Scott Fillmer

This is a followup, and part 2 of a 4 part series, on the work at home factory job of today (read part 1, The Work at Home Job Scam, the New Factory.  This post deals with the freelance job market, the upcoming posts will deal with the call center jobs and Internet evaluator or website annotator jobs.  Keep in mind the term “freelance” encompasses a huge genre of work from photography to writing to virtual assistant to anything you can find on Craigslist in the job area.  The scope of this post is really just dealing with Elance and the Elance alternatives.

Elance is the biggest player in the Internet freelance job area.  After paying for their premium service for 2-3 years, and trying over and over for years to find a good flow of freelance jobs, I found exactly one decent hard working person who hired me to do some ‘Internet research” for $10/hr, which over a period of 6 months has earned me $85.  I still do work for him, he is trying to build his business, and he pays higher than most at $10/hr, but after almost three years, I have found nothing legitimate and it cost me $14.99/month ($450) for revenues totalling $80.

I am not here to say Elance or the others are scams (although there are posting scams all over the place), I am just trying to point out the value of your time and what it is worth.

There are plenty of alternatives to Elance like oDesk, Guru, Rentacoder, Scriptlance, Mturk, Freelancer, Getacoder, and some of my observations from sites like these are:

• there are always tons of jobs available
• Elance at least has it down to a science as far as pay and project organization
• you are competing with an endless supply of workers from India who charge $1/hr (yes, on average your competition will charge $1-2 PER HOUR)
• you have to work literally for nothing to get started by taking projects that will pay $50 for 30 hours of work
• you are competing with noobs and people who have no idea how to run a legitamate business who will do anything for nothing, though their work is often very low quality, something you can easily overcome
• quality is not valued as a whole… I have found the large majority of listings on these sites are looking for the cheapest possible outcome, with no regards for quality work
• and of course, there are tons of scams everywhere you look, offers for work that will have your ISP ban your service, have eBay shut down your account, or worse… some offers might reward you with a federal search warrant and your computer equipment confiscated

Of course not all freelance work is like this, but I know of many people, who live and work within the U.S. and have to pay expenses associated with living in this country, not India.  You can only work for nothing for so long, eventually you have to either cut all expenses (not realistic) or have some revenue.

I have basically worked freelance as a photographer for more than 15 years and the key is to slowly build a client base that will recommend your work to others.  It is slow, tedious, and doesn’t pay well, but it’s far better in the long run than the results from these sites listed above.

Do yourself a favor in the long run. If you are interested in doing freelance work, treat your business like you would any other entrepreneurial endeavor by looking at some of the basics. For what it’s worth, my list also includes ::

1. Don’t quit your revenue stream (job) until you are established
2. Determine what unique skill or art you are going to freelance (what’s your market)
3. Be prepared not to make any money early on, but even so, stay away from the sites above
4. Pursue your passion, not a position
5. Know that trying to monetizing your passion may destroy it or at least significantly change it
6. Seeking alternative “positions” in that industry may also destroy your passion
7. Seek out others who are doing the same thing and try to learn as much as you can from them
8. Working more hours will not always equal better results
9. Trying to integrate your passion into #1 above (results may vary)
10. If you can mentally live without a steady paycheck, a 401(k), a retirement package, and stability, forget about #1 and pursue your passion instead of the culturally accepted “American Dream” but when you struggle to find your way, re-read #3, then, as Buffett would say, breathe in, breathe out, and move on.  My wife and I went over 15 years without a single paycheck (the W-2 type) and I still managed to eat.

Have you had any experience with Elance or any of the other sites listed above?  In my experience most, if not all, of these sites way over promise and way under-deliver for those with quality, experience, and education in their field.  I would love to hear if you have had any success with any of them in your freelance pursuits.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• The Work at Home Job Scam, the New Factory
• Testing Out Freelance Work With Elance
• Linchpin and the Art of Photography
• Are You a Linchpin, Assignment
• How I Can Save Your Business Money

It costs me $20-$30 per hour worked to have a work at home job.  Working from home is totally different, I am talking about a specific classification of job, the work at home job. The job that targets those who want to spend more time with their family, not waste half their life in traffic, the homeschool mom, the out of work in between work individual.

