Business is in the toilet........

Yikes, the economy is slow. Check this chart out-it only starts to get real scary in late 2007. Me thinks we are on the edge of a large hole and we're all getting ready to get sucked in.

Not that I rely on my consulting business to feed my family but I do enjoy making contributions to some of my favorite charities. It's one of the reasons I started the business up.

Not this year-I simply don't have the money...I'm at a zero balance and I still have equipment that I paying off.

One of brother-in-laws is in business for himself and he does feed his family from his earnings...he's extremely worried as he always has a couple of big jobs lined up for the year by now. So far nothing and as an added bonus-his wife is being laid off in June.

Things are bad and I feel extremely lucky to have a pretty good job as does my wife. We are both in trades that will never be obsolete- people eat and they get old and sick.

One of my nieces is considering going to some sort of chef school, I was talking to her on Easter and making here aware that being a chef is nothing like what they show on TV. It can be a good living, but to have some standing in the industry-figure on putting in lots of scutwork and if you're good-maybe you'll be "someone" you're 40.

I talked to a client yesterday and stopped by her house. She had problems getting her task bar to sit at the bottom of the screen. I had it fixed in about 15 seconds and then got a tour of her house. Very cool house, her and her late husband had built on the original house several times through out the years. It had lots of strange hallways and rooms were you weren't expecting rooms.

She's probably in her late 70's or early 80's and she seemed kinda lonely. We had some tea and chatted for awhile.....how much did I charge her? Nothing, I shoulda payed her for the time-what a lovely person-it was a great way to spend an hour of my time.

Yeah, that ain't the best business practice, but another one of the reasons I started computer consulting was to help senior citizen with computers- I hate to see folks go to the big box stores and get taken advantage of. That kinda of stuff really pisses me off because most folks get charged outrageous fees for simple stuff.

This should be passed as law today.

till later.