Getting Started

Well I figure there are a few things that I need to do first. The first question that came to my mind was, "Do I REALLY NEED to make up that lost income?" I suppose this whole exercise would be for nothing if it turns out that I can do without that 10%, right? So, it comes down to figuring out how much I'm going to lose and if there's enough room in my personal budget to take that kind of hit. It turns out that I'm going to lose between $350-$400 a month, which equates to one month of groceries. Looking at my budget, I see that while things would be tight, I could in fact absorb that decrease. But I can't stop there, because I live in a two-income household and my wife works as well. I also need to determine the likelihood of my wife's income being impacted. Now, my wife is not a State Worker so she will not be dealing with the furlough, but she is a business-owner partially supported by a contract with a state agency, and with the shaky economy, her income is not exactly guaranteed. So what does all this mean? It means that I do indeed need to make up that 10%, because if my wife's income drops (which could certainly happen), we would be in trouble.



That brings me to the next step. What CAN I do? What am I good at? I decided to make a list of things that I could offer to people as a service that could bring in money. This list was actually difficult to make, because there are a number of things that I've either given up (things I used to do but decided I didn't like enough to do as a living) or are things that I didn't want to do and decided to go to college in order to avoid. BUT...things are tough, so everything is a possibility. Now, there is one big issue that I needed to keep in mind when making this list...anything I do to generate this income can not coincide with or be a conflict of interest with my current state job.


The list includes:

Organic gardening
Award winning home brewer (beer, cider, and wine)
Chef (menu planning, food shopping, cooking)
Fence building
Laundry room remodeling (and other minor home improvement projects)
Massage (not licensed)
College degree in Ecology (can identify birds by their call, and similar activities)
Change oil in car
Tree pruning
Canning
Know how to hook up a VCR/DVD
Advanced excel spreadsheet skills
Painting (walls, not masterpieces)
Sewing (experienced in tree skirts)
Basic html
Can build a solar oven
Fluent in deciphering Mexican accents (thanks to mother-in-law)
Can make authentic special quesadillas (appealing to Imperial Valley transplants)
Highly experienced litter-box cleaner
Label designer for beer bottles
Awesome Internet researcher
Harry Potter expert (but who isn't?)
Looks good in eyeglasses- eyeglass modeler?
Hole-digger
Fish pond setup
Chemist (anybody get their kid a chemistry set for Christmas and don't know how to set it up?)
Math or science tutor


Now, it should also be said that this blog is one of my ideas for generating just a small portion of the lost income. If you hadn't noticed...there are some lovely ads on the right side of the page provided by Google. If anybody would like to check out some of the wonderful companies advertising there, please feel free...;) I figure that these ads may bring in about $15 a month of income. Only $385 to go!!!


So, now I have a list of things that I can do, but how do I narrow it down? How do I turn one or more of those into a real, income-generating activity? I'm not sure yet...some of them are more self-explanatory than others. I think I'll leave it here for today and think some of this over the next day or two and post again with my thoughts.


I have to admit that I'm a bit shocked that I have 3 followers already!! Thank you to whoever you are and I hope that I have something to say that helps you in some way. Please feel free to comment anytime. I wish you all luck and a very Happy New Year!!

What the F@*k am I gonna do?

Ok,
So we just got the news...as a State Employee in California I will be forced to take 2 days off each month starting in February. Sounds great, right? Well it would I guess if it was paid time off...or if the stock market didn't just completely tank...or if the housing market weren't falling out from under us...or if the unemployment rate weren't rising to ridiculous levels...or any of a million other things that means that taking a 10% pay decrease means tightening the belt more during an already uncertain economic time.

So here I am facing the prospect of having two days off work each month and 10% less income. Now the question becomes...what do I do with that time and how do I make up 10% of my income? I know there are a lot of people out there going through this same situation...not even all of them are State Workers...some are city or county workers. Even private companies are doing this...or worse layoffs.

In this blog I will detail my efforts to figure out how best to address this situation...my ideas, my fears, my struggles and hopefully my successes. If anybody out there reads this and is either touched by or has suggestions for anything on here, please comment.

For all those out there in the same or similar situation...good luck.