Pooped

What a crazy week... it's been super busy. You know I haven't gone to the gym in a couple weeks I feel so horrible about it. I wonder how The Brow and Bermuda are doing without me? I have been running here and there. But that's no substitute and I know it.

Tomorrow I think I will get my butt down there.

In between my mad frenzy of projects, I've found some breaks here and there to play with my home network. OK OK, it's a geek thing to do, but when I can sit in my bedroom to do my work and share files I'll be the one laughing at the poor shleps sitting behind a cubicle. The nice thing is that I actually figured out this Microsoft networking out. I've finally got everything in my house hooked and sharing things with each other through my wireless connection. Let's just hope I got all the security stuff set up right or else my neighbors will get a surprise when they see naked photos of me with Paris Hilton. I keed...I wasn't naked.

Borrowed a monitor from my friend Robert. The sucker is one of those nice cinema displays from Apple. I got me a real mishmash of half-breed equipment at home now don't I? Anyway, my friends are going on a Mainland roadtrip for 2 months and decided not to take me. So all I'm left with is this HUGE monitor that barely fits on my desk. It's really good. So good in fact I fear I won't be able to go back to just a small monitor again when I have to give this back.

This desk is horrible...it's the same one I've had for almost 20 years now. My parents bought this thing for me back in my intermediate school days can you believe it?

It's really sturdy...TOO sturdy in fact. I just can't STAND that extra "shelf" that sits on top of the desk and basically prevents any real use of desk space beneath it. So all I'm left with is less then half a table to begin with. I tried yanking that part off one time and I almost killed myself. Dad must have glued that thing down with all the glue in the universe because it's not going anywhere. I'm practically standing on my desk and yanking with everything I got and it didn't budge. Forget it. All I want is just one big flat table is that so much to ask?

You can see I don't really have any desk space at all. I got this huge monitor in front of me and that huge pen tablet sitting next to that. My brother got that for me a few years back. It's great but I only need something half that size. I just can't part with selling it because I got this typical male mentality that refuses to let me part with things that are way bigger then is practical. Now all I need is a Hummer parked downstairs and I'm good.

My head's going to explode

UGH. It's one of these high humidity mornings where I end up waking up with a headache. It's not one of those migraines I get every once in a blue moon, but it's here. Enough to make me want to curl up somewhere and sleep.

Unfortunately (?) or fortunately, I have a lot of work to do. And if I don't do it..... nobody will.

I'm kinda running up against a situation with another competitor "Company A". It seems in this past week, Company A is either directly or indirectly involved with one of my current clients, AND involved with a new client that is courting my work.

One client likes the work that Company A has done for them on a personal project, so would like me to make something similar to what they did. I don't have a problem with that....aside from the fact it's not really my style and the sample site my client demonstrated to me was somewhat broken. So it's kind of a weird benchmark to use.

Another client, had some work done by Company A, and because there seems to be some designer block or something, has approached me to see if I can just jump in to fine tune what's left. I don't have a problem with that either but I can understand how Company A might take affront to that.

I've been asked to do this type of thing before in the past and it's 50/50. Sometimes I have had success cooperating with other designers to make things happen, other times it can get really sticky once a designer is all pissed off that his or her design is being touched my someone else. I don't know what will happen in either of these cases. I'll have to wait and see what approach Company A might take towards my involvement.

I DID get 2 cool things happen to me yesterday. I got my laptop...which is way cool but perhaps I may have chosen a laptop that is slightly bigger in size then I need. While it's going to work well when I have a desk nearby to use, it might be a bit of a chore using that while I travel.

The 2nd thing that is cause for my personal celebration is the fact I purchased the domain name "lowestudio.com" for my business. This name had been taken by some inventor in Ohio or something and I had to wait out all these months till the domain expired before I was could get it.

It gets nastier then that. If you're ever involved in trying to get a domain name for yourself that's presently owned by someone else, it can be months of aggrivation and potentially very costly to get your business or personal domain name from them.

I found out even an expired domain name is difficult to get. There's no ruling body out there to police domain names....so if someone out there knows that you want "mybusiness.com", they could steal that domain name overnight by registering it and then turn around to offer that to you only of you purchase it from them for hundreds of dollars.

