Work From Home Couple

I remember the predictions: The Internet is going to be a boon for freelance writers. Just look, everyone said, at all the new markets for writers it will bring.

Well, the Internet has been around for some time now, and I certainly don’t see too many writers — a few, maybe, but not many — getting rich from it. Instead, I see a lot of writers pumping out a whole lot of online content for not nearly enough dollars.

That’s been the problem with writing for most Web sites. Sure, they need writers, but they’re not willing to pay much, if anything, to them.

I was reminded of this when I stumbled across two online job postings, one for HubPages and another for Helium. Both were looking for writers. And both promised payment.

For writers unfamiliar with the sites, both are filled with short, blog-like stories written by freelancers. Problem is, the payment — at least the vast, vast majority of it — comes from things such as page views, ad clicks, etc.., In other words, writers will earn pennies from their stories.

One writer who posts on HubPages mentioned that she made $210 so far for the 120 stories she’s written. She seemed excited by it, and thought it proved that the site generated income for writers. Well, $210 for 120 stories is pretty awful pay. Unless this writer was able to pound those stories out in half a day, and if she could do that, I’d hate to read those stories, then she’s getting ripped off.

If you’re trying to break into freelance writing, avoid sites like Associated Content, HubPages, Helium or Constant Content. Never agree to write for payments based on Adsense clicks or page views. Most times, you’ll get nearly nothing for your efforts. Better to approach your local paper. At least then you’ll get paid something. It won’t be much, but it won’t be pennies per story, either.

It’s funny to watch the commercials for the upcoming season of American Idol. The part that makes me chuckle is when the announcer says that American Idol is the show that brings America together?

Really? American Idol does that? I had no idea.

I admit it; I do watch American Idol. I understand it’s not particularly good viewing. I understand, too, that lately the American Idol winners haven’t exactly been setting the music world on fire. And, finally, I understand that the show isn’t exactly good for music in general; Manufactured stars are never a good thing.

But there is something addictive about the show. And you do start rooting for people, despite yourself.

To claim, though, that a talent competition brings America together is amazingly egotistical. I’m making a big deal out of nothing, again, I understand. But this sort of untruth has become so common we don’t even bother to think about it. Maybe it’s the editor in me, but I prefer even my hyperbole to be a bit on the accurate side.

Sometimes something just strikes you as particularly strange. So it was last night at a local pizza place. My wife and our two kids were just getting ready to order when my wife asked the waitress the obvious question: “Do you have any specials tonight?”

The waitress gritted her teeth and replied: “Everything’s special here, every day.”

I was a bit stunned. The answer wasn’t rude. It was actually kind of clever. But it was obvious that our waitress didn’t really want to say it. She had that look on her face, the one that says: “I’d rather rip out my own eyes then say this corporate-mandated slogan one more time.”

I’m sure the waitress wanted to say: “Sorry, our owners are too cheap to ever offer any specials.”

This isn’t a big deal, of course. But it struck me as funny. When you think about it, there are very few times when people really say what they mean. Look at the presidential campaign that ended last year. Weren’t you rooting for Barack Obama to say, just once, “John, why in the world did you pick Sara Palin to be your running mate? Don’t you want to be president?” Or maybe you longed to hear McCain say something like, “Barack, I’d like to punch you in your smug face, you know that?”

No, instead we get sound bites. Or advertising slogans.

I suppose it could be worse. Our waitress could have said: “No specials tonight. Everything’s pretty lousy. As usual.”

Most of my income comes from the freelance writing I do for magazines, newspapers and Web sites. I was hoping that 2009 would be a better year than 2008 turned out to be. In 2008, I wrote like crazy but made less money than I did in either 2007 or 2006.

That really wasn’t in my plans.

So my hope in 2009 was to target higher-paying pubs, like the one I’m working on a story for right now. That story will pay me more than $2,500, the most I’ve received for a single non-fiction story.

