I Don't Have a Good Title Right Now

I get stressed a lot—I'm high-strung and neurotic. But I am feeling stress in a totally different way down here, and it's just strange. Today was much harder than yesterday, with a lot of command decisions to be made, a lot of quickly changing information, and some personal issues that really took me down farther than they really should.

It just feels far too early in all this to be this wound up. I'm trying hard to just take it all in stride, realize that freaking out won't do anyone any good, and move forward. It's just such a mess of information. I am quickly beginning to see part of why it has taken so long to get people organized in such a crisis. And we're just in Houston. In the affected areas, I bet it will be ten times worse.

We may very well have an amazing opportunity to help a few thousand people get back on the grid. I really hope it works out, but there's so much in flux about every opportunity we are presented with, we're just going to be forced to make a choice and stick with it. I'm a 'mull things over' type of person, so this is taking a little getting used to.

So far I've kept up my freelance responsibilities, albeit more slowly than I had hoped. My cash reserves are going fast, though, so I am looking forward to being paid soon (don't quite know how I'll get those in the bank, but I'll get to that at some point). I have thought about it, and once we get some real work done—something I can point to and say 'your help did that'—I won't be asking for money. I'm keeping good records of my expenses and stuff, though, because at this rate I'm going to wipe out my savings entirely, and if I feel it makes sense, I won't be too proud to accept help. But right now I'm scared shitless this is going to turn into some nearing-30 adventure vacation and until I can prove otherwise, I'm prepared to let myself pay a financial cost for an immature decision.

Also, someone I met down here that I really clicked with ended up calling me, more or less, a bad writer and a poor journalist, while implying that was to be expected because I was part of the 'mainstream media.' (This was because of my Wired News story today.) I've never been The Man before, and it's taking some getting used to. If nothing else, it is making me reconsider how I interact with the people involved in the stories I am trying to report.

I also learned that when people ask you how old you are at the end of a conversation, they aren't doing it because they are actually want to know. It's a nice trick. I'll use it the next time I want to belittle someone for no good reason.