Notice I didn’t say it made me x-amount of money, but it has cost me x-amount of money.  That is the difference between today’s standard work at home job and one you have to actually drive to get to, between $20-$30 per hour less even though today, most jobs can be done from anywhere.

If you are looking for the newest in sweat shop factory work (and there are tons of people who are), you won’t find it at the local tire or car plant. No way, their union wages are far too high ($50-$75/hr) to compare with these jobs.  The new factory work in our culture today is the work at home job.  After owning my own business for 15-20 years (and running it from my own home no less) I never understood the extent of the work at home scam until I started looking for one of these great jobs.  I figured that there was some company that could see the value in hiring me, a Linchpin, to work from my home office, but after 2-3 years of searching, and working, now I’m not so sure.

I will review a few companies and positions in a series of upcoming posts for those who are still looking since every time I came across one of these positions, I had to find a decent review about the company (look at forums and sites like WAHM, JobVent or GlassDoor.com) to find out if it was an actual scam or not.  Most were not scams in the technical sense of the word, but I am amazed at what conditions we are now willing to accept just so we can have a work at home job (there is a huge difference in working from home and work at home).

Most of these jobs pay under $10 per hour (many well under, like $5-7/hr) and in the U.S. you will be lucky to cover your home office expenses for that. Generally you are required to put in a specific volume of tasks per hour, calls per hour or however they rate you, and always follow the manual, map, guide, instructions with no deviation.  Most hire you as contract labor so they don’t have to pay taxes, worry about law suits, pay for training, or pay for any benefits whatsoever.

The difference that makes one job an actual scam, or at least a big clue, and the other job not a scam is if they require you to pay them for the job.  Most of these work at home jobs don’t go that far into the true scam world, they are factories of course, not scams. They do go as far as paying you by the minute, requiring you to incorporate, and require you to take “tests” to become qualified, and they don’t pay for your training.  These “tests” are in essence the very work of the job, work you do for free because it is part of the “interview” (I took a 10-15 hour “test” to “qualify” and later realized that I was doing their actual work, unpaid of course).

In each site or company I list in my upcoming posts I am only showing the most obvious match, and those I have direct experience with in the past.  Under the surface there are tons of companies all doing the same thing, looking for the cheapest most expendable warm body, but I know for some, any job is better than no job, and I totally understand that.

The list could be endless.  You have freelance work, call center (centre) jobs, tech support, customer service, programming, search engine evaluators, data entry and so on. In these three upcoming posts I will highlight the three areas I have looked at the most, freelance, call center, and search engine evaluator (or annotator, search engine technician, ads quality rater, etc).  For those of you who are looking for a meaningful job where you can add value to the company, I have an exahustive list of who to avoid, but I would love to hear from you too.  Good luck in your search.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• The Work at Home Job Scam, the Freelance Job
• How I Can Save Your Business Money
• Top 5 Tips to Help Your Job Search in this Economy
• We are No Longer Amazon Marketplace Sellers
• Linchpin and the Art of Photography

This week I was given a seemingly easy assignment. To answer the question; are you a Linchpin, and if yes, why? If you are familiar with the phrase that Seth Godin has made into a coined term at this point, the immediate answer to that question is easy, yes, of course. But the longer I thought about the second part of the question the more I got knotted up into a self debate of what exactly is a Linchpin before I could determine the why of the yes or no.

In short, a Linchpin is the irreplaceable person. You might say that in today’s culture and business market, there is no such thing as a person who can’t be easily replaced.  For a large percentage of the workforce, this is probably the case, but the key to that statement is “easily” replaced.  Many jobs today are just mental factory workers, plug and play, just take out person A and replace them with person B and in a short period of time, no one will notice the difference, certainly not the balance sheet.  It’s all about the value that each warm body adds to the factory by following the manual or map for each task.

