 (Rubin is a dog with a blog. This post is by him.)
It’s come to my attention that Amber and Terry seem to be expecting me to pee outside ALL THE TIME. I mean, not just the occasional alfresco pee, we’re talking all outside, all the time i.e. I NEVER get to pee in the house ever again.
Reasons for me thinking this:
1. When I go outside I get called a “good boy” and I normally get a little something for my trouble, like a sweetie or something
2. When I go INSIDE I get the whole “baaaaad boy” thing and they give me NOTHING
Does anyone else think this is just NOT FAIR?
They don’t pee in the garden. I’ve never once seen Them pee in the garden. They always use the bathroom. Always. I use the bathroom, what happens? “Baaaad boy”. *Sigh* I don’t think this is even ABOUT where I pee. I think it’s pretty much a case of “two legs good, four legs ‘baaaad’.” I think you see where I’m going with this.
Well I’m not backing down, sweetie or no sweetie. Yesterday morning, while Amber was drying her hair, I crept into the bathroom and crapped on the floor. Heeee!
And another thing, just while I’m on the subject of the bathroom: why is it “cute” when the Andrex puppy unravels a whole toilet roll, but why I do it it’s suddenly NOT?
*disgusted*
This isn’t so much an example of “bad” PR as it is “lazy PR” – and ‘lazy blogger syndrome” too, if I’m completely honest.
Over the last couple of months, our beauty blog,Hey, Dollface, has been going through a bit of a growth spurt, and this has led to an increasing number of enquiries from PRs, all of whom are keen to have their products featured on the site.
Now, don’t get me wrong – I’m happy to hear from these people. We’re always looking for new products to feature, and I have to say, the beauty PR industry are very on the ball when it comes to dealing with bloggers. They seemed to realise very early on that a mention on a popular blog could really benefit them in terms of selling products, and so they’ve been much quicker to reach out to bloggers than many other industries.
But they don’t always seem to bother to actually look at the blog before sending their enquiry.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve had innumerable emails from PRs, all asking for the address to send product samples too. I wouldn’t mind this either, if it wasn’t for the fact that the address is on the blog, under the “About/Contact” section. That’s the section they have to go to in order to get my email address, incidentally. Our postal address is above our email address on the page, so these PRs are actually scrolling past the information they need in order to find our email address, which they then use to ask us for our address.
If this only happened once or twice it wouldn’t matter, but I seem to have spent a large part of the last two weeks interrupting my work in order to type out my address and, to be perfectly honest, it’s getting old.
In order to try and streamline the process, I’ve taken to just using a stock email (Which contains a link to the ‘Contact’ page), but I’m still having to take time out to read the PR emails and reply to them. It may sound like a small thing to complain about and, indeed, in the great scheme of things, it is, but the fact is that dealing with email can be a huge time drain, especially for bloggers, who tend to get a huge amount of the stuff.
This week I’ve also had a lot of very basic questions from PRs which they would have been able to answer from themselves if they’d spent just a few seconds on the site – much less time than it takes to find my email address, send me an email and wait for me to respond.
So, pretty please, PR people: we love you, but is it too much to ask that you take a very quick look at the blog or website you’re pitching to before dashing off an email asking for information that’s right there in front of you?
It always goes the exact same way.
“So, you’re still working from home, then?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Hmmm. Still doing that ‘blogging’ thing?”
“I am, yes.”
* Pause *
“And you actually make money from that then?”
No matter how prepared I am for the question, it rankles every time. And Iknow why people ask it. I know blogging is still, despite the apparent “buzz” that still surrounds it, not something that many people understand, and something that still fewer people understand as a money-making enterprise. Many people, especially those of the older generation, don’t really know what a blog is, and those who do know often assume that all blogs are personal diaries, and how could you make money out of telling people what you had for dinner that day, anyway?
Even so, the vague implication that the career I’ve had for years now can’t possibly be making me any money, is always a little disheartening. What do these people think I live off, anyway? Thin air? But no matter how resigned I am to constantly being asked whether I actually make money from blogging, it’s the next question that always takes my breath away:
“How much do you make, then?”
