Tersosity & Verbosity

Have you gotten more telephone averse with age? This is something I’ve written about before myself, or close to it, in reference to phone phobia. Even in times of no creditors, my heart leaps up into the roof of my mouth and addles my brain when I hear the phone ring, in large part because of doing phone support. This also relates to the increasing tendency not to be in touch with anyone who lacks online means of contact, like e-mail. And yes, it’s intrusive and all that, as noted.

Too funny, Bill Gates in a Tandy ad.

Good post on rules of thumb, some of which are familiar to me. I didn’t know the interruptions thing had a number attached, but I knew it was bad. I can seldom do much of substance without being free of interruptions. And I have to keep my self-sourced interruptions under control. I think part of my ramping up process that means the first lump of time I sit down to do a thing barely touches it is that it serves both as a thinking and mood altering phase, and a clearinghouse for things I’d do to derail myself, be they small tasks or ticks or what. The estimating one is well known, too, and soundly ignored by most.

What does one charge as an appropriate rate to migrate a blog, from MT to WordPress or otherwise, for a blogger?

Just talked with a recruiter who apparently found me on Monster.com, and had a very favorable impression of him. I’m not a fit with the specific opening he had in mind, which would have required Foxpro background, but I’m going up to Burlington Monday for the quick get to know you meeting so it’s easy for them to send me out if they do come up with matches.

This means it’s time to update the resume, which is on my to do short list anyway, because they’re asking me to send an updated version in Word format, and references. It’s silly it’s not changed to speak of since I finally had something worthy of uploading to Monster.

I was going to tweet this, but Twitter is acting up and won’t take anything from me, and this allowed for a longer bit of text. I am so close to just “tweeting” here, since I can post so easily. Even from the Blackberry if needed.

Apart from cost and fussiness, depending on model, I actually like the compact florescents, and what they did to the electric bill. At least, until the electric usage we were getting billed for nearly doubled for no apparent reason. One of the things I don’t like is that you can’t or couldn’t, put the new ones in covered fixtures, requiring old style in some cases. I mentioned that to someone the other day and surprised them, as they’d not read the directions/warnings and used them that way without apparent issue. At any rate, I can completely understand hoarding incandescent bulbs for various reasons. It should be up to the market to encourage the switching, not government decree.

On an amusingly related not to my consulting fees post the other day, here’s a post on how to sell overpriced services. The dressing part feels tongue in cheek, even though it’s tried and true advice I first saw decades ago, and so not me. The part about being right up front is something I’ve flirted with and lately come around to wanting to do again, though in my situation there may be a balance between every scrap of marginal revenue being vital and it being worthwhile to make the most of what work can be landed at real rates, allowing focus on clients willing to pay realistically.

Sounding sensible? Apparently it can happen.

This is good post on determining consulting fees, even if it does date back to January. I famously have trouble with pricing, which may be tied up somewhat with self-esteem and excessive desire to please others on my part, and ironically it’s probably low pricing that’s left me with a lack of business and prospects. Obviously you can’t sell to those who can’t or won’t pay a given amount, and competition is ever a factor, but in all reality I need to charge $100 n hour and put in plenty of hours in order to earn realistic income from a support the family perspective. That should be a powerful incentive not to charge $50 to spend 6 hours updating a web site, or $80 to spend 4 hours, or $112.50 for 9+ hours on a POS system update underpriced and misleadingly described. Or you would think.

The baby was away, lunging in bed with the girls taking care of him, having a blast. Now to get him something to eat, drinks all around, and maybe do some cleaning that won’t hurt my hand the way mouse and keyboard usage is doing. Seldom had it hurt that much.

Who’s who and reunion for the famous picture of Microsoft’s early employees.

Via Dan, this is an amusing, lengthy article in which Bill Gates e-mails complaints about Microsoft end user experience to his own staff, which apparently was something he did regularly. I have to agree in general with Dan about Vista.

Apparently text messages are private from employers, per the court.

No surprise, it’s becoming more the purview of professionals.

Weekend Pundit has regularly discussed tin whiskers, though due to the Blogmosis failure those posts are not available. I previously mention the problem in this post. So I was interested to see a “fact or fiction?” post and discussion of tin whiskers at Slashdot.