The factory workers today are programmers, accountants, customer service reps, students (all positions I have done in the past), any position that can be given a set of procedures, required to then follow them without any thinking or creativity required, expected, or desired, to complete their task.

A Linchpin on the other hand is someone who creates spurts of enormous value to the company or organization by doing those tasks that can’t be written down in a manual because they require art, the art of thinking, the art of challenging the status-quo, the art of being a problem solver or troubleshooter, a person who is hard to replace in a replaceable world.

How about it, are you a Linchpin, and if so, why? I’m still thinking about it myself but I’ll let you know next week.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• Confessions of a Pastor by Craig Groeschel // Catalyst Photos
• Review of Killing Cockroaches and Other Scattered Musings
• Tribes, We Need You To Lead Us by Seth Godin // Review
• Are You a Linchpin, Answer
• Linchpin and the Art of Photography

Some of you may or may not know that I have been looking for a good job match in a full time IT related field for about 3-4 years now (yes I said years). So far, it has been one of the most frustrating ongoing experiences I have had in business.  I have been denied a lowly $7-9/hour job to work out of my home office because I had too much experience, and have turned down a $60,000 job because it wasn’t a good match between my personality and their culture.  There is nothing easy about finding a good career match any more, and I have a lot to offer a company.  Almost 20 years of business experience, education, flexibility, a low required salary, and a willingness to travel.  See also my post Top 5 Tips to Help Your Job Search.

How I Can Save Your Business Money

What is astonishing to me, is how many potential employers will not look at the possibility of having a professional (and I mean that in every sense of the word) work out of their home office when the typical IT job really doesn’t require a physical presence in an office, or anywhere for that matter.  I understand some do, and that’s fine, but not all by any stretch.

It’s simple math.  If I can be hired to do a job in a middle-income American city for $50,000, which requires me to move, I can do the exact same job from my home office for $40,000.  That’s $10,000 a year in payroll expenses your company doesn’t have to pay.  Computer equipment they don’t have to buy, phones, office space, parking, gas, and food that doesn’t have to be purchased.  If your company has a tight budget and really needs to control expenses, why ignore this potential savings?

My Office is Better Equipped Than Most Office Buildings

How old is your office equipment? What tools are you missing to get your job done in an effective and efficient manner?

I have 4 different phone lines/numbers I can use including a landline, cellular, and VoIP.  A network of 5-6 computers (PC and MAC), laptops, desktops, mobiles devices, a reliable 6M high speed DSL line, 10 TB of data storage (yes Tera), data backups, and my office is even wired for a 20KW backup generator in case of power failure with 250 gallons of propane on site.  I am probably better equipped and better prepared than the standard office building in middle America.

With that said, I have no problem going out of city or state for the right position, it will just cost everyone more money.

What Comes Around (To Get Down, Timo Maas)

This week I had a few different conversations with potential employers, some very promising.  One of these companies was so unique in the way they required applicants to submit information I decided to go the extra mile and respond to their creativeness with creativity by making a portfolio video.  Videos like this are nothing new but I made it specifically for them for an added personal touch.

Below is the video, (with the names removed to protect the innocent of course), but if you are one of those out there looking for a job, don’t just do the exact same thing that all the other applicants do, that accomplishes nothing but allowing yourself to blend in.  Be creative, stand out, showcase your skills.  Not all employers will appreciate this approach for sure, but a company looking for a Linchpin instead of a door knob will.

