Mmm. Ahhh.

Today's random thought.

Maybe my motivation is hanging out with the dust bunnies....

Sure wasn't under the pile of dirty dishes!

Giveaway from MCP Actions!

I'm shameless.

But it would rock to get $500 down on my $6100 purchase next spring.

Absolutely rock.


So here's my plug for the $500 Adorama gift card giveaway from MCP Actions.
Check it out yourself. :)

Weekend update.

With someone not as funny as Seth Myers. ;)

This was an interesting week.



Monday:
I had an amaaazing wedding consultation on Monday evening.
Also a spell of high blood pressure, from what I can tell. Seemed to be in a fog, hyper yet not motivated, heart seemed to pound funny, dry mouth. Didn't get sick, so I don't really know. I just felt funny throughout the day.

Tuesday:
Turbo started out the day looking like this:

Ended the day looking like this:

Poor thing needed two sweaters to keep warm!

Wednesday was uneventful. The hubby had come home Tuesday night a bit unexpectedly, so that was pretty much awesome. :)

Thursday I had a really awesome session with a darling two-year-old. She's soo sweet! Then it snowed. :) I took some pics. Hubby hit a school bus. These things happen.

Friday, Hubby took my car to work, as the one he took home the night before didn't start. Weird to be stranded at home, even though some days I never leave unless I have errands. Guess it's just nice to have the choice. :) Hubby mentioned it was nice that I have a job where I can stay home in inclement weather... also said he appreciated me being home when he arrives home from work. (Pause for the "awwwww") I agree, sweetheart! :D I love hearing those touching thoughts of his. :)

I also showed the duplex for the first time. Good thing I went over there early... as I found dirty underwear on the bathroom floor and he probably hadn't swept in a year!

Saturday. Hm. A bit random. Included a trip to M&MJ's, and then a night in snuggling on the couch.. waiting for the snowstorm!

Sunday (today). Everyone's meeting was canceled. So we trekked up to M&MJ's for meeting. :) It was a bit hairy on the local roads, but other than that we were fine. Spent the day with them, and came home to this:

Darling Hubby did some shoveling, snowblowing, and made it possible for me to get out in the morning.



One last thing. I thought this series of pictures was adorable!! Our dog is such a bully!

Baily, content, chewing on her bone.

Turbs, on the prowl.

AAAIIIEEEEeeee!

Her indignant look after she's been yelled at.

Have a great new week! :)

What inspired me today.

Amazing, amazing, amazing.

Except we had a better accompanist when we sang it in HS. :)

Yum.

Had to use up some potatoes... so last week I made baked potato wedges with fresh garlic. Yum!

Crazy.

Well, how do you like this?

I thought I had made up the word "Randomities."

Apparently not.

Sometimes.

You regret the things you do.

2011 Baseman Studios Photography Budgets.

Check!

Fine.

Bored with Facebook, blogs, email, and the billions of options the internet has to offer.

Bored with Photoshop, and nothing pressing to work on.

Fine. Guess I'll be forced into working in Quickbooks.

If I must.

Know of anyone looking to rent half of a side-by-side duplex?

Check out the information here!

Things that make me happy.

45-degree weather in late November.

4-day vacations filled with family, food, games, laughter, and visiting.

Stuffing.

Pumpkin pie.

Clients that remember what my favorite drink from Starbucks is... and bring it to me! :D

Getting caught up-to-date in my accounting software.

Snuggling. Dog or husband will do, but preferably both.

Spending nights at Muddy's when our husbands are out of town. ;)

When I wake up and DON'T remember my dreams.



Figured I should make up for my pessimistic list of pet peeves from earlier.



Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving! Maybe someday I'll get some pictures posted...



Ps. I just love newborns! Don't you?!

On a happier note.

Today is the second day in a row that I've felt like "me..." for the first time in nearly a month. Talk about no-motivation central here.

This my friends, is cause for celebration.

Which happened to be KFC popcorn chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy. And now I feel "ugh" again.

Haha, just kidding.

Two major pet peeves.

Not that these happened to me today, but they've just been on my mind.

1. People that don't take me seriously. (This hits big... I switched accountants based solely on this.)

2. People that try to take advantage of me.


Oh, and 3. Drivers in general, but in particular those that a)are slow and b)don't know how to drive through round-a-bouts. Old man nearly broadsided me the other day.

