Where have all my feathers gone?

So I've been licking the wounds and well, showing them off a little I must confess. It makes gashes feel better to take them out and on parade. But the parade ended.

Freelancing is... interesting. It brings up a lot of old feelings. Since I've been nosing around midtown again and let's be honest...the building is right next to the building where I spent 2.5 years working on ads. So yeah. I guess old feelings are bound to surface.

Am I backtracking then? I hope not. But then again I get hit with a mean virus which won't let me think. Is this the fates telling me something? One sec...I need to blow.

In the meantime though, I'm working on projects that are wildly interesting. That's something.

I do miss my friends though. Working way up there is lonely. I miss the warmth of SoHo, the fancy espresso machine, the tunes blasted in the space between us. I miss the way briefs made more sense, ideas came out like wine and nights out laughing were a dime a dozen.

We can all hope this stimulus package gets something done and quickly. Good feathers are hard to find when no one has any money.

Who Needs a Head?

Oh me oh my, children. I haven't blogged in forever and ever because I worked forever and ever since the last blog. As this little chick looked back on all the time in the field, and sat rocking in the chair drinking sweet tea and waiting for the train, she realized that she wouldn't get to see the crop come up as they axed her head off in the southside conference room. Woe is me!

I could almost hear the whistle coming to take me to South Africa where I was to shoot my commercial, then my sobs overcame all consciousness. I looked to my desk to try to get my things together and no one stood up, no one grabbed me and hugged me, no one looked at me. They left me there in that strange dimension to grope around for some decency. After all the times I cared to hear their ideas even when they were plain terrible, after all the times I said good morning with a chipper smile, after all the hours upon hours we worked together that seemed more like play and we laughed until snot drooled out each nose...no one could garner a hug? I was overwhelmed and couldn't find the difference between me and my agency's belongings. Where I ended and it began you might say. I reached for the lap top...no, that's not mine any longer...I reached for my purse and left with what I came in with minus dignity.

Now here's a delicate question: why not a cafe down the road? Why in a glass box where everyone can watch and see? Why not let me produce my commercial that I worked all year on? Why not just after filming it? The tickets were bought people. I was to leave in two days.

Since my head was cut off all I had was my heart to think with. My heart kept telling me you shouldn't have smarted off to that one or you should have stayed later or you're just not good enough. Loads of that kept pouring out of me. I'll not dwell on that rubbish.

Let's just all remember how awesome we are and pray that those greedy bastards on Wall Street go to jail as we loose our jobs and are kicked out of homes. Is that okay to do? To pray those jackasses get ass raped? Ouch. Well my heart's all I got and it doesn't know good manners.

The Problem with Small Wings

We were just throwing around quotes attempting to get a great one - possibly for "Bartletts Familiar Quotations", I mean why not?

And here's a selection for voting:

1. If you try harder less, you'll live longer.

2. If you use a parachute, you'll live longer.

3. If you don't have a parachute, you die.

There they are. Let me know what submission wins?

Content

Where I work you get to do the most amazing stuff. Working with a team of brainiacs who like to laugh and get up for work in the morning, we've gone double time creating content to entertain our audience.

Hope you all like it. There's tons more coming.

OnAShoestring

Here's what I've been up to lately.


www.onashoestringfilms.com

ChickenLegs

My friend was right, knee socks drive men crazy.



Left my house wearing granny blues to the knees and FDNY across the street couldn't help themselves. Though I'm dorkie, townie and pasty, I still get thumbs up and smiles from the penis-sect with some knee highs on. What if they have happy whales on them? What if they're argyle? We must investigate if it's the coverage or if it's the pattern or if it matters at all.

News from the Biddy Fence

Ahhhh. Hello dahlings.

Already you can sense my fresh attitude. It's fleeting. I'm really quite disjointed today. Time for introspection as I say.

New job in month 5, approaching month 6 and the delightful review I was gauranteed upon hire. Lovely. I've kicked ass so I expect it to go smoothly. However my ridiculously feminine desire to please/judge myself sends razor blade thin drags down my heart on the slightest occasion. Meh. That too enriches my performance. Way to lemonade the situation I say.