This online article explains all about it: How to snatch expiring domains.

I lucked out.... I risked everything in the attempt to try the "stealth" mode. I gambled that "lowestudio" was not something in high demand. So I didn't do any searches or "Whois" reports on the domain for months so that nobody could somehow catch that I was an interested party.

At first, on the day the domain was up for grabs again I thought I had lost the domain. The status said it was registered again to some company in Washington DC for the next year. I thought, "Crap...guess I'll have to try again next year to get the name".

Yesterday, I check again on a whim....and POOF the domain is available. You have no idea how fast I registered that name. $9.99 Whooohoo!

So now after I set everything up I can finally USE my business name in my email addresses and websites. *golf clap* Yeah I know, it's an accomplishment only I could appreciate.

I hate Mondays sometimes

You want to know how it's been like today?

I have one client contact out on vacation... so the first call I get this morning is from someone I don't know hoping to get something rushed for the big boss.

I have another client that I recently spent over 150 hrs of time getting a new website up for. But now one of the partners doesn't like it so we are likely to scrap everything and design a new site for them. While it's no skin off my back since it just means I get to bill again for more work....it's still personally hearbreaking because it's like I worked so hard for nothing, just because one person doesn't like it way after-the-fact. I've learned to have thick skin in this business.

I woke up bright and early today so I could make a phone call to an east coast branch of the nursing board that is in charge of looking at Florence's transcripts. I guess it's their job to evaluate and test whether her degrees are real. Anyway, their instructions for their application forms are about as clear as Kailua Beach water after a rain storm. (ok...local reference, you're better off not knowing if you don't know already)

I had one meeting today with one new client YAY!

Now I have to run down to see my buddy Chris at the police station to file a small report for my missing wallet last week.

And in the afternoon I have to rush off to see another new client involving hearing aids. YAY!

It's seriously crazy today.... it's one of those knuckle biting seat-of-my-pants days trying to get everything done for everyone.

Black Sabbath

Black Sabbath was inducted to this year's Rock N Roll Hall of Fame. WHOOOHOO! That's so cool.

So you might ask me, "What's that got to do with design Raph?" Well, then again, what the hell does half of what I write here have to do with design.

Well, when it comes to art and expression, EVERYTHING I do and experience day to day has a big influence on what comes out of my mind in what I do in design.

Think of it this way:

• Without the heavy metal "devil music", punk, hardcore, crazy stuff I got into in high school...
• Without the crazy colored hairdos...the mohawks, the freakish fucked up shit I used to do to my hair...
• Without the instruments, the late night jam sessions with friends, the gigs played in front of audiences big and small....

....I may have never come out of my shell. I'd be some disshelved asian kid with an old Member's Only jacket, thick ass glasses, uncontrollable nose hair. I may have never understood how to stand up for myself, never learned how to buck authority if I had my own opinion, never learned how to step out and try something off the beaten path.

So...in the end, Lowe Studio may never have existed without the likes of Black Sabbath -- unarguably the originators of all that is good! :)

Whoohooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!! CHEERS!!

Babooze

Awwww. Poor kitty. I just couldn't suppress un-manly giggle seeing that picture. When you need a lift, you can always depend on CuteOverload.com to rescue the mood.

I have a plan in place to get enough money in the right places so I can live like a bum on just interest alone. Yeah yeah...who doesn't right?

I mean, if you do some calculations, it isn't out of reach for most of us. I did some numbers as I was waiting in the Taco Bell drive through line waiting for my 3 taco special today...

Let's say you lose your wallet like a "Babooze" (so my 2nd mom Joy calls me), and since you don't have groceries in the freezer, you eat out each day. So that's at least $10/day easy right? Maybe more, maybe less depending on how much of a pig you are. That's $280/mo just to feed your face, forget all the other bills for a sec.

Just putting only about $7k in an account earning 3.8% will get $266/mo. That's like your bank is treating you food for the whole month! HOOOO. I'm that much closer to eternal bumhood heheh. That's my lifegoal....live off interest!!

