Posts Tagged ‘Fun Stuff’
Awesome Clients!
Today was one of those weird days. I had phone calls set up and payrolls to try to rush out of the door and just all kinds of funkiness going on. And then my son comes in while I’m on the phone and stands there with his finger over his lips to tell me he knows I’m on the phone and to be quiet. He stood there and waited for me to get off the phone and then ultra politely asked me to help him put new batteries in his toy. He was just SO cute that I had to load up and go buy some batteries for the kid. I try to reward good behavior like that – especially phone manners. I work at home and the kids are here a good bit of the time when school is out.
Anyway, so I come back and find this on my porch. It was from a client and read, “Candy, For the days we drive you to drinking. 
Thank you for all that you do!”
How nice is that! See, I LOVE frozen drinks, especially margaritas. Oh, I’m not some alcoholic or anything, but I love even just frozen lemonade.
Some days, I love what I do so much. This is one of those days.
And to my son who showed what a polite little child he is, we will use it the first time tonight to make frozen lemonades. (Pina Coladas later for Dad and I!)
Summer is Officially Here!
Even if it it’s not June 21st yet, the official start of summer, it is definitely summer time here at OffAssist.
Yea! Barbecues, swimming, vacations… Cries of, “I’m bored!” ringing in the ears of work-at-home parents all over the country! We work at home to spend time with our kids, at least partly, but there is no denying that working from home gets a lot easier when they are school age.
With the work part of work-at-home in mind, here are a few sites we’ve rounded up that have either great ideas for entertaining the kids or look like good places to let the kids explore to give you a minute or two to meet those deadlines.
Work-At-Home Mom’s list of 15 Quick Activities to Keep Kids Busy While You Work
Great kid, not-so-great handwriting? Give ‘em some practice. This site lets you create your own handwriting worksheets, including cursive!
Funology – Science and fun with both online and offline activities for kids (of all ages!)
I’m sure we’ll have more as summer progresses and the team gets more and more desperate to be both “working” and “parent”.
Happy Summer! Now, go out and play!
Singing CPAs
It’s May 23rd and the start of a long weekend. I imagine, CPAs, like the rest of us, could use the break.
For a look at how some CPAs relax post-tax day, check out this fun article at accountingweb.com.
Excel-lent!
As part of blogging for OffAssist, I’ve had to learn lots of numbers-related stuff I would never pay attention to otherwise.
Which has actually proven handy with the tax stuff going all crazy the last couple years (phone rebates, stimulus checks). For once I actually know what’s going on and get to explain it to my husband 
As part of learning more about things bookkeeping, I signed up for the accountingweb newsletters. Earlier this week I got a link to this article in my inbox. Basically, people are using Excel, in some cases in what must be some incredibly complicated in-going formulas, to create charts representing song titles or lyrics.
Now, I don’t do a lot of charting myself, but I do a fair amount of desktop publishing graphics, so I had to go check out the Flickr group, here. Be warned, they also have comments attached, and sometimes the language is a little, well… Don’t let your kids see it without checking it out for yourself first. How work-safe it is depends on how tolerant your boss is, no adult images, just adult language upon occasion.
Have a giggle – some of them are brilliant, others merely okay and many I didn’t get at all.
This one is my personal favorite, probably because it was the first one I got. Of course, you have to be a They Might Be Giants fan, or you’ll probably be unfamiliar with the song…
Just one of the reasons why…
It’s no secret to any of my clients or colleagues that my husband and I work together from our home offices and we have 2 kids. (Both will be in school this Fall – woohoo!). I will be the first to admit that I haven’t been able to do as much as I have wanted to as OffAssist explodes with growth and I’ve been at the helm of IVAA, but still… I have and do just randomly take the kid not in school somewhere in the middle of the day, or after we pick up the oldest, or “yes, yes, mommy CAN set up the pool outside at 2pm on a Tuesday”. Heck, last year we decided at 8pm at night to spend the day at Sea World the next day. WHO can do that?!?! Yeah, I had to stay up late the next day to catch up, but ya know? It didn’t matter. I made sure I could take the time off and we did it.
Anyway… these videos are showing up on YouTube, it’s someone advertising a travel thing or something, whatever… but I liked this one:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNOcV5y0kxU]
Linux Journal: Scott-E-Vest
Okay, seriously, this is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a while… seriously… I know you geeks read my blog, now go read this and Digg it!
SCOTTEVEST makes innovative, versatile, technology-enabled clothing — jackets, fleece layers, cargo vests, pants, shorts, shirts and more, all designed to help you store, manage, and carry your electronic gadgets and other gear essentials.
The Tom Cruise stuff got me… I was laughing so hard I was sure one of the kids were going to wake up.
Happy Anniversary To Us!
Not OffAssist (although we did hit 6 years back in February).
Happy Anniversary to my other half and myself, Tom. Today marks 15 years of marriage. And yes, we haven’t managed to maim or kill each other yet
Nah, I love ya, Tom… now, get back to work… :p
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Had A Bad Day?
A friend forwarded me this…
http://glumbert.com/wii/view.php?name=baddayoffice
I had to laugh because there are days I want to pick up the screen and throw it right out the window… stay with it, we’ve all seen that first one… I love the one with the one guy throwing stuff at the other one across the big table… dude… remind me not to tick him off.
It also makes me even more happy I work out of my own office!
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What’s in a Name?
Do you have trouble remembering people’s names? C’mon, it’s just you and me here, it’s okay to admit it, I won’t tell.
Because I do, too.
At the tail end of 2007 Scott Ginsberg, The Name Tag Guy, and accounting web passed along a little holiday gift for people like us. I was just too busy to read it at the time. I took the time today and, if you’re like me and have a hard time with names, you should too.
Check out “10 Effective Ways to Remember Names” at accountingweb.com.