Again, I know the subject is interesting to some people. I understand that they may even be wondering if they, too, could make some money out of sitting around in their pyjamas all day watching daytime TV, which is what most people seem to assume those who work from home do all day. (Isn’t it funny how the phrase “Working in your pyjamas,” always seems to come up in these conversations?) But I was brought up to believe that it’s rude to ask people about money, and I wouldn’t dream of asking someone how much they earn. I don’t know, maybe I’m old fashioned. But the thing is, many of the people who ask me what I earn, wouldn’t dream of asking the same question of someone with a traditional job either, so it seems that we bloggers/freelance writers/work from home-ers are a special case, and normal manners don’t apply to us.
I long ago learned to hedge the question with a smile and a “Well, enough to pay the mortgage and keep me in shoes!” but some people can be incredibly persistent and won’t take the hint, choosing instead to pursue the matter, saying, “No, really: what would you make in a month, say?” and leaving me opening and closing my mouth in astonishment, not really knowing what to say.
Perhaps it’s just me. Perhaps I’m just more private or old-fashioned than most, but the constant questioning of my bank balance is one of the aspects of working for myself that I’ve found hardest to deal with, and I don’t really like being asked to disclose my earnings at the drop of a hat.
What about you? Are you asked questions about your earnings by friends and family members? Does it bother you, if so?
In the four years (Is it really that long?!) I’ve been working from home, I’ve worked much longer hours than I ever did in an office. There are lots of different reasons for this:
1. Motivation is higher
Not having a guarenteed wage coming into the bank at the end of each month, and depending on your own efforts to keep yourself and your family afloat is a powerful motivator, I find.
2. Job satisfaction is higher
I hated working for other people; I love working for myself. It’s as simple as that. I’m being paid to do something I genuinely enjoy, so of course I’ll want to spend more time doing it.
3. Earning opportunities are greater
In my last few jobs, it didn’t matter how many hours I worked per day, week or month – my salary would remain the same regardless. Similarly, I was paid for sick days, bank holidays and vacations. In other words, unless I was promoted (and there were no opportunities for promotion unless someone else left the company), there just wasn’t a whole lot I could do to improve my take-home pay. By working for myself, I know that my earning potential is limited only by how hard I’m prepared to work, and this motivated me to work harder and longer.
4. Distractions are fewer
I know this isn’t true for everyone who works from home, but without colleagues constantly interrupting me, phones ringing and other distractions, I find that I concentrate harder and am less likely to break off what I’m doing for trivial reasons.
5. Work is always there
Even if you close the door on the home office at 5pm every night and make a deal with yourself not to go back in until morning, it can be very hard to resist the lure of checking email or just finishing off that last project. It’s even more difficult if you use the computer to relax, because the Internet, along with all of its work-related purposes, is always right there in front of you.
6. When people know you work from home, they take advantage of it
I’m not sure if this is the case for everyone, but my experience has been that once clients know you work from home, they tend to make an assumption that you’re always available, no matter what time of the day or night. When I worked in an office, people wouldn’t have dreamed of calling me in the evening or at the weekend with non-urgent queries, but they think nothing of doing it now, because they assume that I’m always “at work”. I now switch the answer phone on every evening and all weekend, and try to only answer non-urgent emails during business hours, but it’s amazing the number of people who contact me outwith those hours – and expect me to be available.
7. Guilt
Yes, good old-fashioned guilt. When you work for yourself, you can’t avoid it, and every time you try to put your feet up and switch on the TV, a little nagging voice will pipe up saying, “You know, you really should be working,” or “You could use this time to do some paperwork/marketing/start a new project/whatever.” That little voice can be very hard to ignore… and sometimes I just don’t bother.
Now, I don’t necessarily think it’s either good or healthy to work long hours as a freelancer: in fact, I know it’s not. You just end up getting burnt out and exhausted, and not producing your best work as a result. All the same, I was still fairly surprised, when I looked at the results of our last poll, to see that the majority of those who answered the question “How many hours per day do you spend working?” with “Eight hours of less.” I reckon those who gave this answer – or who spent even less hours per day working from home – have got things figured out better than I have in terms of work/life balance, and working smarter, rather than harder.
So tell me: what’s your secret?
Poll Results: How many hours per day do you work?
