High Finance

Thanks for all your kind words of sympathy and occasional snorts of laughter regarding the great fence disaster of '07. My neighbor informs me it will probably be around $500 to fix.... So whenever he gets around to doing it, I'll need to hand him a check. Which is totally fine; on one hand, I feel like I ought to ask for a receipt or something just to know he's not rooking me, but on the other hand I destroyed his damn fence, and he's fixing it himself, and I should really be glad it's not worse than $500. So it'll be no questions asked, I think. That plus the $1200 in taxes, plus the $800 in dental work, has me wound up a bit tight this month.

I find out about the big job next week. Right now I'm doing contract work for them, so I keep getting sympathetic glances from the people in the office who know I'm up for a job.... I actually found a page from one of my competator's "tree briefs" on the copier on Monday, and I was all like, "Hmm, I probably shouldn't read this.... oops! Too late!" It made me feel better, it wasn't all cool lookin' and stuff (obviously, that applicant didn't know Bushi!) and the content was.... well, let's say it was kind of scattered. Part of the fun and challenge of exhibit design, for me, is needing to keep a focus on a Big Idea--what's the point we're hoping to get across here to kids and adults? How does each element of the exhibit point back at that idea while expanding on it in some way? It reminds me a bit of theatre design, back when I thought I was going to be a drama major and design sets and lights--because your space is limited, and you have to achieve purposes X, Y, and Z with your set or your lighting, you have to stay very focused and keep asking yourself, "Is this necessary? How can I make this work in the context of the play?" So I tried hard to keep my project tight, and made a point to clearly relate everything back to my big uber-idea. The person whose project was on the copier? Not so much. So who knows? I could be top of the pile, or someplace in the middle... but don't think I'm at the rock bottom. Small favors, eh?