It’s been about eight years since I last lost someone I loved. I have no idea how I would react to death now, and I’m not particularly eager to find out. I hold out hope for grandpa to get better, but then again, the inescapable truth is that he’s not getting any younger. If it’s not this one, maybe it’ll be the one after that or the one after that. And I won’t be ready, because you never really can be.

One of my best friends took a plane to Berlin yesterday, and plans to stay for at least a year, or maybe for good. I’m really happy for her, because this is what she wanted for so long, and now it’s happened. Of course, at the same time I’m really sad for myself, because I love spending time with her, and now there’s no knowing when the next time will be. Another really good friend will be taking off later this month, to join her busband in Bangalore. Again, the mix of happiness and sadness, and just this feeling of all-encompassing loss. It’s not fair, really, since it’s not like I’m losing them. It just feels like it, that’s all.

Okay, this is going to the wrong direction a bit too fast. Let’s try something from the other end of the spectrum:

Yesterday I took part in a translation competition a friend tipped me of. I translated a short story by the Finnish author Maritta Lintunen from Finnish to English, and boy, it was hard. I haven’t translated much prose before, and it really shows. Still, I did my best, and I finished it even though there was a point where I seriously considered just giving up. I’ve no idea how well or poorly I did, but for me the important thing is that I finished it and did my best. I guess I’ll find out how I measured up sometime in November when they publish the results of the competition.

Today I have a lunch date with another really good friend of mine, which hopefully will lift my spirits somewhat. We’ll have lovely Indian food and a good conversation, and I’ll feel better. Besides, it’s autumn, and it’s beautiful outside. The world keeps turning, and everything is just around the corner.

What I should be doing is designing a website for my private trader company called Write Words Language Services. Yeah, I’m an entrepreneur, my friends. Feels funny, but it’s true. Now all I need to do is make some business happen, and I’m all set. Fortunately I have at least one job coming up, and a possible little something else as well. There are still some loose ends that need tying up, but nothing that can’t be handled. I’m pretty happy about the way things are for the moment, and hopefully more good stuff is coming my way soon.

Kaikki alkoi siitä, kun kävin viimeisimmän kerran Työvoimatoimistossa. Siellä täti-ihminen jonka kanssa asioin totesi ykskantaan, ettei mun opintokombinaatiolla ole mitään mahdollisuutta työllistyä ilman palkkatukea. Ensin lähinnä nauratti tädin asenne, mutta salaa myös korpesi oikein tosissaan. Ei sentään niin huonoa ettei jotain hyvääkin: täti lykkäsi käteeni paperinpalan, jossa ilmoitettiin freelance-kääntäjän työpaikasta, joka kuitenkin vaatisi toiminimen. Jäin miettimään asiaa.

Iltaa kohden ja seuraavana päivänä suunnitelma alkoi hahmottua. Mitä menetettävää mulla ylipäänsä oli? Työttömän peruspäiväraha? Eipä sitä hirveästi kuukausittain tule, eikä se jatku loputtomiin. Olin tehnyt tämän ja parin aiemman vuoden aikana muutaman pitemmän käännöksen ja kielentarkastustyön, joten tiesin osaavani homman. Töistä oli vieläpä tullut oikein positiivista palautettakin, joten tiesin myös osaavani homman hyvin. Oli yleinen taloudellinen tilanne mikä tahansa, yliopistolta pakkaavat ihmiset valmistumaan, ja ainakin osa esim. teknillisestä tiedekunnasta valmistuvista tekee englanninkielisen diplomityön, jonka kieliasu pitää tarkastuttaa. Mikäpä mua siis estäisi?

Otin asioista selvää. Selasin Verohallinnon, Patentti- ja rekisterihallituksen, Yritys- ja yhteisötietojärjestelmän ja vaikka minkä sivuja, kävin verotoimistossa äärimmäisen avuliaan ja mukavan virkailijan puheilla ja aloin miettimään toiminimeä. Nyt paperit on melko pitkälle täytetty, samaiselle virkailijalle varattu aika huomisaamuksi, yhdenkertainen kirjanpito aloitettu, laskupohjia suunniteltu, nettisivuja pohdittu, ja tehty suunnilleen miljoona muutakin asiaa. Ensimmäinen työkeikkakin on jo tehty, kun osoittautui, että tarvitsen toiminimen saadakseni palkkion ulos firman byrokratiasta.

