Insert Title Here (Recovered from LiveJournal)

So this'll make two days out of three. I'll resist the Meat Loaf joke dangling just in front of my face...

We're playing up at Club Diamond's in Bradenton tonight, which makes this the... fourth(?) time we've played there. Maybe it's the third. It's a great little club, I'm not sure how Tom gets us these gigs sometimes. We usually get a good turnout when playing with similar bands there, notably the set we played with the Spitvalves and the Supervillains a couple months ago. Tonight we're there with the Know How, the Supervillains and another band I've never heard of, so this could be pretty good. If nothing else, it'll be nice to play a couple new songs.

I caved and bought a digital camera the night before last, mere hours after my last update. A Sony Cybershot 3.2 megapixel, for roughly $350. I'm happy with the purchase. We got the last one in the house, since OfficeMax was running a special that sold it with a 64MB memory stick. Sweet. All we've done this week is take pictures of the cats. The cats and the pumpkin, that is. I'll get a photo of that up here as soon as I remember.

I can't believe it's Friday already. The last three weeks have just shot right by; one moment it's Monday, I'm trying to get my gears moving again, and then all of a sudden I'm writing an e-mail with an hour left in the work week. Craziness. I guess losing track of time is a good sign you're doing something you enjoy. And doing something you enjoy and receiving payment for it is a good sign you're happy. And being happy is a good sign... ? Nowhere to go with that one.

We'll cut this one a little short today, since it's almost time to call it a week. I'm feeling pleased, as I integrated a new layout for Beneva Flowers in less than a day and it looks swell in every one of the 150,359 browsers I've gotta run it through. Hm.. that's not exactly right. I only have to run it through about 75,175 browsers.. the other half I do because I'm a completist turd.

Dead Cat Bounce (Recovered from LiveJournal)

I just keep this pattern of sporadic updates, followed by long periods of silence. I guess I'll regret it somewhere down the road, since the whole point of keeping a journal is to reflect and remember times that my memory has blocked out.

Life's still chugging along. I've been at Gravity Free for close to six months now, and still feel like I'm brand new. I'm much more secure in my position now, slowly starting to get over the feeling that every day is going to be my last and realizing that these guys actually make enough money to cover payroll, and I'm not in as much danger as I think. That's quite a departure from Rocket Digital. I've been working here something like 5x as long as I worked there, but I still feel like I've just started here, while I felt like one of the big dogs there. I don't mind being one of the bottom rungs on a totem pole.. especially since I feel like I'm actually gaining some experience at this job, building toward the future. So, in short; I'm as happy as I've ever been at a job. And, for the first time, I have security.

I've been creating and integrating my own designs for a series of months now, and have overcome the jitters that plagued my first few projects. I look back at them and just shudder... wonder how long until I'll be saying that about the stuff I'm churning out right now.

Life is allright. Autumn is unhappy, as she's been out of work for several months. We thought she'd have a job doing secretary work at a firm down the hall from my office, but they've been pricks about it. They basically blew smoke up her ass for over a month, telling her all about how they want to hire her, and just need to make sure they have enough room in the budget to bring on someone new. They'd tell her they plan to call her back in twenty minutes, and never get back into contact. This past week, I noticed somebody new entering and exiting their office. Ray did, too, and found out that they'd hired somebody to work the position Autumn had interviewed for. Never even let her know to stop calling. Bastiches...

She's starting to put her frustration into her art, though, which I think is the best possible choice. She's created this mixed media piece of a rabbit with giant, human arms and hands. It's hauntingly bizarre. She calls it her "sleep bunny", and hates it. I heard a quote somewhere that "Every great artist needs someone to keep them from destroying their own work." Or something like that. I'm butchering the quote. I think it's great, though it needs some more pokes and prods, but she's ready to give up on it. Maybe that'd be just as therapeutic.

She's been staying up extremely late, and waking up even later. I'm starting to worry, she just can't fall asleep at a decent hour. Even after staying up for an entire day, she couldn't fall asleep before 2:30. Last night, she made me promise to get her up when I got up, as she was planning to attend a job fair that started at 10 this morning. I woke her four times during the half hour it takes me to get up, ready and out in the morning, and set the alarm for ten minutes after I left. When I came home for lunch at noon, she was still asleep in bed. Fortunately, the job fair was an all day thing, and from the e-mail she's sent me, it sucked balls. I'm not sure what I should do... should i let her sort it out herself? Be more proactive? Shit, I dunno.

We carved a pumpkin this past weekend. One of us found a pattern that produces a portrait of George W. Bush when carved correctly. We carved correctly. It looks great. Hopefully I'll have pictures sometime soon.. which leads to my next point.

I want a digital camera. It's almost to the point where I need a digital camera. I'd just like to have something small, that I can tote around with me and shoot whatever catches my eye. I've always wanted that, really, but it's never been financially viable until now. Joe and I just got a check for $800 to split for the second half of the Flash site we did for IOAD, and like the immature little 23-year old gremlin I am, I want to blow my share immediately. The digital camera is #1 on my list, and a steel mouthpiece for my sax is a close #2. More good news came in on that front today, as Joe told me they want to move forward with a scripted site, which would allow them to update pages manually. We quoted them on it earlier, and they bit... this'll be a big deal. I am pleased.

I've started the process of redesigning my site anew. It moves incredibly slowly. It's funny... when I first set out on redesigning it, I wanted to do so solely to make the process of updating it much, much easier. Then, after a rush of inspiration, I get a layout that looks really nice.. but takes four times as long to update. Two steps forward, one step back.

Time to vanish. The band goes well, we're playing a show in Bradenton Friday night and if I quit being a tool, I'll say something about it here.