I can’t count – by Danny Donovan – Mad Science #?

April 10, 2012 Danny Donovan 1 Comment

I looked at last week/this week’s entry and realized I jumped ahead, skipping #11 and going straight to 12. I’ll ask this to the audience out there, should I fix it or just make up a number every week just for giggles? I am curious about my readership, I started out with a bang with the Static Shock story then sort of fell off a comment cliff.

This week I want to touch on a certain fact of my life, the life of a freelancer. Freelancing ain’t easy, as they say. It’s a constant struggle of feast or famine. And most of the time its famine. They don’t call them starving artists for nothing.

One pet peeve I have about being a freelancer is the idea that just because I don’t go in and clock in somewhere every day, I spend my time goofing off or playing video games. (which is something I do when I DO have a job clocking in somewhere every day)

I can’t count the times I have snuck off the job to get a snack, or (if I was close enough) walk home for a beer or something and come back..  When I worked banquets at a hotel, I totally worked better drunk. It’s not so much being lazy as it is not having a tolerance for people who can’t get it together.

When you have a simple job that consists of putting food on a table and taking away dirty plates, there is no reason for someone in a suit that spends all their time in an office screaming and running around like we’re storming the beaches at Normandy.

Not so when it comes to my freelancing work. Especially my writing. When I am working for myself, I am on point, I have everything firing on all cylinders, except f course when it comes to my overestimation on how little sleep and food I need to survive and over pack my schedule.

Because honestly? I need the scratch.

But that at times means you fall behind because you are just being pulled in too many places at once. Which is why I am running behind on my columns here.

It frustrates me when people try to dominate your time, or make it seem as if they are he only person you are working with.  It goes with the “oh, they’re always home its okay to call.” mentality. No, it’s not. I work like crazy on all manners of projects, comics, films, books, and a lot of it is ghost writing.

Self employed is not the same as “unemployed”. And it seems a lot of the time, when you work fast, and provide quality under deadline, you get MORE grief instead of “Hey, thanks for pulling my ass out of that fire.”  you get “You did this project 3 days early, I want ALL OF THE THINGS 3 DAYS EARLY!”

Sometimes you have to cut your losses.

But it just grinds on me the lack of respect some people show others, when they’re doing you a solid.

Back to the grind.

Next time I promise to bitch about Mitt Romney. I swear.  :p