Vielä on hirvittävä määrä yksityiskohtia mietittävänä, mutta ehkä jo huomenna, tai viimeistään ensi viikolla, mulla on oma Y-tunnus. Sitten voin hakea sitä avointa freelance-kääntäjän paikkaa, ja jossain vaiheessa ensi viikkoa varmasti myös tehdä ilmoituksia yliopiston ilmoitustauluja varten. Ensimmäinen virallinen asiakas oli äärimmäisen tyytyväinen työn laatuun ja lupasi levittää sanaa tuttujensa keskuudessa, joilla saattaisi myös olla diplomityön kielentarkastuksen tarvetta. Kävi miten kävi, onnistuminen on nyt pitkälti itsestäni kiinni, ja se tuntuu vapauttavalta.

Ehkä onnellisin olen kuitenkin siitä, että pääsen ainakin joksikin aikaa eroon sekä Työvoimatoimistosta että Kelasta. Kohta en ole enää työtön työnhakija, vaan yrittäjä.

Viimeisen kuukauden sisään mahtui myös kaksi pientä työkeikkaa, joista toinen oli käännös ja toinen kielentarkastus. Näistä rohkaistuneena (ja liittyen yhteen mahdollisuuteen josta ei nyt tässä vielä enempää) mietin muutoksen tuulia ja toivon, että tällä kertaa niistä tulisi jotain muutakin kuin haaveita, joita ei juuri nyt ole mahdollista toteuttaa.

Viime aikoina on usein ollut samanlainen fiilis kuin reilut kaksi vuotta sitten. Tarve päästä eteenpäin, lyödä uusi virstanpylväs maahan. Ehkä se hetki on jo ihan kulman takana, tai sitten siihen menee vielä pitkään. Kärsivällisyyteni vaan tuntuu olevan lopuillaan.

I’ve become a sourpuss.

What the hell? How can this be undone? I mean, yes, I’ve always been the kind of person who doesn’t let whimsy take over everything, you know, a person who needs a basic structure to hold things together, but a sourpuss? Only occasionally, my friend! Not as the norm. Sure, there are times when one needs to organise things and take stuff seriously, but that shouldn’t mean that life is all about structure. I’m not an accountant, for crying out loud! (No offense to accountants out there, it’s a respectable profession, I’m sure, just not what I’ve ever aimed at in life. Plus, sucking at math, here.)

So, what do you do when you have little money? You use your imagination to make ends meet, and try to have fun with what you have. What do you do when you don’t have a job? Repeat answer no. 1 and also, try to build up that crumbling professional self esteem however you can. Looking back at this time in my life, what is it that will stick out the most? The fact that I couldn’t land a job after graduation? The fact that most of the time, it made me miserable? The only motto I’ve ever lived by is ‘no regrets’. You did something wrong, you say you’re sorry. You messed something up, you try harder next time. You took the wrong path, well, either turn around or make it work. Hell, make it sing. It’s not over, it’s not even close.

This mood will pass, even when I’d like to hold on to it, but let it not be gone for good this time.

Tarkennettakoon sen verran, että tyytymättömyyteni liittyy pääosin täysin itseni sisäisiin asioihin, jotka tuskin edes heijastuvat isommin ulos. Ei tarvitse huolestua, tai no, ainakaan muiden kuin mun. Totuus on, ettei kaikkien tarvitse pitää Emmasta, mutta Emman kyllä täytyy. Ei tässä muuten ole mitään mieltä.

We’re in Raahe, taking care of my ill grandma and balance-challenged grandpa (the parents are in Birmingham for a week). My grandparents are sweet and I love them, but this is not how I was going to spend the extended weekend, and it affects me even when I try not to let it. Grandma has the habit of bossing people around, and since I just have to suck it up and take it even when it grates me, this is where I bitch. I know it’s immature of me, but I can’t help reacting this way. The only thing I can do about it is not to show it.

