Golf, one of my oldest friends.

I don't get to visit very much but it always offers me quite a barrel of fun. A barrel shaped bag? And we were lucky for some pretty sweet weather, too. I hope we get to make some sort of habit out of this hobby. I know it's a bit on the expensive side but I would like to think we should be able to earn a round here and there. Gotta work hard to play hard, I suppose.

Physical exhaustion.

I am so burned out from sports last night that my performance really took a hit today. I could have been worse but I was hoping to be more productive today. I guess I should seriously consider exploring some kind of quicker recovery method to avoid this happening in the future... Or at least plan ahead better for the reduced output level I might expect. I still don't really think of myself as actually getting old... but I am getting older. Just a little. Ha.

Body still holding together.

Despite the pain in my legs and feet. I played some softball, ran around in the outfield for a couple hours, then played some pretty intense basketball for another couple hours. I'm not entirely sure how I had so much energy, even toward the end of basketball, but I did... and now I'm in pain... good pain. I will probably take a couple or so days to recover but I'm down with that. All for the love of sports, I guess. Pain and smiles all day!

Excitement for our work.

We always enjoy meeting with new potential clients but it is still quite exciting when said potential client has great enthusiasm for what we might do for her. Today we had just that sort of meeting and I think we are well equipped to meet many of the needs of her business, of which they are quite diverse and potentially frequent. Fun!

Honing the focus.

Our business is essentially four people strong and I think there's a lot of potential. Until now, we have had our moments, but generally have lacked a bit of the focus that really keeps us churning into success. I think we are starting to buckle down a bit more, though, and I expect good things on the close horizon. All that remains is to do it and keep on doing it long into the future!

Just workin' all day.

And getting things done. It's a nice feeling whenever it happens. I like to think I'm making a difference in my future, anyway. Just keep working... even with a short blog entry. Ha.

Comedy for the soul.

Comedy is probably specifically intended to inject humorous, or at least generally positive, elements into a persons consciousness which aims to cause laughter or, at the very least, smiles in it's recipients. When it can be used as a force for good, causing an additionally beneficial element such as peace, unity, and/or love it might still be called comedy... but it could be called something else entirely. I don't have a proper name for it but I do appreciate it when I see it. And I am glad to be associated with those who strive to do it. We need more of this sort of thing for sure.

Parades are fun.

I've never been one of the parade participants before today, if my memory is working properly, and it was a fun experience, I have to say! I might not even be considered a participant since I was simply video taping our crew in the parade... but I still had fun. It's cool to see how people react to the fun things in life. It's awesome to see kids smiling and laughing, ever excited for the cool characters in their midst. I should like to do this sort of thing again sometime.

Hard work for hard money.

Actually, I don't really know what that would even imply. I just worked hard all day today and even though my rate wasn't too bad it still doesn't feel like it is enough. Maybe I'm just being over-demanding or I just have a unreasonable expectation of what my time is worth. I know I am appreciated but maybe that's just because I'm probably a bit on the cheap side. Oh, well. It's good I really enjoy my job.

The pains of music.

My fingers, my back, my ears... basically my whole body is in an unusual amount of pain right now. Unusual, in that it's source is simply not one I have experienced much over the last year or so since I exited the band. Music is one of the great sources of said pain and certainly one I have missed for quite a while. It is exhausting, exhilarating, expletive-inducing excellence all-around. Something I will shortly, surely miss.

A concentrated ball of work.

We sat around in our desks planning, plotting, projecting and occasionally playing all day long today... the three of us... plus one for the first part of the day. It felt like motivated, purposeful work that might even lead to some results at some point. I am sure we need to change a few things up to really make business take off but even just establishing a solid habit of working well together is a step toward that right direction.

Advertisement through service.

The idea isn't entirely new but the forms of service, and how I might be able to offer it without too much expectation, is starting to take shape in my planning and theories. It seems to me that the opportunity to build rapport with a potential client is far more valuable than simply impressing them with a well-crafted body of work or demo reel. It's sort of the drug dealer method, I guess, for lack of a better metaphor. Ha. Well... I guess they do it for a reason... it has to be successful in some important way.