Uh, duh!

I lick my lips for the 5th time in a row.

Then I realize that I have chapstick at an arm's reach away.

And that the de-humidifier is still running.

Heh.

Spring.

60 degrees, sunny, and a slight breeze.

It has to be spring, right?

tee hee.

"Your kid may be an honor student, but your driving still sucks."

Love that bumper sticker.

Ack!

The other night, hubby was downstairs while I was working.

He picked up this little Chevy emblem that was sitting on a speaker.

"Oh, cool! There's a Chevy emblem design in the dust!"


Sure. That's what I was going for.

Sisterly love.

In one sense, I'm going to miss her.

But I'm so happy for her. And one thing's for sure: I love her to death.

And that's all I'll say... because she might issue a death warrant for me otherwise. ;)

Photog.

I'm happy to say I love the photography business.


Read the article here.

Winter.

I'm trying to accustom myself to the fact that we won't have 80-degree temps for another like 6 months. I still cry myself to sleep at night.

Hah. Just kidding.

However, I am trying really hard to find things that I do look forward to about winter.
Here's what I'm coming up with:

• Boots, leather and otherwise
• My pink fuzzy slippers
• Food. Pumpkin pies, turkey, stuffing, chocolates, soup, need I say more?
• Heated seats in the car
• Being with family during the holidays
• Hoodies (Pssst. Are you a Baseman Studios' fan on Facebook?)
• Mannheim Steamroller Christmas tunes
• Being able to take holidays off. (Heh. Sort of.)

Anyone else have one? Goodness knows, I'm having difficulty with this list.

Halloween

We were lucky enough to get invited to a Halloween party/potluck, so that's pretty sweet. :)

However, I don't really feel like spending money on costumes.

Nor do I have creativity to think up something original that doesn't cost much.

Hm.

Any ideas?

Adorable, no?

With any luck, when we have kids, they'll look like these munchkins!

Huh, what?

Sorry, I'll explain that last post.

It's been a very frustrating last couple weeks in dealing with a last-minute commercial client. I've never done commercial work before (but the images turned out pretty sweet), and he had never used a professional photographer before.

Like I said, it was last minute. The model, which I had met at a wedding I was second-shooting at the Saturday before, called me at 3 in the afternoon on Monday for the shoot at 6pm that night. Their photographer's camera broke, apparently. I'm guessing that was his excuse to get off the hook for that job.

I thought things were fine and great. We met up a week (one week! that's a short time frame) after the shoot, and I gave him the disc.. 26 images, fully retouched and edited to perfection. He was expecting every single image from the shoot, edited and retouched, which was over 90.

Obviously, there were some massive errors and omissions in what was expected from both parties, mostly what he expected from me.

Long story short, he emailed me then, pressuring me to give him all the images, saying he'd invested a chunk of change into this venture (I was only paid 1/5 of that amount, so I'm assuming the other 4/5 went to the model...? Dumb.). So I carefully explained to him that for the number of hours I worked on his project, including shooting time, resulted in me getting paid $5.20/hour with no compensation at all for the images... the going rate for professional commercial images is $50-75.

Despite the fact it was my first official commercial job, I still expect to get paid to expand my portfolio, especially since the images were extremely well done.

I think he folded (HAH! His business deals with poker) since he was apologizing up and down. But I'm not really giving him an option.


Not just anyone gets to boss me around, and no one takes advantage of me unless I let them.


However, this isn't the first email war I've won. :)

(This was one of the images from the session.)

Fail.

He failed, that is.

Don't even start an email war with me. I'll win. Every time.

Hooray!

Got my tuition credit check finally!

This means Baseman Studios t-shirts and sweatshirts, meeting next week with the company to finalize things.

Post.

Hah, Suzanne. I posted.

Actually, I've been really busy lately. But these are some of my highlights from today.

--A PBN with Turbs. (post-breakfast nap) I've been super tired lately. But I've not been busy lately, so there's no possible explanation.

--This article: http://www.ispwp.com/the-secret-life-of-wedding-photographers.html

--Posted a new ad on craigslist. In looking over the "competition," I managed to see a ad from a somewhat relative and friend photographer. I also found this webpage, complete with a dancing purple monkey:

(Don't mind all my links up on the browser; I'm just lazy. And isn't firefox awesome? I can make my browser pink!)