See the full size version of The Portfolio Project here.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• Top 5 Tips to Help Your Job Search in this Economy
• The Work at Home Job Scam, the New Factory
• How a Church Communicates in a Generation Gap
• We are No Longer Amazon Marketplace Sellers
• The 5 Most Useful Twitter Apps and Clients

In my ongoing pursuit of the perfect full time employer I have compiled more information than I could possibly have imagined a few years ago.  I could probably write an HR book called HR, the Good the Bad, the Ugly but I am sure someone else has beat me to it.  After writing a post about a recent interview I decided to put down a few quick tips I learned just in case someone else out there is also looking for that perfect match.

The Match-Making Job Market of 2010 Is Fluid

Today is a different market than even just five years ago.  Potential employers are doing more with less, and are in no hurry to bring on a new hire that may or may not be an exact match with the company’s existing culture.  As a potential employee, I am also just as picky when it comes to looking at a potential employer.  I don’t just want any job, I want a good match, but in 2010 it’s more like online dating or match-making than job hunting.  Don’t just automatically jump on the first offer, really look at what kind of match you are with the company culture, business model, and their clients.

Flooding the Market with Resumes Doesn’t Work, Be Creative

I have sent in hundreds of resumes, made countless followup calls, gone out of my way to not be in the way when needed, met tons of new people, offered to move to all over California (my native land), Texas, Florida (wife’s preference), New York, Wisconsin, Montana (those two were a stretch), Georgia, Virginia, and Kentucky.  Yet, it’s the end of another week of meeting new people, making new connections, learning new companies, and waiting.  One thing I have learned, flooding the market with resumes doesn’t work.

If you want to be seen, you need to do something creative and unique.  Don’t just do the same old thing that everyone else does, that doesn’t do any good at all.  Find a unique way to stand out to the HR person or hiring manager.  For an example of what I did this week see this video I did for How I Can Save Your Business Money.

Become a Major League Scout in Your Search

You need to seek out new prospects like a scout looks at potential minor league players.  Traditional job sites like Monster have been almost worthless to me.  Today, employers will post on Facebook, Twitter, blogs, craigslist, and on their own websites.  Where are the creative companies posting their new positions?  Don’t limit yourself to finding a great job by only looking on the traditional websites.

Do Your Own Research, Don’t Just Skim the Surface

When you do get an Interview, phone or otherwise, do you know more about the company than the HR person?  Impossible?  Not at all, and many times I have known far more about the details of a company than even their own employees do.  Do your own research, and dig deep.  A good example is to look at the company on LinkedIn.  Look at their current employees on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook (are they happy with their job), their former employees (why did they leave, where are they now), and all the associated websites you can find.

Keep in mind your potential employer is doing the same research on you.  Don’t give them a stupid reason like a photo on Facebook to hire someone else.

Don’t Try To Hide, Control Your Internet Footprint

If you are on Facebook and you hide your account from a potential employer they will probably wonder what you are trying to hide, and if there is good reason, perhaps fixing that first would be a good idea.  I have created a one stop shop on Google where potential employers could find out every thing there is to know about me (http://www.scottfillmer.me), professionally and personally, and from there they can find their website of choice without having to give them 10 different places to look.  You can still be publically seen and control your private information, just use common sense.

What are your favorite job search tips?

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• How I Can Save Your Business Money
• The Work at Home Job Scam, the New Factory
• How a Church Communicates in a Generation Gap
• We are No Longer Amazon Marketplace Sellers
• The 5 Most Useful Twitter Apps and Clients

I would say I hate getting sick, but so does everyone.  I haven’t been sick to the point where I felt like I needed to stay home from work (or refrain from work, these days you can work from anywhere) for years.  I say years because I really can’t remember the last time I didn’t feel well enough to go to work, until yesterday.  It really only lasted a few hours in the morning and then the rest of the day was semi-productive but it got me thinking about what a waste of time it is to be sick, or is it God’s way of forcing us to slow down.

Being sick always seemed like a waste of time to me.  All of a sudden you are sitting at home with time (which seems to be manufactured from some where, because if you weren’t sick you wouldn’t have the time) to do just about anything, except you can’t or don’t do anything because… you are sick.