Can you imagine being as rich as someone like Bill Gates? His interest alone is probably more then most high execs get in some major companies. The time he takes to pick up a penny on the street he's earned more then you and I might see all year.

Anyway, I encourage checking out that ING savings account at 3.8% - 4.75% interest that thing is hot right now. You get $25 just for opening it with $250 too. If you message me I can refer you and earn $10 myself as well. If you still leaving your money in a .5% local savings account you're definitely BABOOZE!

Recovery

I'm slowly getting my accounts back in order after my wallet loss. Got me a new drivers license and a new wallet. It will take about 5 - 7 days for me to receive all the cards I need so I have this weird period now where I totally have no access to cash. Well....I guess I could walk into the bank and show my ID to draw out money but as far as the ATMs go I'm SOL.

No big deal I guess. Just gotta move on.

I took another step and purchased a laptop for my biz today. Got a great deal I just couldn't refuse. $750 off. So I basically got a $2000 Dell laptop for about $1400 after taxes. Not too bad huh? Now this will give me the freedom to take my work where my clients are now rather then having to find a place to meet them where there has to be computer somewhere.

I STILL have a reluctance to spend money for my business....I always want to make do using just what I have already. Yet I understand it's also to my advantage sometimes to invest money back into the biz if only to use the money that Uncle Sam would otherwise take away from me during tax time. Anyway, I figured I thought enough about this to make it a reasonable business investment.

Anyone looking for sweet deals on tech goods....check out techbargains.com. They got so many things they dig up there for electronics. It's pretty awesome. That's where I found the Dell specials that otherwise are so obscure you'll never know about them. I think I'll wait till I see a special for the Mac Mini. That will be useful to preview my sites on the MAC OS. I just feel weird spending $600 for what will amount to just a web browser machine. God knows I can't afford all the MAC software just yet.

Well, I should head to bed....

Lost & Found

It's amazing how much of our lives are kept in our wallets.

I lost mine today. Yeah....that sucks ass. There's no better way to describe the feeling then "sucking ass", really. I've never really actually sucked ass....but I can imagine it to be just about as terrible as losing a wallet.

I ran some chores to the bank and somewhere between heading to the bank and walking across the street to my other business bank, I find I don't have it. It's not in my car, it hasn't been turned in to the bank, it's not on the road around and up to my car.

I've already done the rounds of reporting my cards lost...so I'm safe with the 2 credit cards I have in there and my ATM card.

But the stuff in there is still personal...I have my 7 year old driver's license. The one that registers me as a blond because the city worker saw my bleached hair at the time. She insisted that I had to register as a blond even though I told her my natural hair color was black. DUH. What if I had walked in with blue hair?

What sucks about that is that it's the old Hawaii license that uses my Social Security number as the ID. In this day and age people can do real damage with a SS#. I'll have to put alerts on my credit reports I think.

My Costco card, grocery card, a cingular debit card with some measly amount I can't get spend anywhere....and damnit, I was so close to completing my stamps for a free Graces plate lunch!!

What bugs me most is that the wallet itself had sentimental value because my sister got it for me. AND inside I had a cute photo of Florence. The cards & money I can replace.

So here I am....no cash to spend tonight for lunch & dinner, no driver's license to drive out and grab something. The City office said I can use my Costco card as an ID to get a new driver's license.... isn't that ironic? Don't you think? "The card was IN my wallet too beeeeatch!!"

Well....such is life. Bound to be bad days mixed in with the good. Bright side is that I can finally update that driver's license photo.

Random Thoughts

OK, it's another day worth of random thoughts....

I ran into a couple of my irregular clients, Victoria & Franque today. Sisters. I say irregular because I only help Victoria update her site every once in a great while. www.briankeith.com.

I really like them. Victoria has gone through a lot in her past yet she's one of the most bubbly people you can meet. She invited me up to see her apartment once and it was like wandering the halls of Willy Wonka's factory. I mean that in a good way, but it was just so colorful and full of things to look at it was overwhelming.

