Road Trip to Wollongong
I am readying myself for an exciting road trip into the heartland of the South. My trusty companion and I will be riding our steed (aka the rental car) through the Shire (home to hobbits) and beyond, through the charmingly named Fairy Meadow and into the wondrous land of Towradgi.
Actually ,according to my map if I go through Fairy Meadow I will already be lost, but so be it! ‘Tis a perilous journey we face, through the misty mountains, o’er and down the rocky cliffs…
What a wank. Not a bad description of the road to Wollongong but there’ll be nothing mystical about it, I’m off to do a little more research on a new book. It’s a bit top secret (unless you’re one of my friends, in which case I’ve probably told you after too much champagne). It’s a very exciting new book which has me wading very far out of my familiar waters, where perhaps there will be sharks. Still, book writing is quite new to me, and with one book published and another finished I have that cockiness that only a new writer is blessed with. Give it a year or two and maybe the gleam will diminish. But then again, this writing caper rates very low on the Career Suck-O-Metre ™ so I’ll probably keep it up.
Next week I’m off to the hallowed halls of the Australian Film TV and Radio School, so who knows what adventures await me there…
Oh, and happy freelancing!
x Monica
Freelancing for Australian (for Dummies) will be available in bookstores and via the Freelance Success website from September.
PS: Thanks to those who asked. Referring to last week’s blog, the second courier called first to make sure I was home, then used the after hours doorbell when he got here. I am trying not to feel like I wasted my time.
Filed under: Travelling |Writing | Posted by Monica Davidson at Friday, 1 August 2008 2:39 PM
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Two doorbells. One door. No Brains.
Look, I don’t want to use this blog as a whinge platform but sometimes needs must.
Yesterday I chatted to a couple of clients, both of whom wanted to send couriers around today. Deliveries being what they are, they couldn’t tell me exactly when, but sometime between 9am and 5pm. No problem, I would be in my little office (my atelier, if you will) all day.
Now, my lovely home office is a converted granny flat at the back of the house. Normally I can hear the front doorbell from there if both the office door and the door connecting my atelier are open. However, as charming as the atelier is, it’s also freaking cold with both doors open and I have taken to burning excessive amounts of electricity keeping it snuggly warm.
So, thinking it was about time I figured out a solution, I bought a remote doorbell. It’s a most tricky device. Looks like a normal doorbell, but I can plug the receiver in wherever I am and it will chime and flash, even in the distant and toasty office (yes, even I am getting sick of the word atelier). I screwed the new doorbell to the door, with a note on saying it was to be used during business hours. Our other doorbell, which is off to the side of the door, now has “After Hours use” written on. True, it may make our pebblecrete bungalow look more like a brothel, but unless we took to opening the door in lingerie I don’t think the idea will take off. Especially if we open the door in lingerie.
Anyway, one courier arrived this morning while I happened to be making a coffee, and thank goodness for my caffeine habit because I was in the main part of the house. The courier rang the “After Hours” doorbell several times, then banged on the door A LOT. At no point did he use the “Business Hours” doorbell, which was right in front of his face. He was then bugged that it took me so long to get to the door, and that I didn’t have package in hand. I pointed out that had he used the correct doorbell I may have been more prepared, but he simply started at me with dead eyes that silently and eloquently explained that he didn’t give a rat’s arse.
Still, I have faith in the two doorbells, one door scenario, anally retentive though it may be. Perhaps the litmus test will be the other courier, who is yet to arrive as the day ticks away….
Happy freelancing!
x Monica
Freelancing for Australian (for Dummies) will be available in bookstores and via the Freelance Success website from September.
Filed under: Working from Home | Posted by Monica Davidson at Friday, 25 July 2008 2:33 PM
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Happy Pope Week!
Second week of the school holidays and the Pope decides to grace up with his eminent presence. I’ve spent the whole week wondering whether or not I’m going to hell (should that be a capital H?). Given that I’ve been juggling three children deep in holiday-mode, I’ve had a two-day visit from Mum for her birthday, and I’ve been trying to write the first 5000 words of my new book (which I failed to do, and am now behind schedule), I’ve had moments of wondering if I’m already there.
