Hey everyone.
I hope that you and your businesses are having a good 2012 so far.
I wanted to give you a bit of a heads up about the site, and some news about upcoming posts.
The Site
After a really terrible personal tragedy struck my family at the beginning of the year, I realized that I needed to simplify things in my business. Part of that is obviously this site.
As a geek, I have always spent a great deal of time tinkering with things. This is a great source of fun for me, but it's terrible for productivity. This site is no exception to the rule. As you can probably tell, this site is currently based on Wordpress. The great thing about WP is also the terrible thing about WP. There are endless themes, plugins, and tweaks that can be done to customize a WP site. If I had a lick of design talent, this would be a very powerful asset. However, in my case, it's just another time sink. I can't tell you how many times I've spent a good chunk of my Saturday afternoons pouring over new themes I could use, new plugins to make it easier to share content with {insert social media site here}. In the end, I don't think any of that time was used effectively. I'd rather just sit in front of a text editor and crank out a few posts instead.
So, at some point in the near future, I'll be switching this site over to Squarespace. Although it's also a very powerful platform, where design or code savvy people can bend it to their will, it's also great as-is. I think it will force me to spend more time writing, and less time tracking down widgets and installing updates.
I'm also happy to announce that I'm moving the domain away from GoDaddy. The allure of buying whatever domain popped into my head for a few bucks drew me into GoDaddy in the beginning. However, the nauseating ads and the equally nauseating CEO finally pushed me over the edge. Whenever I get the site moved over to Squarespace, I'll also be transferring the domain over to hover.com. I've already moved every other domain I own over there, but I just wanted to be extra careful with this one.
Why am I telling you all this?
Just to give you a heads up, in case I do something stupid and the site is down at any point. Hopefully things will go smoothly, but if you head over here one morning and things are missing, don't freak out. I'm not gone...I just pushed the wrong button by mistake.
Other Updates
I'm in need of a new computer. My Dell Studio 15 likes to shut off once a day at random times for no good reason. I have a feeling the heatsink on the CPU is slightly detached, which is causing it to overheat. Whatever the cause, having a work computer do that in the middle of an important project is a big pain. Plus, it's over 2 years old now, and is having a hard time keeping up with the myriad of tabs and apps that I have running 24/7.
I'm 95% sure that I'm going to do the big switch to a Mac. Continuing with my desire to simplify my life, I'm just too busy to be tinkering around with fussy Windows PC's on a daily basis. This is the 2nd Dell laptop in a row...both have become plagued with problems shortly after the warranty expired. As you may remember, I also tried to do an experiment with bookkeeping on Linux. I absolutely love working with Ubuntu, but it's just not well suited for my line of work. And, once again, it became a real time sink, which I want to avoid this year.
When I looked at the shelf behind my desk, and saw the giant stack of iOS-based products that I've bought (and loved) over the years, I realized that Apple products have always "just worked".
Anyway, all that means to the site is that I'm looking forward to writing about bookkeeping on a Mac. I don't think it's a field that gets a lot of attention, so maybe I can add something to the space.
Newsletter
I was recently approached to write a guest post for VirtualAssistants.com. The post ended up as a part of their most recent newsletter. You can check out the newsletter here. A big thanks to Belinda over at the site, who was absolutely great to work with.
Guest Post
On Tuesday next week, there will be another guest post on this site. Sara Mackey over at Connexx.com wrote a great post about ways to finance your business. I think it will be good information for any of you who are looking for outside funding.
I hope you all have a great weekend. If you're reading this in Canada, don't forget that your kids will probably be home next week. If you work from home, this means you won't get much done. So, instead of fighting it, make sure to unplug a bit more than normal, and enjoy the company. Or, if you're a jerk like me...enjoy the fact that you'll have unpaid interns at your disposal for the mundane office tasks you usually loathe.
You can thank me later.