Yesterday I started planning for my summer vacation. Yes, I know it’s barely even Spring yet, and no, my holiday isn’t imminent – in fact, I don’t leave until June 2nd. But when you’re a pro-blogger, and run a blog like The Fashion Police, which generally gets between 6 – 10 new posts per day, you have to start planning in advance. Well in advance.
Do you really need to make sure that your blog is updated while you’re on holiday, though? Well, yes, I think you do. Last year, for instance, I decided to just not bother. I did write some advance posts, but only a smattering, and I ended up publishing them before the holiday anyway, on a day when I was feeling under the weather and didn’t feel like writing. I also requested some guest posts from our readers, but I left it too late, and by the time the posts started to come in, I was already on the plane. Great planning job, there then.
“It won’t matter,” I told myself. “The regular readers only make up a small percentage of our overall visitors, so the fact that a couple of weeks pass with no new posts won’t make a difference, will it?”
Oh hell yes.
During that two week period, our traffic bombed. Adsense earnings bombed. Advertiser enquiries dried up. Subscribers were lost. In short, it all went to hell in a hand-basket, and not only that, but once I got back from my holiday (It was great, thanks), it took a long time, and a lot of hard work to get back to where we’d left off.
This time? I’m just not willing to risk it. From now until a couple of days before we leave, then, I’m going to be:
- Writing one, non time-sensitive post every day, and scheduling it to publish while I’m gone
- Actively looking for guest bloggers – and giving them two months notice this time, rather than the few days I allowed last time, in my infinite stupidity.
- Looking into the option of hiring a writer to keep an eye on things while we’re gone
The third point is one I’d rather not have to do: not just because I don’t feel we’re quite at the point of being able to hire writers yet, but also because training someone up and making sure they know exactly how I need things to be done would take up more time at the moment than I really have to spare. But I’m considering it, and it would ultimately be better than allowing the blog to stagnate for two weeks. Just by sticking to points one and two, though, I should be able to make sure that the blog has a minimum of six new posts each weekday while I’m gone, and that should be more than enough to keep things ticking over.
All of this applies only to The Fashion Police, of course, which is still our major earner, by a long way. Our other blogs, I’m afraid, including Writing World, are going to have to go on hiatus during the vacation: unless, of course, they suddenly start making a whole lot of money in their own right, and we decide that we really can’t let that happen.
As I mentioned in my last post about self-employment and holidays, I’m exhausted just thinking about the amount of work that has to go into preparing to take time off. I’m not looking forward to the next two months at all. But I amlooking forward to my holiday, so I’m telling myself it’s all going to be worth it in the end…
What do you do to keep your blog going while you’re on vacation?
 (Rubin is a dog with a blog. This post was written by him.)
Amber and Terry are MAD. They’re, like, totally obsessed with my PAWS. “Give me a paw,” they’ll say, a few times a day. I mean, why? What do they want my paw for? “Get your own paw,” I always feel like saying, but once I’ve handed over the paw they always make a big fuss of me, and sometimes I get a sweetie, so I put up with it. MAD, though.
And another thing: what’s with the whole “Sit – stand – lie down” routine that they keep making me go through? I mean, you don’t see me walking up to them and going, “Hi Terry – SIT”, do do? So why do they do it to me? Because they’re MAD, that’s why.
This week, Terry’s been bein’ particularly MAD. It’s like, he just got up one morning and he started wreckin the house, ripping up floors and stuff. I don’t know what rattled his cage, but alls I’m sayin is, I hope it wasn’t ME, you know? Because it’s his own fault that I peed on the washing machine YET AGAIN when They went to see “Gym” last week. I’m tryin to set a world record: Dog Who Has Peed on the Washing Machine Most Times. I’ll do it too, and they can’t even stop me. And if they want me to keep handin’ over my paws, like a “good boy”, they better not even try…
As some of you already know, because Terry and I never really grew up and left our student days behind us, the absolute highlight of our day is the 1.45pm broadcast of Neighbours. Don’t judge us until you’ve tried it and you, too, find yourself lying awake at night troubled by such questions as “Who will buy number 26?” and “How does Carmella do that thing with her mouth?”