Her sister Franque is wonderful as well. She was one of 3 people who really pushed me to go ahead with this idea for starting my own business at one time. There's nothing like straight advice from random strangers....they got nothing invested in your future so you know the advice is real and from the gut.

Anyway, it was strange because within the span of 1 or 2 weeks I received the SAME advice from 2 of my good clients, and Franque was one of them. She told me if I have a goal, I should just go for it, life is short. The other person who pushed me to move ahead is my friend's mom, Ms. Young...she has this gorgeous house up in Aina Haina. But that's another story for another time.

Victoria and Franque told me that once Franque just randomly packed up a few belongings and disappeared for a few months to go travel the world on her own. She hitched on a cruise ship with some other teenagers and just did it. To this day she says that was one of the best times in her life. That was part of the inspiration to make me go for all this..... so far so good! Thanks Victoria and Franque!!

I've been looking at diamond engagement rings. O.o UH OH!!! Is it that time? Uhhhhhh...... well, I can definitely hear a voice in my head that is saying "You're not getting any younger Raph!"
Yeah, I should get a head exam I'm hearing so many voices in my head all the time. It's amazing my bud Chris doesn't label me as one of his "crazies".

Well...it just feels right. I'm in the stage in my life I'm ready for it, I want it, and I found someone that just feels so comfortable to be with it's like wearing a favorite shirt. So....perhaps Franque's advice is perhaps carrying over to this part of my life as well?

Anyway, picking rings is intimidating. All the rings essentially look reasonably alike, but the "4 Cs" of diamonds can make such a big difference. I go to one shop and a nice half carat ring is $3k. I go to the next shop and I see a 1 carat ring that's half that price. Sure enough it doesn't take long to realize the quality of that diamond sucks. So the question is, would she choose to have a big diamond if she had to sacrifice quality? Or would she prefer the perfect diamond, even if it means it has to be smaller? Of course if I asked her she'd want the biggest diamond with the best quality. But I'm not Donald Trump am I?

Anyway, I know Florence well enough to know she's not going to sweat it that much. She's not very materialistic, which is great. I'll just have to look around to make sure those jewelers aren't ripping me off!! Does she know I'm looking? Yeah, she does.... which would make it SOO CRUEL of her if she let me go through all of this and says "NO!!"

I would really be "Futless" then!!!

Designs

OK OK. Back to some designs shall we? Enough mumbo jumbo about all the other crazyness in my life.

I finished some business cards for Pacific Fitness Alliance. I like the way they came out. Just like miniature versions of the website itself. At first I thought this would be as easy as just taking my original web-design and then crunching it down to biz card dimensions, but it didn't quite work out that way. The dimensions weren't the same ratio and the resolution is different as well.

So I basically had to whip each of these out from scratch but in the end it came out very nice. Bumped up the logo and just worked with the usual type layout for each person. I like how they look in a set.

Back to collecting designs I've been seeing around...I've been collecting these things regularly and throwing them all in a giant envelope. I figure I can spend $70 a crack on some design book collection, or I can just collect these myself for my own personal inspiration huh?

Anyway, these were all pretty cool I thought. I think some of these came from the same designer. There's definitely a similar style to each of these. But he or she is pretty creative.... uses a lot of illustrations (I think I know the source), and creates these composite images that are pretty nice. This first one is in the style of an airline ticket. I dig that idea.

Tape idea. Nice. Retro look... once again. Illustration. I don't have that particular font. These types of fonts are the ones you might have in your collection but you there's never a good project to use it on. I have a bunch of these kinds of never-used fonts.


Just another cool font style I like for the "Lucky Tiger" event card. Once again, a very limited application but I like the idea. Not sure what the orange beam is supposed to be but I like the diagonal layout with the semi-transparent fonts in the background. That's always a cheat way to make something look cool...you take a font that you're using and create numerous layers under that...each one with different opacities. Overdone but effective.

I like this set. I've always like design "sets" when you can see several versions of one design. This one was nicely done. Once again a composite of multiple illustrations. Once again, I think I know where the designer got these illustrations from but nonetheless it turned out cool.


This last one I like. It's just anothe retro look inspired by carnival posters.
I guess it's all the rage these days? This one was nice though.