In the past 5 months I've managed to push through an idea that I know for a fact would have been thumbed and pill crushed at prior agency, written a tag line for a global campaign that is well loved and will hopefully set my portfolio up a notch...like a shiny notch on the belt of addaboy, concepted a global campaign for a dying product that enlivened the product merely because the campaign is cool (ha), uh what else...plugged in to a group of folks that seemingly would turn on a newbie like wolves on a bunny. So there you go. Not frackin' bad for 5 months.

Moved. Finally. The coop of Bay Ridge was too shitted up and we couldn't have found a better nest. 2 blocks from the museum, park, and Bot Garden. Not to mention cheaper than the 1.2 hour commute to Beirut. Not to mention 300 to 400 more square feet...we're topping out at 1000 I'm guessing. Furniture time. We have pieces that fullfill duties. But an event horizon is approaching and there's a flat screen TV in it. Or is there a trip to the south of France there? Hard to tell with event horizons.

Here's news. I see kids. Not in a haunted hotel twin little girls in a bloody hallway, way. LIke I can see me digging a little mohawked boy named Atticus Jack holding on to the pocket of my jeans in the future. And that's big peeps.

Hens Have Ears

More recommends for entertainment or alone time or sounding smart. Sure.

Podcast front: Radio Lab by WNYC. At first the SFX threw me because I've been listening to more lo-fi structures of This American Life et al. But once you get into the flow of the audio style you really find that it's a character of the show. Mostly cool, each episode brings heavy concepts into a place we can all share. Particular ones that I really liked have been "Mortality", "War of the Worlds", and "Placebo". These are just a few. As you can feel, there have been a few times that I felt bored, but rarely. It's worth drudging through any boring moments to get to a grander point.

Music Videos: Snoop Dogg's latest is phenomenal. It's amazing to see how reactive the zeitgeist is to the Photoshop slickness of the past 5 years. Now things are cooler when they're Gondry, do-it-yourself cheesy. In these youtube times of "I can make something cool in my livingroom" the producers and directors aren't skipping a beat. Snoop deviates from his usual stuff and it works. Unlike Madge and her attempts to partner with Timbaland-erlake. Yikes. 4 minutes too long fellas. Sorry.

Music: Eve's new song "Tamborine" is awesome. Play it when you need to bounce around the room.

Let me know what you think on any of this stuff.

Today is Foul...sorry but it is.

Yeah. A bunch were laid off yesterday and today. Sour day. Scary when I just got here. But shit happens.

Recession hits. We all get hit.

Lame.

Photo Essay: Yard Bird Rides with Hair Ball

Traveling with the MTA has become second nature. I can read from my front door, down the stairs (look out for that Magnum and ghetto hooch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malt_liquor), on the train, wait on the platform, switch trains, up the stairs, down Broadway weaving tourists, up the elevator (mind the obligatory chat with co-worker). 

Ah, the MTA. Mostly on time. When they feel like it. And it's not on a weekend day.

 

Once in a while there's just no way you can seemingly stare at your iPhone or recent National Book Award. www.nationalbook.org/

When New York City shows it's 45 year old bikini line sans waxing. Wow. Now that's a conversation stopper. "I'm sorry dear but your crisis is on hold until I investigate this phenom."

So enjoy this ride with the hair ball. 

I wondered this: when is an object large enough to have it's own gravity? 

3.5" x 2.75"

Flash in the Pan

Holy chicken shit people! Enough with the fucking cameras already.

Went to a concert last night to stand there and enjoy live music, possibly moving my hips, nodding my head in feeling the lyrics. You know, New York, I'm too cool-ness that I'm forced to participate in. Since the show was stocked with fewer people than actually like the TV show Earl, me and the Man moved closer to the stage. Having claimed our respective space to stand and nod comfortably we enjoyed a few songs. The Man then must go off to pee leaving me there to fight all potential turf wars among the 40 somethings swaying around us.

Right before The Man returned, a girl wearing socks on her arms literally stepped in front of me and onto my feet to shove a camera in the air. I bent back, not giving up my position but not wanting to eat her lollipop smelling hair. Her friend noticed this and hung back. Some, I guess, still have a clue. But she didn't leave. No snap an annoyingly bright flash and move on. No "excuse me" or wink: "thanks". I was astounded. Do I fight? Do I keep things civil?