No, it’s not been so bad. Being freelance meant I was able to take some time off and dragged Mum and the children into the city on Wednesday to see the whole World Youth Day official Dog and Pony Show. It was like being a gate crasher at the world’s biggest party, except we didn’t get evicted. There was a great deal of merriment and everyone seemed to be having a jolly time. Locals were relatively thin on the ground, but we encountered a flotilla of Norwegians, some dancing priests and pilgrims from Poland, and a large crowd of singing nuns from Burkina Faso. No flying nuns so far, but it’s early days yet.
And I have it on very good authority that the Pope smokes. Holy smoke indeed! See, you really do learn something new every day.
x Monica
Freelancing for Australian (for Dummies) will be available in bookstores and via the Freelance Success website from September.
Filed under: Children | Posted by Monica Davidson at Friday, 18 July 2008 4:38 PM
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What a Lovely Doorstop.
I am having an experience I have never had before. I am holding in my hand a book that I wrote. It has my name on the cover. It is a truly strange and wonderful experience.
It’s called Freelancing for Australian (for Dummies). That’s right, it’s a Dummies book. It has the Dummies brand pointy-chin man smiling on the front, waving a little Australian flag. I am giddily in love with Pointy-Chin Man. Even more exciting, within the covers of the book it seems that Pointy-Chin Man and I are having intimate moments at various points throughout. Whenever the heading “True Story” is used, there appears to be a little caricature version of me, wearing intelligent spectacles, whispering in the ear of Pointy-Chin Man. I am advising him on the ways of being freelance. I feel very brainy, especially as my alter ego is wearing brainy-girl specs.
I wrote the book, which is based on the US version, over the summer. The name of the original American author is also on the cover with mine, even though we have never met. Still, I am also in love with this other author, Susan Drake. She provided the recipe, and I baked the cake. An Aussie cake. A pav, if you will.
I have just finished a heady phone call with the publicist and publisher of the book, in which we discussed all the different ways the book will be marketed. Now my love includes the hardworking stunners at Wiley Publishing. It’s also extending to all the people who will hear about the book and then buy it. Those adorable and intelligent souls might even buy two copies, for it is a hefty and meaty book, a satisfying 393 pages. They can read one copy, and use the other as doorstop.
I am excited and full of love. Days don’t get much better than this. Time for champagne – POP!
x Monica
Freelancing for Australian (for Dummies) will be available in bookstores and via the Freelance Success website from September.
Filed under: Freelancing |Writing | Posted by Monica Davidson at Thursday, 10 July 2008 3:08 PM
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Potential Terrorism in Eastgardens
How lovely, the APEC dog and pony show is in town and Sydney has gone berserk. Boyfriend told me this morning that the electronic gate to his work was broken due to signal jamming. Mobile phones don’t work in the city, and the restaurants are closed. There’s a massive fence around the Opera House. All the native animals have been removed from the zoo. The good news? Sydney workers get a public holiday. Tomorrow.
As a freelance I am more than happy to take advantage of other people’s holidays. When planning for this week I was quite happy to take Friday off and join my employed friends for a spontaneous long weekend, despite the fact that APEC was not going to interfere with my professional life in any way.
Ah, spoke to soon it seems! First-born Gracie made it into the regional sports carnival after coming second in the 800m event. (I’m so proud of her – she entered with only one other girl, a mate, and they walked almost the whole way, coming first and second and qualifying for regionals. She is a star). The school directed that, since APEC was on, all children had to be accompanied by a parent at all times. That meant packing up my laptop since I’m on deadline, and sitting in the stands with all the other parents, wondering when it would be a good time to look like a complete tool and commence work amongst the screeching and excitable kiddies.
Of course, I didn’t get any work done. My desire to get everything finished before the glorious surprise holiday has now been thwarted due to the threat of terrorism at the Eastgardens regional sports carnival. It seems even freelancers cannot escape!
Happy Freelancing!
Filed under: None | Posted by Monica Davidson at Thursday, 6 September 2007 4:28 PM
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The Same All Over the World
I had an entertaining experience last night interviewing a charming filmmaker and performer for my new book on creative freelancing. We started the interview with a glass of wine (as you do), and things became rapidly more hilarious from that point on. We discussed how we had both become freelance, how life had thrown unexpected hiccups our way and how freelancing and being creative for a living had bailed us out time and again. We talked about the maverick personality of the creative freelancer, the need to take risks even if we don’t really enjoy it and our extreme hatred of working for other people.
