Z's new client

My list of income-producing activities has expanded: I am now a transcriptionist for Truthdig.com. The site includes written articles as well as telephone interviews and video. Sometimes people want to read only rather than listen and/or watch, so I listen to the audio and type---for your reading pleasure. You'd think a trained monkey could transcribe, but let's just say there are challenges. For me there's also the small matter of ignorance. I don't watch the news and I certainly don't keep up with anything remotely political, but I do lean to the left, the interviewers and interviewees are passionate about what they're doing, and these interviews give me a fabulous intellectual fix. Click here to dig for the truth.

And this isn't just any ol' site; it's been nominated in three major categories for the Webby Award. For past decade, the Webby Award has been the leading international award for excellence on the Internet. So there! Click here to see a list of Webby nominees and winners.

Big Surprise

The fridge, the bed, the TV, a new book . . . All are distractions when I’m not particularly inclined to work. On one such occasion I decided to venture forth and work elsewhere: the library. Before settling down with my laptop computer, I went to the little translators’ room. Rather than put my bag on the floor, I pulled down the baby-changing table to set it there. I noticed that several sheets of paper were trapped between the pull-down table and the wall.

Uh-oh! Did some poor, hard-working mother forget her precious print-out while changing her child’s diaper in the restroom? I pulled out the paper and began to unfold it. The first sheet had a picture of a body builder. Hmmm. Interesting. This guy was older than one would expect. The next sheet also had a body builder. This one was younger, but he had hair on his chest. Uhm, don’t people shave and oil themselves up for competitions and these kinds of photos? Then I fully unfolded the sheets and realized that these guys were naked and, erm, happily erect.

I walked over to the Reference Desk. It was a busy weekday afternoon at the public library, with hordes of teenagers descending on the place, mothers hushing small children, and retirees milling about. I carefully and discreetly unfolded one of the sheets of paper to show the librarian and said, “You might want to check the other restrooms.”

Never a dull moment in my life, people!

For a good time, call Z

My phone number was mistakenly printed in the current issue of the local free weekly newspaper as the contact for the City Parks and Recreation Office. I’ve been getting calls about the 2007 Easter Egg Hunt. I made the last two callers laugh when I asked them if they knew any single guys between 30 and 40 and available for a date next week.

This isn’t a first: over the years I’ve been called about meditation classes and Japanese flower arranging, among other things. The problem has finally been corrected, and the woman at the newspaper tried to console me by saying it was a good thing my number wasn’t listed under Dial-A-Prayer or “For a good time, call . . .”