Well, this is a strange thing. Here I am, getting towards - I thought - the end of my career, and I find myself having to set off in new directions. In a very few months I will other have my working hours cut drastically or be out of work altogether. As I've been working mainly from home for a number of years, which suits my domestic circumstances, I will have to find ways of using my skills as a freelance. Job opportunities locally are limited, but that means local freelance work is too. I'll need to find work wherever I can!

At the moment I'm making lists of the skills I can offer, while doing some copyediting and working 4 days a week at the "old" job. But I don't think I can find enough editing work to replace my current (rather meagre) income, and I'm planning to extend it to include a range of virtual assistant roles as well.

I'm hoping that Deskdemon will be a source of ideas, help fill in any gaps in my knowledge (I've never worked in a large office) and provide uptodate information on technology - I found it while looking for help on virtual conferencing, which may be one of the skills I can sell back to the organisation I work for if there's funding there, and might be useful to others as well. I've got 20 years' experience in conference organisation, but I've never set up a virtual one!

I think it may be useful to keep track of my thoughts here, and I'm hoping that the forums will be help too.