There’s just something about being at someone’s beck and call all the time, which I find both difficult and annoying. This coupled with the fact that I’m constantly worried about grandma, trying to monitor whether the situation worsens and she should be taken to the hospital, just makes me irate. I know she already feels guilty for us being here, because she hates to be a burden, so I keep holding onto a happy face around her to make her feel better. And it’s not all bad, since I do enjoy spending time with them and listening to their stories. It’s just the annoying feeling of the whole thing being compulsory that gets on my nerves. I deal really badly with being forced to do something, even when I’ve actually volunteered to do it and can completely understand it has to be done. I think it’s something that should get better with age, but in my case it just seems to get worse. The only improvement is that I mostly manage to keep my annoyment to myself. Usually, anyway.

This character flaw is one major reason for me to think I should never have children of my own.

Okay, it’s off my chest now. I’ll give myself a few more minutes before I go make coffee for grandpa and onion milk (don’t ask) for grandma…

Häitä suunnitellaan pikku hiljaa, mutta koska tässä on yhdet toiset hääjuhlat tulossa lähiaikoina, joissa toimin toisena kaasona, ei hirveästi ole vielä edistytty omissa suunnitelmissa. Eipä tässä ole onneksi vielä kiirettä.

The blog was intentionally deleted by an administrator yesterday. It seems that a complaint was received about it, but I don’t have any details of the complaint.

According to Blogsome’s terms of service, they have the right to terminate the service they offer at any time, without any explanation:

Browse The World Ltd. shall also have the right without notice and at any time to terminate the blogsome.com web site or any portion thereof, or any products or services offered through the blogsome.com web site, or to terminate any individual’s right to access or use the blogsome.com web site or any portion thereof.

You agree that any termination of your access to the sevices so provided under any provision of these Terms of Service may be effected without prior notice, and acknowledge and agree that Browse The World / blogsome.com may immediately deactivate or delete your blogsome.com site/blog and all related information and files in your blogsome.com site/blog and/or bar any further access to such files or the blgosome service. Further, you agree that Browse The World shall not be liable to you or any third-party for any termination of your access to the service.

The blog was back online today when I checked it, but according to Jenny, there has been no explanation as to the nature of the complaint received or for anything else, for that matter. Sure, we all agreed to the terms of service when we first put up our blogs, but I still think that it’s going a bit far to just delete a blog after receiving one complaint and never even contacting the blog owner first. Hell, the least they could do is to tell Jenny what the complaint was about.

Of course, the reason may very well be related to the nature of the blog, here described by Jaakko Meriläinen:

The blog in question was written in Finnish by a well-known Finnish feminist researcher and sexual minority rights activist and it contained, in addition to personal reflection, texts about Finnish academia and her research on pornography and sexual minority issues, with the tag “porno” being used.

I for one am feeling quite apprehensive about continuing to use Blogsome as the host for my blogs. Annoyingly enough, it is the best free blog service I’ve come across so far, at least from a technical standpoint. So, what to do? Any suggestions for better free hosts?

Edit later:

The admins at the Blogsome forum clarified the issue, and I for one am satisfied with the result:

I apologise for the error made. Just a little bit of background - we get literally 100’s of pornographic blogs set up (and 100’s that are in flagrant breach of copyright). It is not an easy task picking out valid ones from bad ones. If this is an error it is the first, following the deletion of 1000’s of pretty awful blogs. The task is made more difficult as we don’t particularly like looking at the porno blogs in detail to investigate.

In relation to this case, it wasn’t a random deletion. The error arose from a blog post entitled:
“Give me crack and anal sex”
http://jatulintarha.blogsome.com/2007/10/03/give-me-crack-and-anal-sex/
The reviewer assumed that this was a pornographic blog in error and deleted.

I think that’s a fairly reasonable mistake to make, especially if one doesn’t speak Finnish and thus is not able to read the full entry. Now that the admin actually apologised and fixed the mistake, I think it’s not necessary for me to look for another host for my blogs. I find it reassuring to see that things can be resolved quickly and openly with Blogsome admins.

Lisäksi Star Wars: The Old Republicin E3-traileri on todella vaikuttava, vaikkei siinä varsinaista gameplay-matskua olekaan:

Ja lopuksi muistutuksena itselleni: rakas XBOXimme lähti tänään kohti Saksaa ja korjausta. Ilmoittivat, että korjausaika on 2-3 viikkoa, joten katsotaan. Lohdukseni käskivät jättää kovalevyn kotiin, joten mun pelisavet ovat ainakin toivottavasti turvassa olohuoneessa.