I am applying for a six-month contract as Sam-E’s Good Mood Blogger. Please go to the button in the side column and vote for me before October 23rd. Tell all your friends!
This contract would allow me six months of time to work on my next novel as well as a chance to blog for a company I have patronized for several years now. So tell everyone you know, through email, social networks, standing on the street corner with a sandwich board … any way you want! I need your votes to become the next Good Mood Blogger.
Thank you in advance for spreading the word.
Rosemary
Showing posts with label work at home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label work at home. Show all posts
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
Swimming Against The Tide
Did you ever have a time in your life when it seems as if you are swimming against the tide? I mean you are using the strokes you were taught in swimming class and kicking your legs furiously, yet you don’t seem to be getting anywhere? That is where I am today. I am writing the queries with style and finesse, and looking around the internet for assignments, but no luck. I have standing assignments from a few of my regular editors, but that does not keep me in my fuel of choice, coffee, or pay my phone bill.
Today I am also dealing with a collapsed retaining wall involving many calls to insurance (which will not pay for it) and the mason, invitations for a Communion party that need to be addressed and mailed, the need to help in Computer class at my son’s elementary school today, and tons of other mundane tasks that have no relation to work, but that need to be completed in order to be able to find my desk in the first place.
All of this adds up to the need to work which isn’t happening today.
How about you? How is your day going? Leave a comment and let’s complain together. Maybe it will make us all feel a little better knowing someone else is out there going through similar stuff.
Today I am also dealing with a collapsed retaining wall involving many calls to insurance (which will not pay for it) and the mason, invitations for a Communion party that need to be addressed and mailed, the need to help in Computer class at my son’s elementary school today, and tons of other mundane tasks that have no relation to work, but that need to be completed in order to be able to find my desk in the first place.
All of this adds up to the need to work which isn’t happening today.
How about you? How is your day going? Leave a comment and let’s complain together. Maybe it will make us all feel a little better knowing someone else is out there going through similar stuff.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Military Spouses Make The Best Employees
Well, they do when they are employed, but what about when you don’t receive a salary? In this difficult job market, some of us cannot get a job in our field and sometimes in any other field. We are over-qualified or do not have a traditional work history. If we want to simply take any job to pay the bills, companies do not want to hire us because they think we are going to get bored and leave, I suppose. Add to this your status as a military spouse, and it gets even more difficult.
This was a huge problem when I lived in Virginia. I was fresh out of college, but I was in my early thirties when I graduated. Many employers said I was over-qualified and they felt I would be dissatisfied with the mundane tasks put before me if they hired me. What?! I wanted a job, a place to begin my career and money in my pocket. They did not get it. I hear others are in the same boat especially with the current economy making employers leery of hiring anyone new.
Here is a newsflash to all of the employers out there who do not want to hire competent, well-trained workers with a great work-ethic who have been working from home for years while moving to new duty stations every few years. You cannot get a better employee. We work hard because we have to. In order to continue getting new business if we own our own, we have to constantly be on the prowl for new clients. When we get a job in which someone else is paying us, we are grateful, so we show up on time, dress professionally and fulfill our responsibilities. We are highly creative for the most part. I am not talking about crafts - though many of us are into making things - I am talking about things like these:
• Creative packing. We have to pack rather quickly which all milspouses know is a serious challenge. You need to figure out what to keep and what to save for that final house after retirement.
• “The Box.” As we near our PCS date, we use up the food in our cupboards, and sometimes come up with the most interesting meals, don’t we? We have to get rid of food by figuring out what is good enough to pass on to another family, what we should toss, and what will be helpful during our first days in housing. Babette Maxwell of Military Spouse Magazine calls it a “Departing Box.”
• Necessary deception. If our children ask a question the answer to which will disturb them, or if we simply do not have a good enough answer yet, we sometimes have to do a tap dance. We come up with something that takes into account their level of maturity and degree to which they need to know, then come up with an appropriate story until it’s time for the truth. It is a way of letting them down easy in case we have bad news later on.
• Finally, as military spouses, we frequently have to single-handedly run the show at home while our active duty family member is away for whatever reason. This is the time I give serious credit to all of the single parents I know. It can be difficult doing everything, but we get really good at it … because we have to.
So next time you think twice about hiring someone who has been at home for a while or is a military spouse, don’t think, just hire. We are a great asset to any business.
