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Balloon’s Up…..

So now the Elfin Diary site has been live since Monday, and taking orders for 2012 diaries and T-Shirts for the last 24 hours.
I’ve sent out an email newsletter to the 350 or so people on my Elfin Diary mailing list and so far I’ve had three Paypal orders. Hopefully, people will eventually be ordering by post as well; as soon as my new printer toner cartridge arrives tomorrow, I’ll be printing out copies of the order form and stuffing them into those 500+ addressed envelopes that Caroline left for me. I now owe rather a lot of money, so I need to sell this stuff! To that end, I’ve been beavering away at the site’s SEO; it’s now on the 2nd page of Google for “astrology diary 2012”, which I reckon is pretty good in such a short time.

Well, looks like I am now a businesswoman. I’ve been having to work on details like profit margins and unit prices, and working out pricing – you have to strike a compromise between charging too little (and not making any money) and charging too much (and losing customers). So far, I seem to have got the pricing thing about right and should end up making enough money to justify the work involved. And there will be quite a lot of work!

So let’s get on with it!

in:

work

Aftermath…

Yes, we got to the Camp. For us, it was not the best camping experience of our lives.
The disappointment started as soon as we arrive. Every year we park and set up camp in a particular spot next to the hedge half-way down the field. It’s one of the few completely level spots, it’s far enough away from things to get a peaceful night’s sleep, but not so far away that nobody can find us or that walking around to see everything would be a problem for me.
Beforehand, Brian had volunteered our big people-carrier as a taxi for picking up people from the bus station. Upon entry to the camp we were practically ordered to park it right by the gate instead of in our usual spot, because “we could be driving in and out all the time”. Never mind that we would only be fifty or so yards away, or that we would be sleeping in it, or that we would make sure that nobody would block us in (we’d need to go out shopping). No, we had to stick to the plan – which was that the Camp’s taxi would be instantly available at the gate, all the time.
The result was that we were well away from everyone and everything. Hardly anybody came round to talk to us – we were too far out of their way. And the extra walking for me proved ruinous to my knees; by Sunday afternoon, I couldn’t walk at all and was forced to completely miss John Barleycorn – the highlight of every Camp for me. On Sunday afternoon also, the rubbish skip arrived and was parked next to us – oh, yes, I’ve always wanted to camp next to a rubbish skip! And, to top it all, our taxi services were never called upon anyway. So we spent a lot of the weekend just sitting there, bored and ignored.
Then there were my nightly Headaches from Hell. These came on in the middle of the night and were horrific – I was retching from the pain. The first time, I thought I was about to have a stroke; after the second night, I concluded that it was my neck being cricked from sleeping on the damm airbed – the pain was radiating from the muscles at the back of my neck. Shifting my position the next night didn’t seem to help; more pillows under my head were probably the answer, but there weren’t any more.
In previous years, we’d never hurried to pack up and go on the Monday. We hadn’t wanted to leave and often stayed until the next day. This time we drove out through the gates ten minutes before noon, feeling nothing but relief that we were on out way home. We’d have gone a lot sooner if I hadn’t been disabled from a tachycardia attack and so unable to help with the packing.

I’ll have one more try at camping with the people-carrier, with lots of pillows this time to see if I still get the Headaches From Hell. But that was the last of the Camp for us.

in:

General

Another post….

So, packing for the Oakleaf Camp now and setting off in the morning.

