before i move on other things: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, WHYSPER! hard to believe this journal is now 13 years old. granted, posts have gotten less consistent over the years, but it's still going. prior to this journal, where the text is always "perfect," and the "pages" are always pretty and as short or as long as i need, i couldn't keep a journal for longer than a few months. i'd stop writing for more months than i wrote in the book, then those pages would be removed and the notebook would become...something else, anything else from a school notebook to a writing ideas book (and most of those didn't last long either; getting a computer was probably the best thing that happened for my writing, ALL my writing). i'm not sure what i imagined when i started whysper, but 13 years? didn't enter my head. so, happy 13th, whysper! we're limping along, but we're still going.
this birthday comes at the end of one of those months that was busy without really being busy. saxy got his raise, youngest got a job...and lost it again (long story short: if what she said is true, someone wanted her out of there, probably for the hours she'd leave behind), our dryer broke down, linnorm found a job and is paying a small amount for taz again (even though taz is an adult and linnorm is not legally bound to pay anything, he wants to help with caring for his son who will never move out and be able to care for himself), the eight went up and down but the inches have gone steadily down the whole month, i even got good news in the writing arena (that i can't share until august...or so). not a lot of actual running around busy, but a lot went on anyway!
and one of those things was a tentative plan for a...well, i don't want to call it a business, but in essence it would be a business. the interesting things about those tentative plans? they once again prove that somehow, even without talking about it, saxy and i usually end up in the same place more often than not. really, there's a reason we pretty much let each other buy our own birthday/anniversary/christmas gifts. i remember once soon after we arrived in georgia, saxy told my brother he was taking me out to dinner. my brother had to pick me up from somewhere and take me home, and on the way, he said, "your husband has a surprise for you." i said, "he's taking me out to dinner?" he just looked at me and said, "can't you let your husband surprise you?" we just can't help it. we always seem to end up in about the same place with most things. i swear, one day we'll start completing each other's sentences.
anyway, last week (or a little before that, maybe), i searched for a local cupcake shop, and while there are plenty of cupcake shops around here, none of them were what i'd call local even by car. now last year, i'd played with selling christmas cookies around the complex, but we were too broke to get the ingredients together to even try. we're in a better place, and i actually thought about making and selling cupcakes (and maybe a few other things, if it was successful, and the cookies for the holidays for sure). i even came up with a name for it. and we're in a batter place money wise, so i figured if i was serious about it, i probably could do it. then i thought of all the b.s. the production company saxy worked for went through for everything and all the things i'd probably need for a home business including the fees for running a home business and decided it was too much trouble.
then the night before last, saxy went to help a couple move out, and it turns out this couple sells a pesto they make at the local farmer's market and talked to him about what it takes to have a booth there. apparently, the whole idea evolved until he came home and told me about it, saying we could start with me doing some baking first. as his pros: it's something i can do from home and not have to worry about transportation and all the other things we've had concerns about with me getting a job, and it would allow me to help ease some of the financial burden. plus it's something taz can get involved in both in the kitchen and out at the table. and eventually, he hopes to do his cooking (though it is something he needs to talk to his el taco chef about since he'd need saturdays off to help with the transportation and manning of the table, etc).
so, a week and a half after i consider the idea and discard it, saxy suggests it, thus getting to the same place i was at. and it's apparently more doable than i thought: baking from home is treated a lot differently than catering from home. and saxy seems quite serious about this and is looking at it as an opportunity to eventually do a little of his own thing while still working at the restaurants. and i'm not against it, to be honestam already considering cupcake flavors. lol
it will be a bit before we do all this. we have money saved, yes, but for con, which we haven't gone to for a couple of years and are eager to go to this year (especially to get the second to last autograph we need on taz's sg-1 poster, among other things). so the plan right now is to plan now, think about logos and labeling, come up with flavors and whatnot, and give a few things a try in the complex this holiday season. which will also give saxy time to feel things out a bit more, which he needs to do for his own comfort level, as well as teach me a few things i don't know how to do. and he can help me price things as well. plus we need to pick up a few more muffin pans and the like. so a long prep time will make it much more successful when we're ready to go to the farmer's market. and he's right about one thing: i'll feel better if i can successfully contribute even a little to the household income (well, i guess i contribute a little now, but it's very little, and the baking might be able to contribute a bit more on a more consistent basis).
i support saxy in this little endeavor. i think it'll even be fun. but i find it funny how we both got here. at separate times, yes, but we're there together. it's such a nice place to be. i just hope we don't actually start finishing each other's sentences. that would be a bit much.
~*~
word of the moment: chatoyant
having a changeable luster or color with an undulating narrow band of white light