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8/9/00 Have you seen American High yet? Have you? It's totally compelling. It's so much better than all of the other reality-based shows I've sampled. Plus, it's about midwestern kids (Highland Park, where the show is based, is about three towns away from where I grew up), so their accents (or lack thereof) are just darling. These kids are pretty fucking mature, though. I think they're actually more mature than I am (but that's not hard.) Tonight I saw the gay boy on the show make a human-sized collage of naked like, sailor men. His parents were super supportive. "I think it's artistic," said the father. I wanted to hug his parents through the television set. Good, supportive suburban parents. That shit didn't exist when I was in high school. And there was not one openly gay person at my high school. When I first got to college, I thought homosexuality was funny. That got fixed pretty fucking quick. Anyway, watch the damn show. It's fascinating to watch true growth. I am so close to being done with work for the week. This close. I'm a squinch away, if that makes any sense. One down, and one more piece to go for Ironminds (thanks again, female readers, for all your help!).I've got one piece done for another site, and a first round down for a third. And one day left of work before I go out of town. That's right, I headed back into an office this week. Fucking hilarious. I'm supposed to meet with this company next week for freelance copywriting work, and then they called me to do Information Architecture work for this week and next. I know a bunch of folks there from the advertising agency I used to work for, so they knew I had the skills to do this other work. So I worked through a bunch of stuff on the Top 5 article this morning, headed off to an interview at the content strategy division of a company on Park Ave. (loved the woman I met with; she'd spent an hour reading this site in the morning, and she said, "You know, I read your stuff, and, uh, it really looks like you should be freelancing for us rather than working here full-time." Fair assessment. She graduated from Hopkins as a Writing Sems major, too, about a decade before I did, and had the same favorite professor I did, Steven Dixon. We both agreed he was good people. Loved her.), and then finally landed in fabulous, glamorous Silicon Alley, eager to make a little money and do some good work. Two and one quarter hours later, I still hadn't done a thing. Apparently, they had to get approval from their corporate headquarters for me to touch a computer. The approval never came. Meanwhile, I sat on the computer, surfing the internet, emailing people, not only "touching" a computer, but - gasp! - using it, as well. It was insane. I read Advertising Age. Yawn. I took a smoke break. I talked to some former co-workers; it was like a class reunion, really. Then I chatted with the fresh young proofreader sitting next to me who really wants to write. I walked around the office. I thought about nothing in particular. It felt very familiar to me, that whole complete fucking waste of time feeling, that is. Finally, they just told me to go home because the approval hadn't come through yet. I felt so bad for the people who needed the work I was going to do for them - they had a client meeting the next day, and they need a revised site flow document. And they didn't get what they needed, because I wasn't allowed to use the computer. But don't you worry, I still get paid for my time. OK, did I mention how glad I am that I don't have a full-time job anymore? Today confirmed everything I've thought for the past six weeks. Corporate America is stuck, stranded, and suffocated/suffocating. I live on my own little island here in my apartment, but I am the queen of that island. I accomplished more here in the past three days than in the five weeks I worked at my last job. I am as efficient as I need to be, and I don't need anyone's permission to do anything. al;kdfjal;sdfjl;a - see, I did that all on my own!
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