Exploration
Jul. 18th, 2018 08:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
offcntrMy studio is really only about half mine. When we moved in, 18 years ago, we left half of it for storage, metal utility shelves all along one wall, stacked with boxes of miscellany, all numbered and indexed on Denise's laptop. Oh, we had such plans for organizing!
Eighteen years later, some of the boxes are unpacked; many are still there. Added in is a whole bunch of other stuff that just got piled between the back of the work table and the shelves, basically to get it out of my way. More boxes showed up around the periphery, shoved to the side and stacked against the wall. We never seem to manage to find time or energy to deal with them.
But we're finally trying. Denise retired from her service-provider job at Lane Community College at the end of spring term, when her blind student/client graduated, and she's been beginning to tackle some of her boxes in the living room, so I decided to attack three that were definitely mine in the studio.
The top one was labelled Frank's Dresser Top. Lots of easily recyclable stuff: Handouts from my QuickBooks class, and pretty much anything involving the Blair ArtsSpace. The former never turned out useful, as QuickBooks seems designed for businesses that buy wholesale and resell at retail, or possibly provide services, with no cost-of-goods-sold. My business, which manufactures and sells pottery, just doesn't fit their system, as least as of 1998 when I took the class. These days, I just use a hand-rolled Excel spreadsheet. The latter, an ill-fated attempt to build an artists' live/work community that we put a bit over two years into, never came together, and the developer ultimately sold the lot. I think there's a brewery there now.
Other stuff was document and then recycle: The originals to my attempt at a wholesale products catalog (later superseded by my website). Sales tallies from our first Holiday Market, and second year at Saturday Market. A bunch of old newspaper clippings featuring yours truly.
And a few things I don't quite know what to do with, particularly original artwork from our first few years promoting Off Center Ceramics (and Useful Pots, our booth partner). They're lovely things, ink on coated paper or film, and I hate to just toss them, but I don't want to put them in another box.
The second box is way easier: ancient check registers and duplexes. Shred and compost. The bottom box is old tax forms, each with that year's ledger. I think most of them are shred fodder as well, but I'd like to do a little data-mining first, get show sales recorded on a comparison spreadsheet I've been maintaining since I computerized my books in 2008.
Eighteen years later, some of the boxes are unpacked; many are still there. Added in is a whole bunch of other stuff that just got piled between the back of the work table and the shelves, basically to get it out of my way. More boxes showed up around the periphery, shoved to the side and stacked against the wall. We never seem to manage to find time or energy to deal with them.
But we're finally trying. Denise retired from her service-provider job at Lane Community College at the end of spring term, when her blind student/client graduated, and she's been beginning to tackle some of her boxes in the living room, so I decided to attack three that were definitely mine in the studio.
The top one was labelled Frank's Dresser Top. Lots of easily recyclable stuff: Handouts from my QuickBooks class, and pretty much anything involving the Blair ArtsSpace. The former never turned out useful, as QuickBooks seems designed for businesses that buy wholesale and resell at retail, or possibly provide services, with no cost-of-goods-sold. My business, which manufactures and sells pottery, just doesn't fit their system, as least as of 1998 when I took the class. These days, I just use a hand-rolled Excel spreadsheet. The latter, an ill-fated attempt to build an artists' live/work community that we put a bit over two years into, never came together, and the developer ultimately sold the lot. I think there's a brewery there now.
Other stuff was document and then recycle: The originals to my attempt at a wholesale products catalog (later superseded by my website). Sales tallies from our first Holiday Market, and second year at Saturday Market. A bunch of old newspaper clippings featuring yours truly.
And a few things I don't quite know what to do with, particularly original artwork from our first few years promoting Off Center Ceramics (and Useful Pots, our booth partner). They're lovely things, ink on coated paper or film, and I hate to just toss them, but I don't want to put them in another box.
The second box is way easier: ancient check registers and duplexes. Shred and compost. The bottom box is old tax forms, each with that year's ledger. I think most of them are shred fodder as well, but I'd like to do a little data-mining first, get show sales recorded on a comparison spreadsheet I've been maintaining since I computerized my books in 2008.