The Pomodoros seem to be working. I had a very good day yesterday.
First job of the day was chasing a client for payment that was due on Monday. By midday they’d come back to me to say payment will arrive before the end of the week.
I did my 25 minutes on social media, and I jotted down what I wanted to achieve for each of my 12 Pomodoros throughout the day. I’ve reactivated my Trello board for this. Next up was my daily blog post, for which I wrote 392 words.
There then followed two research-reading Pomodoros for the Richard Cadbury book and one writing Pomodoro, during which I wrote up my understanding of what I’d read so far. I added 386 words to the Cadbury book.
During my dinner break, I started the next NetGalley book. It’s one of the Christmas books I was recently approved for, and I’m loving it already.
First job after dinner was acknowledging the email from the late-paying client. And the rest of the afternoon was reading and writing Pomodoros for the Cadbury book. I added 753 words.
I’m a bit disappointed that I haven’t heard from the Greek client since mid-August. I’d advised him that I would be working on my own contracted book until the end of October but that I could still work on books for him with a two-week turnaround.
He’s already on a very good deal with me, at just over half what I would normally charge for an 80,000-word book. His silence has made me realise that he’s actually getting an excellent bargain because I can’t do any other work while I’m editing his 80,000-word books full-time.
This morning, I went onto the job boards and I saw that he is advertising for Beta readers. So he’s still active. And I’ve decided that I can’t sustain working for half the price at twice the speed any longer. And anyway, I didn’t give up the rat-race to work for one person full-time, or to work until 11pm on a Friday night just to meet someone else’s deadline.
I have a pile of projects of my own to be getting on with and I have other clients too – and thank goodness for Australia this week or I wouldn’t have earned anything.
One of my Pomodoros this morning was to update my fees and my availability on the job board, and I added three new “quick projects”: writing short stories and features; editing and proofreading; and writing novellas and novels. I’ve set a minimum rate and a cap for each, and I’ve added a bonus to any ghostwriting to compensate for the lack of royalties.
The rest of the day will be more reading and writing Pomodoros for the Cadbury book. Plus I want to pitch for one job on the job board.
