I’ve decided I need a website. “You’ve left it a bit late, haven’t you?” said David, “at your age”. Charming. Just the encouragement I need. Well, OK, it has taken me rather a long time to get round to it, but I’ve got an excuse: every time I make a start some work turns up without me looking for it. But this month has been pretty slow so far and it’s been a week since I finished my last job.

That’s as far as I got with this post before some work arrived in my Inbox. Three contracts for tomorrow. I’ve done the drafts and feel like a break before I check them so here I am, blogging again. Finally. I always find it easier to get on with something when I’m trying to avoid doing something else. And if there are two things I’m trying to avoid, it’s easier still.

So why can’t I get on with it? The website, that is. You’d think it would be easy enough, wouldn’t you? Just write a bit about yourself and say what a wonderful translator you are, list your areas of expertise, rates, etc. You must be joking. I’ve been at this for weeks, on and off (not to mention previous abandoned attempts) and I’m stuck.

To start with I can’t decide whether I want to present myself as an individual and speak in the first person, or give my enterprise a name and talk about myself as if I were somebody else. I don’t really like either approach, but there don’t seem to be any others.

And since most of my clients are Spanish, I have to have a version in Spanish. After much mental flailing about I did manage a first draft. I even got my daughter to check it, since she lived in Spain all her life until she joined the brain drain to Germany. She changed a few things, but said it was OK. Then I gave it to three Spanish friends to look over, one of whom is a fellow translator. One could only find a minor error, another suggested several changes “to make it more convincing” and the third (the translator) hasn’t had time to look at it yet.

Anyway, I’ve just read it again and decided I still don’t like it. Where do I go from here?