Free At Last!!

Wow. I am having so MUCH FUN not working 6 days AND 4 nights a week anymore. I don't miss the place a bit: don't miss the unhappiness that pervades the place, the nurtured and reinforced sense of failure that hangs over every single person, the horrible insecurity that is implanted from the very top down. I have even watched recovering 'boxers struggle YEARS later to overcome the effects of working in that environment. It won't be my problem, however. When I am done with something, I am DONE. No regrets, no look-backs, no second guessing and no freaking guilt. Not when I got sober, not when I gave up on my joke of a marriage and not now that I have left my professional home for the past 17 years. Hahahahaha, I'm freakin' free, free, FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. And I love it.

Goodbye Shadowbox, Hellooooo World

Aaah. After 17 years of long, long weeks and zero social life, I'm done. Quit. Adios. Gonesville, Pee Wee. Yep, employeed #1 finally tosses the towel. I am now going out on my own, well, with my partner in life Megan, and forming my own firm: Feinex Design House. We create identity systems, graphic tools, art, fashion, friends, dynamix & laughter. My severance package will allow me to focus on business building for 9 months. Actually, I don't expect to need that much time, however, the cushion keeps my stomach from knotting. LOL>>just kidding. This is the 2nd time in my life that I have walked away from a career, only this time I deliberated for months and plotted my exit with the fervor of an OC surgeon. OC as in Obsessive/Compulsive NOT Orange County (LA or NY).

Since sharing my plan with various folks outside the four walls of Shadowbox Cabaret, my impression is that the World At Large has been waiting for me, outside the confines of my self-imposed prison, with open arms, beckoning. Every day that I run into an old contact/friend/associate, I hear the world say "See? We've just been waiting for you to come back to us. Let's play!"

And boy howdy, am I having fun.

NEXT POST: "And now begins the business of starting a business from scratch"

Alack and alas <>

Ok, the election debacle that almost wasn't. The One that Wasn't Disputed, But Was Still Goddamned Close.

Fine. Let the Right take it again. And let them stack up the House, the Senate AND the Supreme Court (Can you say "3 New Conservative appointees" this term?). Let them erode personal, constitutional rights under the guise of Security. And let them dictate personal beliefs to the entire Nation. Let them further bankrupt our financial backbone, making a mockery of any Anti-Bushie who shies at the thought of a Reaganesque-size National Debt. Hell, watch W outdo even Ronny in the Spend Without Control category. And let them continue to fuck up the New Nam. We will never rebuild Iraq. We will simply move on to Iran, China, Pakistan, Mexico.

<>

And more will die. And our Whuffie in the Global Village will approach record deficits. No one will want to play with us, not even GB. Intolerance will reign. For a while. And screw the Dems as well. What crap they marshalled for this Electoral Battle. They should feel ashamed.

We need a third party. A party of technological mobility and accountability. A party of youth and resources and energy. A party that embraces differences yet extolls the virtue of effort and conviction. And a party who treasures the spirit of the Declaration of Indepence, the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights. Rights, my friend, are what makes this cake tasty. Rights are what set us apart from the rest of the world. Well, most of it anyway. Capitalism can drive us back to being free from fear and favor, might and mayhem, lies and deception.

We need a third party dedicated to a return to the Spirit of America, not the Spirit of Exclusion or th Spirit of Godliness or the Spirit of Excrable Dirty Dealing. We need a party without binds, a party free from the corpulent conventions of the last 180 years. We need a party that isn't dominated by fat, middle-aged white guys who under tip their waiters and make racist jokes while at The Club. We need true patriots.

Reread the Declaration of Independence if you haven't done so in the past 3 years. Consider posting quotes from it around your town. Make bumper stickers and stick em. The ideas most scary to our entire political machine lie within that wonderful piece of paper. Let's live by those words and put fear back into those who would rule.

Bandwagon, shmandwagon

So. In 2 weeks, my divorce finally gets underway in court and another tribe is joined. A questioning look around reveals •my boys (8 & 4.5) seem happy and stable•my gf not quite half my age continues to astound me with beauty, grace and the most primal, fulfilling love I have ever experienced•I am still a financial retard•I have the best job in the world, even if I am often a petulant closet whiner•I exhibit boundlesss slack•my geek factor could use a financial boost•I adore my decision to make classic cars part of my life•I really miss unlimited music downloads.

Two weeks ago, I finally checked out Cory Doctorow's scifi book Eastern Standard Tribe. I've been reading boingboing.net for years, but never leaped over to his hardcover work. Big mistake. My reaction to EST was as strong and enervating as it was to Stephenson's Snow Crash. My favorite scifi falls into 2 catergories: those stories that I get lost in, fully engaged and thirsting for the advance of plot and character. These kind of books often keep me reading into the wee hours. The second are those books and stories that speak to my life and desires. Snow Crash's immersive tech scenario reset my tech future view. Cory's EST makes me want my own comm on my hip, enabling me to take and store pix and transfer PSD files to my various computers, make phone calls, surf my email, store calendar info, play mp3s and radio signals, text and instant message, and share ideas (and contracts) on the fly. I have fantasized about exploiting my creative views and hacks with a global community in real time, for compensation, the 21st C version of Think Tanks.

Tribes. In my world of thought, tribes have meant OSU Fans (and any other voyeuristic fans of any sports complex), socio-economic fascists, and the seemingly limitless number of online subcultures. Doctorow expanded on that for me and now I want to move on to the next level. Impatient.