Tag Archives: internet

So far, so good

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“Happy March First!” my mom would call and say. It was a contest between us to be the first to call on the first day of each month. I miss being able to call her today.

Yesterday our new dishwasher arrived and was installed. I’m so thankful the first one delivered was broken and I sent it back. The motor would have blown out with the faulty wiring, like our old one did. It’s a blessing we had to wait several weeks for the new one to arrive. It wasn’t until last week that we figured out we had an electrical problem and not an appliance issue.

I’m not upset at having to buy a new dishwasher, because the old one was, well really old. It didn’t work that well and everything came out wet or spotted.

Life is quiet and good. I even finished preparing our taxes for the CPA yesterday. I scanned all the paperwork and was able to email it rather than stand in line at the post office.

Until I got the taxes done, I wasn’t allowing myself any time to revise my NaNoWriMo manuscript or to look for publishers for my picture book manuscript about my mom. No, I was focused on getting the taxes done. Do you know what happened? I procrastinated and wasted time reading articles on the internet for days.

Do you procrastinate with chores you don’t like (like preparing taxes) or do you get things done right away?

How do you not “overwork” from home?

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robahh 1

Back when I was working from home as a stay-at-home mom with my first-born child.

Working from home is something I’ve done for years. At first, I had what is now our guest room dedicated as my office for my sole proprietor public relations and marketing biz. That’s why the kids called it the “computer room” when they were little.  I had a desktop Apple IIc something computer and heavy-weight laser printer. Back then, I also had a fax machine and a separate phone line for my work.

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This looks like the very first Mac in my home office.

My downfall with that venture was not knowing when to stop. Even though I had a separate work space, I couldn’t stop working. I had a client who loved to call me after 6 p.m. and give me work that had to be done by morning — and they were my main client! Also, this was pre-email days and internet. I had to transfer files to the people who changed my files to film over a modem. Then the film had to be picked up from these mom and pop shops and I drove them to the printer. I’m talking newsletters, flyers, brochures and veloxes for newspapers. Can you imagine that?

I’d wake up throughout the night and to make sure the files transferred from my modem to the film person’s modem. Sometimes a newsletter or ad file would take six or seven hours to transfer.

How things have changed from the early 1990s! Prior to that it, was a Selectric IBM typewriter I used and hand delivered copy to a print shop who then had to retype it all into columns, lay it out with my photos or artwork, give me a rough copy and finally a blueline to proof before going to print. Things are so much easier these days.

I’m still working from home and everything is so much quicker and convenient with emails and the internet. But the question still remains, how do I guard my time and not work all the time?

What’s a blueline you might ask if you weren’t alive back in the olden days? Here’s the definition I got from googling it from Dictionary.com:

blueline

[ bloo-lahyn ]SHOW IPA

nounPrinting.

a print made on light-sensitive paper and used as a proof for checking the position of stripped-up negatives or positives and copy prior to platemaking.
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What are your solutions for separating a life from working hours when you work from home?