Right now

The day before my flight’s departure to Shanghai, I had my first real day off in over a month and a half. That’s right, Alex Stillwell worked everyday including Saturday and Sundays. When you work that much, there is no time for thinking, no time for taking a step back and really thinking about what you’re working on. 

Its different if you work for a company, have a set role, and someone above you sets the agenda, direction and speed. I, however, do freelance work. People hire me as a contractor. I have to pay my own income taxes. So, I get to set my agenda. I can deny clients (have yet to do that, but if I’m getting to the point where I can and sometimes should), accept clients or do my own things.

Doing my own projects has yet to make me any money. But because of them, I am in a position of where I have clients and can actually do the things my clients want me to do.

Its a great advantage, but I have to eat. That means I have to make money. And although I am in a good position financially (or at least my accounts receivables looks good), the stability of the nature of my work is non existent. Coming home from Tokyo, I got in contact with two of my current clients. One has a potentially large (seriously 10x the biggest project I’ve done to date) on the horizon. I find out in about a week if it will materialize. The other client said their focusing on a different path and my services won’t be needed until near the end of the year.

So now, my vacation has jumped the pond and has followed me here to North America. For the time being. But standing still is “bad,” so I have the opportunity to work on my own projects (read: learn more).

I’m happy about my situation right now. Its good for now. Eventually, I’ll be working for someone elses projects… hopefully. So until then, I’m going to create some awesome shit!

My heart is grateful of some things that I would like to share as well.

Slippers… given to me by Delta Airlines.

Sweater… I missed my hoodie’s warm embrace

Music… I only had 4 albums that I listened on repeat for the 10 days I was gone. I’ve grown tired of them.  Coming back to pandora and hype machine is beautiful. Music seems fresh again and kickin ass. I’ll post a couple of the songs that grabbed my attention.

Notebook… I bought a notebook in the airport. Its simple, but I like it a lot. And in that same vain of thought…

Writing… I’ve written this blog post, a previous blog post on rice, an entry on one of my favorite websites 750words.com and in the notebook mentioned above… thats a lot of writing for little ol alex, but it feels good. I think being alone in Tokyo did this to me. 

It’s 6am, but I’m still on Asia time. So, I’m going to brew some coffee and hunker down into some code and design.