My plan, if you could call it that, is to aggressively pursue work here in Bako, approaching all the local clients I've done work for through the local agencies and offering to do the work cheaper by working for them directly. Is it the right thing to do? Probably not. Is it unethical? That's a debate for better times. A girl's gotta eat.
The only problem with the plan is it's going to take time and I need cash now. So Monday I did an e-mail blast to everyone in LA I've worked for over the past three years. It was done out of desperation more than anything else and I honestly didn't expect anything to come of it; if I had been getting any work from these people over the past couple of years we wouldn't be living in Bakersfield. So imagine my surprise when I started getting work within about an hour! By yesterday afternoon I'd racked up four jobs already. And then I hit the motherlode...
"Are you available for a project over the weekend?"
It was a big project for a former client, a lot of money for two days work, and easy work at that. How great is that? Am I available? Absafuckinglutely.
"Great. We'll messenger you a script and materials. What's your address again?"
SHIT.
I knew this would happen eventually. I'm actually surprised it hasn't happened before now. So far I've been able to maintain a charade that I'm still in LA, working from a secure and undisclosed location. Now someone needed to know where I really lived. The ironic thing is all these agencies already have my address, they just don't know it. In order to be paid I've had to provide my mailing address to all their accounting departments. The beauty of the system is that no one at an agency ever talks to anyone from accounting. I doubt anyone at an agency could pick their accounting department out of a police line-up. But now it looked like the jig was up.
I tried to think of some even remotely plausible reason to have stuff sent to Bako, but let's face it, there just isn't any. So I was left with just one option..
"Oh that's OK, I'll just swing by and pick it up in the morning."
That's a big fucking "swing", 2 hours plus each way. But like I said, a girl's gotta eat.
So it's off over the mountains. Again.