Quite looking forward to it, but I do hope I’m not disabled with another humungous tachycardia attack like the one I had at the camp a couple of years ago. It lasted the whole of Saturday, and left me whacked out for the rest of the weekend. I’ve increased my dosage of beta blockers for the past week to try to head it off – I’ve already had a couple of short attacks. Otherwise, though, my health seems to be improving somewhat. I had my monthly blood-pressure check last week and it was a healthy 128 over 80. My damm knee has been twinging more than usual, so I’ve tried to keep off my feet. Did slip a little Tuesday night – B had gone to bed early, I was bored and restless, there was a letter to get into the post. So off I went in the dark, down to the postbox in the village and back again. The night wasn’t completely dark, but a long stretch of the road is overhung with trees, forming an almost black tunnel. There’s no footpath or verge and there’s a blind bend. So you have to take a lot of care walking it at night. I slung on my cream-coloured jacket and took a torch – I have a reflective tabard that I should really have worn but couldn’t be arsed digging it out from under all the jackets hanging in the porch. Only one car passed me the whole time, but it was on that dark bend so I was glad I had the torch to make myself visible.
The walk was otherwise completely uneventful. There was some strange noises from the bottom of the field bordering on the loch. It sounded a bit like a pair of geese quarrelling, but it could have been almost anything – foxes, badgers, deer. I’m not enough of a countrywoman to know the difference. Whatever it was, it didn’t sound scary, just natural.
The whole trip there and back took me 40 minutes; I was quite breathless back in the house, but otherwise fine. Curious to know just how far I’d walked, I got out the Ordnance Survey map and measured it; to my surprise, I found I’d walked a total of one and a half miles. I’d always thought it was only half a mile to the village, but the map said three-quarters. Fifteen years ago, I’d have managed that distance is about 25 minutes and not got out of breath; in my current state of health, 40 minutes isn’t half bad. My knee complained by the next morning, of course. But that was as I expected. And it had been an enjoyable little adventure.

Ah well, will report on the Camp next week.

in:

General

Here we go….

I just had a long convo with the printers – the Diary will be with them in a week. I just have to write the Sky at Night stuff, proof the whole lot and we’re off!
It’s hard to believe that I’m doing all this, by myself. Of course, I still have to market and sell the Diary, but that’s falling into place as well. I have the email addresses of about 250 of last year’s Elfin Diary customers (the ones who ordered via the website shop), so I can start off with a mass email out to them. After that, if I can find the dosh for the stamps, I can start posting out flyers to some of the other past customers.
Fortunately, I won’t have to find the money for the envelopes. Caroline’s system of keeping customer details was to write their names and addresses onto C5 envelopes that were then filed away in boxes. She had no truck with computerised records at all; she didn’t even print out address labels. Consequently, I have around 400 of these hand-addressed envelopes, neatly filed in alphabetical order. Unless I want to bring on RSI by typing all of them into the computer, I’ll have to just use the envelopes for sending out sales flyers and potentially lose all those name and address details.
Caroline, why did you have to be such a technophobe?

There’s still a couple of loose ends. For instance, I’m still waiting for the paperwork that will let me transfer ownership of the elfindiaries.co.uk domain name. The hosting will come to an end in only five weeks’ time, so that’s getting rather urgent. I do have a Plan B – I’ve bought elfindiary.co.uk and can use that if needs be. However, that will lose all the Google-goodness that the original domain name has acquired over seven or eight years – which is why it’s strictly Plan B.
And I have no records of the shops that stocked the Diary, nor of any of her suppliers. If the bloke who printed her T-shirts hadn’t contacted me, I’d probably not have bothered with printing Elfin T-shirts; and I’m still trying to find the wholesaler for the incense that she sold.

But, that’s all teething troubles – I will have a Diary to sell!

in:

work

Working….

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Well, I’m landed with the Elfin Diary good and proper. Before I took it on, I had some idea it would be easy; after all, wasn’t most of the work in the laying out of the pages, the entering of the data, the research, the proof-reading and so on? I was already doing all that, and it was pretty easy. Naturally, I hadn’t given much thought to what was involved in actually selling the thing – the advertising, the distribution, the suppliers….
Gah, the suppliers. I wasn’t allowed to touch any paperwork when I went to Caroline’s house, let alone copy stuff off her computer (I’d bought along memory sticks and recordable DVDs, naively thinking I’d be welcome to take the business information that I needed.). So I have no idea of which shops stocked the Diary, who printed her T-shirts, where she got her special incense from and all the rest. I’m having to start right at the beginning and source my own suppliers.