Notes:
The 2009 Defense Authorization Act is now law, and includes a 3.9 percent across-the-board raise in military basic pay, effective on January 1, 2009. That means military members will see the raise in their January 15 paychecks.
http://usmilitary.about.com/od/fy2009paycharts/a/bpayenlless.htm
This was a huge problem when I lived in Virginia. I was fresh out of college, but I was in my early thirties when I graduated. Many employers said I was over-qualified and they felt I would be dissatisfied with the mundane tasks put before me if they hired me. What?! I wanted a job, a place to begin my career and money in my pocket. They did not get it. I hear others are in the same boat especially with the current economy making employers leery of hiring anyone new.
Here is a newsflash to all of the employers out there who do not want to hire competent, well-trained workers with a great work-ethic who have been working from home for years while moving to new duty stations every few years. You cannot get a better employee. We work hard because we have to. In order to continue getting new business if we own our own, we have to constantly be on the prowl for new clients. When we get a job in which someone else is paying us, we are grateful, so we show up on time, dress professionally and fulfill our responsibilities. We are highly creative for the most part. I am not talking about crafts - though many of us are into making things - I am talking about things like these:
• Creative packing. We have to pack rather quickly which all milspouses know is a serious challenge. You need to figure out what to keep and what to save for that final house after retirement.
• “The Box.” As we near our PCS date, we use up the food in our cupboards, and sometimes come up with the most interesting meals, don’t we? We have to get rid of food by figuring out what is good enough to pass on to another family, what we should toss, and what will be helpful during our first days in housing. Babette Maxwell of Military Spouse Magazine calls it a “Departing Box.”
• Necessary deception. If our children ask a question the answer to which will disturb them, or if we simply do not have a good enough answer yet, we sometimes have to do a tap dance. We come up with something that takes into account their level of maturity and degree to which they need to know, then come up with an appropriate story until it’s time for the truth. It is a way of letting them down easy in case we have bad news later on.
• Finally, as military spouses, we frequently have to single-handedly run the show at home while our active duty family member is away for whatever reason. This is the time I give serious credit to all of the single parents I know. It can be difficult doing everything, but we get really good at it … because we have to.
So next time you think twice about hiring someone who has been at home for a while or is a military spouse, don’t think, just hire. We are a great asset to any business.
Notes:
The 2009 Defense Authorization Act is now law, and includes a 3.9 percent across-the-board raise in military basic pay, effective on January 1, 2009. That means military members will see the raise in their January 15 paychecks.
http://usmilitary.about.com/od/fy2009paycharts/a/bpayenlless.htm
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Introducing Work At Home Milspouse
Every since agreeing to edit a career site on 4 Military Families (http://www.4militaryfamilies.com/careercorner.htm), I have been asked repeatedly for links to work-at-home jobs. Quite frankly, there are not as many jobs as there are freelance opportunities and articles on how to create your own business. In other words, there are few companies that will pay you to work from home. You have to create your own opportunities.
To that end, I invite everyone and anyone to email me with their favorite links to freelance opportunities, flat out work-at-home jobs, and articles about creating a business from home or handling your business at home. I will organize the links and post them for you in a new blog, Work At Home Milspouse (http://wahmilspouse.blogspot.com/).
Help me make this the premiere site for work at home opportunities for military spouses. It’s tough moving around and finding a job that doesn’t involve a cash register or making coffee for people. Send me links and I will post them, but be careful to check out the links ahead of time. Anything that doesn’t fit the mission will be cast aside with gusto. I have spent a lot of wasted time going to links that do not offer anything to someone looking for an honest way to earn a decent paycheck from home.
Good luck with your search. Make sure to send me thoughts on how to make the blog better or even just your thoughts on what I am doing right so I keep on doing it!
To that end, I invite everyone and anyone to email me with their favorite links to freelance opportunities, flat out work-at-home jobs, and articles about creating a business from home or handling your business at home. I will organize the links and post them for you in a new blog, Work At Home Milspouse (http://wahmilspouse.blogspot.com/).
Help me make this the premiere site for work at home opportunities for military spouses. It’s tough moving around and finding a job that doesn’t involve a cash register or making coffee for people. Send me links and I will post them, but be careful to check out the links ahead of time. Anything that doesn’t fit the mission will be cast aside with gusto. I have spent a lot of wasted time going to links that do not offer anything to someone looking for an honest way to earn a decent paycheck from home.
Good luck with your search. Make sure to send me thoughts on how to make the blog better or even just your thoughts on what I am doing right so I keep on doing it!
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