Let's go over the week that was, shall we. Last Monday all I knew was that night I had a cocktail party. The rest of the week was wide open, read: I had nothing scheduled. Monday night turned out to be an easy gig, about 20 elderly women sitting around a big conference table. I was dressed up as usual in my monkey suit -- white shirt, black pants, black tie and vest. At the end of the night the woman who was running the meeting walked over to me and handed me some cash, which I stuffed in my pocket without looking while saying thanks. Turned out to be 25 bucks, which always comes in handy.
Raul, who is the head chef at the school where the gig was held and who basically runs all the catering events there, asked me if I could work Thursday night and, possibly, Wednesday morning. Of course, of course, I said, just give me the details. Oh, one other thing: before I left for the Monday night gig, I got a call from Artisan asking me whether I could work that day for Select; they needed a proofreader. I said I was available Tuesday but was already on my way to another commitment. I never heard back from them, which sucks. Anyway, it turned out that Raul did need me for Wednesday, 8 in the morning, a graduation ceremony on the West Side. Basically we set up tables with appetizers & cookies & such, along with iced tea & lemonade. Each iced tea had a mint leaf in it, each glass of pink lemonade had a slice of lemon in it. That didn't stop around 20 supposedly intelligent people from asking which was which! First, have you ever seen pink iced tea? Didn't the floating lemon slice give you a hint?
Thursday night was another cocktail party. We expected around 15 people, four showed up. So I sat behind my makeshift bar for around 2 1/2 hours while the four guests chatted away. You really can't call four people sitting around a party, just as you wouldn't call two old men ambling down the street a parade. But I made 400 bucks for the three gigs, plus a 25-dollar gratuity. Not bad, not bad.
Wednesday afternoon got another call from my agency: C.B. was requesting my expertise for Friday; the wall calendar needed one last going over. It turned out to be only 5 hours of work, but at least it's another paycheck. Paid off my Con Ed bill, along with the phone. Unfortunately, just as I was catching up, it turned out I needed some medication: 20 bucks for antibiotics, 80 bucks for a cream. So there goes 100 bucks which I could have put toward the rent. It's always something, my friends.
The only thing on the horizon is a catering gig on Tuesday night. Hopefully this week will be as busy as last week; I worked 4 out of 5 days and it could have been 5 with a little luck. In fact, for this month so far, out of a possible 20 work days, I worked 11 days (counting one Saturday job), which isn't bad for a freelancer.
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