Nevergirl’s

Talked the hub into doing some photoshop work, that’s what I did today. He was grumpy and unwilling but I’m not pregnant and ill for nothing. I sulked a bit and pointed out what I wanted him to do would only take minutes – ten at the most. And it’s not like I make him do odd jobs like this every day.

No, that’s not quite honest. I pelt him with odd jobs but these are thinking tasks, and getting to them would do his mind a lot of good. This morning, for example, I asked him to make my site template writable, dash a quick mail to my site host why I don’t have an API for my dotcom, and then figure out how google analytics works. “This is slavery,” he groused while I bossed him around and fed him chocolates.

For someone who hasn’t done photoshop work in years, he sure did finish quickly.

I know, they’re all pretty. I’m curious to know which one you like best, though. Let’s divide the house, yes?

[poll id="3"]

Thank you for humoring me. Just so you know, I wrote this post so 1) I could show off the pretty buttons and 2) take a recently installed plugin for a test drive.

Who knew the following services could be outsourced?

1. http://www.bagborroworsteal.com
What if you were not born with a trust fund but need to look the part? Well, you Bag, Borrow, or Steal. For a monthly fee, this designer handbag shop lets customers pick out designer handbags online and borrow them for as long as they need to. Monthly fees could be anywhere from $20 to $175. This might seem hefty to you, but it’s small change to those who are trying to befriend or marry their way into the Fendi lifestyle.

2. http://www.alibila.com
Looking for a way to wriggle out of that party your boss is throwing? Desperate to get away for the weekend without having to come up with at least five reasons why? A new French company can manufacture custom-made excuses for you! Founded by former private investigator Regine Mourizard, Alibila can cook up phony emergency phone calls, fake weekend seminars, and invitations to nonexistent fundraisers or weddings.

3. http://reputationdefender.com
For $10 monthly, this company will scour for your name everywhere and then give you a report of their findings. For $20 more, they will thoroughly disinfect your reputation online and make sure that photo you posted on MySpace years back, for example, showing an acne explosion so bad your face looks like miles upon miles of bad road or that comment you made at an adult store online will not appear once someone googles your name.

4. http://www.newyourkey.com
Do you live in New York? Are you always misplacing your key? For a small fee, this outfit will keep copies of your keys and deliver them to you once you find yourself locked out of your apartment. They deliver day and night anywhere in New York City, so you need not worry about sitting on the steps for hours while you wait for your key to arrive.

5. http:www.texaslicesquad.com
If you can’t get rid of lice yourself, why not pay someone to do it for you? Texas Lice Squad offers a complete range of services starting with inspection, elimination, and prevention of recurrence. For $65 for a family of four and for an extra $5 for every additional household member, members of the Texas Lice Squad will inspect heads, use non-toxic products, and comb through family members’ hair for lice and nits.

I’m going to spend at least an hour each day thinking of ideas to build a startup on. Someone’s already thought of outsourcing the uterus, but maybe it’s also possible to outsource anxiety, yes?

Okay, going slightly mad here. A dotcom is a lot of work. It’s almost as – if not more – demanding than a toddler. One, it doesn’t run on its own. Two, you have to feed it lots of plugins, widgets, and codes and most of them, dear God, entail the use of ftp.

The only good thing out of this is that my learning curve has improved immensely. That, and the ability to perform basic computer-related functions (think typing and mouse-clicking) while lying down with buttocks propped by two fat pillows. No, no, I am not a contortionist. The pillow-propping is done for a good reason and not because I’m masochistic that way. But I digress. As I was saying, running my own dotcom has improved my learning curve by leaps and bounds. I now know that a widget is not a variant of the word midget and that plugins neither have sockets nor do they actually require physical plug-in into one. I can now download themes and upload them to filezilla, never mind that the only directory I feel brave enough to touch is wp-content, nothing else.

Still, there’s still so much to do. I haven’t figured out how to track blog stats. Iris, that tech geek who has successfully duped people into thinking she’s a bimbo, suggested I use google analytics. But goshdarned it, I cannot figure out where to embed my codes!

This is frustrating. I’ll go play Simply Smashing with the little girl now. Catching plates and getting scolded by a mustached rabbit over the ones I break beats babysitting a dotcom.