There is a freelance connection here, but you have to read to the end...
Here's page 55 of the 2009 Saskatchewan Driver's Handbook. Notice the diagrams that demonstrate when to use low or high beams while driving at night.
Now here's the high beam graphic blown up.
You can just imagine the boredom of the graphic designer tasked with making 166 pages of driving instruction. I can imagine it's late at night, and she's designing yet another image of a car, or a street, or a traffic sign. *Sigh* And then the decision: I think I'll put some hitchhiking aliens in this graphic. It's a dark image. You can barely see them. Why not?
And you know what: good for her! If it's any sector of society, it's probably the bureaucrats who deserve a little bit of humour in their lives. Way to go, faceless public servant. Well done. (And, in all seriousness, it's a well designed book.)
Why was I reading the SGI driver's handbook so closely that I noticed these obscure aliens? Well, let's call it the next phase of my freelancing year, of which there remains four months and five days.
I got a part-time job. I'm going to drive a school bus. I train next week. I drive in the morning 7-9 and the afternoon 3-5. I will continue to freelance in the hours in between. I did make several attempts at getting professional work in my field, but I couldn't even get an interview. And so the bus.
I'm trying to not see this as a step backwards. Here's what's good about the decision.
No more financial pressure to "publish or starve." A lot of the writing I've done in the past months has been a mix of work, ranging from decent, respectable journalism to terrible, soulless advertorial writing that made me feel dirty. Now that I work, I should be able to pick exactly the stories I want and either reject the rest or set much fairer terms for the work. At best I made a low 30 cents/word, at worst a pathetic 10 cents/word. I should have pursued publications that pay higher, I suppose.
Well, now I will. I'm doing an investigative piece right now, and if it turns out I should be able to sell it for quite a lot. But it will take months to actually publish it from now, and thanks to the part-time job, I can take that time!
I learned this much: to freelance full time, you need A LOT of discipline. I could have wrote more, pitched more, hustled up more work... and made more money. I certainly had the time. I think that it's really important that you like what you're writing about. Advertorials are certainly uninspiring.
My hope is that the external structure of a part-time job will help. Instead of having "all the time in the world" to procrastinate, stress over the bills, and juggling multiple deadlines, now I hope to just focus on one story at a time that I choose. I hope, I hope.
Here's page 55 of the 2009 Saskatchewan Driver's Handbook. Notice the diagrams that demonstrate when to use low or high beams while driving at night.
Now here's the high beam graphic blown up.
You can just imagine the boredom of the graphic designer tasked with making 166 pages of driving instruction. I can imagine it's late at night, and she's designing yet another image of a car, or a street, or a traffic sign. *Sigh* And then the decision: I think I'll put some hitchhiking aliens in this graphic. It's a dark image. You can barely see them. Why not?
And you know what: good for her! If it's any sector of society, it's probably the bureaucrats who deserve a little bit of humour in their lives. Way to go, faceless public servant. Well done. (And, in all seriousness, it's a well designed book.)
Why was I reading the SGI driver's handbook so closely that I noticed these obscure aliens? Well, let's call it the next phase of my freelancing year, of which there remains four months and five days.
I got a part-time job. I'm going to drive a school bus. I train next week. I drive in the morning 7-9 and the afternoon 3-5. I will continue to freelance in the hours in between. I did make several attempts at getting professional work in my field, but I couldn't even get an interview. And so the bus.
I'm trying to not see this as a step backwards. Here's what's good about the decision.
No more financial pressure to "publish or starve." A lot of the writing I've done in the past months has been a mix of work, ranging from decent, respectable journalism to terrible, soulless advertorial writing that made me feel dirty. Now that I work, I should be able to pick exactly the stories I want and either reject the rest or set much fairer terms for the work. At best I made a low 30 cents/word, at worst a pathetic 10 cents/word. I should have pursued publications that pay higher, I suppose.
Well, now I will. I'm doing an investigative piece right now, and if it turns out I should be able to sell it for quite a lot. But it will take months to actually publish it from now, and thanks to the part-time job, I can take that time!
I learned this much: to freelance full time, you need A LOT of discipline. I could have wrote more, pitched more, hustled up more work... and made more money. I certainly had the time. I think that it's really important that you like what you're writing about. Advertorials are certainly uninspiring.
My hope is that the external structure of a part-time job will help. Instead of having "all the time in the world" to procrastinate, stress over the bills, and juggling multiple deadlines, now I hope to just focus on one story at a time that I choose. I hope, I hope.
