Caz counts it down

cazmanian_minx

mfmaybe wrote: »

Incredibly interesting what you said about searches vs purchases. Not in a good way, but certainly eye opening. You've got to wonder why they keep changing the goal posts; presumably a lot of people set up fleabay businesses particularly because it worked well with their model at the time. I bet many businesses are struggling the same way now. Do you have repeat customers or does it tend to be one-offs? I hope it picks up for you soon.

Thanks, so do I. I do get a lot of repeat business, my typical customer is someone making jewellery to sell rather than someone making the odd piece for themselves, so as long as my customers are selling stuff I'll still have a bit of a business going.

EssexHebridean wrote: »

I'm unsure what eBay are playing at with all the odd changes they seem to be making. I've already made a conscious decision not to sell on there again at the moment - I have a Digital Camera I'm looking to shift at the moment but I'm going to sell by word of mouth, or not at all, just not prepared to go down the eBay route now really. OK, my situation is as someone who just sells odds and ends, occasionally, but it used to be geared up to JUST my sort of seller, and now, not so much sso. Then it doesn't seem to be geared up to your sort of seller either, so who DO they want?! :rotfl:

Great news on free plants - a grape Vine though? It's not something I can envisage doing *all that * well up your way, if I'm honest?!

Sending good vibes for "reasonable" vets bills.

*waves at Gallygirl*

To be honest, they'd rather get rid of people like you and me altogether - they want people like Argos, Littlewoods and Schuh. There was a big push about four or five years ago to get the big high street names to start using eBay for their clearance stock, mainly in the clothing categories. Even Canon has a clearance shop on there, I've had a couple of cameras from it in the past.

Mr Minx did express concern that the vine wouldn't survive with us as we don't have a polytunnel (the other one is a fig tree, by the way, he remembered over lunch!), but she says as long as we keep it out of the wind it should be okay. We have a spot in the garden that reliably grows 8-9ft hollyhocks every year, so they're coming out and the grape and the fig will go there. Fingers crossed!

The vet bill was pretty good, all told. £29.xx for the call-out charge (it's a 52 mile round trip for them, so that's reasonable), £25.xx for dealing with the abscess (and she was here for nearly an hour, so that's extremely reasonable!) and £8.xx for six sachets of painkiller - £63+shrapnel in total.

Add in another £67 for diesel and £48 in Tesco and I'm pretty much where I thought I'd be at the end of today.

Pippilongstocking

All sounding very exotic with you and plants

If you're growing mega holly hocks you've cleary got some good sheltered nooks there.



I waved to you from Hoy but I think the hills were in the way.

cazmanian_minx

Well, they're only mega until the first strong wind of the summer, then they bend in an alarming manner and have to be held up with canes! The Angelica's about 4 feet high already as well.

It's been a remarkably busy day. Up early doors and by 7.30 Mr Minx and I were loaded with our various choice of shooting instruments (a Tikka rifle for him, a Canon 50D with 100-400mm lens for me) and on our way to the land the syndicate has rights for in Strathy forest. It's only about 20 miles, but 17 of those are on estate tracks which haven't been maintained - the sand has all been washed away and even in a 4WD vehicle we could only do just over 10mph most of the way. We saw a few deer, but they were all roe hinds and it's only roe stags that are in season at the moment, so no venison for us this week.

We left the forest at 11 and went over to Torrisdale to collect the fig and grape vine and came away with a free tomato bush as well That went straight into the cold frame when we got home, the grape vine is outside the front door and the fig is next to the wooden bench - both of those are pretty sheltered spots, so we'll see how they do. I don't want to take them out of their pots for now because they've both come with rosebay willowherb starting to grow in them and it took me three years to eradicate the blooming stuff when we moved here.

After lunch I tackled the ironing pile in front of Friday's The Blacklist and then went to the annexe to pack up all outstanding orders (only 17 of them ). Proofreading work started to trickle in around 3, so I got going at 4, took a break at 5 to sort the horses and another break at 8 for supper and finished just after 9, so I'm getting quicker The weekend co-ordinator emailed to check that I'd meant to book myself on a double shift tomorrow, so I explained about the downturn in business and she's given me loads of proofreading work, bless her

Oh, and I've sold a perfume set - the one that got 'accidentally' bought last time round, but this time it's been paid for straight away

I've worked out that I need to make £50 a day, every day, to be on about £1300 a month net. I'm going to try and only take 10% of turnover out of the bead shop so that I can get the overdraft paid off - that leaves me quite a bit to make up in proofreading/transcribing/other things. I'll start keeping score tomorrow.