The particularly enjoyable part of this experience is that we were in Newcastle. No, not my home town, the very north shore of Sydney, but Newcastle Upon Tyne, home of the Magpies soccer team and many, many Geordies. I was halfway around the world, chatting to a women I had so much in common with it was spooky.
Since arriving in sunny England (heh heh) last week I have interviewed writers, photographers, performers, puppeteers, musicians, composers and more. I have traveled to Yorkshire, Scotland, and Newcastle, and next week am continuing my journey to encompass Nottingham and, of course, London. At every step of the way, and no matter how financially secure or well known or established each person has been, we have all been incredibly the same. And of course, having interviewed a similar number of creative freelancers in Australia for my Aussie book, I have come to understand that we are alike, everywhere. I am so heartened by this.
Next time I enter the long dark tea-time of the soul I will remember that thousands of miles away, in a dingy café down a little sidestreet, another creative freelancer is supping on cheap wine and a tasty Italian feed and contemplating the future, just as we were last night.
Happy Freelancing!
Mon xx
Freelance Success (Australia edition) is being released in February 2008
Freelance Success (UK edition) is being released in May 2008
Filed under: Freelancing |Travelling | Posted by Monica Davidson at Sunday, 8 July 2007 01:25 AM
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Left Hand Doesn't Know...
Oh the joys of working out a contract. One of my new clients is a very large government organisation, and truly it is so - the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.
My immediate client, the lovely woman I deal with on a daily basis, needs me to send in my so-called 'standard' contract so she can pass it to legal, and they can add stuff from their standard. Having said that, a tight work timeline means we have had to get started before a contract is officially signed. No problem, we have an agreement via email which will suffice for now. Contract is still in the works.
Then legal call me. They need a huge number of forms to be completed by my various freelancers before they can process the contracts. I can forward the information to my lovely contact, all will be well. If I can assemble the team to come in we can sign all the forms and proceed.
I send the correct material to lovely client - she has no idea what's going on. I amass the team, call to make a time to come in, and legal tell me that's no longer necessary but we need a JP to witness signatures. Do we have a JP? No. We bustle about as a mass from chemist to post office to police station, and we can't find one. Eventually we locate a JP in the local funeral parlour. We bustle in for signature witnessing in less than salubrious envrions.
Necessary forms are sent in, but some have to wait as some team members are not available. It's OK, they don't start for a few weeks yet. Oh no, says legal, we need their information. The busting continues.
Legal person gets sick. Forms cannot be processed until she returns. When she returns she asks me what the situation is, and informs me that all needs to be done before we can start work. I tell her that work has already started, due to aforementioned tight timeline. I get stunned silence on the phone.
At this point, I tear out hair, them book appointment for swanky stylist to address growing bald patch.
And still no contract.... * sigh*
Happy Freelancing?
x Monica
Filed under: Client Management |Filmmaking | Posted by Monica Davidson at Thursday, 12 April 2007 5:23 PM
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New Day, New Blog
Greetings! The sun is shining, the washing is calling to me, I've already had a cranky client on the phone and a potential who wants a quote and I need another cup of coffee. Welcome to the wonderful world of creative freelancing.
I have nothing enlightening to say today, apart from howdy. I can't promise that this will be a regular blog (after all, freelancing and regularity don't necessarily go hand in hand), but I hope it will be entertaining. And maybe a bit educational, although again I'm not promising anything until after that second cup of coffee.
I read a report today that a new survey has found that people in employment don't think they'd be able to work from home because they'd get fat and lonely. They'd be constantly distracted by daytime TV (obviously they've never watched it) and foraging in the fridge for tasty treats.
My advice? Keep the tasty treats at the shop so at least you have to get out of the house and meet people, and walk there do alleviate any potential fatness. And as for TV? Apart from a brief stint when Marlena on "Days of our Lives" was possessed by the devil I haven't yet succumbed wholeheartedly to that particularly nasty.
Now, you'll have to excuse me. It's lunch time, washing needs to be brought in and "Dr Phil" is about to start.
Happy Freelancing!
x Monica
Filed under: Freelancing |Working from Home | Posted by Monica Davidson at Monday, 2 April 2007 01:59 AM
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