I’ve meandered around my thoughts on this blog before as to whether I’m as busy as I used to be (I’m not), and sort of missing those days.
Well, as I was finishing up my last show, I was looking for my next job. With 2 1/2 weeks still to go, I found a night job. But they wanted me to start the next day.
It was only supposed to be a short term job – 2 1/2 weeks actually, with the end date of both coinciding.
In the entertainment industry, it’s all too often feast or famine. So I wanted to feast while the feasting’s good.
I never want to turn down an opportunity to work with new people. But I didn’t want to leave my job early. (We were really winding down. They were basically letting me stay ’til my outdate as a favor. I didn’t want to turn down those paychecks, baby!)
So, I worked 9 hour days, 10 hour nights, and had commuting time between all that. It took about two hours to get between the jobs, and one hour to/from my home from either of them. Add all that up, I basically just had time to come home and change clothes.
I was napping on busses, napping during my lunch break, getting sleep whenever I could.
It felt really nice to be busy again. Even though in reality I wasn’t doing anything wildly special, I at least felt like I was important or something. After all, I must be with how busy I am, right?
I ended up working Saturdays as well. The rest of the weekends were spent sleeping as much as humanly possible, doing homework, and doing laundry.
It was fun for 2 1/2 weeks, but obviously that would not have been sustainable.
For the first time, I actually really appreciated having a job away from other humans. I sit in a bay all day by myself looking at a computer screen. Generally, I love interacting with people. But as a super tired person barely hanging on, having to do nothing but simple computer tasks really helped me keep going.
I will admit I think I crossed the line from awesomely busy to that’s too busy. When I’m awesomely busy, I try to use my time preciously – doing homework during a lunch break, reading on a commute, whatever.
When I was that busy it took everything I had just to stay awake and keep functioning. I couldn’t use my time wisely on writing a musical or doing anything else worthwhile because my brain was totally fried. (I did not look spectacular either.)
However, I did watch tons of Breaking Bad. A big part of my job was babysitting footage – making sure things copied correctly, waiting for things to render, etc. So, in the downtimes I did get a ton of Breaking Bad in. I marathoned the entire show within a 2-week time span. So, that was nice.
Anyway, I did it! I was busy. Now I’m not nearly as busy. The best part is, the temporary job liked me and someone happened to quit. Now I’m employed ’til December 20th!
(And that is why I do my best to always follow Sutton Foster’s advice – take every single gig offered to you unless it is absolutely impossible to do so, because you never know where those gigs might lead.)