Hey! Lady Bug Mecca is coming...she had a cool voice. I have a couple "Digable Planet" albums from back in the day. Smooth! Maybe I should go!

TiVo

I've had TiVo for a few years now. It's one of my most fun toys I must say.

Well, recently my ISP gave me a free wireless router so I figured, why not try the other features that TiVo has where you can have it hooked up to the Net?

I picked up this wireless adapter for it on their site and hooked it up. OH it's fun...all my geek flags are flying now!

It's neat, I can transfer any photos and music to my TiVo wirelessly now...so that's cool. How often will I use this? Probably not that much, but I guess if I had to share pictures with visitors I can easily upload them all to my TiVo and we can all watch them from the comfort of my couch.

It also let's me take shows recorded on TiVo and transfer them over to my computer. So now I can view them from my computer or elect to burn my shows unto a DVD. I guess that's kind of useful if my mom wants me to record her Oscars or something again next time.

Another cool thing is that I can schedule to record my shows from anywhere. I can be in Singapore and still get online to program what shows my TiVo will record for me. I tried that yesterday and it worked great.

Supposingly in a couple days they'll upgrade my system online so that I can check weather, watch the traffic, check my local movie listings, etc. I can't wait to play with that too.

HEY! I'll have none of that....you try working by yourself at home all the time. Suddenly the smallest things at home become the biggest entertainment.

Pride

Pride controls a lot of what I do...

On one hand that's a good thing. Pride is what drives me to make the best designs I can. It motivates me to push ahead to get things I want and to succeed in goals I've set for myself. Pride has helped me each time someone told me "You can't do that" or "You're not good enough", where I turned the table on them later on and there's no better feeling of pride to be able to kick it back in their faces and say "STFU I did it!"

On the other hand, I know pride has driven me to have ignored good advice. It's allowed me to create stress and pressure for myself that needn't be there. I know it's one of the 7 deadly sins, in general it's probably a more negative trait then a positive one.

I guess it depends how I handle it. Somehow I have to steer it more towards using pride as a motivator rather then a crutch.

Why did I bring this up? Well.....when I consider that my girl may move to Hawaii someday, there's a strong likelihood she may make more money then me. She's awesome with her money and there's no doubt she's in better control of her retirement situation then I am. Her career as a nurse is in super high demand right now so it's like she can take her pick.

While I know this is a new day where it's more and more common where sometimes it's the wife that can be the main breadwinner for a family, somehow there's still the male pride deep inside that makes this situation feel very emasculating. You feel like somehow the order of the universe has flipped and as they said on one of those Seinfeld episodes -- "She's got hand". (Again with the Seinfeld references?)

Now it's not one of the stupid male things. All my life I've worked with strong and intelligent women who taught me a lot of what I know in business and life. But I guess what I'm saying is that when you consider getting together with someone, you want to make him or her feel proud of you. Not like they're doing you a favor.

I guess I can either decide to shell up and cry about it. Or let this drive me to build my business to succeed to the point where this is not an issue. I don't see that as an impossibility...but it's certainly going to take a lot of work and dedication. The good thing is that she's driven me to look more at retirement planning and investing. I just have to suck it up and allow the fact she's been better at these things then I am.

It's just another manic Monday....

Everybody together...."WHOOOooooooh....."

Kind of blowing up a bit today....but somehow this is the way I like it. When there's no activity during a day I get nervous and my productivity gets lower for some reason.

My ads for the phone directories have all been arranged. In both cases I'm spending just a LITTLE more then I intended, but LESS then both sales reps suggested I spend. So I think that's right about where my gameplan is...spending a moderate amount there. I still have plans to put additional marketing in other places so I told the sales reps I didn't want to go crazy and have all my eggs in one basket.

The cool part is that this coming year I'll have my logo & information in both directories. Whoo! Makes me feel like my business is so "official" hehe. My little child is growing up!

Taxes has been almost taken care of too. The nice thing is that my accountant has determined I'm getting money back, but recommends I just keep that "refund" and put it back towards my tax withholdings for this 2006 year. While it's not as fun as getting a big check back for my taxes, I guess it's the wiser and safer thing to do.

