BoldUlysses.com

My back is hurting again, but at least I don’t know it. It’s been hurting for a good half-week now, and I finally broke down and took some ibuprofen this morning. It was sore over the past few days to the point where it was affecting my posture, which I think was probably exacerbating the situation; I’m hopeful the restoration of my posture helped by the lack of pain at the moment will help eliminate the pain long-term. We’ll see.

Good, albeit tiring weekend. I put the rest of the beadboard up the in the kitchen, took the kids to church Sunday morning (Diane wasn’t feeling well) and had a reasonably productive Sunday afternoon and evening. The job I’m doing for my father-in-law requires the use of a tool which happens to be portable, so I brought it home and clamped it to my (awesome) work table in the garage. I’ll be able to put in a lot more hours this week, and get the job done more quickly, which is a big win-win for both Mr Eppley and myself. I’ll be down there tonight, listening to my homeboy on the radio starting at 9 p.m. whilst I crank away. Should be fun.

I’ve had a real hankering lately to play the old games in the Gran Turismo series. I was a huge GT1 and 2 junkie and played most of GT3 before GT4 came out. But when I saw the size and depth of GT4, I decided I didn’t want to spend a month holed up in my house completing the game, which I certainly could have done, so I kind of fell off the horse. This was during flight training in ’05-’06, so I certainly had enough to worry about at that point without getting engrossed in a video game. And I’m still not sure I’m ready for something that immersive, but…I would like to revisit the earlier games. GT1 and 2 at the very least. I remember blasting up Trial Mountain in GT1 with an Impreza WRX…good times.

Bartering services is a tricky thing, I’m finding out. I do Web and graphic design and tutoring on the side to supplement my day job’s income, and recently connected (through my car community) with a pair of guys who run a car restoration outfit and car care products retailer. I e-mailed them asking if they needed help with their websites, since the ones they had up looked pretty bare-bones. I do “cold e-mailing” from time to time and don’t usually get a response, so I was pleased when they wrote back, interested in working out a deal.

They’re relatively cashless, and my car needs a little work here and there, so we’re in the process of working out a deal whereby I provide them Web design services and they tackle a few projects my car’s been needing… But good gravy, it’s hard to come to an agreement.

First of all there needs to be agreement on the value of the services provided. When dealing in cash the process just ends there, since everybody wants money; that’s the advantage of it. But to barter services we both have to be in agreement about the nature of the services provided as compensation, too… And there’s the rub. There’s one thing I want for my car, quite badly: the bumper conversion mentioned a few posts down. And they’re unwilling to tackle it, for a number of reasons. So I’m disappointed about that, and conflicted as well, since I really do want to design their websites—it would give me a chance to “make a name for myself,” as it were, in the car community I frequent, among other things. But I don’t want to sell myself short. I’ve done Web design for quite a while now and know how these things can balloon and spiral out of control.

So we’ll see what happens. The ball’s in their court at the moment. I sent them at e-mail last night relenting from my dogged pursuit of the bumper swap, or at least of having them do it. I hope we can work something out.

Sitting here at work, adding an outer glow to the center graphic of the ARC display to simulate LED lighting, listening to Richard Marx’s “Angelia” on my headphones. I’m on an ’80s pop kick this morning. First Peter Cetera, then Phil Collins, now this.

Saxophone solo!