Time to stop and smell the flowers so to speak.  In a few weeks this part of the country will be in full bloom of Spring.  The photo above is one of our very early bloomers in the front yard, and a reminder that one of the most beautiful times of year in the south is on its way, if we stop and take the time to look.

10 Things That Being Sick Brings to Mind

1. we are not in charge
2. those of us in generally good health often take it for granted, until we get sick
3. we have time, we just don’t make time
4. you take pleasure in little things, like silence
5. a cloudy rainy day is a great time to be sick
6. no one wants to be around you
7. your spouse is the greatest person ever
8. nothing tastes good
9. daytime programing hasn’t changed and the news is still annoying
10. the work you did’t get done, probably didn’t need to be done that day anyway

Of course this comes from being sick where I couldn’t move or do anything for about half a day.  If I was laid up for several days in a row I am not sure what in the world I would do with myself.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• We are No Longer Amazon Marketplace Sellers
• Welcome to Our Living Room // Friday Feet
• How is Your Simple Christmas Going :: Friday Feet
• Well It’s Full Speed Baby in the Wrong Direction
• Installing a Ham Discone Radio Antenna on the Roof

It’s official, we are no longer selling books on Amazon.  For those of you who didn’t know, we have been selling books on Amazon in the Amazon Marketplace (those are the used and new books you see when Amazon is sold out or when you just want to buy the same book Amazon sells for $39.99 for $.01) for years.  Yesterday we sold all our remaining inventory, some 4,000 used/new books in one large bulk sale to a buyer in Texas.  For Deb and I, the books had become (as Andy Stanley put it last week) the old sofa that no one wants to get rid of because it has always been there.

We started selling book on Amazon at the same time we were full time eBay sellers (eBay lost out as a viable place to sell as a business long long before Amazon) back in 2005, and sold full time on Amazon in 2006-2008, and it was some of the hardest work, most laborious, and in the end least profit making work I can ever recall doing in my life.  It came at a time when Deb and I needed to work from home, needed and wanted to work together, and many blessings came our way over those years of selling books online.

Over our selling life on Amazon, we sold over 9,000 books at a retail price of $65,000 (that’s not as much as it sounds when you divide by 3 years and then start thinking profit margins), kept a high feedback rating, and learned a lot about hard work and to appreciate what we were given.  Not much different than what we gained and learned from our previous businesses we started and ran together, except that this particular one took over our entire house top to bottom.

After running several small businesses over the past 10-12 years I have come to understand that each business or product has a defined life cycle, especially when you are running very small self made businesses.  Products come in and out, jobs, customers, and life in general, has a lifespan or timeframe where some things work well.  The key is to know when it is time to move on and get rid of the old sofa.  For the books, yesterday was that day, and we were both thrilled.  There were many many reasons, but knowing it was indeed the right time to let it go was a good feeling.

Anyone that wants to know the inner workings of selling on eBay or Amazon feel free to drop me an email.  Combined I think we have about 12-15 years experience selling on both platforms and we lived and breathed eBay and Amazon, so we do know our way around.  We certainly know how to get in trouble with big brother, and how to survive when the rules get changed (and they always do).

Our online selling life was great, and really is always something we think about no matter what we are working on or doing.  In those years, we managed to:

• work together 24/7, netting 20,800 more hours spent together
• fought off fraud
• and copyright infringement issues
• fended off domain landsharks
• had $300,000 in sales without making a profit
• sold alongside corrupt competition
• continually fought customer theft
• avoided a few lawsuits
• didn’t sue a few times when we could have
• were falsely accused of anything and everything
• Witnessed to many (I hope)
• were praised and awarded
• ridiculed
• made some great friendships
• ate at a huge unknown number of restaurants
• filed for our own patents and trademarks
• never clocked in once
• travel to every state in the country
• live in a bus, apartment, house, tent, campground
• lived in Nevada, North Carolina, Florida, Texas, Alabama (and many others)
• filled approximately 250,000 orders
• counted approximately 2 million crystals
• imported products from Austria
• invented our own products
• worked for a competitor
• took 50,000 product images
• went through about 30 computers
• used miles and miles of tape, boxes, and packaging
• cried, laughed, bled, and cherished every second

