After a bit of hard work I've managed to get myself into a cushy position that pays me to do pretty much nothing. Now before you get the wrong (right?) idea about me let me say that I'm not adverse to working hard to support myself and those I love. However, if I can do that while not needing to work my fingers to the bone, well I'd just as soon do that instead. Don't think of it as laziness; think of it as economy of effort.
I don't mind the work but it's pretty mindless. A trained monkey, if properly motivated, could probably do as well a job as I. Not saying much about me, I know, but I think it properly directs attention to this particular job's ... mindlessness.
I've been working with a friend of a friend doing techie type stuff. Really enjoying it and I'm earning a few extra dollars while I'm at it. It's nice to finally be making money doing something that I really really enjoy. The boss I work for is very cool as well and makes doing the work itself fun. With a bit of luck he'll be able to give me more and more work until it becomes something near full time. that would be a fine setup for me to get into.
However (and this is a very large however) why can't I be doing the same sort of thing for myself? Doing some simple math, if he's paying me as well as he is, would it be completely outlandish to think that he's making money off the deal still? I hear stories of 'geeks on wheels' or whatever they are called doing housecalls for $75 an hour. Outlandish? I don't know. What's it worth to have someone come over to your house and fix your computer problems?
I do my own time keeping and have been having a hard time reconciling my time. Things like a full back up and OS re-install taking upwards of 4-5 hours? Is that not a bit excessive? And I'm a bit shy of telling my current boss how long these tasks are really taking for fear of having him lose faith (however small it is currently) in my abilities. That should sound the death knell in my current working arragement. I wouldn't like that.
Today for instance. I'm tasked with visiting a local mortgage office and installing Symantec Antivirus on 2 of their computers and ensuring a third laptop has printing access to the printer in their office. Easy enough, no? Yes, no is the correct answer.
First install went easily enough with a few complaints from their old version of Norton. The second machine didn't want to co-operate AT ALL. Infested with a couple of spyware and adware variants as well as trojan that I didn't recognize the new version of SAV just didn't want to install. Cleaning it out took a while and then installing the new version went in like a snap. What should have taken not more than and hour got up and over the 2 hour mark. Makes me question my own abilities and also whether or not my boss is going to start questioning my abilities.
How to end this post on a positive note: I like pie.
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