So, I've been working for the past month or so on getting my one-man business planned, formalized, and well, in business. Been learning about the kind of stuff I never imagined I'd need to know: LLCs, C Corporations, Sole Proprietorships, DBAs, Tax Law, Accounting, the works. Good grief. Well, learning about it as in I mostly know what these things are now. It's a start. I'm actually learning to use QuickBooks, and I like it. I've been researching trade names, working on a logo, reading sample business plans, and still it's all seemed fairly surreal. That is, until a large flat package arrived for me recently. A little something from Merchants Bank of VT.
The giant checkbook.
You know the one. Business envelope-sized checks, three on a page, all bound up in a fancy, faux-cardboard binder the size of my high school yearbook.
Wow. I'm really doing this. The giant checkbook has made it real. Now, if only the giant checkbook could create a marketing plan for me. Hmm...
In Bid'ness
The Writer's Almanac
I've been a fairly long-time public radio listener, but it's only recently that I've started hearing The Writer's Almanac. VPR plays at 8:30 am and lately I've been catching it on my way to work.
Call me a geek, but I love it. Garrison Keillor's voice is a lot more soothing and introspective in this context, and seeing as I no longer enjoy the pleasure of the FileMaker lunch table gang, this short little show is a terrific source of odd facts and interesting stories.
I really enjoyed the poem he read today by Jennifer Maier, from Dark Alphabet (reprinted without permission):
Love at First Sight
You always hear about it—
a waitress serves a man two eggs
over easy and she says to the cashier,
That is the man I'm going to marry,
and she does. Or a man spies a woman
at a baseball game; she is blond
and wearing a blue headband,
and, being a man, he doesn't say this
or even think it, but his heart is a homing bird
winging to her perch, and next thing you know
they're building birdhouses in the garage.
How do they know, these auspicious lovers?
They are like passengers on a yellow
bus painted with the dreams
of innumerable lifetimes, a packet
of sepia postcards in their pocket.
And who's to say they haven't traveled
backward for centuries through borderless
lands, only to arrive at this roadside attraction
where Chance meets Necessity and says,
What time do you get off?
I Love My Husband
Paul went to the library last week and came home with a book in large, easy-to-read type.
The book was crap, but he liked the large type so much he came home yesterday with another one. I always thought that was for people in their eighties, or those wearing eye-glasses with lenses the size of veal medallions.
That's it. He's getting a Reader's Digest subscription for Christmas. Go for it. Laughter is Best Medicine, Life in These United States, the works. Or better yet, Guideposts.
Old Man is Snoring...
Woke up this morning at 6 to steady, pouring rain. It was such a soothing, comfortable sound. Burrowed under the covers for another half hour, then read for a bit before padding out of bed and letting the dog out. Of course, he didn't want to go out in the rain. (The little turkey has NO IDEA what he is in for.) So he danced around the house with his legs crossed while we tried three different times to let him out. Good grief!
It's raining, it's pouring,OK, how sick is that really? I mean, I've long understood that most fairy tales were generally pretty grisly, early "scared straight" style propaganda. But I don't know that I've ever really thought much about the simpler nursery rhymes. Pair that little ditty with "Now I lay me down to sleep", and it's no wonder your kid doesn't want to go to bed.
The old man is snoring,
Bumped his head, and he fell out of bed.
And he couldn't get up in the morning.
We had a Peter, Paul and Mary album when I was little that was all children's songs. I have a copy on CD these days, and gave one to a friend with small children so she'd have something other than the Music Together tape to listen to in the car. Well, they have a song on this album about this very same unfortunate and concussed old man, and it's filled with references to other mildly terrifying nursery rhymes, while all the while Mary counts off a game of hide and seek like the ship's computer in Alien, but in an eerie, child-like voice.
Has anyone else ever heard this song? Talk about freaky. I mean, I know it by heart but never really listened to it all that closely before. They sing about a ladybug whose house is on fire, and her children are about to be burned alive. They're not currently burning, no. They are going to burn. It's the anticipation and her inability to save them that gives it an extra kick.
Ol' Greybeard
So, the grey in my beard continues to spread. How about that? It's on my head as well, but not quite as evident there. I like it, but I'm wondering how quickly it's going to take over. Will it be a slow, gradual change, or am I going to look in the mirror on my 40th birthday and find myself grey with the occasional fleck of brown or red? Who knows? My dad has taken his time, but his sideburns were among the first to go, and I'm betting his whiskers are probably a motley crew.
I know, maybe it will turn out that our house has a poltergeist in it, and I'll have some horrible spiritual encounter that will leave me with a dashing white streak through my brow, like JoBeth Williams. God, I hope not. Simon, stay away from the light.
I had a friend in Arizona who grew a white patch under his chin, and a matching one on the top of his head. Funny thing.
Oh, we're going to the Tunbridge World's Fair next weekend. It's one of the longest-running country fairs in Vermont, and is said to be full of "old-time charm". I'm hoping that means deathtrap rides, apple cider, corn dogs, and pick-pocketing carny folk. This year, they are celebrating The Cow. Yes indeed.
Hear that Michele? More cows to pet!
Alison, I'll eat an extra funnel cake just for you. No, don't mention it, I'm glad to do it.
Label Me
When I was in kindergarten or first grade (or maybe both) I won a Dyno label maker selling Tootsie Rolls and salt-water taffy door-to-door to as a school fundraiser. Do you remember those things? They were the best! It came with three different dials, each with a different type face, and a few colors of tape, and it all fit into compartments inside the nice plastic case.
A place for everything, and all that. I loved it! That satisfying noise it made with each stamped letter: kind of a cross between a "click" and a "chunk". Then there was the cut button that you had to hit twice in order to peel off the label backing.
I labeled everything.
My books, my toys, my brother, my friends, my anxieties, you name it.
Well, after years of a relatively label-less existence (we all have a few we cling to) I gave in on Friday and bought a low-end Brother labeler. It's not fancy. Just one font, for example, and there's no saving frequently used labels. I have no truck with that. But it does let me clearly distinguish the laundry detergent from the washing soda in their identical plastic bins. And my new magnetic spice wall will be greatly improved by neat, transparent labels on each metal tin. How could I have done without it all these years. (Rusty, can I get a hallelujah!) Paul mocks me, but how could he truly understand?
Did you know you can make your very own circa-1975 Dyna labels online? Or pretty close, anyway. It doesn't make the cool "chunk" sound, but it does make some very nice labels!