I'm kind of having some fun playing with my finances. Putting some money away for retirement and checking my credit history. I have a rating of 800 right now for my credit history... which is super good. I suppose this will be important if I want to pursue a home loan sometime soon. I understand the credit score can mean the difference between a few thousand dollars in interest because the banks may give me a lower rate.

For anyone who hasn't checked their credit score I highly recommend checking it at least once a year. www.myfico.com is the most comprehensive and official source right now. You pay about $45 to get the scores from all 3 credit bureaus. It's worth that investment to see how you're doing and especially to keep an eye to make sure your credit hasn't been stolen and everything is accurate. In my reports I see credit activity going back as much as 17 years... it's quite eye-opening what people can find out about you.

INGdirect (those guys with the wierd commercials about insurance) has been offering 4.75% on their personal savings accounts that you can set up online. That's an awesome rate that I've been taking advantage of. Their system is really good, you can log in at any time and see how fast the interest has been accumulating to-date. It's kind of addictive checking on that once in a while and seeing how much is being built up. I've basically transferred a good portion of my savings to them and so has my brother. The only downside of money transferred to them is that it takes about 2 - 3 business days to take or put money into that account. That's not a big deal so long as you plan for it. I recommend it.

Anyway, I better get something to eat and start jamming on work......

Wish money grew on trees

I'm still getting used to the routine of spending big chunks of money up front for business expenses.

My friend who used to own his own business once told me, "At some point you get used to writing $1000 checks like it is nothing." I didn't quite believe him then but I'm slowly seeing the light.

The past couple days I've spent trying to get my phone book ads in order. The sucky thing about Hawaii now is that we have 2 phone books...so it's almost like you have to hedge your bets in both books to see which one is likely to pick up more business. Double the pleasure, double the expenses.

It's pricey...both book representatives getting me to spend just a little more then I was ready to spend for. But they DO make a convincing case... this will be my first appearance in the phone directory so it pays to maybe invest a little more this time to announce myself and give my business an heir of legitimacy.

So here I am, once again writing checks in excess of $1000 asking myself, "How in the world did I get myself in a situation where I'm paying this amount of money for a little bit of print in a phone book?". That could be a new plasma TV heheh.

Well, I guess I have to keep reminding myself, "You have to spend money to make money" Hopefully those ads will get me enough work this coming year to get me that TV...my current TV has a yellow discoloration on one side of it already. I'm starting to think all my TV stars have yellow faces.

Catching up

Getting things back in order again after vacation. I'm feeling pretty good about everything, I have a few projects that are picking up again where I left off.

Some new things to tackle lately. I know the ads for the phone directories are due next month so I need to tackle a strategy for how my business will be listed there. Without doing or paying anything my business will have a default listing there....but usually that's not enough. If you look in either phone book under "Graphic Design" or "Web Design" there are a whole slew of competitors and usually if you just leave things on default then your listing will usually just blend into nothing.

On the other hand, the phone directories look ridiculous these days. Each page is clustered with bigger ads from everyone...it's like holding up a hand drawn sign on the Vegas strip. No matter what you do, you'll be drowned out by everyone else.

I guess my decision is to keep it moderately conservative this first year in there. Get a couple small listings in each book...perhaps invest a small amount just to get a bold title or something in there. If it turns out to hook me a few new clients here and there then perhaps next year I can invest in a bigger ad that might have my logo and such in there. It's hard though....there's always a small voice in my head that says "You gotta spend money to make money....", while another voice is saying, "Don't spend more then you can afford".

I told you I was crazy.

I guess I'll just stick to a gameplan and adjust them as I see fit next year.

I'm also looking at investments and retirement plans. Florence's zest for investments is starting to infect me a little....I think that's a good thing. As my mom always remind me, I got to remind myself to pay myself before everything else. Meaning I should be putting a little away each month for my future retirement. Better late then never.

Growing up I was never really encouraged to do so my my mom and dad. Only very recently in the past year or two I realized my mom was pretty good at it and only lately she started encouraging me. I've spent the last few years trying to square away early debt, and now that I've done so, I feel I need to start now towards looking out for my future comforts. Luckily both my investment broker and my accountant have both been encouraging me to do so as well.... so far I'm happy with my choice to pay a little more for good people like this to help me with my money.

