Bitter Brew

Michael Idov wrote this article for Slate Magazine in 2005.

Given the current economic climate, it’s even more appropriate now.

*sigh*

Forewarned is forearmed

The things I wish I’d known pre-Biblo:

1. As soon as you are self-employed no-one will lend you any money. Financial institutions will ooh and aah over your increasing sales, and wax lyrical about future business potential but not one of the buggers will extend your personal overdraft to cover the gas bill.
2. The thrill of having created something from nothing will never pall. Particularly if someone told you not to.
3. The sneaking suspicion that it isn’t a real job ’cause you don’t have a real boss will never fade.
4. You will need to create an Enterprisation: a witty, self-depreciating tale of your commercial origins to recount whilst simultaneously steaming milk. The trick is to make it absolutely clear, despite your light coating of chocolate powder and coffee grits, that you are an expert in your field, therefore inane advice (proffered on the dubious grounds that “my husband’s second cousin is a business development manager” or “I drink a lot of coffee”) is a sure-fire way to get a crappy drink. Get it wrong, and you’ll be biting your tongue every day for a decade.
5. Some accountants would be better suited to a career in plumbing.
6. Your bank manager is not omnipotent.
7. The VAT man is.
8. No matter how long you have been in business, and no matter how successful that business is, if you actively participate in daily service you will, to a certain class of individual, always be an illiterate moron. 
9. You can tell immediately those who will patronise, annoy and frustrate you forever by their first words after hearing your Enterprisation: “Well, what you should be doing…” as if you hadn’t obviously considered absolutely everything during those all-too-frequent moments of self doubt in the leanest months of the year. As if you hadn’t the wit to weigh and discount these potential income sources due to the physical and financial limitations rather than personal preference…including the merits of harvesting organs in GenFic whilst unsuspecting donors peruse A-C…
10. The guilt of opening late far outweighs the pleasure of an impromptu lie-in.