Desperate Freelancer

Some people dream of going on freelance. They think they could get more than they actually have being a standard employee.

They would get rid of the awful pressure of their boss, they would get more bucks for working whenever they want, they would be so smart and handsome, they would live the perfect life.

The truth, and I know it because, I became throughout years the confident of so many freelancers.. the truth I say is not what they dream of.

Here is 10 reasons you should never go on freelance.

1. You wouldn't stop working

Days and nights, you would be sited in front of your computer. Whereas you were able to delegate, you can't anymore because you have no one to delegate the shitty work to. Whereas you were able to skimp on your projects, you can't anymore because now that your boss has became your client, you have no more excuses to produce dull reports.

Moreover, most freelancers don't manage to separate working time from free time and just keep on working till they fall asleep. With a far better home made coffee, they hardly fall asleep till 3 o'clock in the morning.

2. You would get tons of paperwork to do

Because accounting and such stuffs are your fate now.

3. If you work at home, you would be alone all day long

Yes, you could make phone calls. Yes you have some clients to talk to. Yes, you have more freedom to see people. But clients are not friends, they just want you to get the job done, not spending too much time talking with you because it costs them so much. All your friends are working during the day, so who else could you chat with ?

You would end buying yourself a cat and be glad to clean up its litter in acknowledgement for its company.

4. If you don't, you would be alone all day long

If you do your freelance job inside a corporation, the "normal" employees will just hate you. They will avoid you, being afraid you could be a consultant spying for the management staff. They will be jealous of your so called freedom. They would envy your supposed huge income.

You would end buying yourself a blackberry, and call it a friend.

5. you will earn less money

On the contrary to what you think, most freelancers earn less than during the period they were employees. They have to pay social taxes, insurances, accountant, phone calls and a lot of new expenses they didn't imagine before going freelance. So their higher income often vanish leaving fewer bucks than expected.

They are also compelled to buy their own booze for they can't go to company's parties anymore.

6. You will become "mercantile"

Focused on developing your freelance business, you will be in search for clients and leads everywhere. Your friends, family and relatives would become potential clients. You would find yourself trying to sell a mission to your 12 years old cousin.

7. There will be no more paid holidays

Because being your own boss, you won't be stupid enough to pay yourself for doing nothing. Let alone lying on the beach sipping a pinacolada.

8. You would quit sport or any other activity you had besides your job

One day, you will figure out that you can be more productive not going to your weekly table tennis class. An hour class, half an hour commuting, you spare so much time you can use to work. Why not cancel house cleaning as well huh ?

9. You won't be able to do good job anymore

Whereas in some companies, you are listened to and can do a nice job you can be proud of, as a freelancer, you won't have much credit (remember your are not a consultant). In most cases, you would do anything to please the client because you just don't want to lose him. Even if this "anything" implies transforming a wonderful logo into an ugly one, or developing a website with some hell-raiser code.

10. In the end you will become a total looser

Instead of becoming the rich independent guy you dream of, you will turn into a corporate hobo in less than a year.

You will get fat eating all day long. You will get stinky by forgetting to take showers. You will become addicted to coffee or alcohol, or both. You will become poor and depressed. You will spend all your time and money to play online poker. You will be wasted.

Good News. There is still some hope to be happy as a freelancer. And, next time, I will give you ten reasons why you SHOULD become a freelancer

It's commonly admitted that France is among the countries where employees are the most lucky concerning paid leaves. Many people around the world know this fact and just take it for granted, assuming that countries have different regulations according to their culture and government and that's the way it is.. some have to be the lucky bastards while others slave all their life in a less amenable country.

For your information, If you don't know, French People benefit from 5 weeks of paid vacations and furthermore they benefit too from time off in lieu for people working more than the 35 hours normal week working time. In some companies, it can double your paid holidays time.

So people from others countries wonder.

But nobody can figure out the real ground reasons of this situation.

As a French myself, knowing perfectly after more than 40 years working as an employee the subtleties of the attitude of my fellow countrymen dealing with work, I am in position to tell you the truth.

1. We have more holidays because we do appreciate them

On the contrary to many others people, French people know what to do with their holidays. Whereas Japanese or Us citizens mostly get bored after two weeks, we could find ourselves plenty of decadent occupations to use spare time. Occupations such as eating (we can hold 5 hours long lunch, can you believe that ?), drinking, reading books, having a nap, visiting our wonderful country, playing cards or "pétanque", holding long and fruitful conversations (especially with women) or just watching the day passing by.

We do have a certain sense for appreciating life in itself, with no need to be over-busy.

So we really want and need holidays, and that's why we get so much of it.

2. We have more holidays because we never let our government go backwards concerning working time agreements

Unions in France are quite weak in comparison to others countries, and most French employees are not unionized.

Though, we are quick to get down in the streets and strike hard when it deals with holidays. We are stubborn about it.

During prosperous economic period governments are kind enough to redistribute productivity to workforce in terms of paid leaves and social advancement. But during harsh times, they just can't go backwards.

Governments have tried so many times using so many ruses and law projects to try to increase working time in France. But they did not succeed. Partly because we are so hard in negotiation and partly because governments don't want to. They know that increasing working time of those who works may lead to more unemployment, in a country where official unemployment rate is flirting with 10%. They don't want to take the chance.

3. We have more holidays because we are more productive at work

It's a well-known rule that the more time you have to do something, the less productive you get. You just take all the time available to do it, no matter the task and no matter if you have one hour or one year to do it. That's a law of human nature.

