Feeling AwesomeI think the best feeling, for anyone who does any type of design work (or actual artists) is hearing that people love your work. Doing something for the masses is pretty hard, esp. when there's a diverse crowd of people you have to design for because you don't know any of them or what they might like.
For instance for the publishing company I work for I first got asked to design 5 MySpace layouts for the House of Night series of books. One for the main profile and 4 people can download and use for their own pages (you can see them all here
http://www.myspace.com/houseofnightnovels) so I just had to look at the page and seeing comments about how much people love the layouts makes me feel pretty freaking kick ass.
Now this company, I love it and I love the people I work for in it. They have always made me feel pretty awesome and appreciated. But it's very rare I am not sitting here criticizing my work and though I can sit here and look at these layouts going "I should have moved that one pixel to the left" or the other stupid shit I put myself through it's really a boost to my work confidence to see complete strangers (not friends, or people who pay me) praise my work. It's cooler with strangers because they don't have to say anything, and though I like to trust that my friends would tell me something sucks if it did, there's always that off chance they won't tell you when something sucks haha.
Anyways, it seems the authors & others involved also loved what I did, so much so that they asked me to do 4-5 wallpapers. I did 12 (well 13 cuz I did two versions of one) and they want to use all 12. It again makes me feel awesome that I banged out a ton of stuff, and not one was bad in fact they were so good they want them all haha. After that I have also been asked to do some banner ads for them, then some AIM icons.
I'm all over this shit like white on rice. A selfish part of me wants this series to get bigger than Twatlight so I can be like Oh yeah I worked on that mo'fucker. Haha. A non-selfish part of me hopes it does because from the pages I read online these books seem to be well written, I'll actually read them when I'm done with the other books I'm reading.
Oh noes, I'ma lose!
Money that is...
I bought a new TV, my current one has a green spot on the left side that makes peoples faces green, and a purple spot on the right that in turn makes people on that side of the screen purple.
I have a regular tube TV, which I paid like 125-150$ for, but naturally since LCD/Plasma TV's came out tube TV's are about as hard to find as a good 8-track player. So I had to go HD, not that I mind because all I do is watch movies and OOH PRETTY, but obviously unless I want a 19 inch TV you can't get something 32 inches + for less than 500$. So 6th Ave. Electronics here was having a Labor Day sale which I figured was the best time to get a new TV because they were all 40-60% off and sales make me crazy.
Originally, Tracy & I stayed up all night Sunday watching movies/playing SceneIt, and watching a marathon of old ass 90210 episodes on SoapNet so that I could head out at 7am to get the 32 inch TV for 400$ that you could only get between 8-9am. We get some Dunkin Donuts, get there around 7:30 and join the short line of people outside, spending most of the time amused by a praying mantis I wanted to take home and name Spartacus.
Of course I get in and see all the pretty TV's and go well I can get a 37 inch for 200$ more and if I'm gonna spend hundreds on a TV I might as well make it worth my hard earned dinero. Tracy is trying to convince me to get the 42 inch because it's only 20 bucks more (well 220 more than my original plan) but I think about the size of my living room and my current computer desk turned TV stand and think it wouldn't fit. So I say fuck it, get my 37 inch TV and wander home.
Get home and tell my mom the story and she convinces me that I am indeed a friggin idjit and that I can get a new stand and to get my ass back there and return it for the 42 inch one. I still don't think this is the best course of action but my mom calls and they agree to hold one for her after she goes on one of her tangents only my mom can go on. So I do it anyways, because I can always re-arrange my living room and I'll want the 42 inch in December when TDK comes out on DVD (haha) and really why the fuck won't I pay 20$ for an extra 5 inches of screen? I mean besides because I'm a stubborn asshole.
So Tracy had headed upstairs and was ready to pass out when I wake her up and drag her back. Return the TV and also, because I suck at life get a DVD recorder that was on sale for 40$ from 200$. Because I know after this purchase my monthly DVD buying spree's will have to come to an end for a while and I have 100 blank DVD's lying around my house I can just use to convert my current VHS's until I have money again. So in ways it was kinda smart?
Anyways so that was that, we came home and she went to bed, I talked to my mom a bit and also took a nap around noon. Got woken up around 5, drank some wine coolers, ate some bbq, watched One Tree Hill & some more cheesy oldschool 90210 and went to bed around 12:30-1 and didn't wake up again until 10. Which was freaking awesome.
Of course, I am having serious buyers remorse but I keep reminding myself that the TV I got was 53% off (saved $801) and I have a 4 year warranty on it so if it breaks I won't have to go buy another one for at least those 4 years.
No Canada :(
So as I think I mentioned before, I was supposed to go to Canada the 12-17th to hang out with Jen, Nikki & Cailin. I was really looking forward to this because I really need a vacation and it's been far too long since I've seen them (even though I saw Nikki a short time ago, that counts too haha). I tried everything to get there, and finally found a round trip flight for $220. I tried to book it the minute I saw it but kept getting errors so my plan was to call them today and book it over the phone. I am going on the assumption that the powers that be were trying to stop me from putting myself into more debt somehow since booking a ticket there seems to have been hard as fuck since I started looking for one.
Because then I got slammed with financial problems (not counting the TV, because that's on my credit card and I figured I could still pay it off after I went out there) such as:
1.) I realized I have to pay the gas bill soon, which is about $230 a month & until Tracy gets a new job I am paying that so it doesn't get shut off (I'm sure Lois wouldn't be pleased if it did).
2.) My mom reminded me I have to give her at least $300 this month to go towards my estimated taxes so I don't get slammed with having to send them another $1000 at tax time. If I don't send them at least $300 every three months then I get charged a penalty on that too even though I'm paying it on my own free will, makes no sense but whatever.
3.) My mom also advised Tracy & I that starting in October we're going to have to pay a bit of rent aside from the bill or I'll be moving back to NJ & I don't want that to happen.
4.) I have Brandi's wedding to go to next month and though I thought I could do both I can't. So since Brandi will hopefully only be getting married once (
) it takes a bit of priority. So between flight, happy presents, finding something decent to wear, etc. my bit of extra cash is going in that general direction.
5.) I just sent over my hours for August, and I'm getting paid about $1000 LESS than I have been for the past year. Which obviously is coming at the worst time it possibly could.
6.) After calculating in taxis and actually being able to do stuff besides sitting around on my ass, if I add Canada on top of the other shit I have to pay for/do in the next month I'd be left with about 300$ to last me 4-5 weeks and living in NY that just doesn't add up.
So I have to be responsible, and do the responsible thing no matter how much it annoys me. I really wish I could think differently, be like "Oh well I can just run up my credit card bills again!" but if my paychecks are going to be like this for the next few months, I have to conserve the fundage for stuff like food, bills and putting gas in my car.
That said, I am more than likely going to be looking for a 3rd side job to fill in the gaps. Unless the publishing company starts sending me a ton of work it seems to be the only way to go.
Blah, I hate money with a firey passion & I hate being a freaking adult.
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