Nerwen (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
nerwengreen) wrote2011-04-01 11:16 pm
nerwengreen) wrote2011-04-01 11:16 pm
Drastic Major Life Changes! :D
It has been quite a month. Summing it up: I got the job that I didn't apply for, and now I'm in Mobile, Alabama. :D
So basically I went from being completely dissatisfied with my lot in life, living in half a bedroom in someone else's house, no clue what to do next, and also suffering from extreme writer's block ... to being back to working at the job I originally loved in Savannah - before it all turned to rubbish. And in 1100 square feet with all of my own stuff arranged the way I like it.
Mobile turns out to be a lot friendlier than I was expecting, given how covertly hostile Savannah had become after the 2008 election. People look me in the eye while talking to me, pay attention while I'm talking to them, and respond specifically to stuff I've said instead of with vague stock generalities. Random passersby notice my existence and do basic courtesy things like move out of my way, hold open doors, and occasionally even say something about the weather. All in all, I'm impressed and glad to be here.
The job itself is almost exactly like how things were for me in 2006ish. My new boss doesn't care what my hours are as long as they aren't completely unreasonable and I get the work done. The drive in to work is even more scenic than the view on the way to work in Savannah (though also twice as long - gas is going to be interesting). As far as I can tell, the IT Dept. will not be locking me out of my own computer and I'll be able to install stuff and run it however I need. I won't have a window unfortunately, but the office space is quite large with three long tables. The place itself is surrounded by hiking trails and beaches including a bird sanctuary.
I'll be processing cruise data, and the lab's postdoc is highly interested in seeing me go back to doing satellite images stuff. So the work will basically be exactly what I was doing before. I feel like I've gotten a workplace upgrade. :)
On the writing front... err. Basically there wasn't any. I spent the whole month moving and didn't get internet back until last night. It turns out to be possible to browse the internet on an iPhone, but not get any serious work done.
For Bright Hub, the only thing I managed was to finish off my RotMK series with an article about trade (Complete Guide to Trade in Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom). It's doing surprisingly well for a game that is several years old. I guess there must be some diehard players out there who are happy to have a strategy guide, which I'm of course happy to provide. ;)
I have a todo list for other things that need doing, chief among them moving my Bloons Tower Defense guides off of eHow, then writing some new articles to bring in traffic for them. (Google doesn't like when an article moves to a different site.) There are also several adoptees and stale articles that need tweaking. On the whole, I don't think I'm going to be doing many more new articles anytime soon. First priority now is getting settled into the new fulltime job. ;) But even after that... there have been a few recent changes that don't sit too well with me, so I don't know what I'm going to do in response yet.
Even without writing anything new though, the recent Google algorithm adjustment (to rank high-quality sites higher up the list and move crappy sites down to the bottom) has been extremely beneficial for both Bright Hub as a whole and my articles in particular. I'm looking at at least $40 of ad revshare this month on about a hundred pieces (about half are the 100-word guide blurbs), which is pretty cool for not doing anything at all. Not a living of course, but *will* pay a monthly utility bill now, and still way better than bank interest. I'm also expecting around $20 for eHow (it was a low month there) so all in all... I think I'm doing pretty good with it.
As for fiction. Lots of worldbuilding type thoughts floating around in my head, mostly for Fortress Launne, but I haven't had time to pin them down or do anything useful yet. The biggest piece is where I have been trying to rearrange the local geology so that the three major rivers aren't actually flowing uphill. >.> Hopefully I'll have time this month to mess with it in more detail.
So basically I went from being completely dissatisfied with my lot in life, living in half a bedroom in someone else's house, no clue what to do next, and also suffering from extreme writer's block ... to being back to working at the job I originally loved in Savannah - before it all turned to rubbish. And in 1100 square feet with all of my own stuff arranged the way I like it.
Mobile turns out to be a lot friendlier than I was expecting, given how covertly hostile Savannah had become after the 2008 election. People look me in the eye while talking to me, pay attention while I'm talking to them, and respond specifically to stuff I've said instead of with vague stock generalities. Random passersby notice my existence and do basic courtesy things like move out of my way, hold open doors, and occasionally even say something about the weather. All in all, I'm impressed and glad to be here.
The job itself is almost exactly like how things were for me in 2006ish. My new boss doesn't care what my hours are as long as they aren't completely unreasonable and I get the work done. The drive in to work is even more scenic than the view on the way to work in Savannah (though also twice as long - gas is going to be interesting). As far as I can tell, the IT Dept. will not be locking me out of my own computer and I'll be able to install stuff and run it however I need. I won't have a window unfortunately, but the office space is quite large with three long tables. The place itself is surrounded by hiking trails and beaches including a bird sanctuary.
I'll be processing cruise data, and the lab's postdoc is highly interested in seeing me go back to doing satellite images stuff. So the work will basically be exactly what I was doing before. I feel like I've gotten a workplace upgrade. :)
On the writing front... err. Basically there wasn't any. I spent the whole month moving and didn't get internet back until last night. It turns out to be possible to browse the internet on an iPhone, but not get any serious work done.
For Bright Hub, the only thing I managed was to finish off my RotMK series with an article about trade (Complete Guide to Trade in Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom). It's doing surprisingly well for a game that is several years old. I guess there must be some diehard players out there who are happy to have a strategy guide, which I'm of course happy to provide. ;)
I have a todo list for other things that need doing, chief among them moving my Bloons Tower Defense guides off of eHow, then writing some new articles to bring in traffic for them. (Google doesn't like when an article moves to a different site.) There are also several adoptees and stale articles that need tweaking. On the whole, I don't think I'm going to be doing many more new articles anytime soon. First priority now is getting settled into the new fulltime job. ;) But even after that... there have been a few recent changes that don't sit too well with me, so I don't know what I'm going to do in response yet.
Even without writing anything new though, the recent Google algorithm adjustment (to rank high-quality sites higher up the list and move crappy sites down to the bottom) has been extremely beneficial for both Bright Hub as a whole and my articles in particular. I'm looking at at least $40 of ad revshare this month on about a hundred pieces (about half are the 100-word guide blurbs), which is pretty cool for not doing anything at all. Not a living of course, but *will* pay a monthly utility bill now, and still way better than bank interest. I'm also expecting around $20 for eHow (it was a low month there) so all in all... I think I'm doing pretty good with it.
As for fiction. Lots of worldbuilding type thoughts floating around in my head, mostly for Fortress Launne, but I haven't had time to pin them down or do anything useful yet. The biggest piece is where I have been trying to rearrange the local geology so that the three major rivers aren't actually flowing uphill. >.> Hopefully I'll have time this month to mess with it in more detail.