Suz stopped by for a bit tonight. Love that girl. :) Even though she forced me to play piano while she videoed from above me. Better not see that one on YouTube.

My aunt was in town with her co-worker the last couple nights, so they stayed with us... even cooked us supper Wed night. Roast in the crockpot all day, with scalloped potatoes, garden squash, and salad. Mmm.

Workers are coming for 2 (?) nights, tomorrow and Saturday, so that should be fun too! Any MSG-free ideas? I think I've got it covered, but it's nice to have some options.

I have a co-photographer session tomorrow, so expect an introduction to my second photographer next week, along with some new promo images of myself. Eeep. I would so much rather be in FRONT of the camera.

Did I ever let the blog world know that my business plan passed? The Small Business Development Center passed it awhile ago, which means I'm getting a nice fat tuition credit back... hello, Baseman Studios t-shirts and sweatshirts!!

Plus I should be wrapping up the deal with my car sign/sticker next week. Woo hoo for cheap marketing!

Oh, PS.

Just in case you hadn't heard, last week we heard the final decision from the helicopter company in California.

They were able to see and understand that we had no money to pay them, so they wrote the entire amount off!

It was a little victory celebration here. :)


Pssst. Read the original (California) story here, a random whining post here, and a specific whining post here about their company. Or don't. I wouldn't wish that on you.

Happiness.

...is finding you have 4 (!!) grape fruit snacks in your little pouch.

Or having a dog that's this stinkin' cute. :)

Laundry

A little conversation this morning:

"Mariah, do these jeans look too small?"

"Mmm. A bit."

"Oh, well they're the last pair clean."

"Oops."



This ever happen to you?

Dangers of working in a bathroom.

Heh.

Our health insurance carrier proudly boasts:

"Health insurance carrier of the Green Bay Packers"

Do we want health insurance from the same company that has to shell out for a football team's injuries?



On the flip side, I suppose the Packers shell out big time for their premiums and carry the rest of us, so nevermind. :)

Tricky.

For some reason, my anal brain is concerned about the number of "plays" each song gets in my iTunes.

(Probably the same feeling it has about the Genre category being filled in. Don't get me started.)

If I like the song, I wait for the song to play the whole way through so it records it as a "play."

If I sorta like the song, I often skip to the last 2 seconds of the song, so it still records it.

If I don't like the song, wouldn't you think I would delete it? Nope. Even if I listen to most of it, I will often quick jump to the next song without it recording the "play." Yup, I'm that tricky.



It was heartbreaking when I re-did my computer and all my "plays" were set back to zero. Sigh.



Hm. Does this go beyond random and plop me right down into the "weird" category?

Did I use too many quotation marks in this post?

Eeep. Thank goodness it's Friday.

Ameteurs.

Sometimes they really bother me.

Especially when this is their (craigslist) ad:

"Why risk your big day with an amature. Your wedding day only happens once. Wedding photography is something you just can't jump into. You choose an amature you risk getting amature results, missing parts of your big day and having poor photo quality. Sure they are cheaper, but what if you could get award winning elite professional wedding photography for the price of the amatures?"


Phew. My spell check is going crazy right now. And my comma sense.

Heh. That sounds like "common sense."



Comma sense: possessing the common sense it takes to use commas correctly.
  {RandominitiesOriginal}

Denial

Summer is still here, right?

Random

I know, 2 posts. 1 day.

BUT, the forecast this morning said 100% chance of showers at noon. Incidentally that's when I started seeing patches of blue sky.

Now? Full out glaring sunlight. Ahhh.

Love summer.




Ps. I had a wonderful convention last weekend, which included amazing thoughts, wisdom, advice, reuniting with old friends, a fun ride down with my in-laws, and a nasty head-cold.

Note to self #4782

As I sit here squirming.

Why do I always wait until the utter last minute? You know, bursting point, where I can barely take the time to pause my music, pick up Turbs, and dash upstairs to the little ladies room?

Eeep.

Guess who's turning one?

That's right! Today!


A few random facts:

She "plays" with her food while she's eating and starts getting full. All out, rolling in it, growling, etc. :)

We call her a lot of things aside from her name. Our favorites are Turbs, Turbsy, Turbo-doggie, and Pogs (puppy + doggie - gie + s). Sometimes Turbs-a-runity. If you know Joel, you'll understand. haha

We spank her when she's naughty. And guess what? She's pretty well behaved overall.

