Things are kind of quiet on the home front September 9, 2008
Posted by Jill (@bonnjill) in Business practices, Random musings.trackback
I’ve been enjoying a couple of slow days, and that is why I haven’t been posting much in the past couple of days (unlike Corinne who has been a blogging machine… 🙂 ). I got a small job this morning that I finished in about 15 minutes. I charged my minimum rate, so I did pretty well for 15 minutes’ work. I met a friend for lunch and treated myself afterward to a latte at the café down the street. I spent the rest of the day cleaning up my office, shredding some old documents, catching up on my e-mail, buying the new electronic version of Dietl/Lorenz Dictionary of Legal, Commercial and Political Terms, updating my LinkedIn profile, and reading Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris (the HBO series True Blood, which premiered Sunday night, is based on her Southern vampire/Sookie Stackhouse books, and I had forgotten who the murderer was so I decided to reread it). Her books are addicting and light reads that you simply can’t put down. I also gossiped/chatted with several colleagues about various things, so I know I’m not the only one having a slow week.
When you are a freelancer you have to take advantage of the lulls, because there isn’t usually a lot of down time. When things are a little slow you have the chance to install software updates you’ve downloaded but not gotten around to installing, organize and archive the files on your computer, import some glossaries into your Multiterm termbase, buy that dictionary you’ve been meaning to order, and finish those little things that have been languishing on the To Do list for a couple weeks. I use a To Do list on iGoogle to keep track of appointments I want to make, phone calls I need to return, and things I need/want to buy. It really helps me remember things. If tomorrow is slow I have a list of things I want to do, but if I don’t have the time it isn’t that big a deal. Because chances are I am going to wake up tomorrow morning and have three translation requests in my in box.
Musings from an overworked translator 
Hello, Jill!
I’ve just thought taht you would be interested in using a new task mangement system that was recently released http://task2gather.com.
Task2Gather (free on-line service for managing tasks) was released a month ago, it appeared to be a good example of task management system as it has unique features. They are: hierarchical structure of tasks, sharing separate tasks with different people. Moreover, tasks can be discussed straight in the service. There are many other features that make this service worth using and organizing your day-to-day routine.