Nostalgic opportunity.

For the first time since I left the band I got a call to see if I could sub back in for an upcoming gig. I think it has been more than a year since my last gig with them so I naturally jumped at the opportunity and am quite excited to jump back in the ring, even if it's only for one night. I busted the old bass out of the corner and, after a couple or so hours of trying to cobble the setup back into working condition, jammed back into some jamming like a sloppy jambino. I found a few old tracks online and tried to play along and definitely realized that I am WAY out of practice. I feel confident I can do the tracks justice by the time we're on stage later this week... it's just gonna take some actual practice everyday until then. Weird!

Slowly getting things pulled together.

It is good to enjoy the actual opportunity to take a break. And it is even good to take that time to do some work on myself, even though it is technically work. I sort of feel that when I take a little "me" time to do some cleaning, and/or introspective focusing, that I have a decent chance that life progress is being made. There is still a lot of cleaning to do, of course, but every little step is a positive thing anyway. More swimming, I suppose.

Connections with people are important, too.

After Elisa and her family left, and I left home for work, I basically became an island for the rest of the day. I did eventually participate in a card tournament and obviously this meant I took a few hours to engage with the people of the world. The strange part, and something I've heard in many forms from many different people for most of my life, is that I don't really feel like I was with people... connected to anybody in particular. I felt somewhat alone. It wasn't a totally unusual feeling but it did seem a bit magnified for some reason. I suppose I should be grateful. It does increase my motivation to seek out the opposite.

Family is important.

It is what binds the human race together. Commitment is often lost on the world in so many ways... except through the ties of family. People easily connect with those who are the good among us, however, they still tend to remain connected to even the worst of us when they are our family. And I doubt it would happen any other way nearly as much. We are all truly family, after all. And I am especially grateful for the family I am apart of.

Learning to handle conflict from an outside perspective.

I am not technically totally outside of the situation I am referring to but I do feel almost totally emotionally uninvested in the outcome. It's an interesting challenge to help friends deal with a conflict we all face together. I am lucky my demeanor is calm and my thinking has remained clear on the whole topic. I am not entirely sure it my assistance is all as helpful as I'd hope it to be but I am confident it is positive help in some way... and that's good enough for me. I can only do what I can do.

The turbulent possibilities.

Not in a bad way, though... just a bit fickle and unpredictable. We have a lot of different types of opportunities at work and I think it will definitely be an interesting path to navigate through in the coming months. It makes me curious what things will even look like toward the end of the year. Fun, crazy times!

Planning deep into the future.

It is always fun to dream out loud. When we have our weekly meetings and think about where we'd like to be in the future that can be a great catalyst for said dreaming. And so much of it seems very achievable and much of it even seems somewhat inevitable. It feels sort of like the daydreaming fun from elementary school, even. Ha.

Diversity definitely keeps things fresh.

I have done a fairly wide variety of things in my field and when I get to do something I basically have never done before I am always super excited. Sure, I've done tons of camera operating, a decent amount of multi-cam work, a little bit of streaming, and a great deal of b-roll shooting... but I have never had to do it all during a live broadcast/webcast pretty much all at the same time... with a camera style I've never used before. It wasn't particularly difficult but it was still very interesting to me. Reason #2438950 I continue to love my work.

Recognition of talent... outward and inward.

It is cool to see well-crafted creations of pretty much any kind. They seem to represent all the effort, intensity, passion, and practice expressed by their creators in their creation. And in this, they often inspire those who follow to reach for a similar level or type of achievement. It is very easy to forget, however, that those who follow also include the original creator as well. Everything we create is always a step to something different in the future, hopefully better expressed/realized/crafted in the process. Sometimes my entries here can feel rote and redundant and I am sure they definitely read that way to the outside observer who would casually glimpse at any given entry, or cluster of entries, before finding a personal judgement to suit their appraisal. Every instance, every entry, every creation, is a small piece of a greater work, a greater picture, a greater creation... and the ultimate creation is two-fold; both an archive externally represented and a creator internally changed. We do not practice just to do something. We do things to become someone. I often forget that I am allowed to recognize that I have become someone different through all that I have created. I hope I have chosen good things to create/become along the way.

