Holding Patterns

I feel as if I've been in some strange holding pattern the past two weeks. I'm hoping it's ending. I just got offered a temp assignment. It sounds sucky. A company had water damage so now I have to go through all their stuff and reorganize everything and do a lot of faxing, etc. It may last a couple of weeks and it actually pays pretty well. So, I won't complain too much even though it's not what I want to be doing. Part of me just doesn't want to take another crappy job, but what am I holding out for? Will something tolerable truly come along soon? I need money, so it better. In the meantime, I've been writing a lot more. I'm going to start sending my short stories out to publications. Having the blog is good, but I want more people to read them and also maybe make some money from it. So now I have to sit down and go through a Writer's Market book figuring out where to send them. The weather has been really nice here--perfect Chicago weather--something Chicago rarely sees. It's either sweltering hot or mind-numbing cold here. I think I should become a beach bum. Until I get a job, maybe I'll just hang out at the lakefront a lot, work on my tan, and inevitably get skin cancer.

Tuesday night I went to a rum tasting. It entailed me sitting at a bar at 5pm drinking mojitos with Bacardi reps. They are trying to market a new rum, so since I work for a website that promotes booze, I got to "taste" for free. A couple of my fellow writers and my editor all indulged in free appetizers and all kinds of drinks including margaritas and pomegranate mojitos. All for free, mind you. Then at the end of the event, we kind of "took" some bottles of rum. I know "taking" rum is probably not right, but I have a strong inkling the reps left them there for us. Afterall, we deserve to get something out of this. Drinking lots of rum probably wasn't the best idea, but what else did we have to do on a Tuesday? Last night I went to another show, which was okay. I'm getting sick of going to Subterranean all the time. After the show, my friend and I went to a bar and drink more. We ended up having a couple of very deep and depressing conversations. I know most people go to a bar for lively spirits, but not us. I realized certain issues still upset me and probably always well. Maybe you just don't get over things. And maybe that's okay, just as long as you don't think about them too much. The past will always be there, lingering. It solidified the fact my friend and I have some sort of connection and parallelisms in our lives. I don't know what the next step is if there is one. A couple of my friends ended up randomly showing up, which was cool. I like to randomly run into cool people. This town is so connected together.

At this point, I really need stuff to transpire. I'm not good at waiting for things to happen. I'm waiting to hear about some freelance opportunities. I'm waiting for something to happen romantically. I basically need my situations to reverse themselves--like go from unemployed to finding something feasible, etc. I need my life to turn itself out into a different direction. I can see myself doing something drastic like moving overseas. I mean, I initially went to L.A for the intention of staying for 2 months which turned into 5 years. You never know. Next weekend I'm going to D.C, so I'm really looking forward to it, albeit I wish I had more money to blow there. Not having money could be a good thing because I don't need to frivolously spend i, anyway. Some things for me to look forward to: D.C, music festivals, a big, open bar next week, show at Second City tonight, a friend's play reading next week, and the possibility and hope of things truly going the way I not only want but need them to.

Movie recommendation of the week: Jump Tomorrow. This came out 6 years ago and stars the lead singer of the ban TV on the Radio before I believe there was a TV on the Radio. I saw it in an art house when it initially came out. No one has probably heard of it for some reason. I just got it on Netflix. This was the first movie Ex Boyfriend and I ever saw together. Such a long time ago. It's your typical quirky and funny indie film about a guy who is going to have an arranged marriage but meets someone else. Hijinxs ensue.