At the mo, I’m trying to get a proper computerised mailing list of customers organised. This is not easy. Caroline was a technophobe and kept a lot of stuff on paper only. Her “mailing list” consisted of two boxes of addressed C5 envelopes – one box for people who had bought the 2011 Diary, the other for past customers who hadn’t. Worse, the envelopes are all handwritten, so I can’t even scan the names and addresses into an OCR program and digitise them.
I do have one customer list in digital form. It’s the one from the e-commerce shop on the website, of people who bought the 2011 Diary only. There was an option to download it in CSV format, which can be imported into a spreadsheet; the file duly imported but the result was incredibly messy, with fields and data all over the shop. I’ve just spent the entire morning tidying it up and now I’m going through the envelopes to weed out the website customers from the rest; I already have their email addresses and I can save postage by using email.
I’m not even going to attempt to enter the undigitised names and addresses into the computer – I’ll just use the envelopes to send them the one flyer each and only put the responders on the computer.

There are approximately 400 envelopes to sort through. Caroline was organised enough to file them alphabetically; I’ve just finished going through the Bs. Not far to go now….

in:

work

Tomorrow is another day….

Just been out doing some weeding in the garden. The rose is flowering, the scent is heavenly. And I was pleased to see that the honeysuckle is about to flower. Two years ago, I cut it right down to the ground – it was just too wild and overgrown. It started growing back last year, but sulked then and wouldn’t produce any flowers.
It was Caroline who told me how to prune and train honeysuckle – I’m now training this one over a frame and it will look magnificent in another couple of years.

Her funeral is on Friday – naturally I’ll be there.

And now I have the Elfin Diary, as was her wish. I’m busy finishing the 2012 edition. It’s a couple of months behind and we have no real idea yet of how we’ll get it printed. But the wheels are slowly turning….

I sent a mass email out to all her customers that I had an email address for; nobody else seemed to be thinking of informing them, so I did it myself. I set up a Facebook memorial page also. The responses have been touching. She evidently touched many people though her Diary and newsletters. And I have a duty to carry that on.
It’s a bit intimidating – the Diary appeals to the New Age crowd, the people who believe in ghosts, the afterlife, angels, aliens arriving on UFOs, all that carp. Once I was a believer, like them. But I left all that behind years ago – so much of it is anti-reason, anti-science, anti-logic. However, here I am, pitched right back into it and faced with a very fine line to tread. Well, now I am the editor, so I shall decide what goes in the Diary….

in:

work

Here, There and…..

Red Squirrel
Red squirrel caught on my neighbours' bird table
Yes, I snapped this little fellow yesterday, happily nicking the nuts from my neighbours’ bird table. I was able to get up to within four feet of him; he was watching me, but didn’t seen concerned. Since I didn’t want to waste time faffing with arperture and shutter speed, I had the camera on automatic settings and zoom. So yes, it’s a decent picture, but it’s all down to the camera, not me.
However, taking such a good shot cheered me up after the mess that was Tuesday. I won’t go into details, except that my marvellous (non-) communications skills really put me in the spotlight! So I’m retreating back into my cubbyhole and sticking to what I know I do well (which doesn’t include writing nicey-nice diplomatic emails…)

Caroline is still gravely ill – the news is not good; she’s no longer able to talk and she’s unlikely to be coming home. There’s not a lot I can do from 200 miles away. I’ve said my goodbyes to her.
Although I had to cancel my Lancashire trip and the likelihood of getting the Diary paperwork now seem remote (thanks to the aforementioned terrific communication skills), me and B are getting on with our plans to publish the Elfin Diary. So life goes on, ever changing….

Health-wise, I’m better, thanks to Doc G increasing my levothyroxine dose. I’ve got more energy and I’m sleeping better. I still get tired after walking to and from the village, but it’s now just normal tiredness that’s swiftly dealt with by a sit-down and a cup of tea. Not the oh-god-i’m-aching-all-over-and-can’t-move tiredness that I was getting before. And I’ve not had any more tachycardia attacks – the ones I was having were obviously a temporary reaction to the new dose. B is a whole lot better as well – he’s nearly back to normal fitness. Oh, and we’ve got a new car!

So, things seem to be looking up at last. And of course, it’s summer, though it doesn’t look a lot like it at the moment – we’ve had rain almost every day for weeks. There’s almost no darkness at night now, the Sun is doing it’s usual northern midsummer thing of spending all night skimming just below the horizon instead of setting properly; next week is Full Moon, so there won’t be a lot of difference at all between day and night then.
How many times have I seen this happening? Too many times to count. I’m getting old…..

in:

General, Photography

Second Thoughts….