Anyway, like the Famous Five before it, it recently came to my attention that there is many a life lesson to be learned from Australian soap operas, so,, just in case you’re unfortunate enough to be at work while it’s on, here they are:
- One doctor is more than enough to cater to the medical needs of an entire community.
- Most suburban Australian homes have an unlimited amount of bedrooms, so even although from the outside they look like they have four bedrooms max, they will comfortably accommodate two, sometimes three families.
- This is lucky, because most of them actually DO contain two or three families.
- Still only one doctor, though!
- If you ever decide to talk about someone behind their back, they will almost always turn out to have been standing just behind the open door, listening.
- When you walk into a house, it is absolutely fine to just leave the front door wide open, by the way. Nothing bad will happen because of this.
- No, the real threat comes from fire, plane crashes and minor explosions, so watch out for those.
- Lucky you’ve got that doctor on hand, eh?
- In every suburban street, at least two people will be suffering from memory loss at any given time.
- Often, this is due to a brain tumour.
- Don’t worry about brain tumours, though: they are rarely fatal, and the operation to remove them will leave you with only one small sticking plaster on the side of your head.
- Oh, and memory loss, obviously.
- Your brain tumour will be removed by the same doctor who delivered your baby, amputated your leg (which you lost in the last major explosion) and treated your head cold.
- Not the same doctor who prescribed you the drugs you ended up getting addicted to that time, though: that was just a fake doctor.
- Your new neighbour will always have a dark secret.
- You will find out what this secret is by listening at the open door of their house one day.
- If the new neighbours have twins, the dark secret is that one of them is evil.
- All sets of twins are governed by this good/evil rule.
- This makes life really, really difficult, because identical twins are SO alike that not even their parents can tell them apart. Seriously.
- So if a twin ever stars doing Bad Stuff (and a twin will, trust me), you should work on the assumption that it is the OTHER twin who is actually responsible.
- But listen at their open door anyway, to be sure of this.
- When your children decide to leave the quiet, yet intensely interesting, neighbourhood in which you live, you will never see them again, ever.
- Not even if you get a brain tumour, have to have something amputated, have another child, re-marry, or die.
- All of these things are likely to happen to you, so again, it’s a good job you’ve got that doctor on hand.
- Don’t worry, though, because most children don’t move out of the neighbourhood: they just move into one of the houses next door. (See rule 2: unlimited bedrooms)
- If they don’t do this, and actually do chose to leave the area altogether, don’t worry: give it a few weeks and you will soon have a bunch of totally new children living with you, that you just took in out of the kindness of your heart.
- Most suburban families are happy to take relative strangers into their homes, even if there are lots of them, plus animals.
- Speaking of animals, though, don’t worry too much about these either, because if you DO decide to get an animal – a sheep, say – you will hardly ever have to see it.
- This is also true of babies and small children, interestingly enough.
- Sometimes your child will go away for some reason (school trip/ visit to brother or sister who moved out of state / kidnapped by evil twin, etc) and return with a completely different face.
- Say nothing about this: and be aware that it may happen again at any time.
- Kidnapping can happen to anyone, and often does.
- The kidnapped person is always returned safely to their family (although sometimes with a different face), so if the kidnapped person is you, try to chill.
- All kidnapped persons are taken to a caravan in the bush.
- Although this experience is traumatic, you will get over it pretty quickly – like, within a day or two.
- This is true of all major traumas, even plane crashes and explosions.
- If someone is missing, presumed dead, they won’t be.
- They will always turn up again years later, so if the missing person was your husband or wife, and you remarried in the meantime, that’s going to be awkward, huh?
- Although not really, because the missing person will undoubtedly have suffered memory loss – or you will have.
- And most people marry four or five times in their lives anyway, so like plane crashes and brain tumours, it’s no biggie.
- All of the major dramas of your life will be played out in a coffee shop.
- Don’t bother to order coffee/food, though, because if you do, you will always have to leave seconds after it arrives.
- Normally to go to the hospital, which everyone in your street will have reason to visit at least once every week.
- So it’s a good idea to get to know that friendly neighbourhood doctor!
