There are some people who have been trying to get me to do work without compensating me as agreed. Last night, I told two of them that I was done being taken advantage of by them.

Company #1: More than a year past due on paying hundreds of dollars. More than a year past due on returning $3,500 worth of prints belonging to me and Forrest. Actually told me that I needed to do twice as much writing and twice as much photography for them now and they also wanted me to do publicity for them.

Company #2: Really thought I could trust these guys, but they are past due and telling everyone else they work with that they are planning on effing me over, but ssh don't tell Amelia.

Telling these two that enough is enough feels better than I thought it would. Frees up some of my time too.

Just got off the phone with the new Beverly Hills attorney I am retaining. Tra la la. May will be better than April.

--Amelia G

So, my brother tells me that the reason people whining about how busy they are while inconveniencing other people makes me so aggro . . . well, he tells me that I really am too busy. He suggests that I slow the fuck down and smell the roses and stop driving myself so hard that almost everyone else seems lazy to me. He also pointed out strenuously that I need to stop worrying so much about helping other people and pay attention to when they are taking too much out of me. I gotta admit he has a point. Or two. But this means that something has to go. I need to make lists for the next few days I think and figure out what all I do with my time and then take a sincere look at surgically removing some of the cancer from my schedule. My bro is so right that I should take more time to just chill, drink coffee with friends, keep in touch with folks I like and care about, read a book, go to the gym, travel for pleasure, watch a music video without stressing about the three minutes I could have been working.

So what do I do?

Journalistic art photography
Journalistic writing
Fiction writing
Screenwriting
Magazine editing
Site editing
Event promotion
Erotic art photography
Commercial photography
Site promotion
Publishing consulting
Site updating
Design

Sheesh. I can't decide whether I should try to break this all down into some sort of giant list of component parts. Some of these things would be easier if I just stopped doing them entirely. Some of them I probably just need to trim down a little. Food for thought. I'm sure thinking about it, but I haven't figured out what to do yet.

--Amelia G

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One of my biggest pet peeves is people who go on and on about how they are just too busy to do whatever. It makes me see red. My head spins on my neck 666 times. I vomit pea soup. I wonder why I'm losing my stomach lining.

There are some of my compatriots in Los Angeles who really do not have any more time they could make. Not too many. But some.

I just had to deal with a problem where a designer I work with claimed that he would not have time to swap one picture for another in a layout any time this week. Even though this would be potentially extremely costly for the publisher. Even though the reason that anything needed to be changed at all is because this designer pushed the line on what was acceptable when he knew what the rules were. Without him having pushed things, this swap would not have been needed. Supposedly, however, this guy's part time job was just so time-consuming. Only this production edit was really really really important and lot of people's future situations were on the line. So Forrest came in to save the day and said he would do this other person's work. Suddenly the designer decided he could actually do it after all. The guy was too busy if it was just really important to other people, but he was not too busy if it looked like he could be replaced.

The real irony here is that the publisher told me point blank that he would fire this lazy designer's ass in a heartbeat if I wanted him to. This was when the designer first caused the problem And I was all like no, no, we'll work it out so everyone is happy. And I haven't slept for a week while I've been trying to keep up with my usual schedule while interfacing with various concerned parties. And we finally hammer out a solution where everyone is a little bummed but mostly happy. And the guy who caused the problem in the first place is too busy.

--Amelia G

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I bought this gardenia sachet thing while I was in Beverly Hills doing an attorney meeting. I only go to Beverly Hills to meet with doctors, lawyers, and bankers and once in a while to eat. Usually just to meet with professionals. The area has really good shopping, though, so sometimes I buy dumb impulse stuff while there. The gardenia sachet thing is this pretty glittery little bag filled with rocks which smell really good and I think aggravate my allergies. I went to the Terri King fashion show last night. The fashion part was scheduled for very early in the evening, so I was in a hurry to leave the house. I was eating these precooked dill mustard shrimp they make at my local supermarket. And I left the plastic container with the shells on my desk.

Gardenias and rotten shrimp. All I need to do is engage in some watersports and spit some booze around the room and I will have my own private New Orleans.

--Amelia G