She also knows what "Do you want a spanking?" means. It's her last warning. heh

She still gets "sit" and (lay-)"down" mixed up sometimes.

She would go outside (for the bathroom) every 20 minutes if we let her. Mostly just to sniff around and see if any neighbors are out. This can be frustrating. :)

I always said I would never have a small dog, and be one of "those" people. But now, I completely am... and don't care! However, I draw the line at "Mommy" and "Daddy." Sorry, that thing didn't come out of me. Nor is it human. ;)

She's one of the few dogs I'm actually not allergic to. We all know the hubby wasn't going to go for a standard poodle.

If Joel's out of town, she starts getting antsy downstairs around 5. She knows he should be home by then. :)

She always perks up at vehicles... I swear she can pick out GMC/Chevy pickups from all the rest. haha

She is the absolute biggest cuddle-bug when she's tired. Love it. :)

She knows she has to sit on the couch while I'm working. Then she knows when the washer/dryer signals go off, she gets to go "help" me with laundry. Haha.



Have a great weekend, everyone! Mine will include a convention!

Whine. Sigh. Annoyance.

Dealing with the helicopter company again.... do I ever sound like a broken record?

This time we're dealing one-on-one with them. No more insurance companies.

But, in order for us NOT to give them all a lump sum, we have to fill out a very detailed form and APPLY to get to pay in installments.

Hello. We're 22 years old. We own a house. And vehicles. And we (I) have student loans. And I'm still in start-up mode in my business.

Do you think we have $21,000 just sitting around? Especially to use for medical bills? Maybe in mappy-pappy land. Or in Palm Springs, where all the rich and famous (and the helicopter company, coincidentally) are located.

So meanwhile, I'm running around to get together last year's taxes, pay stubs, a couple months worth of checking and savings account statements, and business financial information. Just got done going through a personal financial statement... detailing out each bit of income, all our assets, and expenses (no place for liabilities... we have LOANS, people!).

Good news and bad news.
The bad news is our bottom line looks pretty grim.
The good? There's no way they can expect us to pay hardly anything for monthly payments.


PS. Would it feel weird to anyone else to pack up all this sensitive, personal information and ship it off to a medical provider in California?

PPS. Let's vote. Who here thinks we should enlist a lawyer's help? If nothing else, to at least explain to us our rights in this whole situation?

Hardware Upgrade v.1.06.87

How to install new hardware in your computer:

1. Do NOT back anything up. No files, pictures, nothing.

2. Open the pretty shiny packages with your new stuff.

3. Call your tech support and put them on speaker for the next 5 hours.

4. With their help, put in the new hardware.

5. Start up the computer.


6. Do what your tech support tells you for a few hours.

7. Windows still doesn't load.

8. Start to realize you could potentially have to re-do all your books and lose all your image files since April.

9. Follow your tech support's great idea. Install NEW Windows to a different hard drive, then copy all the files from the old to the new.

10. Start computer. Boot to NEW Windows.

11. Old Windows boots up. What??

12. Jump up and down with glee.

13. Do a massive backup, which takes about 4 hours.

13.5 Dig out a fan for your poor, overheating external hard drive.



14. Put the hardware back in, wipe clean your drives, re-install Windows the right way.

15. Spend a full day's work putting programs back on and downloading drivers/updates/etc.




16. Thoroughly enjoy your fast programs and new Windows.

17. Remind your tech support you love them.

18. Buy your tech support a gift card. (Wait, my tech support doesn't read this, does he?)

19. Laugh with glee when your tech support still answers your calls.

20. Remind yourself to get an auto-backup system in place.

21. Prank call your tech support.

22. Resolve not to do another hardware upgrade for a looong time.

Pics!

Found all these while looking for something else.

This is her typical traveling position.

"Helping" with laundry. Usually she just chews up my tennis balls that I keep in the dryer.

Bales and Turbs.

Suz and I wore our matching shoes (that we both wear like once every 6 months) on the same day. It was pretty epic.

I'm really drawn to this saying. I love it.

Georgia

Georgia was really great. The lakehouse was amazing. Mark, Lauren and their gorgeous kiddos are the best. :)

Apparently the whole album should be viewable here.