If there are any I’ve missed (and I’m sure there are), feel free to add them…
Apologies for the double-whammy of Rubin-related posts this week, but when he showed me this video he* made, I laughed so hard I actually cried. Also, I’m too lazy to write a real post today, so suck it up, people, suck it up. And look out for a guest appearance from my main man, Ted:
* OK, it was actually Terry who made the video. Don’t tell Rubin I told you.
Rubin writes:
One of those days when they stand you on a TABLE and CUT OFF YOUR HAIRS! I couldn’t believe it. Well, actually, I could. I mean, I should have seen it coming. There’s been a number of comments made recently about my appearance – by Terry mainly. He’s very pass-remarkable, Terry. “Scruffy” is one word he’s been using. “Smelly” is another. I mean, I just ignored him and made sure to pee on his side of the bed whenever I could, but I should’ve know he’d be up to something.
Well, yesterday they BATHED me. I thought that was the end of it, but no. This morning Terry comes and gets me, and he’s actin’ all excited, like we’re going to be doin something cool… and then he stands me on a table and he CUTS OFF MY HAIRS. Amber just sat there the whole time, patting me and offering me goodboys, but I just looked at her, like, “don’t you even touch me, traitor.”
So anyway, that’s me, HAIRLESS again. Again! Afterwards Amber gave me a JUMBONE and even Terry kept going on about how good I was and stuff – yeah, right- let’s stand YOU on a table and cut your hairs off with a sharp thing, and we’ll see how good YOU are, Terry. No, really, lets. Honestly. At least that’s it over, though. I spent the rest of the afternoon sleeping and playing with my toys. And actually, it’s not so bad, this haircut thing. I mean, it’s like, it’s not like anyone could make the Rubinman look like a sissy now, is it?
Imagine, if you will, readers that you have a blog. In fact, chances are you already do have a blog, so imagine you have a whole bunch of blogs: a veritable blog network, in fact! And imagine that every day you get up and you work long and hard on your blogs, slaving diligently over a hot keyboard for hours on end, and working long into the night to bring your loyal readers news from the world of fashion, beauty and random acts of stupidity.
You do all of this, not because you are a complete glutton for punishment (although that too), but because you keep on telling yourself that one day, one of these blogs will Get Noticed by …er, someone important. Someone who will, say, feature them in a magazine or just give you wads of cash, for reasons that aren’t yet 100% clear to you. "And then I shall be rich beyond my wildest dreams!" you tell yourself, laughing a manic laugh as you pour another mug of coffee and get back to burning that midnight oil.
So, say you do all of this, and then one day you open up your email and you find a message from a journalist telling you that your dog – that creature who still pees on the washing machine every time you go to the gym, and who once ate three of your shoes in one sitting – has just beaten you to the punch, and been featured in a magazine. BEFORE YOU.
Yeah, that would suck.
Actually, it was pretty damn cool, too. Rubin, you see, has appeared in this month’s edition of Dog’s Today magazine, in an article about blogging. See, there’s a picture of his blog and everything:
Writer Julie Hill says:
"Rubinman is a Bichon Frise who writes his own blog, and Rubin is another dog with character. I live with a Bichon, and from the photographs I recognise many of the traits of the breed, such as relaxing with tummy exposed and paws flopping. Rubin apparently has a distinctive odour, unfortunate toilet habits, and a taste for pulling the ‘brains’ out of tennis balls. His blog is offbeat and amusing."
So, I read all of that, and all I saw was, "Blah, blah, blah, blah…offbeat and amusing." And it made me smile because as much as I’d hate to try and take credit for Rubin’s work, I did teach him everything he knows. About blogging, I mean. Not about peeing on the washing machine and having a distinctive odour. And then it hit me. "It’s the dog who will make us rich!" I thought. "At last that bag of fur will start paying his way, and fame and fortune will be mine! I mean his." This thought has cheered me up greatly. And really, it almost made up for the person who called me a "pretentious asshole" in a StumbleUpon review last week…
Rubin, meanwhile, has let the "fame" go to his head, rather, I’m afraid. He’s asking for his own agent now and refusing to work unless he gets at least the minimum wage and five weeks’ paid holiday. And he tried to chase an Alsatian last week. You can’t get the staff these days, you really can’t.
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