the slack daily

50 Weeks of Marriage...

...and this is what passes for a fight in my house:

Me [walking in the door at 5pm after seeing my friend L.]: Hey, honey.

Will: Did you have fun?

Me: Yeah, we just caught up and went to Ernie's Taco House.

Will: You went to Ernie's?

Me: Yeah.

Will: I didn't know you were going to eat!

Me: It was three o'clock!  We were hungry!

Will: I can't believe you had tacos without me!

Me: It was a quesadilla.  Anyway, remember last week? 

Will: What are you talking about?

Me: You had a burrito while I was working. 

Will: I don't--

Me: You went to Los Tacos while I was at the Adoption Fair!

Will: I-- oh.

Me: So what do you want for dinner?

Will: NOTHING! ...or tacos.

Who Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?

My friend Carla and I always said that once we hit 65, we were retiring to Florida and bagging groceries at adjoining registers at the Piggly-Wiggly.  It was between that and wearing a turban, drinking martinis by the pool and banging the pool boy.

Now that I'm married, so the pool boy scenario is out.  The Piggly Wiggly is still a strong prospect, as is the Slackmistress' Home for Elderly Pit Bulls.  Maybe somewhere in there Will and I will become the couple at the ballpark who shakes their angry fist at those damned kids while gumming our shared bag of peanuts.

Today I had my first eye exam in four years so they insisted on dilating my pupils*.   I forgot my sunglasses, so I had to rock the little old lady sunglasses for the way home.

The Ghost of Christmas Future:

Part Roy Orbison, part Whatever-Happened-to-Baby-Jane?

What kind of old person d'you want to be?

*Check out the email I sent Will from my Blackberry here.  And please use the term "afterboob" at least once today. 

These are a Few of my Favorite Nerds.

My friend, fellow blogger, and career Democrat Greg Dewar has more blogs than I do.  There's Greg Dewar.com, the N-Judah Chronicles, and the N-Judah Sideshow.  However, it's his latest blog that I believe that will be of some interest to my readers who are fans of the BSG.

My fellow Americans, are you unhappy with our current crop of Presidential Candidates?  Are you looking for a leader with a larger worldview?  Look no further:

Adama for President!

Dog Day Afternoon!

I spent my afternoon with a handsome boy.

We even made out!

Hootie, along with many other fabulous dogs, is available for adoption through the Bill Foundation. 

Separated at Birth?

WLTV's Gary Vaynerchuk brings the thunder:

UFC's Matt Serra will hopefully bring the thunder in the next couple of minutes:

Edited to add: damn, that was BS. Yeah, he was losing, but they called it way too early. 

For the Birds!

This morning, Will and I collapsed on the couch with the remnants of last night's dinner and a Wonderdog, watching Nature's Engineers 2 on the History Channel.  We learned about Trapdoor Spiders and Naked Mole Rats, but it was really the behavior of the Great Hornbill that I found the most intriguing. 

According the show, when building a nest, the Hornbill creates a cavity in the trunk of a tree with its impressive beak.  While the female waits at home, the male goes out, swallows mud, and regurgitates it b to the female.  She will then mud-vomit to seal the opening to the nest, proving that nature is eerily similar to a sitcom family where mom knows best and dad's just a buffoon mud-puker.

The female Hornbill leaves only a small slit in the opening to protect her brood from the outside world, while dad is charged with the responsibility of finding food and bringing it back to the nest.  Mom can stay inside for up to three to four months.

How does she not go crazy? I ask Will.

So you don't want me to go out and swallow mud?

I thought about it for a second. Y'know, with the kids it sounds like a hostage situation.  Without, it sounds like heaven.

...

Things have been teetering on the edge of crazy here a Slack World Headquarters.  Remember how I wrote the other day about losing my freelance job?  I managed to pick up another freelance gig with them.  But it's one where time is of the essence, and I'm essentially on-call.  My friend S. also hooked me up with her husband's company, making sales calls and helping them with their online marketing.

Nina's List of Jobs:

1. Gym, part-time at the front desk.
2. Bill Foundation, Volunteer Coordinator.
3. Unnamed Website, Customer Service Rep.
4. Phone Sales, medical software.
5. Online Marketing, medical software.
6. Printing scripts, mailing scripts, emailing people about upcoming pilots, pitches, etc.

Nina's List of Blogs:

1. The Slack Daily.
2. The Post-Apocalyptic Workout. (With accompanying workout)
3. New blog, to premiere soon, half Geeks' Guide to Girls  and half Social Networking Yenta.

What Nina should really be doing:

1. Writing.
2. Writing.
3. Writing.

I've wondered to myself if it would make more sense to just get a regular full-time job, and write on the side instead of trying to fit it into the various nooks and crannies that I now use to sleep.  Except that finding a full-time job is a full-time endeavor.  While there are things that I think I can apply my skill set to, there are plenty of people that don't believe that it translates.  I've dug myself into odd little hole of a whole bunch of odd jobs.  Which pretty much makes me like the majority of writers out there: figuring out a way to balance earning a living and making time to write.

Will said I reminded him of Hey, Mon:

So I'm here, I swear.  I'm trying to keep up with your blogs and your twitters and your email, but mostly? I'm just working.

Tribute.

I started a blog about the following article:

Study Shows Couples Stay Together if They Watch Baseball Together*

It was the Juno of blog posts, both gut-bustingly funny and oddly tenderhearted,  a post that could heal rifts in families and bring peace to war-torn regions.  There were anecdotes braided together with facts to create a rich tapestry of linkable delight.

And then I had to go to StubHub.com for one last link.

It crashed my browser.

StubHub, you owe me one Best Blog Post in the world.  Or some free tickets.  It's up to you.

So I can only offer you the above link.

