Hollywood, CA!

Well, I'm all moved in.

I found a great place right in Hollywood (Cherokee and Yucca) for the astonishing price of $1025 for a studio. But it's big and cool and I like the people in the building.

No job yet - which is awesome. I'm not going to seek employment until the Nichol deadline (May 1st). Hopefully I'll be able to get a good stack of entries done and get some traction with this year's contests.

I've been treating writing as a job - eight hours a day, whether I like it or not. It's been an intersting change. I've found I write very differently when I have all that time, rather than scrambling to get something done in my one hour of free-time.

When I come to a big, important scene, I can decide to spend all day on [i]just[/i] that scene. It's great to be able to spend all that time considering it, "unpacking it", and looking at it from many different angles. It's a valuable thing to learn and I'm really glad I have the cash to take this time off.

Other than that, I've pretty much just been hanging out - unpacking, getting the feel of the neighborhood, etc. I like it here. Yesterday, they were filming "Shark" on my block - I saw James Woods drinking coffee. Later that day, I was walking back from the internet cafe and saw them giving Vanessa Williams her "Walk-of-Fame" star. Maybe I'm a dork, but I think that's a cool neighborhood to live in for a while.

I still haven't found a decent bar in the neighborhood. It's all either hot-shit night clubs or ironic hipster dive bars. Not my scene really. I'll find a good one though. God knows I'm giving it the old college try.