The Office - Nielsen Version

As some know, Jon left his position at a good construction company after feeling like he had reached his growing potential and ventured out on his own. We saved for a little over a year and then made the big plunge into self employment. There have been some high moments and some low moments but it has definitely been a year to remember.

One of the best high moments has been having him home. After several years of having a 'travel for work husband' and then a 'lengthy commute husband', or there was 'work for three days without sleeping zombie husband' followed by my least favorite, 'works a whole lot of overtime hours without any financial benefit just to get the work done husband', having access to him was an entirely new experience.

It meant we have had a lot of freedom. No vacation days to worry about, no schedule to work around but our own, we liked to call it our early retirement.

Even though the traditional workweek ended, the work didn't. Jon is officially in business for himself and enjoying it for the most part. He describes himself as a "contractor" but is deliberately vague on what that means sometimes. He owns a licensed building contracting company, but he takes advantage of his new freedom through projects doing what he likes best, "Doing Everything." He is somewhat a man of action, and whenever somebody needs something done...well apparently he will make it happen. He told me there were some limits to what he would do, those being 1) that he wouldn't do anything illegal or 2) anything in the sex trade. Not sure if I should be relieved or concerned that those options had to be clarified...

It has also meant we have been very involved with each other's companies. Jon is the best free contractor a girl could ask for and is the only reason I have had any success with my business venture as a dance competition event organizer (also the only reason I haven't already been carted away by the IRS). I pretend I am just as useful to his cause but so far I have occasionally answered the phone and picked up office supplies at Walmart. We balance each other so well.

Sharing an office space has been a challenge, mostly for him. Turns out he is not impressed in general with my computer filing system. He has revamped most of my stuff for me but was absolutely appalled the other day by my messy desktop. It won't be a shocker to most that my desk is messy, but this was my computer desktop. I am not one to care about which files end up there, and it was getting a tad bit full. In fact, there was only room for about three more icons before the screen was full. I knew it was driving Jon crazy, but I was very curious to see what my desktop would do with files after I filled those three spaces.

Well after today I may never know. I hopped onto my computer to find my desktop down to about four folders. They are aptly named:

Stuff that might be useful

Program links that you should have already deleted

Things that JW is sure are just trash and should be deleted now

Recycle Bin (I think he somehow found a way to bold and highlight this one, hoping I would find it more frequently)

While our new lifestyle has brought many great and wonderful changes (for the first time lifestyle is even a consideration), running his own business also comes with a new set of challenges. Jon does a large variety of work that normal employees never have to consider. Some of it doesn’t really sound fun to me. I guess he gets what he deserves when he tells people he can do anything.

Among all of the craziness, I am pretty sure the low of all low moments when running his own business blew up in his face....

literally.

Here is his "Don't worry, I got this handled" pose he took on right before scrubbing his face with a scouring pad for two hours. Face is ink free, the hands... not so much.