Problem is, that very publisher sent an e-mail to its freelance writers yesterday with the subject line “tough times.” With a subject line like that, you know you’re in trouble.

Sure enough, the message said that from now on, thanks to the nation’s terrible economy, the magazine would not be assigning as many freelance stories and would not pay as much for the stories they do assign.

So, unfortunately enough, 2009 is starting out much the way 2008 went: My clients are struggling. That means I’ll struggle, too.

I’m still writing enough to pay the bills, but it seems to be getting tougher by the month. I’m fortunate in that I also have a full-time editing position that pays insurance for me and my family, so I don’t have to worry about that, at least for now.

I’m not giving up on my dream of writing less and making more in 2009. It just looks like it might not be either that less or that more.

Illinois government has been a laughingstock since before Christmas. That’s when our sleazy governor with the bouffant hair do was arrested for, among other things, trying to sell the open Senate seat vacated by incoming president Barack Obama.

Everyone wants the governor to resign. But that isn’t going to happen. Blagojevich, who’s been an embarrassment ever since taking office two — yes, Illinois voters voted him back in! — terms ago, is maintaining his innocence, despite overwhelming evidence that indicates he was using his governorship to make him and his wife rich.

Showing his defiance, Blagojevich recently appointed longtime political hack Roland Burris to Obama’s former seat. This was a shrewd move on Blagojevich’s part: Burris is black. He immediately picked up support because of this. Critics are also a bit muted partly because Chicago has such a long history of racial unrest. There’s still, unfortunately, a big divide between blacks and whites in the city. Chicago remains perhaps the most segregated city in the country.

So the news today is that Burris will probably get his Senate seat. This is disgusting. Burris should first of all be ashamed of himself for even accepting a nomination from such a tainted official as Blagojevich. Burris knows exactly why Blagojevich appointed him. The governor is using Burris to stick it to everyone who wants to see him locked up as soon as possible.

The news is disappointing, too, because it shows that despite Obama’s election, the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois is nowhere near solving its racial problems. I guess it was naive to think otherwise.

I’m thinking of smashing my TV. I accidentally (yeah, I know, I could have changed the channel, but …) watched an episode of VH1’s “Real Chance of Love.” After washing my eyes out with acid, I still can’t get the images out of my mind.

If you’re not familiar with this show, well, you’re lucky. It concerns two brothers, Chance and Real, who are looking for, yes, love. And they’re doing it by inviting several idiot women to their home to “try out” to become their real-life girlfriends. Or at least I think thats what was supposed to be happening.

I had trouble getting past the two “stars,” Chance and Real. For one thing, the two mush-mouthed brothers can barely string three sentences together. For another, they gave nicknames to all the female competitors, names like Cornfed and Lusty and Meatball. Yes, Meatball. Is Meatball Italian? That was my first question. Sadly, I did get an answer to this question from the show itself.

I’m always amazed at the absolute crap that VH1 puts on the air. But this show was something else completely. I’d declare any woman on the show the winner if she would shoot just one of the brothers. If she managed to shoot both? I’d declare her the winner of the next edition of “Survivor,” too.

Now, this blog post may not seem to have a lot to do with working at home. But because I do work from home, I’ll often sneak a peek at afternoon TV when I need a break. And that is where I fell into the “Real Chance of Love” trap. I’m thinking of swallowing the batteries of my remote control so that this never happens again.

During the last week, our friends from Texas braved the wintry Chicago weather to stay with us. It’s been a relaxing few days of card games, eating out and catching up.

What’s interesting, though, is that one of our Texas friends works in the field of public relations. Because I sort of work on the other side — I make most of my money as a stay-at-home freelance writer — I enjoy talking with her about her views on the media.

We had something unique to talk about this week. Our local hockey team, the formerly miserable now up-and-coming Chicago Blackhawks, played a historic game this week. They put an ice rink in Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs, and played the Detroit Red Wings outside this Sunday. Now, this is a neat thing. But from the way the game was hyped in Chicago — and, I’m guessing, in Detroit — you’d think the Hawks had just found a cure for the common cold.

