Does anyone write letters anymore?

I woke up in the middle of the night 1:30am to be exact and this was a question racing through my mind. I'm not sure if I was dreaming about writing, or what, because I never remember my dreams anyway. But it got me to thinking, Does anyone write letters anymore?

I was going to start a letter to my Dad, who I'm sure would rather get a letter in the mail than the circular from Bobs Nothin But Crap store, when it occured to me that I spend most of my day sitting in front of a computer either creating audio, checking email, downloading videos and mp3's, reading the newspaper online and various other things. When I should be thinking about writing, you know with a pen and piece of paper. I once read,(online of course) that people would spend weeks composing a letter to loved ones, their congress-person, whomever.

I can't fathom spending much more than 3 minutes thinking about what I'm writing about now much less weeks gathering thoughts to compose a letter. Maybe that's where I should be thinking when it comes to the future of our business, Voice over and production is so 21st Century that I'm wondering if I composed a hand-written letter to a radio station PD or a company that I would like to do voice work for, that it would be read, or for that matter even opened? Makes you think a little doesn't it.

I'm still going to write my Dad a letter, and it probably won't be as long as this post, but it will be hand written, thought out and mailed.. with a stamp! Wow what a concept.

I found, well, I didn't it was link forwarded to me by one of my bosses of a great new blog site
radiocreativland.com for folks that eat breathe and sleep creativly for radio. Everything from writing copy to posting your favorite spots for, and I'm guessing critiques. I'm too self concious to post one of my spots there for fear I'll be shredded. I don't mind critiques as long as their beneficial and I learn something from them, but bashing me, I would just rather not post.
I believe that I create great audio, both commercials and imaging and if it makes me happy, my bosses happy and anyone else I'm producing for, then we're all just fine. But check it out if your so inclined. Changing gears, I've rejoined Plaxo and made some more connections, hopefully I'll be able to garner some much needed production or voice work for the coming months. Lots of Huggies to buy :)

Baby Larson

Big Day Today

Through the wonders of science and technology, I will be able to do today what my parents never could and that is see my child in it's mothers womb. Fascinating really, think about it, through the magic of airwaves, an audio signal is bounced in and around my beautiful wife's baby bump and it sends that audio signal back to a radiophonic device that interprets the audio sound waves and develops sort of a radar signal that materializes itself into a shape that the good doctors will point out is "my child" hereto for known as "The Baby".

My parents got the "well you're getting pretty big, you're carrying low so it must be a boy". The wives tales on how to accurately determine the sex of your unborn child are 50/50 at best but it's sure fun to hear them tell the tales of long ago, before cell phone cameras, YouTube, Color TV (yes I was born before Color TV). My Mother said that I was a pain to carry, both literally and figurativly. This might explain why I'm so afraid of letting myself open up. This is the happiest day of my life, and it's right up there with my wedding day and the day I lost my virginity.

Moved

My wife informs via text message, hey all the kids are texting now, it's great fun, that our unborn child that took 10 years to conceive moved twice in the middle of the night. I wish she had shook me awake so that I could have experienced that small miracle and joy. It's going to be difficult in the coming months to try and juggle careers, part time jobs and life in general to accomodate something that we've waited so long for. The anticipation is gathering energy and I'm starting to look forward to moving the office to my basement, and painting the room in neutral colors (We've decided that we want to be surprised by the sex on it's birthday).

Changing gears, I lost an old friend to cancer last sunday, Dave was only 53 and had so much to live for, his death brings a renewed intrest in my own mortality, am I doing everything I can to take care of myself physically? I've got to start eating better and finding time to excercise more, taking walks, jogging, lifting weights, maybe riding a bike, but definitly eating better. My doctor said that I was "pre-diabetic" what the hell does that mean? Noone in my family has ever been diabetic that I know of and granted I eat lots of sweets, but that's just because I quit smoking 17 months ago(pats himself on the back Yay me!), it's kind of scary really.

Remembering

I just got through sifting through the various websites I subscribe to and have tagged as favs, that deal specifically with Voice Over, and I can't for the life of me remember where I saw a forum I needed to subscribe to so that I can get some marketing tips on how to market myself more efficiently as a voice talent.

As a freelance voice talent, I just don't have enough hours in the day to freely market my voice and my other talents effectivly. I have a full time job imaging two radio stations and doing production for 6 more. Then on the weekends, I'm a courier for a Laboratory Testing facility, and I drive, listent to radio and drive somemore, then Monday, I'm back doing my paying job.

So when, how and where can I develop my freelance voice over talent marketing plan, so that I can effectivly make some darn money in this business. I'm already part of several networking sites like Talentdatabase, here's my address http://thedb.com/scottlarson and I regularly participate in this forum http://www.voice-overs.com/forum/ it's another great place to learn about stuff. I guess I need more face time networking with real people, not just cyber peeps. If you know what I'm talking about, and would like to help me get my sh#! together please post here, send an email radioimage@gmail.com I'd really love to know when you find the time to do all of this.

Larson

Taxing my Voice?

February always depresses me for two reasons, it's cold, and my tax man wants to start early knowing full well that I don't file until April 15th. Why does he do that, surely he writes this down in his multi-colored three ring binder that adorns his desk full of pencils, unfiled returns, cookie crumbs, smoldering cigarette butts and various other trivial things. I didn't make much money in Voice over in 2007, but just enough to put me in a slightly higher tax bracket, whatever that means.

I mean seriously, think about it.

You make XX amount one year, and by increasing your miniscul pay by just 100 bucks, you will create an even larger headache than you had the previous year. I bought one of those software packages to do my own taxes, but figured out that it would cost me more in therapy after attempting to install the software, read the FAQ, and gather all my tax info to "input" into this program just to find out that I'll still owe the tax man a healthy chunk of my hard earned chump change.

Here's a novel idea, why not just go ahead and take 25% off the top of each paycheck I get, to pay Mr. Fica, Ms SS, Mrs.Medicare, Joe401k,Mr and Mrs. MOKAN, and anyone else that they can think of that I may or may not owe money to or I can just bend over and take one for my team.

As a Voice over talent and producer I worry that I may be not charging enough, or maybe too much, or I'm not unique enough, you should worry too, but not too much, you're much more talented than you think, and I'm just paranoid.

Larson