I need advice

The past week has put me in a funk.  The kids, our finances, the damn drought...they've all conspired to make me a grouch.  So Monday night, I headed to the movies all by myself, Peggy Olson style (although I was doing it more than a decade ago before Mad Men was around to inspire me).  I used to go solo all the time to the movies--it's relaxing to be quiet for awhile, soaking in a story.  Sunday mornings are best, but Monday night was pretty tame, too.  I saw The Avengers and learned a few things:

1) Chris Hemsworth is perfectly cast as a god.  Loved him in Thor, and again in this flick.  Per usual, I'm asking myself why I can't be Natalie Portman, but I think we all know I'd be the chunky sidekick anyway.

2) I am really glad I don't live in NYC or any other big target for aliens.  Kansas City wouldn't be on most aliens' radar, except for maybe the most savvy who'd realize that the bbq really is that good. Of course, perhaps I'd rather my city be destroyed by a giant fishy monster thingie than survive and be enslaved and forced to mine dilithium crystals.

3) I don't actually hate Samuel L. Jackson as much as I thought.  I almost liked him in this movie!

Random squash photo.  Pretty, isn't it?

But all of this is a completely unrelated introduction to my post for today (it's my blog, so I can do it any which way I want, right?  Preferably with orangutans named Clyde, but that's not always possible).

I would like your advice.

I know, weird coming from someone who dishes it out so easily.

I have written a non-fiction e-book.  And I have no idea how to price it.  E-books are priced so inconsistently that this is not an easy task.  I recently bought one for 99 cents to see what I'd get at that price and not only did it consist of regurgitated blog posts, but it was also not very much substance.  I've spent five times that amount for disappointing content, and I've bought $2 books that were awesome.  One e-book I read a few months ago wasn't even that great or ground-breaking, but the writer has sold a few thousand copies at almost $10 a piece!

My book: 98% of the content is completely original, never seen before by my readers, so I'm not recycling anything from the blog except for maybe a couple of anecdotes.  I had briefly considered working in some essays and testimonials from others, but decided to stick with my own writing.  The subject matter?  Generally speaking, it's about motherhood and being home with the kids, so kind of a niche market. It falls under self-help (as much as it pains me to use that phrase, it works).

It's looking to be between 125 and 150 pages, perhaps more (haven't converted it yet).  I'll offer it in as many formats as I can.  The book is still in the editing stage, but I'm hoping to wrap things up soon.  


So any advice? I've thought about offering it for free as a gift to the universe or as high as $1Million since it took a long time to write this thing. Neither of those seem appropriate, so I'm open to ideas.  Feel free to comment here or send me a private message at starr@thekiefercottage.com


PS I have not gotten any good spam or rants recently.  You guys, those brighten my day!!

What color is my bathroom?

I can answer that question easily. My bathroom is pink.  But really, that is not the question I'm asking. I'm really asking, What color would my bathroom be if I ruled the world and had a bottomless budget?  Or better yet,  What do I wanna be when I grow up?


Bathrooms aside, I should say that I've been a teacher for most of my career.  I enlightened spring-breakers on the brewing process at Coors in Golden, CO; taught CPR in Columbus, GA; trained bankers on a proprietary credit processing system all over the country and in the great land of Canada (Please, I swear I am NOT trying to steal Canadian jobs, Mr. passport control man.  Ugh, a probe? Again??)


But I've often wondered what I should be.  Could I have hidden talents beyond being a know-it-all with delusions of grandeur?  Ryan told me recently that he took the ASVAB in high school. He scored so well that the Navy hounded him for years because his custodial engineering skills were out of this world. They were desperate to fill their shortage of deck swabs.  It's okay, though, that he skipped out on the armed services, because he's busy swabbing my deck.

No, really, he's outside with a mop as we speak.

Anyway, I have never taken such a test.  So, of course, I have no idea what my talents are (wink, wink).  Or I should say, I *had* no idea before I bought Discover What You're Best At: A Complete Career System Lets You Test Yourself To Discover your Own True Career Abilities by Linda Gale.  By taking such a test, you won't learn what you enjoy. You'll learn what you're actually good at doing.  Those two things might not match up.

So I took the test. It took about two hours.  From best to worst, here's how I ranked:

Logic
Numerical
Business
Social
Mechanical
Clerical

The book then puts the results in clusters and makes recommendations for career choices.  It was a bit difficult to make my clusters because my scores were very similar, but I managed to narrow things down to BLN (business, logic, numerical) and LNS (logic, numerical, social).

I'll just give you the highlights for recommended careers for LNS people:
1) Geriatric Nurse (am I old enough to be considered geriatric?)
2) Physician (and about 20 variations of this, including Cardiovascular Physician and Naturopath)
3) Probate Lawyer

For BLN:
1) Accountant
2) Silviculturist (apparently, these people care for trees in nurseries)
3) Probate Lawyer

You'd think I should be a probate lawyer, right?  Or maybe a geriatric probate lawyer?

But one recommendation stood out in particular:

Accounting Teacher.

Well, that was almost exactly my last job. I trained the Accounting system to accountants and bankers; it looks like my old job was a perfect match for my skills.  But then Ryan was offered a great job here in Kansas City, and I had to say a sad goodbye.

So next time you don't like something I've done in my house, just remember that I should've been a probate lawyer, NOT a designer.