Thankfully for us, now, we have both moved on to a new chapter in our lives together and it doesn’t look like there will be much online selling involved, and that’s a good thing, because I am exahusted.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• Boxes of Books for Amazon and Charity
• DK at Work Listing Books on Amazon
• We Are Officially Amazon Book Sellers Now that We Have Inventory
• We Now Have a House Filled With Nothing But Books
• Anyone need a book? We Recieve a Huge Book Delivery Today

This was a different kind of Friday for Friday Feet this week.  If you are new to reading this blog, each Friday I do a post called Friday Feet which is just a photo “feet” shot that is where we happen to be on Friday.  If you are married you know the importance of spending some time together and after a busy week, Friday is usually our day.

This week we had plans to go to Panama City Beach (our last trip down there was on our motorcycles in September 2006) for this particular Friday but as things go in life, it was not meant to be this week.  It ended up being very cold down here this week (and today), and the timing just didn’t work out for us to go.  So today, we just spent the day at home in the living room working on our computers together and we thought we would just go out for a nice dinner together on Friday night.

The day spent in the living room together worked out great, nice to take a day and stay home, but we perhaps never should have left the house.  We ended up going to three different restaurants before we found one that had less than a 40 minute wait and it was our last choice of any place to eat between Columbus Georgia and our house, which would be Phenix City Alabama (yes that is spelled correctly for those not from around here, that’s how we spell in Alabama), not really known for all it’s great eateries, sorry).

We make the trek over to Columbus GA probably once a month so Deb and go to a few fabric stores that are not in Auburn.  Each time we go, we try to remember not to go back because of the traffic and crowds.  With the military base so close by (which is a good thing) the city seems to be so overcrowded at the main shopping centers.  So in a huge shopping center which houses a Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart, Lowes, Barnes & Noble, Circuit City (right now), Bed Bath and Beyond, Movie Theater and a lot more big box stores and tons of restaurants, to eat is a 40 minute wait (outside in the freezing cold).

We went over to Wal-Mart and picked up something for our favorite Superman in Birmingham (that is just in there to see if he reads my blog) and made our way over to Phenix City to eat.  For some reason this restaurant was loaded with Bama paraphernalia so the first shot was for my favorite Bama fan (anyone want to take a guess where that shot was taken).  On a side note, if you have a restaurant in the Auburn / Opelika area and would like someone to do a review for you, let me know, we love to eat, write, and review.

Never under estimate the greatness of spending the day at home with your wife and never leaving the house.  We did this for probably 10 years straight, so I have some experience in that area, but as a friend of mine put it, sometimes a day at home is a very good thing.

All that to say, welcome to our living room.  The feet shot was a vague attempt to sort of re-create a photo my grandfather took of himself (see Son of a Son of a Photographer?) that he took in 1938.  I am sort of always trying to recreate that image in my mind but with 71 years difference in the photos there isn’t much other than perhaps the position that remains the same.  The photo still fascinates me and it didn’t need a bunch of blabbering text like this to tell a story.

Winter is a strange thing down here.  It never really gets a strong hold like it does in the north so we fluctuate between humid storms in the 50-60* and like it is today and tonight, freezing in the 30′s.  Even so, the winter would be unbearable to warm loving people without our Lopi (see photo) wood burning stove that keeps it in the tropical range all winter.

In case you were wondering, after being in this house three years we have finally moved the lawn furniture out of the living room and that macbook on the oversized chair across the room is Deb and Ebby’s place (Blazer and I get the other side of the room away from the fireplace).  Some days I still feel like we are moving in with boxes everywhere (literally) because of the last remaining remnants of our book business that takes up the entire garage, but it is getting better each week.  When Deb starts her classes up again in March all will be gone and cleaned out.

