In-laws need my help
By blog on Jun. 12, 2009.
I mentioned in a previous entry that my in-laws visited earlier this week. I pretty much stay in my study for the duration of their visits. It’s not as if I don’t like my SO’s parents, her dad is a nice fellow, if completely different from me, but her mother doesn’t exactly like me very much. My mother in-law just sort of, pleasantly gets along with me, unless I do or say anything that she doesn’t like, and then she stops trying altogether. Now, I really don’t stand for that sort of crap in my house, so rather than have a blow out, which results in my SO not talking to her mother for weeks or months on end, I keep to my self, in my own space, until they are gone.
However, this visit was a little different. Apparently, they want to take their business online. They run a little travel agency, and have done so for the past 20 years, and now they want a high quality website that prospective clients can use to find out all the intro information, and even run searches for holiday packages and the costs associated. Guess who they want help them out with all of that? That’s right, me.
I was more than a little shocked, to say the least. Though, it soon occurred to me that they only want me to do it because they think I will give them a cheaper rate, but seriously, I don’t feel like taking on a project like that right now. It’s not that it would be terribly difficult, but I already have other projects on the go, and I really don’t feel like working with my in-laws, especially when they don’t want to pay my going rate anyway.
So instead I outlined for them what they will need. They told me they have been looking at different websites, trying to get a handle on what they will need from their end, and it is good to see they are taking some interest. They have a broadband connection, which is a good start, but in reality, they know very little. So I set them up to read broadband news from now on, to gain an understanding of this aspect of the internet a little more solidly. Obviously a better net connection will be needed if they are going to be uploading and hosting all of that, so I set them up to look into the best SDSL internet connection for them. I checked out what domain names they could get, and there were actually a few that would work for them. I also showed them a few good server sites, so they don’t end up with advertising all over their site, and then gave them the number of a few web designers who could set up the site well for them.
Then I merrily bid them goodbye, knowing all along how much it must have sucked for my mother in-law to have to ask for my help. That’s a satisfying thought, now isn’t it?
Category: Technology