I’m so tired of waking up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night and realizing that I don’t see how I’m going to pay my taxes or next month’s bills.

I love my work.  I mean specifically my role as a software trainer in law firms.  I’m paid splendidly, I’m treated like a movie star, I get to travel, and, well, I’m damn good at it.

Four full days of this work is enough to pay my exhorbitant rent.  Seven days of work a month will easily pay all my bills and keep me in groceries.

I also love my life:  my apartment, my neighborhood, my lifestyle (which is NOT fancy . . . I just live in an expensive city!)

The only problem is:  I don’t get enough of it!! This is no one’s fault; I love working with the folks who book me.  And I don’t need to work a LOT more.  I just need to work a LITTLE more.

Since I have no control over the legal work that comes my way, I need to have a realistic supplemental way of making money.  Ideally by doing something sitting at my computer. 

Here are some of my current ideas:

1.  Investigate medical software training (I have a good lead for this).

2.  Write questions for game shows.  This is not as far-fetched as it sounds, since I’m actually highly qualified to do this.  Plus I have a connection or two in the industry.

3.  More computer tutoring?  (Cringe.  I really don’t enjoy doing this, plus it’s a lot of driving for not very much money.)

4.  Medical Records.  I’m hot and cold on this idea.  I think it might take more training than I’d like, and I’m not sure I could do it at home on my own time.

Dear Reader, I’m placing this problem in YOUR capable hands.  What do YOU think I should do to shore up my income?

One rule:  No suggestions can include me becoming a full-time employee.  I simply cannot do this.  It nearly killed me the one time I tried to do it.  And when I say nearly killed me, I am being quite literal.

Say you’re walking onto the set of a new game show and the host is someone you’ve never heard of.  Here’s how to pick him out from the crowd milling about the bagel table:  He’s the best looking person in the room.  That’s why he’s the host.  If the show accidentally hired a gaffer who was better looking than the host, then either the gaffer or the host would have to be fired.

For generations, Westerners referred to the lands and people of the Far East of Asia as “Oriental.”  This term meant nothing more than the opposite of “occidental.”  Oriental means east.  Occidental means west.  Nothing more than that.

Somewhere along the way it was decided by the PC gurus that “Oriental” was somehow offensive.  I still haven’t quite figured out why.  What is racist about a direction?

But no one can fight the intertia of PC, I guess.  My problem lies with the term which was chosen to replace “Oriental.”

You know the word I mean.  Asian.  It has become a very hip word.

The trouble is, it’s not nearly specific enough.  People who use the word “Asian” to describe a person do not mean to say that this person is from the continent of Asia generally.  They mean that the person is from the far eastern Pacific Rim of Asia.

Guess what?  Pakistanis are Asian. So are Iraqis.  So are Indians and Israelis.  All Asian.  But you never hear someone from Iran or Lebanon described as Asian, even though they are just as Asian as someone from Vietnam.

So either give us back Oriental, or come up with a better term than “Asian, ” if you don’t really mean “Asian.”

I’d suggest use of the term “Pacific Rim, ” but of course that sounds way too much like a gay porno title.

Okay, I’ve HAD it with the rampant and inexcusable mispronouciation of these two words!!

Listen carefully. You won’t believe how often the words “photographer” and “familiar” are pronounced as if their first syllables end in the letter “r”.

This must stop immediately.

Carry on.

In general, you are not allowed to feel sorry for rich people.  There are a very few exceptions to this rule.  One of which is dead children.  Especially suicides.  You are allowed to feel sorry for Mary Tyler Moore and Gloria Vanderbilt but ONLY because of their suicidal children.

 Any questions?