another busy Friday
the journal of Michael Werneburg
twenty-seven years and one million words
Today I did a lot of running around. Sadly, a fair bit was in the wrong direction.
I started the day with a review of several odds and ends that we're producing for the business. A diamond-buyer's guide for the website. A letter to a wood-working specialist who can make custom boxes for us. A job description for our first (upcoming) hire.
Then it was time for a string of appointments. The first was with our representative from Softbank, with whom I applied for a 0120 number. It turns out that within certain bounds, you can choose your own number, which surprised me. Rather than ask for a specific number (e.g. something with lots of lucky 8's in it) I've asked for one that hasn't been used recently. With a 0120 number I don't want a repeat of the situation I had in Toronto where I got a lot more calls to my mobile phone for "Mabel" than I ever did for myself. Calls from a steady flow of gentlemen who would call in the evenings....
Then it was off to our manufacturer to get the ring exchanged for the one we actually wanted. I'm happy to say that spending a little cash on getting our own rings made for photography purposes really seems to work; the freshly minted jewelry looked much better than the pieces from the sample set that I'd been working with. We just need the proper size of gem!
And then it was time to see the accountants. And it's here that I began to get off-course. Taking the Sobu line into the city centre, I always seem to get turned around. I got off the train and wound up heading off at a 45 degree angle to where I wanted to be, and by happy chance was able to correct my mistake when I found one of the street maps that are thankfully common in this city (probably because it's so easy to get lost among the endless forests of mid-sized buildings in this vast urban area). Happily, everything is now sorted for both the company's finances and for my partner and me. No tax issues outstanding, etc. It's one of those things that we have to pay careful attention to of course, and we're lucky to have competent and honest accountants who speak English.
On the various train trips, I'd been reading a few interesting articles from the Financial Times about things relevant to our business. Getting my head into this stuff while I'm travelling is one of the reasons I get lost. And I did it again when I hopped back on the Sobu line. Rather than taking the short route back to Akihabara and then down to Shinagawa where I'd left my bike, I wound up heading the very long way out to Shinjuku. But as they say, "when life gives you lemons, go to Yodobashi camera and buy film".
So it took me an extra thirty minutes to get home, but all ended well.