And this photo:

This is not The Best Blog Post in the World...this is just a Tribute.

*Link via QueenofSpain!

If You're Not on the Internet, Do You Really Exist?

Last night Will and I had the pleasure of meeting up with James, Eden, and Marjorie for dinner and bubbly to toast James' new digs. Partway through the evening Marjorie was lamenting the fact that she had a on of photos to upload to Flickr.  I mean, just because I didn't put it on Flickr doesn't mean it didn't happen! 

I laughed, but agreed.  It hasn't been my intention to post less and less, although I feel like it more and more.  I wonder when I drop off for a couple of days if readers think I'm doing less, which is ludicrous because usually bloggers drop off the landscape because they're doing more.  Because attempting to balance living one's life and recording it is a never-ending teeter-totter, attempting to be both Boswell and Johnson.

I thought about this all this morning as I caught up on the previous week's blogs and ran across Sue Shellenbarger's Wall Street Journal profile of the incredibly-popular Dooce, aka Heather Armstrong.  The article discusses the fact that  Dooce sought therapy to deal with hate mail (she now prints it out and runs it over) and how being a living, breathing commodity has put a huge strain on her marriage and her family.  Shellenbarger writes:

But less obvious is the behind-the-scenes price an at-home mom pays to shoulder her way to prominence in the blogosphere -- giving up her privacy, sustained time off and any remnants of work-family boundaries at all.

This isn't just about Dooce, this is about all of us.  In a technological landscape where privacy is a hot-button topic, I feel like bloggers/Twitters/Social Networkers/Flickrers forget that you don't have to do this.  Your life can still be full and wonderful and meaningful if you don't share it with the Internet.  We choose to do this.  We are our own first defense.  We decide what we share with Internet-Community-at-Large (don't make me say blogsophere!) 

Sure, sometimes the seeds we plant grow relationships and causes and communities. 

But if you chum the waters, don't be surprised if you attract sharks.

That's not to say that hate mail is okay or warranted.  I've received a disproportionate amount for my level of visibility in the blogosphere. (There, I said it! Happy now?)  But if blogging is detrimental to your mental and physical health? The computer does have an off switch.  Use it.

Panic in the Streets of L.A...

I lost one of my freelance gigs yesterday.

I got the email when I was on my way to pick up three dachshund puppies at the vet in Mar Vista and drop them off at one of the Bill Foundation volunteer's homes.  I didn't have time to be upset, as there were three squirmy puppies in the backseat, yapping and wriggling and nibbling at my fingertips.  I'm not much for small dogs, but I dare you to not elicit the smallest "aw" under your breath when confronted with such cuteness.

Will (who's writing for LA MetBlogs now, check out his first post here!) reminded me last night that we'd be okay. We'll figure it out, we always do.

I wasn't let go due to the quality of my work, but because they had found someone in-house to do the same thing.  I've been able to continue this part-time circus act by keeping a bunch of plates spinning simultaneously.  I guess I was shocked when one of them fell with no warning.

I've spent the morning in job hunt overdrive, which is a combination of finding short-term freelance gigs and searching for full-time positions that I can attempt to translate my television writing experience and my torrid affair with social media (which is strictly amateur level) into a plausible pitch as to why I'm the right chick for the job. To be fair, I'm always on the lookout for a new gig.  It just rarely has this level of panic attached.

Writing cover letters and re-tailoring my resume for each possible opportunity hasn't proved difficult.  What has proved difficult, and sometimes bordering on embarrassing is when I get replies like why on earth are you applying for this job?  One day I will respond because I don't hate money, do you?

A couple of weeks ago, a crazy woman at the gym (honestly, she's wacko) asked me why I hadn't gone back to my writing job after the strike.  I reminded her that I didn't have a gig before the strike - that's why I was working at the gym.

Well, why not? she asked.  D'you have a drug problem or something?

Scaling the Hollywood ladder isn't always a linear process.  I've had agent problems (one refused to finish a spec pilot we had written because we made an abortion joke that offended him), a Darren-Lamb-esque manager who sends email forwards and can't get people on the phone (although he's made a ton of money for the ex-boyfriend I set him up with), and the people who hired me weren't working for a long time (now they do, but in features which means no writing staff.)   

And that's not even the Hollywood side of the equation, the part where you're told you can't write for boys because you've only written for girls because they're unaware of your credits or that you can't write adventure because you've only written action or you can't write for adults because you only written for kids or you can't write for prime-time because you've only written for cable.

Today also marks 11 months that Will and I have been married (which means you people who had "one year" are about to lose your bet!) and it hasn't always been easy, as marriage is wont to be (or not be), but there hasn't been a minute that I thought I wanted to be married to anyone else.  But I am hardwired with the responsibility gene, and I can't stop thinking about our future.  Forget buying a house, what about retirement? Pension?  What if we had to pay market value rent?  Can I fit a mini-wine fridge in the Mini?

Of course, there are still career-type irons in the fire, a book proposal out there, a spec to finish, plus the possibility of Two Actual Jobs, something I can't even think about right now because I don't dare let myself dream anymore.   A deep cleansing breath, and I'll just concentrate on making the rent.

Your Moment of Zen:

Not Truthy, Just Lazy.

Notes:

1. Dear Crafters: I kid because I love. I am crafty only in the Beastie Boys sense, so I am jealous of people who can Make Stuff.
2. As if the screen grab above isn't hot enough, check out the one at YouTube.
3. JustJENN Designs can be found here.
4. The Self-Portrait Truthiness Project can be found here.
5. I am trying out Viddler, because you can make comments within the video, and I think that's just peachy.  However, I will continue to use and upload at YouTube and blip.tv if you'd prefer to watch there.  I'm good that way.