So Now What?

Go find a corner to cry? Seems like a pretty good option though it won't solve anything. I'm trying to remain hopeful, but...

I still have a little key work in the shop and supposedly another four sets arriving - sometime - maybe. I hate that part. Techs call or email and say, "I'll be sending you some keys." Then I wait and wait with no idea when or if they will actually arrive. Sometimes the techs send stuff right away, sometimes they dilly-dally around for a week or two, and other times the job never materializes and they don't bother to let me know. And here I sit.

This past week I had five local business calls. 2 were folks looking to sell their pianos, 2 were price shoppers for tunings that were still "checking around". Either they can't afford a tuning no matter who they talk to or the other tech on the island is charging significantly less than me. I have no way to know. Nor do I have a clever way to find out WHAT he's charging. 1 call was for service on a Pianomation system. I don't do that.

There's a new book group starting at our library. It's the Music Book Group. "Cool, " I thought. The first book to be discussed (on Jan 25) is The Piano Shop on the Left Bank. I read that about 8 years ago, when it first came out. After reading this announcement in the upcoming events in the newspaper, I made a note to attend. I even decided to sign the book out again and refresh my memory on it. A good chance to increase my visibility, right? There was another blurb in the paper, today. Seems the event is co-sponsored by the library and the big music venture in town. I'm not mentioning specifics on that name as I don't want this post to show up in a search on the venue's name. Longtime readers and local readers will know to which music venture I'm referring. Anyway, in the blurb today, it was noted that piano tech Ms. MiddleC would be a special guest. Yeah, yeah, Ms. MiddleC is THE tech for said music venue. We'll just ignore the fact that she's not A LOCAL PIANO TECH. I don't care the least that she is in charge of said venue's piano. It's fine with me. I'm confident she is a more than capable tech. I just feel totally non-existent. Would have been nice for them to acknowledge that I live and work in this town. Well, I'm attending anyway. It will come under the heading of Shameless Self Promotion with Style.

Other than that, there has been at least one piece of really disturbing news. I'm not going to go in to any details at this point. I'm sort of waiting to see what pans out and hoping it will be good before writing about it here. Also there are a few who are trying to 'help' when all the details aren't available to them and it's becoming problematic. Nuff said for now on both.

The countdown is underway for 'A' going to have her lower wisdom teeth extracted. Jan. 28 is the day. I think I'm dreading it more than her. She doesn't 'deal' well and already her behavior is reflecting her 'dealing' problem.

I spent today working on a set of keys (nearly finished - probably tomorrow) and printing more art notecards for craft fair season. I've painted four more necklace ivories and many more are in the works. I balanced my checkbook. Last month it appeared that I might have a couple hundred more than I thought. I couldn't find any mistakes and decided to wait for this month's statement to see what was up. Unfortunately, that appearance of a couple extra hundred quickly vanished. I may have to finish up the paperwork to apply for temporary food assistance. I hate having to do it, but the government hasn't created a "very small business relief" line. I've never been poorer.

That corner is looking pretty good.