Some More Photos Of Darlaston

Just to make me feel a little bit better, I've downloaded some more photos of Darlaston, the town I grew up in. At the moment. I'm fighting the temptation to return there to live.

The Bull Stake (Town Centre)

The Bull Stake In Winter

Victoria Park Centataph. I've walked past this many times as a child

The New Darlaston Town Centre

Middletons Chippy - The ONLY Original shop I Found

Midland Bank - Now A Night Club

The Old Railway I've Walked Along Thousands
Of Times On The Way To My Schools
Slater Street, Victoria Road JMI & Kings Hill

This Shop Used To Be Called The Spot -
So called because this is where bulls used to be staked
It Used To Be The Tabaconist My Dad Used To Use

Another View Of The Centotaph

Wednesday 30th November 2011

Just the two things to report today - firstly, a friend at work has gone off sick after being unable to breathe properly last week.  After an hospital visit, he's been told he's got shadows on his lungs as well as fluid. He's back in hospital tomorrow to have it drained and they should then be able to say what else is wrong with him.

The management at work believe he's just got a chest infection, and I hope, and pray, that this is the case. I know my mates over retirement age, and his wife and family have been on at him to leave work and take it easy. He doesn't want to leave - he likes his job, but I guess his family will win this time.

Lets just hope it's a chest infection.

And secondly, the baliffs have been around today to try and get some cash from me for the old council tax account, totalling £520. Here we go again. I'm on a 14 day notice to pay this year's council tax as well, which is another £809.00.

Apparently I can pay the old account in installments, which it looks like I'm going to have to do just to buy myself some time. It's all starting again.

Monday 28th November

I'm back after a 3 week absence again. Writing a blog is hard, to keep updating it is even harder.

Payday came and went, and already I've betrayed my own definite chief aim in the savings respect. I'm supposed to be saving 5% of my income - all my income - but at the moment, I'm still fighting to survive and that savings money - which I did leave in the account - had to be pulled out to pay some bills.

I'm not sure what's happening to my motivation at the moment as it appears to have died. I've had the flu over the last fortnight or so, and all this has done is given me an urgent need to sleep (last weekend/19th & 20th), and simply chill out on the couch and not do anything at all, business wise.

It's so difficult, sometimes.

I'm arguing with myself as to the reasons for this - logically, when you're down with the flu, you don't want to do anything much anyway - and I'm defending this, to myself at least, by saying that a two week break is normal. It's a way, as well, of getting everything ready for the future. This weekend just gone I've redecorated the kitchen and planted some more plants in the garden, Erysimum Wallflowers actually.

Erysimum Winter Sorbet

The garden represents my future in a way as I want to be working in the back garden next summer - and I want to be surrounded by beauty, fragrance and inspiration as I'm on the computer. I've no doubt that working from home will be incredibly lonely at times and I think working in the garden will make a welcome change.

The business format is going to change. I'm going to stop selling the PLR & Ebook downloads (which don't sell) and instead changing the WHOLE business around to provide an information service using blogs which will be based around affiliate links for various products in that specific blog's niche. I'll be dropping Adsense soon, along with their links for pennies, in favour of quality affiliate links which will generate greater amounts of cash.

All that is in addition to the Homeworking magazine which will be the central focus of my business from January. The first edition of the mag is already done, having finished it last weekend, and I'll be putting the sales page up for it in January - but first, I've got to pay £90 + VAT (sales tax) to the Royal Mail to get a PO box address to collect the post (rather than having it come to an house address - which won't work).

Once that's done, I've got to open a basic business bank account to be able to process payments for advertising. 

I'm on the way!

Sunday 6th November 2011

Well, that's another weekend over with then unfortunately. Even if it is the weekend before payday, and things are really tight. Again.

Just started on the magazine for the business this weekend. And, now I've "won" a 4 day week from my employers, which I need to concentrate on my magazine, the self doubt keeps coming in.

And I keep knocking it out. The magazine has been very hard to formulate - you know, to get a brand new idea into a form we recognise as a magazine from a totally blank page. But I carried on, despite it being extremely hard to start, physically as well as psychologically, and, like everything else I guess, once it starts, it rolls.

The objective here is to get the magazine designed and ready to publish, then fill the intentional blank pages with adverts, which means I'll have to design a web page to advertise the magazine itself, and collect subscriptions.

Had a bit of a break earlier though, I spent an hour in the garden and have just planted some summer flowering bulbs, Ranunculus, also known as the Persian Buttercup. The picture shows what they'll look like when they come into flower.

Ranunculus (Persian Buttercup)

I've put this thing about the flowers here as much as a reminder for me more than anything else.  I love gardening, and it's a side ambition to the business if you like that I'll have a good garden to sit out in in the summer to work so I can infuse my spirit with the scents and colours of the flowers to help inspire me and to calm me down on occasions.

There's nothing like Mother Nature to feed a man's soul.

And the bulbs I brought from ASDA Darlaston last month have just started to sprout today as well, or, at least, it's the first time I've noticed them. I've got a little bit of my Homeland growing strongly in my back garden. It makes me feel good, and I still think - believe - I belong to Darlaston, not Norfolk where I live now.

OK, it's 9.10pm on Sunday as I write this. My daughter's asleep on the couch, where she's been most, if not all the day, since she woke up with a hangover after her night out last night. I've washed and shaved, and my brain has now closed down, as it always does when it's faced with the prospect of working the job.

But then, it won't be for long now.

Wednesday 2nd November 2011

First update for a couple of days or so. Nothing much to report really. On the finance side, I've written a letter to the local council saying that I'm bring my council tax account up to date when I'm next paid, which is a week on Friday - 11th November.

Just checked my publisher's preview and I've found out I've sold the following books this week:

Woodturning Guide - 26th October  - USA
Woodturning Guide - 27th October  - UK
Woodturning Guide - 27th October  - USA
Vegetarian Cookbook - 28th October - Australia
Woodturning Guide - 30th October - UK
Woodturning Guide - 30th October - USA

Thank you customers - whoever, and wherever you are - your support is appreciated. I must say though that what they're saying is true - the ipad/ipod books are selling, but people aren't buying the paperback books much now. No matter - I'm still getting residue income - and that's vitally important to my future plans!