The Man returns and slowly gets a sniff of what's happening. I drove it home when I leaned back and said, "apparently we're in the camera pit." When you looked to my immediate right, there was sock bitch, to the front and left was snappy the annoying snapper who hadn't the sense to turn off the flash so she could get a picture that wasn't full of white smoke and burnt out skin on the singer. To her right was yet another bimbo with an unGodly sized view screen. What will come next, I wondered, a vibrating tone that tells you when there's a picture worth taking around?

Glancing around the room I counted ten other fucking cameras gleefully snapping flashes that pierced eyes and disrupted the moody funk of the room.

Oh, and the sock bitch next to me continued camera-ing the entire show. She was recording fucking video on the thing. I'm sure the concert is on YouTube right now. Listen for my comment about the camera pit around song 5.

I say ban the bitches with cameras. My God, do you have record every fucking thing in your life instead of actually live it?

New Farm, New Dirt to Scratch

And so it goes...the time has come for me to pick it up and move it on downtown. After two years at (unnamed ad agency), I'm making my move to something a lot less corporate. A lot more stressful perhaps since I won't be the smartest guy in the room there, but a lot more fun. I'm not suggesting I was the smartest guy in the room, just the most unchallenged.

The raise I was due over a year ago came too little, too late and the creative energy began dwindling before that. It happens. I'm not ready to approach the statement that I know how to run an ad agency, but I am learning what doesn't work. Fear. Fear wreaks havoc on creative people and the ideas.

CLIENT: "Oh, we can't do that. That'll seem like kids chase baseball players around because players won't sign autographs. Can the players run with the kids?"

AGENCY: "But it's a game of chase. You've liked it for three months."

Yes, I'm leaving at a good time. Not only do I hope that my new CD will put a bullet in ideas that can't be gutted by spineless clients, but I'm even more hopeful that he will see spinelessness before it starts thereby protecting months of work and heart and sweat from being for nothing.

They say it's the same room of whipped copywriters and art directors in hell as in heaven, but in heaven the work gets produced.

Moving on.

I decided to take a week between jobs to do who knows what. Should I go somewhere and soak my feet in lemon juice? Or should I maybe look for a new apartment and move myself back into civilization? Bay Ridge, Brooklyn is not fun, nor cultured, nor the New York City I meant to move to.

New Job, new apartment is what I say.

More on this later.

The reason I'm so hot to move is The Crazy Neighbor. So there's this guy who lives on the other side of my wall, the wall that's closest to my head when I sleep. He DJs to the world. Really, he has a microphone and a stereo and I assume, some type of fader. He likes to do this at 3am or maybe as early as 1am. When you ask this Crazy if he'll turn it off, he screams something about cutting up your face or using the N word and runs back and forth across the street screaming about needing some respect.

Plus I do not dig Bay Ridge.

New Podcast thumbs up for Ira Glass and This American Life. It's the public radio show gone podcast and it's a perfect listen with three segments giving you a short train ride listen to a longer train ride to the longest train ride. Plus it's just so neat.

Starting a carb-less life. It's hard and I'm wondering if it's worth it.

Now Serving Chicken and Dressing

Can we start celebrating Valentine's Day now?

One Hen Does Not Make A Hen House

I'm so dramatic.

It is true that my partner is now moved on, the art buyer had surgery today, my creative director was out sick and for some odd reason, the office manager split and just left the main line ringing. In between trying to concept on four different clients, I had to go answer the phone, negotiate with Brazilians for an estimate that they think is "Terminator 4" and handle my freelance assignments while the producer frolics with tigers in India.

So if I shout out to the office to pipe down as they stand around my desk exchanging memories of holiday parties past, forgive me. Not that I don't love the busy work and the chance to do something I don't usually do but enough already, peeps.

Now for some new recommends on the Podcast front: Studio 360 is amazing. I've fallen off of listening to my meditation Podcasts choosing instead to read the paper which is more stress. I feel for the victims I read about and the violators too. I mean what events have to happen for someone to grab a gun and maul down Mary Lou and her mama shopping for ties at Penny's?

