I don't know how I have been paying rent all this time. For the last five months I have been driving a cab two days a week, done an average of one counseling session a week, and otherwise spent my time frolicking. I had been looking for freelance Flash or translation work, but almost nothing had worked out since Thanksgiving.
I had started worrying about money about two months ago, but last week I had started REALLY worrying. And like a birthday present from the universe, a new freelance Flash gig was secured on my actual birthday, and I started yesterday. I will be there this week and possibly longer. It's at yet another ad agency. People at ad agencies seem to move around a lot, and by now I know people at all major ad agencies in San Francisco. And sometimes, when they need help with Flash, they think of me and call me. I love how this works because that way I get to work with people I already know and trust and they me. Working at ad agencies is not the most rewarding but it pays money, and I like money, especially when I'm broke.
At this week's job I get to play with ActionScript 3.0. I had used it back in 2005 at Macromedia when we were first developing it, but I had never used it in the real world. But now I am relearning it, and I am glad because it will make it easier and less daunting to get more of this kind of work in the future.
And now that I'm finally working again, the company I had last freelanced for and which had let me go in November, finally contacted me today and wants me to come back.
But that is not all. A good friend from Adobe/Macromedia is trying to bring me in for a project as well. We have been talking about this for several weeks, but now it is finally starting to sound like a real possibility.
Oh, what to choose? The new company that I started coding for yesterday? The company from before where I can hang out with Bret and Alex? The mother whose ship I jumped over two years ago?
This weekend I am going camping with a few of my favorite people. I don't normally like camping but sometimes and for some people I make an exception. And I am actually looking forward to being in the woods.
It's my birthday weekend because Monday is my birthday. I invited about 32 of my friends to come celebrate that night at another friend's house who offered to host. Kean is going to be our bartender of exotic cocktails. Then I am going to try to drag everybody out to Death Guild.
Right now I'm working on the playlist for my birthday party. I'm burning four CD's, all with songs I love, from all kinds of different genres. The artists range from Depeche Mode to 50 Cent and from Autechre to Pet Shop Boys. Oh yes. And we are going to listen to all four CD's during the drive out to the woods, and we are going to love it. Well, I am going to love it, and I am excited.
Yesterday at Dolores Park we celebrated the 5th birthday of BAH (Bay Area Hoopers), the Sunday afternoon hoop group Philo and I started the day after meeting at Min Jung's party in 2003. Philo wrote about it on hooping.org. And here is how it all started.
I have a total soft spot for poppy, dancey, electronicky music from the very early 90's. I started giggling this morning when I heard Strike it up by Black Box on the radio. This song makes me happy.
Nightshade also has a picture that has the Kean in it (on the far right).
The performance was completely awe-inspiring in its skin-crawling creepiness. It made me super proud to be one of the creatures Anastazia chooses to work with. Late Friday night I got a text message from her--I assume she sent one to each of her creatures--that said "You rock my SHIT thank you for being you with me." Thank you indeed.
We did another Bad Unkl Sista performance at the Exploratorium last night, and I played a small part in it. Kean was involved this time too. It was a last minute decision by Anastazia to add him as a creature and a helper to belay Carl into the air. Aside from the two staged performances, we got to run around and play and weird people out with our characters.
Afterwards we went to MEAT vs. Death Guild at DNA Lounge in our make-up. Mine was crazy red and his was crazy blue. A friend commented on our make-up, and I told her that we had just done a performance. Thinking about that makes me really happy. I love how many different fun and exciting things we do together. I have never been in a relationship with this much shared expression. It makes me never want to settle for anything less. Before this, I had never even had a boyfriend that I could dance with. I had one, a long time ago, that I could dance next to, but not even really dance with. Now I have one with whom I can dance, perform, model, power play, hoop, do subway acrobatics and play other interactive human games. Maybe it's because I am more expressive nowadays, and so the people in my life are as well. No matter where it came from, it's glorious.
This makes me think of a spam email I got the other day, saying "Had some FUN and excitement lately?" Yes, and I feel really lucky and thankful.
After dealing with some difficult emotional stuff at DNA, we released some of that by shoving and pushing and slapping each other on the way to the car, and then Kean put me on his piggyback. After a block or so, we heard a voice from the other side of the street.
"Hey, did you guys drop a jacket or something?"
I turned around, and sure enough, my jacket was lying on the floor half a block behind us. We piggybacked back and picked up the jacket.
"Thanks," I yelled and giggled. People are great sometimes.
Then we switched over to the more poetic part of the day.
"What do you have to eat at home?"
"Meatless balls."
"Okay. We can eat them alls."
In the morning, I was lying on the floor, and Kean looked around the room.
"Your floor is a mess, and you are part of it," he said.