My bud Andy took me for a ride this past weekend in his old Mini. The real one...not the modern remake. It was great fun...it certainly helped put my mind off the funk I was feeling once Florence left town.

It was certainly interesting though...watching one of the biggest guys I know fit into one of the tiniest cars in the world reminded me of the old Electric Company sketch where all these clowns climbed out of a tiny car. Andy stands something like 7'2" tall so it was no small feat.

Cruising down Waikiki in the thing was great. Remember that movie "Italian Job" with the bank heist and all the Minis? I certainly felt like pulling over somewhere and making a quick getaway in that car haha.

Makes me really want a hot rod of my own one day. Mark that down as a future goal!

Back to work

Back from vacation. Was it all a dream?

Florence is back home...poor girl went back to work just about on the same day she got back home to Hong Kong. Is that a little crazy? I think it is because I can never recover from jet lag that fast. But I think she did that to maximize the time she stayed here with me... and for that I can't thank her enough. That girl spoils me.

It's certainly hard to have a long distance relationship. On the other hand, I think there's a silver lining to this type of thing because it really makes you appreciate the time you DO have time together. I think having experienced this, the day we're both together in a more permanent setting, we'll be that much more appreciative & attentive of each other. Well.....I certainly think that's my positive way of looking at all this.

Back to reality though, I've been trying to catch up with all the going ons of working life again. Looks like I stacked the chips up pretty good before vacation, everything seemed to have gone smoothly and nothing blew up.

This will be my first time returning from vacation in my own business so I've been a little anxious what my clients think about me being away and if I may or may not return with more work in queue. There ARE a few things I need to jump back on so I am not twiddling my thumbs, but I certainly hope those verbal promises I have from various parties pan out into confirmed and payed work.

I picked up samples of a print job I did recently for Tiki's Grill & Bar. I made this card sleeve that holds their gift cards. Not a very complicated thing to do, which was good because I had only a few days before my vacation to do this.

I think they came out good. Quite and easy job since Tiki usually lets me run with my own ideas for a change. It reminds me of the time I used to design these things for LavaNet, Inc..... where I was given quite a bit of artistic freedom.

I'm happy with the way these came out. I hope to eventually lean my business a little more into the print design area....maybe 40% of it in print by next year. I'll have to strategize that somehow without stepping on any toes. I know a few of my own clients are print designers so I don't want to bite the hand that feeds me too. But certainly there's enough work for everyone out there.

Back to reality

So soon....2 weeks sure flies by when you're having fun.

I really DID have fun these two weeks. Amazing how life can be -- at this point 1 year ago I was pretty down in life. My friend called me "futless". For those who can't understand our Hawaiian vernacular, suffice to say "futless" means I was having some bad days.

Flash ahead 1 year later and I'm just about as happy as I can get. Sure, it's a little depressing dropping my girlfriend off at the airport this morning, but I know there's going to be more to this relationship and it's great to look forward to.

Things could not have been better. My girl Florence & I spent the past two weeks practically inseperable. (ok it's official now, I no longer need a make up name like Christy). The weather sucked ass but I think we made up for it....we spent a lot of time eating take out dinners at home while we watched home movies.

There was a couple days of sunlight in between this monsoon weather where we managed a day hiking up Diamond Head and spending a day out at the Polynesian Culture Center. Nothing pleased me more then to see how happy she was watching the hula dancers and hearing her stumble her way through saying some of the Hawaiian words.

Yeah, it rained a LOT these past 2 weeks. Some parts of the island we had 22' of rain in just 7 days. I think they declared some parts of the island a disaster.... how's that? We haven't had rain like that in over a decade and the weeks my honey is here we practically have to swim to get around town. /sigh. DAMN YOU WEATHER GODS!!!

I'm a lucky man though. Now I'll just have to spend the next 48 hours left of my vacation coming down from the clouds to be back to reality.... thinking ahead to my next trip up to Hong Kong!