I’ve been trying out the new dosage that Doc G has prescribed. Haven’t got the new pills yet, but I’ve cut one of my 100mcg tablets into four and taking the extra each evening. Have tried it for two days and although I felt much better on the first day, I’ve been getting more tachycardia attacks and general irregular heartbeat and racing heart episodes. Last night was especially bad for that, so today I’m knackered again. Sigh.
Botheration. Back to ye olde drawing board, methinks…

On other matters, I’ve arranged to go down to Lancashire on Wednesday to see Caroline and sort the Elfin Diary stuff i have to take back. She wants me to carry it on. I’m already doing almost all the work for it anyway (bar the marketing and selling) so the only big change there will be is that I get all the profits. There will of course be some changes in the appearance of the Diary – every year I’ve longed to make my own changes, but Caroline was insistent on keeping things exactly the same year after year. “My customers like it that way!” she would always tell me brooking no argument.

So, on with wurk…..

in:

General, work

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow…

Things have been happening…..
B has had his operation, and is slowly recovering. Still gets tired and a bit breathless, but he’s already far better now than he was before the surgery.
Our car is dead – needs a new fuel pump. B’s still not well enough to do any lengthy walking, so I’m doing all the walk-about shopping stuff. It’s not too bad – the local Co-op now does home deliveries. The catch being that you actually have to go to the shop and buy the stuff – you can’t do it online. Still, that’s a sight better than hauling a trolleyfull of goods onto the bus and back from the village. We’ve settled into a weekly routine now – I go into town at the start of the week and get the whole week’s shopping home-delivered, then go out once or twice more during the week for fresh bread and milk.
I can just about manage that. My problem is that I don’t seem to have much energy to spare. Just walking around the shops for an hour leaves me exhausted, so that I have to flop onto the sofa as soon as I get home and stay flopped for the rest of the afternoon. I had a blood test last week and got the result today – my thyroid levels are low and I need a higher dose of levothyroxine. So that’s probably the cause of my tiredness. I bloody well hope so; I don’t want to lose a whole day to tiredness every time I go out shopping, or just a bit of walking.

And…
An old friend is dying. Caroline Heaney, who has been publishing the Elfin Magical Diary for the last 20+ years, is now very seriously ill. For a couple of years, she’s been treated for a chronic blood disorder that meant she had no white blood cells. Then earlier this year she went down with pneumonia; I thought she was recovering from that, but she’s going rapidly downhill again. I’ve spoken to her by phone, she’s not all there, she’s distant and a little confused; she says she’s dying…. She’s such a strong person normally, she never gives up. So it looks bad.
Not an easy person to deal with, she infuriated me many times in the past; but she was also kind and generous, a good soul underneath it all. She was direct and didn’t hide her feelings – that’s what I liked about her, I think. You knew exactly where you stood with her. She was what she was.
And I’ve only just noticed that I’m already talking about her in the past tense….

in:

General

Watching the washing dry…..

Watching the washing dry
Watching the washing dry

It’s been a beautiful, relaxing sunny day today, so I’ve sitting out in the garden, watching the washing dry (see pic for proof!) and watching the tourists buzz past. The only drawback of living in a lovely rural patch of Scotland is that lots of people want to come and see it, especially on sunny Bank Holidays.
I was listening to music on my iPod as well – because of the news, I went through the several version of Masters of War that I have (the Flying Pickets version is the best, I think).
But I soon tired of that and went for softer, gentler music – Beethoven’s Sonata, some Emmylou Harris, some Len Cohen….
B has been five days back from the hospital after his surgery. He’s still feeling tired and ill, but improving daily; he still needs looking after, no carrying anything, limited trips up and down the stairs. So I’m still kept pretty busy with him. There’s lots of work for me to get back to – these last weeks, with him being so ill, I just haven’t been able to concentrate on doing any of my computer work at all, and it’s getting urgent.
But today, things are feeling better, I’m thinking more about work. So I’d best be getting down to it, eh?

in:

General, work