It is All Relative...

Despite the fact that I had a wonderful Christmas and a financially successful December, this has been a tough week. The worst item of all was work related - my company had to lay off three employees yesterday. Two of them worked for me, so I had to let them know personally. These were long term employees and I've been having a rough time with it. We did great severance packages and all that for them, but somehow, it doesn't help. I still feel rotten. The decision was made because of the economy, basically we just had too many employees for the amount of work. Even in my present financial situation, I offered to take a pay cut if it meant we could keep folks. My boss, however, said that that can be a great financial strategy if you expect a quick recovery - but in our situation we don't see anything changing anytime soon, and we can't ask everyone to take a pay cut for what might be years or recovery.

It doesn't help dealing with all this that I have a cold. Seems like the virus was sitting in wait for me until the day after Christmas - my first day of rest - to hit like a sledgehammer. Usually colds don't last very long with me, but this one has been sticking around. Fortunately I am well stocked in juice and vitamins. I wish I could shake it off though.

Some good news, however, is that I am working on making one of my goal for 2009 happen - selling items on eBay. One of the reasons I think I have a harder time with my eBay sales, despite their lucrative nature, is that I don't have it well organized. Every time I want to sell something, I have to set up an area to take photos, get out my rulers, scales and packing materials and so forth... basically it is more of a process than it should be. (Especially since everything is scattered hither, tither and yon around my house.) So, last night I started working on putting together an area where I can keep everything together - items for sale, boxes, bubble wrap, etc.. I think that if I can make it even easier to do, I will be more likely to do it.

This past weekend I had a little basement flooding. Not too bad, fortunately, and everyone I know had basement problems. It's what happens when mountains of snow melt overnight and then are followed by 2" of rain. Anyway... last night I spent some time in the basement cleaning up the mess and at the same time doing some organization. I picked out an area (near where I store the books I have for sale online) that could be "eBay central." A friend of mine offered to lend me some clip lights and I have a big roll of newsprint craft paper, so I am going to create a little photo booth down there. My sister and brother-in-law (bless them!!) bought me a new camera for Christmas, so I should be all set and have no more excuses!

In addition to eBaying, I still have more furniture to sell. I've been a bit quiet on that lately since I didn't think too many people would be shopping Craig's List over Christmas. Plus, I've had something going every night that there hasn't been a snowstorm! However, the weather seems a tad more under control and I know my schedule is, so I'll be able to get back to that. I also have a few more books that were given to me to sell that I need to post.

So, despite the rotten end to this month - I'm looking forward to a brighter 2008.



Photo by: destabee (Who also has some other great bird photos!)