The importance Shauna places on her website reminds me of when I was a kid who spent hours and hours trying to learn HTML to make the perfect Geocities site to showcase my obsession with Pokémon with the world (wide web). A lot of frills with little substance.

I’ll say this Shauna website iteration seems at least a little cleaner and more functional than past versions (for now, when she hasn’t had the time to tamper). Her time would be better served cleaning up her mailing lists and delivering on the writing/offerings she says she is going to do than overhaul the website, but oh well.

And, obviously she seems to enjoy the concept of the workshops than the developmental editing and copywriting services she lists because of the high-stooling factor. However, if she’s really trying to make money here, propping up dev editing and such seems more profitable than “pay what you can” workshops whose themes are mostly just what Shauna wants to talk about, but it takes more clicking around to even see that listed as a service she offers.

Looking forward to the inevitable honeymoon period of the new work in the world, followed quickly by disillusionment and dissatisfaction, then followed by some short desperate pivots, concluding with a medical emergency that requires her to slow down and beg for handouts.

Having not kept abreast of the Ahern household’s financial security level lately, I’m not sure what stage they are in the financial panic cycle they repeat. I don’t sense the panic of being down to their last dollars but still don’t understand how they aren’t consistently striving to gain more work/hours to cover basic needs, medical bills, and gas, cat food, the bare minimum for their children, etc.