Some surprises, some failures on this tour of Manhattan’s last publically-accessible pay telephones.

Sitting in the break room, by the air conditioner, freezing my ass off, teeth are almost chattering. But I like it. This week, for the first time since taking this job, I get 5 straight days off. In the past I’ve requested consecutive days off but was rejected so regularly that I quit asking. I did squeeze a couple of 4-day breaks, but those did not go well, and felt like no time off at all. So I’m looking forward to Wednesday through Sunday away from this place.

I am, truly, feeling the lure of going back to my Bohemian life. I just have to find a way to afford being able to do it again. This job, for all its merits, fails to pay a living wage. My income is well below the official New York City poverty line. But I am feeling motivated to pursue other options in addition to this job. So we shall see. I’m becoming a true Beekeeper, with multiple hobbies and multiple jobs.

Speaking of Beekeeper status, I spent far more time than a growed-ass man should scrolling through TikTok yesterday. It’s not as daffy and twitchy as I remember from a previous tour, where I could not seem to shake titty-teasing teens and obviously staged “accidents” or police encounters. Things seem more real now, with good NYC vibes if you know where to look for them.

Before and after yesterday’s payphone stramble I spent time organizing and re-encoding some of the endless quantity of stuff I grabbed from Usenet. It is not the best use of my time but then what is?

I learned yesterday that I will not be allowed to upgrade to future versions of Premiere Pro because my processor is lacking. This comes just a couple of weeks before my subscription expires, or renews, depending how I decide to go. I’ve tried most if not all of the open source video edtor alternatives and none of them work for me. Either they encode at glacial speeds or they crash without even a dialogue box telling you it crashed or their keyboard shortcuts are sorely lacking. I downloaded DaVinci Resolve last night and will try it this week.

I have to be at work now. Yay. A 2-day week. I’ll take that.