cellini's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I hate freelancing. My first story for Sp!n still hasn't run, and my supposedly accepted pitched still haven't been given a price tag and I found out why both things are true today. My story on the Gw@r B@r has been held up for weeks because the photo editor is an idiot. I turned this in something like a month ago and they wanted it immediately. It needed photos. Photographing a dimly lit bar is not easy, which was why I asked for a photographer in the first place. My quick snaps did not do the job. So the photo editor turned to Getty Images and found that there is nothing there that does the job. Some professional photographer in Baltimore has good pics of the bar, so B@rt told the photo editor to pay for the rights. She took two weeks to even ask him by email, because all she knows is clicking through Getty images. He wants $150 each, that's too much, now she has to bargain him down for a reduced cost for three pics. Bart tells her to call him up and get a lower price for three photos. She says "ok" then does nothing for a week. She's in her mid-twenties, has grown up texting, and is terrified of cold-calling someone. She is literally too scared to pick up the phone and ask this guy to sell three photos for $300 or whatever. Fucking grow up. You are the photo editor of Sp1n M@gazine. Learn the basic ropes of doing your job. So the piece I wrote is just sitting there, not published, because this chick cannot get through her fear of making a phone call. This is big-kid journalism. It is time to get over your stupid bullshit that should have been beaten out of you in your first internship. Meanwhile, my story on B1g Lurch is also waiting on a price tag because B@rt is sitting there with his arms crossed over a pretty reasonable stand-off. Sp1n had a story ready to publish which would be a pretty serious piece about a pardon for a drug conviction that was actually way more serious than it has been portrayed. Bob G. wants to kill it because it might upset a sponsor. B@rt is rightfully defending the piece and insisting that it go live. So I have been passed off to the new features editor, who happens to be the guy who wrote the story in question. In addition to B1g Lurch, I have a new feature to pitch to him, which B@rt thinks is great, but he might not be Editor at L@rge for much longer. Also I am in the midst of another big edit through the new book. I'm trying to cut 5,000 words, which is probably a dumb idea and I'm mostly doing it because one agent passed because she thought that 89,000 words is too long. Which is honestly fucking bullshit, because it is not like this would be like picking up a Ron Chernov volume on Hamilton or Grant. This isn't 600 pages. Nobody decides not to buy a book because it is a centimeter thicker than something 65,000 words long. But the new edit is also tightening up the writing and prompting me to do things like introduce characters better and let reveals wait for their better moments. I have to sell this fucking thing soon because I am going to run out of money. And the drama at Sp!n Magazine has meant that I'm not getting paid from there at the pace that I should be. I could be doing 5 or 6 pieces a month for them but the stupid bullshit and drama over there has slowed it down to one a month, entirely because they can't communicate and say "yes, we would like this article and we will pay you X dollars to write it." I hate freelancing so much. I thought that I would never do this shit again. But the tech layoffs happened, and science communicators are not so much in demand, and here I am just trying to tread water until I can sell the fucking book. Also there's this chick, Maisey, whom I really like, I'm not in love with her. She's just cool and fun. Engl1sh, neur0 scientist. If she shows up at the gig at the pirate concert venue that I'm going to tomorrow and might be doing a story on for Sp1n and told her that I'd be going to, I'm going to assume that she wants to hang out with me. She did find excuses to touch me when we last hung out last weekend. Alex has been MIA and I'm not going to reach out to her. The ball is in her court. If she drops it indefinitely, it's her old age that will be lonely. 3:27 a.m. - 2023-04-07 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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