The L.A. Report – Part 21
03-21-2014
Hey Everybody,
It’s been two years since my last L.A. Report, so
now seems like a good time for my next one.
A couple months after I wrote Part 20, I got a
programming contract with Union Bank (where I worked in 2010). It was supposed to be for just five
months. But they kept finding more and
more projects for me to work on and it stretched out to 22 months, ending at
the end of February. It may have gone
even longer but Union Bank has a weird rule that contractors can only work
there for a maximum of 18 months, then they have to go away for at least two
months. I was able to hold on for four
months longer because I was working on a critical phase of a critical project. Will they hire me back in May? Possibly, but most of what I was working on
is pretty well finished and they’re trying like hell to do as little as
possible on their mainframe applications.
So I’m not holding my breath – I do apply for the few other mainframe
jobs that come up. In fact, last Friday
I was supposed to have a phone interview with AAA of Southern California, but
they never did call. But it’s probably
just as well – since they’re in Orange County I would have had to rent a room
down there during the week, like I did when I worked in Irvine.
In my last report I told you about my all-day
non-emergency emergency room visit at the county hospital. I finally got a bill from them – after five
months – for $1,050. WTF??? For ten minutes in a doctor’s office??? Christ, even the most prestigious plastic
surgeon in Beverly Hills wouldn’t charge $6,000 an hour! So I disputed the charge and have been
sending them letters of protest (usually ignored by them) ever since.
Also in my last report I told you about my role on
an episode of Unusual Suspects on the Investigation Discovery channel. An old friend from Minnesota (who now lives
in Phoenix) was flipping through the channels last week and saw me in that
show. She recorded it and re-recorded my
segments with her iPad. I hadn’t seen it
and was surprised to find that they actually used my voice; when they were
shooting they just told me to ad-lib some stuff about the suspect so I had no
idea that they would actually use it, I thought it would be silent with
narration over it! For several days I
tried to find it online and just last night I got lucky – I found it on
YouTube: http://youtu.be/h-9YiG0g_zA. I’m at 21:48 and 24:13 (although the second
one is garbled, apparently from bad reception by the recorder’s service).
Now that I’m not working, I’ve thought about
getting into background acting again but I haven’t decided yet. I’m now eligible to join SAG-AFTRA (got lucky
and did three days of union work on Gangster Squad), so I could join and work
for $148/day (plus almost always overtime), instead of $64/day plus
overtime. The drawback (besides having
to pony up $3,200 to join) is that there’s not nearly as much work for union
background performers as for nonunion.
Plus, I would never be able to do nonunion work again (legally). The benefit, though, is that I’d be eligible
to do speaking roles.
I’ve started looking for a new agent, too (my
previous one retired). I just met with
one last week in Beverly Hills but she didn’t seem to have much clout so I’m
still thinking about it. I’m meeting
with another one next week.
Still loving California. We haven’t had many earthquakes in the last
several years but we had a minor (4.4) one Monday. That one was the second-strongest one I’ve
experienced. No damage, but it woke me
up, and one of my CD-cabinet drawers came open.
Yesterday we had a 2.7 aftershock.
I also felt (and heard) that one.
My health is still pretty good (knock on
wood). Still running, hiking and
dancing. I’ve also been playing quite a
bit of golf lately. I usually play with
my best friend Susan, and we usually play when the “twilight” rate starts at
about 2 hours before sunset. We always
walk so it only costs us about $14.00 each for nine holes.
The biggest news is that my “Batmobile” failed its
latest smog test. It was 17 years old,
had 232,000 miles on it and I’d had to make a few thousand dollars of repairs
in the past year. To fix the smog
problem would have cost another couple thousand so I decided it was finally
time to retire it. I traded it in for a
new 2013 Kia Rio (click on the picture below).
I wanted something cheap ($17,000) but good (100,000-mile
warranty). I miss the tight, sporty feel
of my 3000GT but otherwise I like it.
It’s technically a sub-compact but it’s actually 4 inches longer than my
3000. Feels like a minivan compared to
my old car! You’ll notice it’s not
black! No, black is reserved for cool
cars, not boring and practical ones! J
Well, hopefully my next report will have good news
on the job front and the acting front.
Jay