In France especially, when someone has something to do, he uses all the time he was given to do it. Because he just doesn't want to get more work for that period.

Bosses, managers and business owners had very well understood that rule. So they give their employees very little time to do stuffs that are to be done. And we will do it within the time given... just because we don't want to do overtime nor miss some holidays. That's why, France is one of the most productive country of the world.

And that's why we deserve more holidays.

4. We have more holidays because we have the most beautiful women in the world

And this doesn't need any comment. Just this point : in countries where women are ugly, you are more prone to work. That's human nature once again.

Facebook is on his way (if not already) to become the biggest social website in the world.

Still, Facebook doesn't make sense to me. I just don't see the point of "being on Facebook". To speak frankly, I'd rather be at home or in a restaurant having a great lunch (with tremendous wine, needless to say).

Though, as I absolutely want to turn myself into a geek, I started to investigate about this website. I dug deeply into Facebook to discover what kind of fabrics it was made of. I did much, I tried much, and I still understand nothing. Except for this conclusion : Facebook is a pure waste of time.

You need some entertainment ? You are bored at work ? You are bored at home ? You don't want to watch Stupid TV shows ? You have finished all video games of the galaxy ? You've read every book ? You are afraid of going outdoor because the girl from weather forcast told you it will rains frogs and cockroaches ? Hurray !! Here is Facebook !

Yep. It took me some months to understand this. Because, I wanted to be fair with Facebook. I wanted to give this huge, famous and incredibly rising website a chance.

Now, I can't tell what to do on Facebook. I can't tell you how to use it usefully. I can't tell you how to optimize your Facebook presence.

What I could tell you is I what you shouldn't do If you don't want to get stuck forever into this endlessly useless website.

1. Don't open an account : Lots of people are going to invite you, pretending to be your friends. Don't trust them. It's a trap. They are stuck into Facebook and they do believe that inviting more people into the maze is their way out.

2. If you accidentally do, don't close it : If will get you into more trouble trying to explain people why you don't want any web-social life and why you don't need to go to the shrink.

3. Don't fill your profile : You will become an interesting dude to some people. You could get involved into some "relationship". How creepy.

4. Don't add friends : Are you sure, this acquaintance is really an old friend. Can't it be an old dumbass risen from the dead that you'd better avoid ?

5. Don't join any group : Sometimes, people gather to be more stupid together than clever alone. Facebook groups make no exception.

6. Don't add any application : You are old enough to understand that pretending to be a werewolf or comparing movie tastes with strangers is not going to lead you anywhere. If you are not, then you are not old enough to use this computer without your parent's permission. Moreover, if you add applications in response to some "friend" 's invitation, they will believe you like it, and you will be overwhelmed by emails. If you aren't already.

7. Don't read your Facebook wall : You don't read graffiti in the toilets, do you ?

8. Don't go offline : Some guys set up real life events and parties through Facebook network. Well, unless you want to be harassed by a mob of no-life nerds with a mouse graft instead of the hand, you shouldn't go. Trust me, you don't want to see what people you mix with on Facebook really look like.

9. Don't send or forward anything to anyone : E-mail, invitation, game, photo, .. don't send it. They would believe you are part of the community now. They would treat you like a peer. You would be cursed and condemned to roam on Facebook for the rest of your life (or hopefully for the rest of Facebook's life)

10. Don't criticize Facebook : As the plateform tracks everything you do, it surely will track your negative comments, report it to Facebook's board, and who knows what could be the traitor's lot in such a hell ?!!

Well. I may.

As my life on Earth has today only a vague remaining interest to me, I decided to apply to be on the pioneers of the Virgle project.

Never heard about it ? Well, you should. It's the project launched by both Virgin and Google (hence the name : Vir-Gle), in order to settle the first human colony on Mars. Every thing is detailed on the Virgle website. They have planned it all, over a 100 year period.

I wanna be a part of it. Man, it's so huge.

Listen to the founders :

First, Richard Branson himself :

And the 2 nerds from Google (I can't remember their names and can't hear them properly as they seem to speak both like Donald Duck)

They convinced me to quit my planet to live the most exciting experience of the coming decade.

I have no more valuable destiny here on Earth. There is no future for me on this planet : I am a poor, desperate freelancer having hard times with wine shortage on Sundays. How can I recover here on Earth ? What can I expect from life if I stay here ?

Whereas, I could start it all again on Mars. I can have a new life, with new pals, maybe new chicks (they say we should be fruitful and multiply..), new experiences.. I could be the cook of the colony, teaching all that fatty and goofy Americans how to eat great. And what a great blog I could run !

So I took the questionnaire, and I guess I did well, because they urged me to send a video to explain my motivations. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to post it because Youtube was saturated with other postulant's productions. There were more than 300 hundreds responses

I didn't renounce so easily. And I sent an email to the guys from Google :

"Dear Google Guys,

You look funny on that Youtube video. I can't really believe you are the ones who created Google but you look confident about going on Mars, so please take me with you.

I know I am an old cranky scornful moron. I can't do much on Mars. I even can't upload a video on Youtube here.

But there is one reason you should bring me on the red planet with you, inside the Virgle Project : you must have me under control. Coz if you don't and let me alone on Earth, you never know how I can mess things up down there ... and if your all Project fails, you may never be able to come back.

Hoping you could make up your mind quickly. I have another proposal from the Nasa to be the first human to be satellited for ever.

Seeya.

Charles"

I think they can't resist my argumentation.

I will let you know. And for sure, If I am in, you will all get postcards.