Far more than I am sure any of you care to know but there you go, a mostly uneventful Friday Feet but in my usual long worded way.  If any of you do your own Friday Feet post on your blog please let me know so I can link over to you.  Have a good weekend everyone.

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• Cold Day of Code and Godin’s Tribes :: Friday Feet
• A Texas Roadhouse Dinner and a Movie :: Friday Feet
• Good Friday Tornadoes with Minor Tree Damage :: Friday Feet
• Getting Sick is a Waste of Time, Or is It?
• In the Middle of the Road’s Yellow Line :: Friday Feet

Today was supposed to be a day off but it was so cold outside today that I ended up just looking at code all day long (which was better than going outside).  So I took my friday feet photo today of what I had planned on doing today, sitting back and reading a book.  That didn’t happen but I was able to get moving on a few blogs and website development projects (the shoes in the pic are just for effect since each week I am wearing the same shoes).

I am in the middle of reading two books right now, Tribes and Unleashing The Idea Virus, both written by Seth Godin (his blog).  Some how I ended up reading both of these books at the same time.  Unleashing The Idea Virus was written first and Tribes is making more sense after reading some of Idea Virus.  I will be posting a review of one or both once I get through reading them, but so far they are both excellent.

I am about to finish my first two full months at the church and now I am really starting to get into the grit of my position.  Once the new website is launched over the next week or two it will really be a start to what I hope is going to be a strong Internet presence in the months and years to come for the church.  I am really excited about how it is starting to come together, and today I spent a good bit of time getting to know the code a little better.

After looking at coding for about 12 hours Deb and I went out to eat at a (very) local restraunt called Good ‘Ol Boys.  Tomorrow the Auburn Basketball team takes on Vandy in the next SEC matchup for the Tigers.  Doesn’t look like it is going to be any warmer, some are actually calling for snow on Monday night, yikes.

Other Posts Related to this Topic

• Welcome to Our Living Room // Friday Feet
• In the Middle of the Road’s Yellow Line :: Friday Feet
• Dinner at Locos Grill in Auburn :: Friday Feet
• Busy Week Ends with Smokey Bones BBQ :: Friday Feet
• A Texas Roadhouse Dinner and a Movie :: Friday Feet

I love the title to this book, it is so accurate to the way I think sometimes.  I want to dive in head first in the deep end from the 50 meter platform and forget that once you get to the bottom, you actually have to swim back up to the surface to breathe.  It is 3pm and somehow, I am about the only one left here, and now I am starting to get some productive work done (except right at this very second of course).

I have officially been here for about two months now and I can’t think of any place else I would want to get in the car and drive to work in the mornings.  Although I have been in the work force for 15+ years now, I feel like a baby when it comes to “ministry’ work, but am learning at a crash course pace.  It is quiet at times and panic stricken at others.  This job is totally different than anything I have done before and I am loving the chance to learn so much about the bride of Christ, and most of that is getting to know the people here and across the Internet that make up the church body.

[INSERT 2 CRAZY HOURS HERE]

…and boom… just like that a quiet afternoon went into a totally different environment.  Maybe that’s why I like it, it is always changing and always challenges to meet.

What I love about this book title is the tag line that goes with it.

how God uses ordinary people to do extraordinary things

There is nothing extraordinary about anything I do when compared to what skills and talents other people have been given as well.  We have each been given our specific skills and talents by God (someone told me yesterday their’s was sarcasm), but there will always be someone who is more talented in the same areas, and someone less talented in those same areas than I am.  All throughout the Bible God used regular ordinary people to do His work, Moses being the all time great example.

I work with some great, talented, ordinary people, that are determinied to do God’s work as best as they possibly can, and I love that.

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