favorite parts of the job. It's just so satisfying when these little bite-sized bits of copy come together, and they're so quick and easy it's like eating raspberries out of a bowl. Popping them into your mouth one by one – yum!

Also today, I committed to writing a 500-word fluff piece on a local business, for a hundred bucks. Is that a terrible rate? Not so much, I guess. I figure I'll spend an hour talking to the lady and an hour writing it, and that's not so bad – especially since I'm the one who edits these pieces anyway, so I'm fairly sure I'm not going to be spending any extra time revising it for some stern and picky taskmaster.

It's funny ... when I was writing full time I used to pop things like this out like I'm doing headlines now – quickly, easily, effortlessly! Five hundred words? No sweat! Maybe I'm just out of practice but I'm a little nervous about this one. The usual anxiety pecking away like a hungry little bird: what if they don't like my stuff?

More and more it feels like my professional life is trying to move away from the security of an office job working for someone else, and toward doing more freelance stuff at home, working more or less for myself. (Although really, even with an office job you're still working for yourself – it's just that you have only one big client instead of several, and the client pays all your expenses in exchange for being able to tell you when, where, what, how many, etc.) Contemplating the cost of duplicating my office setup at home has given me pause to consider whether this is really something I want to do ... Because I know I don't want to work on equipment or software that's any less up to date than what I have at my office. But paying for it all myself, and paying to maintain it – I'm not sure it's really worth it for me right now, especially since if I'm still working full time I know I'm not going to want to take on much new additional work to do at home.

Still, people are starting to come out of the woodwork with projects they want me to do, and my hourly rate for those jobs is more than twice what I get paid at my "real" job. In particular, Mr. A's old boss has approached us with a proposal for some work that could be ongoing and fairly lucrative, so that's kind of got my attention at the moment.

One of these nights I really need to just sit down and do the math. Not tonight, though. Tonight I have to run home and vacuum, and wash a load of towels, and give the dogs their dinner before my three-year-old house guest arrives. Actually, she isn't even three yet – her birthday is this Sunday. I was her mom's doula when she was born. Hard to believe she's turning three already.