EssexHebridean

cazmanian_minx wrote: »

It's been a remarkably busy day. Up early doors and by 7.30 Mr Minx and I were loaded with our various choice of shooting instruments (a Tikka rifle for him, a Canon 50D with 100-400mm lens for me) .....

Now this reminds me - a few years ago, one Friday afternoon I was idly engaged in the usual "who's doing what at the weekend" conversation with a few colleagues. Now it so happened that was the weekend I was meeting up with some chums from the TalkPhotography forums for a day in London - we were planning a day of general shooting but one of the chaps coming along had a degree of expertise in street/candid photography, so we were planning a good focus on that with him as "tutor". It also happened that I was trying to get a complicated job finished and so only had half my mind on the conversation... When asked I said that I was having a "days shooting in London" with some pals. I was a little perplexed that there seemed to be some surprise, but when I was asked what I was going to be shooting, still with only half my attention on the conversation my reply was entirely naturally "Hmmmm? Oh, people mainly...." It was the ensuing complete and utter stunned silence that made me look up, and then connect what I'd said with what they thought I'd meant..... :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Glad the proofreading work is trickling in nicely, and that you're getting quicker at it, too. Good plan to set solid targets and keep score as well - definitely an incentive in seeing numbers clock up!

We used to be plagued with Rosebay Willowherb at my parents old house. where we are now it's Herb Robert - very pretty, but I don't want my entire garden over-run with it, thanks!

cazmanian_minx

Is it still Monday? Judging by the amount of work I've got through today, it feels like I've done enough for it to be Wednesday at least!

So today was my first day of signing up for all the daytime shifts. Now, the company says that if I sign up for simultaneous transcription and proofreading shifts, they'll work out where I'm needed most and assign work accordingly, so I was a bit surprised to log in this morning and see a full shift's worth of proof reading AND transcription! Fortunately there was also an email from the transcription coordinator asking me if I wanted her to reassign my work, but I said as long as 4pm wasn't a hard deadline I could get it done. She said I could have until tomorrow morning if needed, so I got stuck in.

The day's timetable has gone something like this:

06.30 - alarm
06.45 - roll out of bed, fire up laptop, check email, footle about on Facebook
07.15 - wave Mr Minx off to work, have breakfast, get dressed
07.30 - feed horses, walk dog, feed dog
08.00 - start downloading the day's proofreading files
08.05 - realise that although the proofreading shift is 7am until 3pm, all the files have deadlines of 9am or 10am, apart from one that's due at 12. Panic!
11.45 - upload last proofread file.
11.46 - download transcription file. It's enormous (three hours long and there are three transcriptionists working on it), so I leave it running and go and pack up the rest of the day's orders, weigh them, bag them and do the posting documents.
13.00 - start typing. Discover the audio is pretty quiet, so take the mail sacks to the post office while the file is processed to give it a sound boost.
13.30 - type like a demon. Lunch? Nope, no time.
16.30 - quick break to sign for a stock delivery.
17.15 - upload transcription file. Enter all proofreading work since Friday into the May invoice (now standing at £132 just for proofreading). Sort out a bit of financial admin from the weekend and find I've been paid for my April transcription - yay
18.00 - feed horses, walk dog, extend the electric fencing to stop Merlin trying to climb into next door, take the wheelbarrow around the top field.
18.45 - fall into shower and the collapse on sofa.

I have to say though, the highlight of the day was going to the transcription company's website to read their weekly Monday report and finding this on their Transcriber of the Week page:

This week's TOTW is another unsung hero who has always hit those high proofreading marks - so much so that she's just become a proofreader herself and is really helping us out! She's super friendly and helpful with a great attitude so it's high time she got our weekly award. So please give a cascade of applause to the cracking...
Caroline Jones

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D My prize is an extra £10 on my May invoice, but I'm just so chuffed

LAM2011

Just catching up. Well done on the recognition and even better for the little extra. Hope your business picks up too.

How are the boys? Abscess all gone now?

Knit_Witch

Woo hoo!!! go Ms Minx :T:T

JustAboutThere

Well done on the recognition.

Mara_uk7

Wtg you ! Hectic day .. Hope today is a bit easier

gallygirl

Nice one :T