In the last episode of Adventures with Scottie, we learned about the difference between unhelpful and helpful ways to approach a girl on a scooter. It was also raining in that episode.

It’s raining again in today’s episode. Only, it started raining right as I pulled away from the curb. Needless to say, my attire wasn’t entirely appropriate: flat leather aqua shoes, dark denim jeans, green trench coat. The coat was perfect, but the shoes got completely soaked.

On my way to campus, I’m at a stoplight at 19th and N Streets. A while utility van is in the lane next to me. My eyes are fixed on the stoplight when I hear:

“It’s slippery out there today.”
I look over to see the utility van’s driver side window rolled down and a salt-and-pepper comb-over.
I nod.
The light turns green.
I zip away.

On my way home, Scottie is acting up. He’s hesitating as I ride down Freeport Boulevard. I look at my broken gas gauge, then at the mileage. 2,717. I’m supposed to fill up at 730. I’m gunning Scottie at full throttle, and he’s hesitating, nearly lunging down the road, until he peters out.

I turn on my right blinker and coast to the next side street. I’m right in front of The Bicycle Business. I push Scottie up on to the sidewalk. Look at my phone. 4:00. Bridget teaches at the same time as I do on Tuesdays. Maybe she’s just leaving too. Call Bridget. Voice mail.

“Hey, Bridget, this is Janna. I was just leaving campus and I’m on Freeport across from McClatchy High School. And, well, the scooter ran out of gas. I was gonna see if you’re still near campus and could come pick me up. Call me if you get this in the next 15 minutes or so, otherwise I’ll walk to Light Rail. Thanks.”

I hang up and walk inside the bike shop. A bell rings. It smells like rubber. A guy comes out from behind the counter.

“Hey, do you guys have a parking lot?” I ask.
My phone rings. It’s Bridget.
“Oh, just a sec. Sorry. Hello?”
Nothing.
“Hello?”
The call failed.
“OK, sorry. That was my ride.”
“No problem. So, we just have a back alley, but we park back there,” the guy says.
“So could I park back there? I ride a scooter, and just ran out of gas — could I leave it here until I can come back for it?”
“Sure, no problem.”

I go back out into the rain and push Scottie to the back of the building. Then I call Bridget and stand under the overhang in front of The Bicycle Business until she gets there.

The one thing I find myself writing most often in feedback to student essays is: The answer to the questions HOW and WHY is the core of your essay. Answer those questions and you’ll find your purpose and focus.

This is true of any message. Answer the question WHY to discover motivation, significance, connections between concepts or past experiences that affect each other, that affect you. Answer the question HOW to discover evidence of the why.

Example:

Why do I write? And how does writing affect my life — how does it affect my day, my mood, my thoughts, the way I communicate?

Or:

Why do I believe what I believe? And how does that belief manifest itself in my life — how does it affect my decisions, the choices I make, my behavior, my actions, the way I treat others?

Tough questions. But when we stop to think about them — really process an answer that we can then articulate — it’s usually something that you can’t stop reading.

(On freelancing/being in business for myself.)

Me: “I feel like I’m retreating.”
Alejandro: “What do you mean by that?”
Me: “Well, if you use a battle analogy, when you’re advancing, you’re gaining ground. I feel like I’m retreating — losing ground.”
Alejandro: “But are you gaining ground in other areas of your life?”

“I’ve told you about the essay ‘Shitty First Drafts’ that I give to my students every semester, right?” I said to my friend James when he picked up the copy of Bird by Bird that was sitting out on my desk.
“Only every time I see you,” he said.
“Well, it’s from that book.”

So I talk about this book a lot. It’s a good book.

I’ve kind of been in a bit of a writing rut lately, and one thing that stuck with me from Lamott’s book is the idea of giving yourself assignments. Donald Murray also talks about this in his book The Craft of Revision (which also happens to be the text book I use for teaching freshman comp.). Murray says that at the end of your writing time, you should determine your assignment for the next day. That way, when you sit down to write the next day you know exactly what you’re supposed to be working on and there is no excuse for not writing (because you couldn’t figure out what to write about so you just sat there, staring blankly at the computer screen and getting distracted by cleaning up your desktop, checking email, catching up on blog reading, which is what has been happening to me lately).

Lamott’s take on assignments is that they should be (ahem) short. She uses a 1-inch picture frame as a reminder that she’s assigned herself a piece of the story that fits in that frame: one scene, one memory, one exchange.

I think this is why I like Trazzler so much. They’re having a contest right now and you enter by writing trips for the site. You can submit up to 5 trips, one for each of the contest categories, and the grand prize is some fancy trip or something like that. I’ve been thinking about entering the contest for the fun of it, and to have an outlet for keeping up some more feature-y writing that I miss. But I keep waffling because I tell myself that it’s a waste of time, how will writing these silly trips contribute to my writing and business goals? Probably they won’t, but it still seems like fun, and I could do the whole social-media-twitterati-spread-the-word thing and maybe I would actually get a couple of votes. But, really, it is a waste of time (just like writing this blog, as someone once told me), so, should I? Really?

Well, today I decided to enter. Not because I think I could win (though that would be frickin’ rad), but because the trips are 160 word or less — a snapshot. A short assignment. I wrote one trip today in less than 30 minutes, and I have to say that it was a great sense of accomplishment.

Just like writing this blog post.

Something tells me (and I could be totally off here) that for most people the term “freelancing” conjures up a romantic ideal of someone who cherry-picks her projects, carefully selecting only the most interesting, most challenging or most lucrative, and subsequently brings in a nice chunk of change on a regular (consistent) basis.

