setbacks
so i bought my plane ticket for boston, and i arrive at 6:30pm on nov. 1. will there be a welcoming party at the airport?, you ask. i say: you have to show up to find out!!!. humorously, this makes YOU the welcoming party, and me a latter-day God of Almost Unimaginable Craftiness.
within 48 hours of buying my ticket, it was brought to my attention that:
- whereas i thought i had an apartment in boston, i do not
- whereas i thought i also had a way-sweet editing job lined up, i do not
the former is my fault. i was going to live with the other members of the taste explosion--you recall, undoubtedly, the inventive instrumental mostly-us-banging-on-stuff stylings of the taste explosion--but i failed to tell them that i was definitely interested in sharing the taste explosion house until recently, when they had already found someone else who wanted to stay there.
this is just as well, due to the latter: it turns out pearson, which has enticing jobs for battled-toughened career editors, doesn't take people on until january, if then. as it turns out, i'm going to spend the first few months in boston living in the taste explosion basement, next to the drumset, paying a somewhat more forgiving rent and doing laundry WHENEVER I WANT.
it's all good. i have plans. i have plans i can't even tell you about. we will see if they are successful; smart money is on "if like last time it involves a 'pet hotel,' probably not." the 2nd draft is now finished, although it's definitely not the final draft; i just want feedback on it. those of you who have requested copies will get one via email in the next few days. those of you who haven't may well get your credit rating altered online. the first 40-some pages of godspeed, aka novel #2, are also available to those of you who are huge fans and don't especially care for characters who are not identical to me.
now is also a decent time to point out that i have become disenchanted with work and am looking forward to life as a celebrity, which will happen when the band gets successful. doubters have but to listen to our demo, or me singing loudly at them for hours at a time. honestly, there is no way being an international rock star will be worse than what i've been doing recently. tour-guiding and receptioning have their problems.
1. tourists are dumb. there are a few classes of question that i deal with, as a tour guide, that fill me with rage, or occasionally just profound depression.
badly informed: "so... why did the nazis... i mean, why did they even build the berlin wall in the first place? it doesn't make any sense." sometimes they're not even questions. they're just assertions of stupidity. "prussia and russia are the same thing." please talk among yourselves for five minutes. i have to go take up heroin.
wrong-headedly editorial, as well as not a question: "it seems from all this that germans, like... i mean it seems like they don't like remembering, uh, what happened. can you, uh. can you answer that?" good. that's a really good, careful observation that (interpreted generously as insight into, succinctly put, the responsibilities of the son for the sins of the father, which it is not) in no way would take, at the very least, half an hour of respectful treatment from any responsible student of history. also, not a question. "would you say that berlin suffers from its past? or does it even, uh... does it even think about it." i'm glad that we're treating "berlin" as a single, coherent entity. you should be shot.
foreign: "I AM THINK, IS INCREDIBLE SO MANY THINGS! HAPPEN HERE ALL IN SAME CITY!" this may not seem like a question, but it is posed as one. "THIS MEMORIAL I THINK IS TERRIBLE, WHY YOU BUILD IT?!?!" good point.
2. no one says please. i counted once; at reception, people asked for things fifty-two times, in four hours. "please" was said twice. "i'll have a..." was said, please-lessly, fifteen times. here is a piece of advice to you, if you are planning to travel: learn how to say "please," or i will claw my initials into your face. frequently it's possible to say it in english. i can't believe no one does this. "i think i'll have a beer." that makes one of us. "i'll get a towel." here you go! i've been peeing on it, intermittently, since 8 in the morning.
there's more--there's a lot more (germans have no conception of how traffic lights work)--but i have to go. we will revisit this topic, because it is of great importance to me. so, good. in the meantime, may the steelers' holy season of dominance continue with a victory over the loathsome patriots next weekend.
i'm richard quest, and this has been "business traveller."
within 48 hours of buying my ticket, it was brought to my attention that:
- whereas i thought i had an apartment in boston, i do not
- whereas i thought i also had a way-sweet editing job lined up, i do not
the former is my fault. i was going to live with the other members of the taste explosion--you recall, undoubtedly, the inventive instrumental mostly-us-banging-on-stuff stylings of the taste explosion--but i failed to tell them that i was definitely interested in sharing the taste explosion house until recently, when they had already found someone else who wanted to stay there.
this is just as well, due to the latter: it turns out pearson, which has enticing jobs for battled-toughened career editors, doesn't take people on until january, if then. as it turns out, i'm going to spend the first few months in boston living in the taste explosion basement, next to the drumset, paying a somewhat more forgiving rent and doing laundry WHENEVER I WANT.
it's all good. i have plans. i have plans i can't even tell you about. we will see if they are successful; smart money is on "if like last time it involves a 'pet hotel,' probably not." the 2nd draft is now finished, although it's definitely not the final draft; i just want feedback on it. those of you who have requested copies will get one via email in the next few days. those of you who haven't may well get your credit rating altered online. the first 40-some pages of godspeed, aka novel #2, are also available to those of you who are huge fans and don't especially care for characters who are not identical to me.
now is also a decent time to point out that i have become disenchanted with work and am looking forward to life as a celebrity, which will happen when the band gets successful. doubters have but to listen to our demo, or me singing loudly at them for hours at a time. honestly, there is no way being an international rock star will be worse than what i've been doing recently. tour-guiding and receptioning have their problems.
1. tourists are dumb. there are a few classes of question that i deal with, as a tour guide, that fill me with rage, or occasionally just profound depression.
badly informed: "so... why did the nazis... i mean, why did they even build the berlin wall in the first place? it doesn't make any sense." sometimes they're not even questions. they're just assertions of stupidity. "prussia and russia are the same thing." please talk among yourselves for five minutes. i have to go take up heroin.
wrong-headedly editorial, as well as not a question: "it seems from all this that germans, like... i mean it seems like they don't like remembering, uh, what happened. can you, uh. can you answer that?" good. that's a really good, careful observation that (interpreted generously as insight into, succinctly put, the responsibilities of the son for the sins of the father, which it is not) in no way would take, at the very least, half an hour of respectful treatment from any responsible student of history. also, not a question. "would you say that berlin suffers from its past? or does it even, uh... does it even think about it." i'm glad that we're treating "berlin" as a single, coherent entity. you should be shot.
foreign: "I AM THINK, IS INCREDIBLE SO MANY THINGS! HAPPEN HERE ALL IN SAME CITY!" this may not seem like a question, but it is posed as one. "THIS MEMORIAL I THINK IS TERRIBLE, WHY YOU BUILD IT?!?!" good point.
2. no one says please. i counted once; at reception, people asked for things fifty-two times, in four hours. "please" was said twice. "i'll have a..." was said, please-lessly, fifteen times. here is a piece of advice to you, if you are planning to travel: learn how to say "please," or i will claw my initials into your face. frequently it's possible to say it in english. i can't believe no one does this. "i think i'll have a beer." that makes one of us. "i'll get a towel." here you go! i've been peeing on it, intermittently, since 8 in the morning.
there's more--there's a lot more (germans have no conception of how traffic lights work)--but i have to go. we will revisit this topic, because it is of great importance to me. so, good. in the meantime, may the steelers' holy season of dominance continue with a victory over the loathsome patriots next weekend.
i'm richard quest, and this has been "business traveller."
posted by jesse at 6:53 AM
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