Got into IFC's podcast series, "Getting Away with Murder". Cute, well shot, poorly acted. Curiously amazing cars for such a low budget affair.

Rainbows and kittens.

Looking forward to the trip down south for the holidays. Which is stress too, really. I have pastoral visions of crickets chirping and porch swings in total relaxation alas it's more like relatives that judge and friends too jealous to act interested in your life. So I made some mix CDs to listen to as we cart ourselves all over North Georgia.

Cup cakes and cubs.

When a Fellow in Feather Flies the Coop

News from the Coop.

Yesterday it was finalized. My art director is moving on to another agency. It's an agency where I feel I probably wouldn't have done well with my personality. But I think he'll do fine. It's sad to see him go....first. I thought maybe I would be the one but alas, I'm still on a hook wondering if I'm being reeled in or not. Desperation in my boss's eyes this morning. Yet, I feel he was hinting around that it may have been my fault Roger is leaving. Uh, believe what you want dude.

Finished a book: "Eat, Pray, Love". It was profoundly good.

Found that podcasts are really cool. They're free and I enjoy playing them on the subway. Cuts the 1 hr ride in 1/2, I swear.

New Podcasts are:
News from Lake Wobegon, a slice from each week's Prarie Home Companion - 4 stars
Learning to Meditate - 2.5 stars (the Australian accent makes me less meditative, more hungry for shrimp and steak
This American Life - 4 stars (there is also the show you can purchase, but the audio shows from NPR are free)

Keep getting Georgia hints. I believe that Georgia is calling me home. Weird. Yesterday morning on the commute in there was a woman wearing a Georgia sweatshirt. She and I spoke briefly. Later that afternoon "Georgia on My Mind" came on the office radio. I blurted out, "I know! I'm coming!" Sheesh, the tickets are bought. Not like I'm putting anything off.

Interesting dreams last night. Had an idea dream. The idea was called The Princess and the Pea Idea. In Big Guy's documentary film, I was testing him for the camera. I hid something in the house that was testing his "powers". In my dream I expressed that it was a shame I didn't have the bad voodoo mask from the Brady's trip to Hawaii, but that I would make do. This morning I woke up Big Guy and told him the idea. I don't know that it took.

ah well.

The Gospel According to Drained Blood/No Avian Flu

Got the follow-up call from Dr. Martin today.

He ran down the blood work...liver good, kidneys good, iron good, cell count good.

"You're totally normal."

"Hells yeah, Dr. Martin! I knew I was normal!"

He chuckles. "Well, on paper you are."

I asked about the cholesterol. My LDLs are 89... I looked up the optimal level for the bad cholesterol and 100 is king.

Dr says your diet is perfect, don't change a thing.

Good thing they don't check for caffeine levels. Then I would have gotten a lecture.

So that's the saga of the ordeal of the escapade through the dealings of drawing my blood.

Bleeding the Chicken or Why I'll Never Do Heroine

They tapped me today. I was naked, scared, shivering from fear. I had support but even He couldn't stop the inevitable stabbing and sucking and ripping of a piece of my soul.

I went to get a physical today. Pretty stratightforward: blood pressure, reflexes, eyes, ears, swallowing (?). I showed Dr. Martin my excema, he said yep. I conjured a harrowing tale of fire fighters busting into the building next door to discover that the building was seeped in carbon monoxide and I sure had a headache the other day and shouldn't we do a blood gas to be sure?

He asked of my parents ailments. I spoke of the colonoscopy and angioplasty and granpa's five heart attacks. He took my blood pressure. It was excellent. He's just trying to distract me from the horror film that starts in five.

There were no pictures on which I could gaze. My attention lept around the room hoping to land on something soothing. Left alone to get naked, I paced the cage, found an almost full biohazard can of bloody tubing and syringes. Oh God, Oh God should I be breathing this? Will mine go in there with all those other anonymous goos and Oh God, will a piece of my soul be tangled forever with Fred the Delivery Guy who raped his fourth grade teacher!

Calm it down Chicken Head, don't loose it.

Breathe.
In.
Out.
Okay, that's bullshit. Where else can the eyes go to find distraction?