If that’s your romantic ideal, I hate to break it to you, but freelancing is NOT an easy gig. I have written self-pity diatribes before about how much freelancing sucks, how I’ll never get ahead, how I’ll never make it, and waah, waah, waah, poor me. (In my own defense, I do frequently earn less than I need to make ends meet on a monthly basis — AND I have not one, not two, but three part-time jobs. That’s in addition to freelancing, which is really more like being self-employed or owning and operating a one-person business. And, p.s., if you think running a business is hard, just think about how much harder it would be to run a business all. by. yourself.)

Note to self: In spite of your depressive tendencies (as I lovingly call them), here are 10 reminders why you continue to choose freelancing:

1. Wednesday: boyfriend had the afternoon off, so we set up shop together at The Weatherstone.
2. Wednesday: enjoyed lunch with friend and potential client, mixing business and pleasure.
3. Friday: Two-hour lunch with my friend Shawn, checking in on our 2010 plan. (Subsequent depressive tendency ensued, however I seem to be recovering.)
4. Friday: Spontaneous drive to Applegate (north of Auburn) after lunch to get a special surprise for the boyfriend with my friend Stephanie, who I seem to hardly spend any time with lately.
5. Monday: Spontaneous lunch with my friend Allyson (who had the day off) at Midtown Taqueria on J Street.
6. Monday: Normal Monday night class canceled (holiday). Finished everything on my to-do list by 4 p.m., and my friend Sarah offered to treat me to a massage at Happy Day Spa (definitely a different experience, but worth it for the price).
7. Tuesday: 10 a.m. coffee with the always-delightful Colleen from Sacramento Press.
8. Tuesday: prepped for class while getting a pedicure (special treat from the boyfriend).
9. Tuesday: grabbed a cup of coffee from Peet’s on my way back to the office.
10. Tuesday: lunch in the sun on my balcony before a pleasant afternoon ride to campus with Scottie.

Now, to solve that whole cash-flow problem…

Shawn: “If your goal is to update your web site, what’s the very next step?”
Me: blank stare.
Shawn: “Don’t think about the 10 blocks you have to go, think about the very first step.”
Me: blank stare. (Read: mind racing thinking through choosing new photos, re-writing copy on every page, updating portfolio, which work samples to include, collecting client testimonials, figuring out where to put client testimonials — the autobiography page or the portfolio page? — which clients should I ask for a testimonial?…)
Shawn: “Put down, ‘write blog posts.’ “

We’re sitting next to each other at The Bread Store’s window bar facing J Street. A guy wearing a Member’s Only jacket walks up with a dog on a leash. He ties the leash to one of the metal outdoor tables. While he is inside ordering, his dog tries to chase some kids on skateboards and — huge clatter — nearly drags the table into the street. Last time I had lunch with Shawn at The Bread Store, we ran into Lesley and Ashlee. The time before that, I met my friend Adam for lunch and ran into my friends Lara and Lucas and their 6-week-old daughter, Molly. I order the same thing every time: 1/2 veggie sandwich on honey wheat bread and a cup of veggie chili.

Me: scribble “write SHORT blog posts.”

Scottie Scooterson makes rare appearances on this blog. I think it’s time he starts to make more regular appearances. I often wonder about how I’m perceived by average passers-by when they see me scooting down the streets of Midtown.

Yesterday, I wore black flats, gray dress pants and a bright grass-green blazer, which was covered with my long, black jacket for the scooter ride. Does that trendy girl wearing tights under her shorts and round-toe pumps think I look like too much of a stuffy-business professional to be riding a scooter?

At the stoplight on the corner of 19th and J Streets, right in front of Starbucks, I clench the handbrakes through purple leather gloves. A guy wearing Chuck Taylors and a beanie with an orange strip skips right up to me.

“Hey, you look like a fun girl,” he says holding out a flier.
“No, thanks, I can’t really take that while I’m riding.”
“Put it in your pocket,” he insists, waving the flier at me.
“Not while I’m riding.”
“Just put it in your pocket. Don’t be a hater.”

He continues to wave the flier at me. I take it just to get him to leave me alone. I try to get it into my pocket, which isn’t working so well through thick-fingered gloves. The light turns green. There is a car behind me. I scoot away holding the crumpled flier against the handlebar all the way down 19th Street, past the Light Rail tracks and Safeway, through Land Park to Freeport Boulevard, past Freeport Bakery and McClatchy High School to Sacramento City College. All the way there, I am holding this piece of trash against Scottie’s handlebar. I can’t just toss it along the road. That would be littering.

When I get to campus, I pull into the designated scooter parking and kill Scottie’s engine. I look at the trash in my hand.

Sorry, Boulevard Park and Musical Chairs. You may be playing at Old I on February 13, but this is a most unhelpful way to approach a girl on a scooter, even if she does look fun.

On my way home from class, it was — arg! — raining. The worst part about scooting in the rain is that you are blazing through the rain at top speeds of 40 mph and without face protection the rain is pelting your cheeks, nose, forehead, eyes. Yeah, sucks.

At the stoplight on 21st and Q Streets, right next to the Sacramento Bee, I see my friend Lori and a beep at her. Scottie’s horn sounds oddly like the Road Runner’s notorious meep-meep. There is a silver Honda in the left lane next to me. The passenger window rolls down. A guy with black curly hair leans out.

“Excuse me?”
I look over.
“Do you want some glasses? It’s raining.” He’s holding out a pair of black men’s sun glasses.
“You don’t want them?”
“Nah,” he shakes his head.
“Thanks.”
I put the glasses on.
“How do I look?”
“Sexy.”

That, my friends, is the most helpful way to approach a girl on a scooter.