It’s an interesting job, that’s the least I can say.
Pork:
I was trying to work a set of chopsticks from a “fire in the belly” bowl of vermicelli, talk on the phone, and relate my impressions, all at the same time.
A regular astrology client phoned about a particular piece of Austin real estate, and I was asked to do a “walk-by.” Which, I suppose, is kind of like a drive-by, only, I do my version at a much more relaxed, almost sedentary pace.
I rambled past, took a couple of pictures, leaned up against the building and for the life of me, I couldn’t detect any “ghosts.”
“So is this billable time?” I asked, around a mouthful of food.
“Look: if I get this deal, you’ve got a free office as long as I’ve got it.”
I can work with that. Now, let me look at the charts and pick a good time to make a binding offer on a building…..
The ghosts? That’s one of the most effective marketing tools I’ve ever seen. Say that the property is haunted. There’s absolutely no way to verify that data. None whatsoever. Yet, in old buildings, it rather easy to prey on the superstitions that abound, and it’s easy to work folks into a frenzy. I’ve seen it done before. Austin, its self, is ripe with such tales and folklore.
“Yeah, it’s haunted building. But it’s a friendly spirit.”
Brisket:
I saw Richard III at the Shakespeare’s Globe last fall. It was an amazing production, and seeing as how I was sitting in the top of the theatre, I was rather pleased to find that the players played to the whole crowd. Plus it was an all-female cast. Pretty amazing show. Perhaps one of the very best versions of Richard III I’ll ever see, and that includes, just for comparison’s sake, Sir Ian’s version on stage at the National.
So in the April 25 copy of the Time’s weekly supplement, there was an article that was forwarded to me, all about Shakespeare’s Globe, and one comment was that the Richard III all-female production wasn’t very good. Or something to that effect. I don’t know which critic, or critics, blasted it, but from a deconstructionist point of view, it was a brilliant show. Two shows on that trip stood out. Midsummer Night’s Dream (all male cast, the Queen of the Fairies with broad shoulders, masculine chest and five o’clock shadow did not deter from the performance, in an off-Broadway West End theatre). And that Richard III.
Ah well, yes, I understand what it’s like to be an outsider in one’s chosen business.