These black ice cream cone things are interesting...no they're not! Oh God.

No, no, look there's lube. That's funny. Lube. Right next to the latex gloves. Latex...some people are allergic to latex, like really bad allergic. Don't they use the alternati...knock on the door.

Oh God.

New nurse. Haven't seen this one. She has that look. That look says I heard you're a big baby and I'm here to treat you like the nursery citizen you are. Oh, don't give me that look lady. I'll just kick things around in here and really show you how it's done.
I chirp out, "my support system!"
"Your what?"
"He's in the chair out there!"

She walks out slamming the door. She didn't mean it but it reminded me of doing bad before in my life and triggered the ole pain body that was so near the surface anyway. Pain body. Sounds oddly sexual in a German, red light way.

Support walks in with look on face too. That's okay. He means well but I can't look directly into the look or my head will spontaneously pop off my shoulders.

Last thing said to doc before Nurse with Face came in, "let's just do this and not talk about it!" Doc, if I was rude, I'm sorry. I chuckled it off to trying to make it seem quirky and cool rather than obnoxious and freaked out.

So Support lays on the babying and I begin to violently shake. Stomach is whirring. Can't focus on anything in the room. Memories are burning. Time is bending. Space is shifting. Is this what dying feels like?

Lie down! Nurse with Face barks politely in fear that she'll have another dropper.

Yeah, that sounds good. Lying down is always better than I don't know jumping jacks, karate kicks, barrel rolling.

(Breath quickening as I relay.)

Support comes around to the head. Nurse with Face touches me!!! Ok, that's it! This is over!!! I'm out.

She coos out, I'm just touching you, there's nothing in my hand. Coo, coo.

Smell hightened, sight begins to go. Or maybe the eyes are closed. Can't think long enough to solve.

Nurse with Face opens drawers, closes drawers. She fixing the fix. Oh God!

She touches me again!!!

FEELING MASSIVELY SICK. MAY NEED TO BRING FLUID QUICKLY ONTO NURSE WITH FACE!

Oh God. Oh God.

(What did all this sound like outside the door? Cut to outside the door, muffled winnying.)

Okay, she says, just cleaning. She's touching me! My God people, she's touching me! Just cleaning.

TAKE A DEEP BREATH SHE SAYS! Pump your fist. I'll show her fist pumping.

And then something cold and painful bit me. And my toes began to collapse in on themselves. I click my feet together frantically. Now I look back and how Dorothy of me! I notice the feet slamming together. It's psychotic. I'm near to scream. Stiffling scream.

BREATHE OUT! I let go of breath.
DEEP BREATH! I suck in a small one not yet finished with the last.

Is this for real...there it goes, the soul is for sure running out my arm and my toes are desperately trying to get it to stay. It's a tug of war between the angry piercing thing and my toes. Toes pulling it back, piercing thing pulling it out. Back, out, back out, back out back out!!! I'm backing out!

Ok, we're done.

Poking a Timid, Feathered Head Out

A rant that's voluntarily read? Really?

Well okay.

Today I had a black forest ham sandwich on pumpernickel with a side salad of soy beans and cucumbers.

You still here?

Okay.

After that I went down to the Writer's Guild of America strike so that I might glimpse my idol, Tina Fey. Alas she wasn't there but it was damn exciting and I did get to see Amy Poehler. I may have stared slightly as she seemed afraid of me. Maybe it was my maniacle smiling. I feel for the plight of no back end points on DVD sales. Seems boring to the rest of the world, surely. But I get it. Someone in the crowd overheard me say the name of my agency's boss and misunderstood that it was a network. A coordinator came running over handing me a card asking me to join the cause. I saw in his face the let down when I explained that yes, I'm a writer, not for TV per se. Ah well. It was cool. Right up until I smelled the lady in front of Sax. I mean wild animals don't even smell like this. Why she was yelling the N word at the ambulance confused me. But I thought about the rest of her rant..."they don't take you to a real hospital!" Wow. Some ambulance must have taken her for a scary ride at some point. Then I felt sorry that she smelled so bad but I was delighted she chose the front door of Sax to call home.

Hmm, still here?

This does work.

Maybe I'll come back tomorrow and see if you read that too.