Been busy, driver?

Sleeping beauty,
originally uploaded by skyring.

No. It’s been real quiet. Might pick up a bit after midnight. You know what Thursdays are like.

Or. No, just started my shift. Looks like it could be a good night out there.

Or. No, I’ve been stuck down at Tuggeranong all night. Had a flat tyre and the spare was flat as well.

Whatever. It’s never been a busy night. Not unless you’re a little old lady or a guy in a wheelchair or my mother or someone I know isn’t going to jump me for the night’s takings.

Not that the night’s takings are going to be anything special. It’s a very rare night nowadays when I actually take in more cash than dockets and credit cards and e-tickets and things.

But still, it’s a habit. I might have been flat out all night, barely a moment to scratch myself, but if you jump in the cab and ask me if I’ve been busy, no, it’s been a slow night.

Of course, if the passenger has been trying like crazy to get a cab for the past hour, hailing driver after driver, standing in a queue, making angry calls to the cab company, and it’s patently obvious that it’s the busiest cab night of all time, then I’ll say that I just started work.

It was about three in the morning and I had a money bag stuffed full of notes after picking up drunks all shift and this guy was my last fare for the night. I was looking forward to dropping him off, gassing up, running the car through the car wash and going home.

“Busy night?”

“Nah. Just started.” That’s the advantage of being near the end of the shift. I can pretend I’ve just logged on and haven’t made any money yet.

We drove on through the morning and the passenger yawned.

“I’ve been working since nine this morning,” he explained. “Boy, will I be glad to get home and hit the sack!”

“So will I!” I agreed wholeheartedly.

He looked at me, puzzled. “I thought you said you only just started?”

“Ahhh, it’s been a long week.”

http://www.skyring.com.au/Skyring/Ask_Skyring/Entries/2008/12/6_Had_a_busy_night.html

Pro blogging

I'm looking to expand and professionalise my blog(s) and I've come to the point of realising that iWeb/MobileMe and LiveJournal aren't supplying the environment I want.

What I need:
RSS feeds that work. I need buttons to allow people to subscribe, add a feed to Bloglines etc. make it easy for readers to subscribe.

A community that has its own life, and that I can manage. Livejournal has the ability for readers to comment and participate in a richer fashion than iWeb/MobileMe (which is essentially linear and difficult to manage). Often the discussions are richer than the original posting.

Trackbacks and links and things to fix my position withing the wider blogosphere. There are other blogs I want to be close to, to be able to comment on them and for those bloggers and readers to visit my blog.

Income generation through Google Adsense. LiveJournal doesn't do this, iWeb/MobileMe does, though it doesn't seem to do pay per view.

A "dashboard" to let me see what works, what doesn't.

Ability to set and customise themes.

Ability to upload entries easily, including multiple photographs.

A page/subpage sructure so the blog is a site rather than a page. There's material that I want upfront on every page, other stuff that doesn't need to be so prominent, but should be around.

Easy archive searching and browsing.

A site-wide search.

Integration with other sites such as FaceBook, Flickr etc.

I don't want to be a nasty money grubbing professional blogger with SEO tricks and one eye on the rankings and a site full of ads, but neither do I want to keep bumping along the bottom, pleasant though it is to entertain an audience of family and friends. I feel that I can expand my horizon a fair bit without too much effort, and while the current skyring.com.au site has a nice look to it, I'm running into limitations.

I'm passionate about taxis and travel. I need to stop rambling and become more focussed, and my writing needs to improve a fair bit. I can write well when I've the heart and mind for it. I take some reasonably decent photographs, and all told, I think I can produce a quality blogsite that will attract hundreds or thousands of readers.

But I need tools that will work on a Mac, preferably integrated with the software I already use, and I need a host that will give me the support I want.

I'm finding any number of ideas via Google, but it's hard to know what is hyperbole and what is solid. Any suggestions and advice from my all-knowing friends gratefully received.