Our friend from Dallas knew all about this, of course. When the public-relations machine kicks in, there’s no stopping it. In fact, we’ve had a lot of the PR machine these days. After all, that’s what the holidays are all about, right? First, there’s nothing at all as important as FINDING THAT PERFECT GIFT FOR EVERYONE for Christmas. Then, the instant Christmas arrives, no one cares about it anymore. The hype machine then moves on to New Year’s Eve and how important it is to HAVE THE BEST NIGHT OF YOUR LIFE! If you watched any of the New Year’s Eve shows that night, you no doubt would have heard some breathless announcer enthuse about how “the scene here is amazing! I’ve never seen anything like it!” Yes, you have, every single New Year’s Eve.

It’s nice that the hype season is over … at least until the Super Bowl, THE BIGGEST FOOTBALL GAME EVER!

Today is that most dreaded of days, the days when the Christmas tree comes down.

It’s not that I’ll miss the tree — or Christmas — that much. To tell you the truth, I’m a bit tired plugging and unplugging the thing every day. It’s just that I hate the work involved in putting our fake tree away for another 11 months.

Putting the tree up is one thing. Yes, it’s still a pain. But the kids like it, and they’re always eager to help and excited about seeing the ornaments again. Of course, no one is excited about seeing those same ornaments when they’re being put away. And those helpful kids are nowhere to be found.

So up to the attic I’ll go today, with bins of ornaments and Christmas tree parts. The only joy on this day? At least I won’t have to do this again for another 12 months.

Ho, ho, ho.

The last two weeks of December are tough. No one wants to work. I don’t want to work, either. Unfortunately, if I don’t work, I don’t get paid.

That’s one of the challenges when you work for yourself from home: You can take as many days off as you want, but no one’s going to pay you when you don’t turn in your assignments.

Sometimes — rarely, I admit, but sometimes — I envy those folks who do work a traditional office job. These last two weeks of the year, it seems, none of them are working. I should know: Whenever I call them to get a quote or two for my newspaper or magazine feature stories, I only get voice mail. But because they work on salary, they still get paid, whether they’re at home sipping eggnog or at the office slaving away.

Now, when you work for yourself from home, you have to work around all the holiday hubbub. I don’t get my paychecks if I don’t turn in any stories. I can’t afford, especially with as tough a year as 2008 has been, to take two weeks and slack off. I still have to work, which is a drag during the holidays.

This week is especially tough. We have friends in town from Texas. It’d be easy to take these days completely off and play cards, chat and have a beer or two. Unfortunately, I’m working. Now, it’s not a full day of work, but, still, it’s work, and, like I say, it’s a real drag.

Oh, well, the holidays are over soon. Then I can go back to snickering at all those poor souls who have to travel to an office every day.

This holiday season has been a bit rough because my family during its course has lost two people due to cancer. We had our second funeral in as many weeks today.

Both funerals were sad, of course. But today’s particularly struck me. Not because of the emotion involved, but because of the emotion it lacked. The reverend who spoke didn’t know the deceased. No one from the 25 or so attendees got up to say anything. And it was all over in under a half hour.

In contrast, the first funeral we attended, about two weeks ago, was packed. At the wake the day before, people had to wait outside in the cold to get a chance to view the body. On the day of the funeral, the entire church was filled, and at the reception afterward, people lined up for the chance to tell their stories about the deceased.

Is the funeral you have an indication of the type of life you’ve left? That’s a tough one. Both deceased were good, kind people. One was more vivacious, immersed himself in his family and his community and made everyone he spoke to feel like they were the most important person in the world.

It’s hard not to imagine your own funeral at times like this. It’s hard not to hope, either, that yours is like that first one I attended two weeks ago, and not the one where the only personal item the reverend speaking could include was that the deceased was feisty.