Doing a little summer cleaning.

I was mostly lazy today, since I actually didn't have to go into work and needed a break, but I did pick up a little cleaning energy and used it to do a bit of organizing in my bedroom. I still have a ways to go before I would call it good but it's definitely improving and that's definitely a good thing. My car will be the next area of attack but that might be on hold until next weekend or sometime later. Organization of my environment is a nice upgrade to life, I have to say.

Hanging with the peeps.

It was nice to relax and hang with some friends in a easy-going environment for a night. It felt like I was being a normal human being again. Chill, eat, laugh, play. It was a great way to kick off the weekend. I look forward to more days like this.

Starting to feel a bit more fit.

I think my recent semi-regular trips to basketball have started to increase my physicality a bit. At least, it feels a bit better and noticing anything at all is something I haven't experienced in a while. My hops aren't totally back but it feels easier to touch the rim so that's cool. I might be able to touch with two hands if I tried hard enough... maybe I'll try next week. I could still stand to lose about 15lbs or so to really feel like I am back in action. Weight loss is a much more difficult thing to do than I ever really expected. Mostly, I just think I don't have enough motivation to improve my self-discipline enough to get it done. Some other time, I guess. Ha.

Focus among friends.

I have been working my brains out for quite a while and I mean that almost literally. My brains are often useful but only when they're actually in my head. So, when I take the opportunity to visit with my friends, to socialize even a little, it really feels like my brains do actually return for a pleasant increase in my focus. It's basically like finding my ground again. A bit of a reset button... and more metaphors as well. I need to socialize more. I'm sure it is actually a need, even. Now to actually implement it, I suppose, is the challenge.

Still feeling a little sapped.

I am not sure my little bout of food poisoning last week didn't have any lasting effects. I've felt a bit lethargic several days since and I don't think it has to do with poor sleep necessarily. Maybe I'm just a little burned out and need a little more slow time to get back in shape. In any case, I wouldn't call it the worst thing... it's mostly just a little annoying. Just keep swimming, I guess.

The unfortunate misses.

As much as I enjoy most of the elements of my chosen career, there are a few things that aren't so cool. The only one I will mention at the moment is the semi-common occurrence of when my work crushes my normal life schedule. I did enjoy my work today but would have much preferred to hang with my peeps in the non-work world. It could have been a grand life memory, now lost in the ether of non-existence and something I could easily regret if I take a negative stance about opportunities missed. I choose positivity, despite my thought that it could be an "unfortunate miss." I am more motivated. This is a good thing.

Doing work that matters.

I saw an interesting commentary about the field of art and the opportunity and purpose for one's work in that field. The remark was made that, in general, nobody really cares about artistic work. That the world doesn't look for specific artistic work to be made. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be made, though, and doing it for a beneficial purpose is always an important goal. At least, that's how I paraphrase what was said. In my opinion, however, doing art/making art/working in an artistic field it doesn't necessarily matter if the world doesn't care about what you're doing(assuming the "care" part isn't technically referred to as money.) The art we do as performers, artists, creatives improves us through the process of creating it, thereby improving everything else surrounding it peripherally. And the value of work is so often and easily forgotten.

The ever-evolving ream of human networking.

I specified it as "human" networking because I am not talking about computer peripherals... this post could have been confusing. Anyway, I think it's cool to meet new people and get to know them somewhat beyond the surface interactions we commonly experience with the most frequency. What sort of experiences get us past those surface interactions, you might ask? Doing work with or for somebody is one of those good ways. It is literally inhabiting the same space with that person for an extended period of time all at once... the added element of labor often spurs more interesting, insightful conversation by its nature, I tend to think. It is all yet another positive element to my job that definitely serves to keep it interesting, in the moment as well as in anticipation of things yet to come.

Become a better ________.

I think it's VERY easy to think we are doing things at a level of quality that will continue to carry us forward. What a dangerous thought that is, though... danger in two forms; the misconception of ability(which is technically almost always present anyway) and the misunderstanding of inertia, or the lack of improvement, which is actually regression. I need to improve my craft continuously. I need to become better at what I do.