Saturday, September 16, 2017

Frustrations on catching up


So my frustration and stress levels are piling up. I'm trying to catch up but it's like some unseen forces are trying to stomp me down.

Let's see:

1. Still battling the fatigue. I do manage to stay awake more, it seems, at least I did in the past 10 days or so, but considering everything else that happened, it was rather useless.

2. The whole paperwork I have to deal with for the probate court case I have in Romania. I have an attorney who I think bites more than she can chew and is extremely disorganized. As a result, it's always "we need this paper right now" just a few days before a hearing in Court. And I'm 8,000 miles away. And every piece of paper that I have to send has to be apostilled by the Secretary of State otherwise the Court there doesn't accept it. And every piece of paper is money. That I pretty much don't have, so I have to cut here and cut there. If I could have notice ahead of time to be able to budget... but nooooo. Enter airheaded attorney. Why I still have her as my attorney? Well because I paid her and because I don't have money to go there and hire someone else.

3. My online store (read website) built on an opensource started hiccuping. As a result, I decided to completely remove that platform and use another one. When I tried to do that, suddenly everything went haywire. I spent almost 7 hours last evening and this morning until I was finally able to call the hosting company and discover that "oh well we made some changes to the control panel and still working on updating the links". W. T. actual. F.

4. My recording software - that everybody loved as it made better quality videos - suddenly, after getting past the trial version, and purchasing the license, started hiccuping too. In the most frustrating way. All of a sudden, at one point, the "record/pause/stop" buttons would grey out and I'd have no way to stop recording a video, save it, or close the program otherwise than by force close with task manager. You have no idea how much clay (and time) I wasted because I had to re-do several times videos for tutorials. Because even if I stop in-between the "baking breaks" and start a new recording after the piece is baked and cooled off, if this happens towards the end of me making a piece, I have to start all over and make a new piece because I can't show you how I start with a piece and end with another one, right? I was never able to do things the same one after the other, I'm an artist, not a crafter.
I contacted them. They asked me to provide more information (and every single time I have to go on their website and re-enter the whole story) among which to provide my DxDiag. Ok this will get very technical, but I'll still say it. When I saw that requirement, I immediately thought "you bastards, you are going to try and say that it's my fault and my computer is not powerful enough to handle your crappy software. Good luck with that" as I know my big Stormtrooper is an EIGHT core i-7 3.7 Ghz processor, with humongous memories all over the place (just to not get too technical), a graphics card good for NASA and all that (not boasting, just remnants from my former life before cancer). I reverted the updated driver on my graphics card as the latest version has some glitches, and I was sure that, finding nothing to say, they'll say something about that. And guess what? That is exactly what they did. I replied with the explanation why, and with asking them if they keep at all up to date with the latest developments as they should have known this, and also "I would believe you if I would have gotten this issue when I was still in the trial version - but I didn't. So it's your software that has issues, not my computer". Then gave them an ultimatum to give me a solution or I'll just file a claim with Paypal to get my money back.

5. I said before, the chemo unfortunately robbed me of the capacity I had before to multitask to unbelievable levels. Right now I go through - start working on something/phone rings I need a new paperwork/dog wants out/cat wants food/neighbor at the door asking about something - and there you go I'm all thrown off track and takes me another hour to get back to what I was doing.

There's more. But I'll stop here.

So in a nutshell: I am working on several tutorials at the same time. I got most of the stuff taped and will have to edit. I want to make them of good quality - otherwise I could just tape myself working and talking nonsense but I don't consider that quality tutorials. So, sorry, you'll have to wait for a couple of days until I get the other stuff fixed. Might be Tuesday or might be Wednesday. I don't know. You know at this point I can't make promises.

One thing is for sure. I was cursed with the need for order and quality. I cannot and will not present to you a product (i.e. a tutorial)  that is not of good quality. I will not get off the planned path - to give you an example, when I make tutorials, I always go - one more basic, one more intermediate, one more advanced/master class level, one for my sponsors. I will not get off that path, and no matter of the level or status, everybody deserves the best I can give. I will not sacrifice quality for "fast fast fast" - I am not in the run for subscribers, fame or self-image enhancement. I am and always will be in this to share what I know, to teach, and help people develop and grow as artists.

I hope you can bear with me.

2 comments:

  1. Don't worry about us Day, it takes time to do a thing 'right'. Everyone has hiccups in life that slow down progress. I am sure your followers can wait for 'real life' interruptions. 😊

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    Replies
    1. I hope they can. I'm slowly starting to catch up and I'm happy. Finally the website software is installed, I started populating it. Almost done with the public tutorial (advanced) and getting ready to start the sponsor one. I hope to be at least half done by the time the live event starts.

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