Routine Log #4: Heading up to the finish

I’ve wanted to get back to this blog for a while, though the times I’ve had available to write (and not constantly be on myself about how I should be working) would mostly have been in the wee hours of the morning. I know that’s not unusual (for me), but I had gotten really out of my Circadian rhythm, and was not looking forward to only being able to fall asleep after 2 or 3 AM. It can take me hours to write one of these posts, though I generally don’t notice that much, when I’m in a flow state.

I officially have less than a month left of classes. My hands are feeling it. Particularly, one of the fingers of my right hand has been a bit out of sorts, over the last couple of weeks. I’m not sure if it’s because of too much smartphone use, too much writing with that hand, too much typing, too much unscrewing jars and pen caps, or what. But because of that, I had been trying to rest it. I’m not entirely sure what caused it, so I’m not entirely sure what I’m supposed to stop doing (other than lifting electronics, which seems to trigger aching).

Because I do so much with my hands, I’m pretty sure that I should make it a priority to work it less, until the ache goes away. It’s not a severe pain, or a constant one (yet), so I have some wiggle room.

Reading back over this blog, I can see the precursors to this post relatively clearly: much more clearly, than I did at the time of writing them. For one of my classes, I had to create a Business Plan, which — well, this is really not a high-level class — it didn’t have to be elaborate. I’ve had to write at least one Business Plan in the deep past, and it was essentially for the same hypothetical company. What I find, through being in Business courses, is that my Business Plan is really not all that awesome. 🙂 This is likely because I’m prioritizing doing what I want to do, as versus what will make money. There is a difference.

Long story short: I’ve had to cut back on any hope of making a living working with beads, due to a number of present and future factors. The main one of these is that I don’t want to run a sweatshop. Hiring on extra help to do what I will not have time to do, greatly boosts productivity and profits…but it isn’t fair to the workers, and the system is a fragile thing to begin with. I don’t want to manage other people, and I certainly don’t want to be the manager who doesn’t pay enough.

The other end of this is that I don’t want to gouge people for work that takes hours to make (and more to design), but is inexpensive as regards materials. Neither do I want to drive myself into debt or bankruptcy because I don’t want to charge a fair price for my time. What I’m dealing with is the quandary of producing labor-intensive products in a Service- (and increasingly Information-) based society. There are places on the planet where the main mode of income generation is in manufacturing. I don’t live within one, and there’s no way I can compete in this market on the basis of price (and still live here).

On top of that, I’ve learned over time that people don’t necessarily know or care about the skill required to create beadwork. It doesn’t help that finding excellent examples of skilled work, takes some digging.

I am not entirely certain, but I am disconcerted that it may be riskier and cost more (both out-of-pocket and in time lost) for me to attempt to monetize my beadwork habit online, than it will to do what I can already see myself doing — which is keeping up the blog, developing content, and sharing where I’m at on my journey in Jewelry Design. (For instance, I’ve thought of going back to that tour of off-loom beadweaving techniques that I mentioned before classes began.) These aren’t useless pursuits: they keep me writing, and they help me develop skills in desktop publishing and blogging, as well as giving purpose to my continued beadwork. They’re certainly better ways for me to spend my time than television or video games…which tend not to hold my interest anyway, but that’s an aside.

So what am I thinking of doing?

I’ve heard that I may be a very good fit for Cataloging Librarianship…which gives me a lot to study, after these classes are over! I’ll want to look at increasing my knowledge of the field as well as acquiring another language. As always, I’ve been torn between español (Spanish — because it’s more in demand, I have prior training, and it’s therefore easier) and 日本語 (Japanese language — because I have personal use for it).

I just recently learned that the kanji I kept seeing but not connecting with a known word, 大丈夫, is daijoubu. I also learned that Google Translate doesn’t understand this word unless the “u” is included after “jo” to make an “o” held for two beats, or “jō”. So “daijoubu desu ka?” (“are you OK?”) is spelled alright, as is “daijōbu desu ka?” (like anyone knows what a diacritic “macron” is) but “daijobu desu ka?” may not be. At least, Google Translate can’t understand it because it isn’t an exact match to what it expects.

I need to find a better easy Japanese-English dictionary source…not to mention, a Japanese-language word processor. I mean, seriously, it should be possible to look up a kanji by either an on or kun reading…

Anyway, given that this site may morph into a personal blog plus extra information on books (or issues raised in books), possibly language acquisition, libraries, and beadwork (depending on where my focus is at any one time…which is a perennial problem that I don’t even know how to solve), instead of a Business or eCommerce blog focused on sales; (at least if things keep going the way they are), hey: maybe trying to disentangle my life from my work, won’t be so bad. I should note that I’m thinking of applying Creative Commons licenses to some stuff that I’m planning to put up here (eventually), which allows me some degree of flexibility, at least…