Greetings my lovelies, today I am going to share the story of my transition from a getting-paid-for-it whore-writer to my current position as a giving-it-away writer-slut. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin …

Once upon a time back in about 1992 I was working for a commercial real estate brokerage in downtown L.A., which, to-date, has been one of my three favourite jobs — out of about 50+/- [which may or may not include temp assignments; I can't remember and I don't care, so stop interrupting!]. It seems archaic now, but back then we were using WordPerfect DOS which was up to about version 5.1 and getting ready to release their first Windows version. Which, for the record, we all HATED when it was unceremoniously dumped onto our PCs without us being given a single shred of training. So upset were we at the sudden loss of our hot-keys and shortcuts and the alien new environment that we insisted on having the DOS version restored!! Of course, once I knew how to use the software in a later job, I was assimilated into the Windows Cult. To this day, I am a hard-core, hard-wired WordPerfect user and I will defend it to the death.

The brokerage had a full-time graphic designer who worked in Pagemaker, but after they saw the graphic designs that I could do in WP DOS [yes, DOS!!], they let her go and gave me all of the graphics projects. At one point for shits and giggles I sent some of my designs into WordPerfect Magazine for DOS^® and they wrote me a charming letter saying that as far as they were concerned I was “blowing the limits out of” their software as they hadn’t even realised themselves the extent of what the programme could do! They invited me to start writing technical articles for the magazine, based on my designs, explaining exactly [step by excruciatingly-boring step] how to create the designs. Over the next couple of years they published about eight of my articles, all of which paid quite handsomely thank you very much.

In 1993, my then-husband and I relocated from Los Angeles to Boise, Idaho. In 1995, the magazine started an annual “Best Shot” contest with three categories: Best Make-over, Best Macro, Best Business Form. Around this same time I happened to wander into an upscale lingerie store in downtown Boise where I got into a casual chat with the store owner. She started telling me about a series of “lingerie luncheons” she was planning, and showed me the “flyer” that was to be distributed. The flyer consisted, basically, of two typewritten sheets…

When I saw that bland, matronly, sex-less piece of crap, I cheerily told her that I could “make some improvements” to the “flyer” … by the time we were done talking, I had sketched-out a redesigned two-sided quad-fold flyer which I later created in WordPerfect using some of their beautiful Victorian-style clip art graphics and an oh-so-sexy font:

Once folded, here’s how the front and back would look:

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By the end of our conversation, I had also been granted the print order for the flyers together with matching business cards — all of which we printed on a cream bond paper with brown ink. I had also been asked to model for the store, both in print for the newspaper advertisements and in person for the live shows which were scheduled to take place during both the day and some evenings. The shows themselves were an absolute blast. The models were lovely and fun and really easy to get along with. At first it was just female models, but later we did some co-ed shows and much to my amusement I was partnered with a male model who looked just like my then-husband … who was not in the least amused.

When WordPerfect Magazine came out with their Best Shots contest, I submitted my make-over design [along with a business form entry] … and much to my shock and delight, I won for Best Make-over!! Why shocked? because the magazine is headquartered in Utah!! I also ALMOST won the Best Business Form but they had JUST changed one of the requirements immediately before opening my entry. As a result, I won $1,000 and hubby and I were flown to Utah where I was to pose for the magazine cover with the other two winners. We were put up in a beautiful cabin at Robert Redford’s Sundance Ski Resort where we met The Man Himself in the restaurant at dinner one night. [Even at 60-odd back then I would totally have done him.] I have to mention here that the resort was designed to be very ecological, and thus the dining room was built around a tree that grew up through an opening in the ceiling. Unfortunately, the genius who came up with that idea didn’t take into account that the tree would subsequently die because of the extreme difference in temperature between the roots and the upper tree … oopsie. I began to wonder at one point whether we were being fattened for some sort of human sacrifice as the magazine staff — who were terrific and not remotely preachy Mormon-types — kept feeding and feeding us!

The contest winners’ photos were to be taken for the magazine cover by what turned out to be a rather surly professional photographer, but we were not provided with a professional hair/make-up artist. When we arrived at the studio I discovered to my absolute HORROR that we were to be posing with a giant Oscar statue cut-out that was probably about 7-feet tall. Why, I wondered, had I bothered to dress so nicely when I had to climb up a stepladder, cling to a flimsy cardboard statue, and then follow the idiot photographer’s instruction to “do something goofy”. All I could think to do without toppling off the stepladder was to stick one leg out to the side and then they didn’t use that photo anyway so I risked my lovely swan-like neck for nothing. For the love of Zeus, you could barely see me behind the stupid prop. Of course, it was a piece of cake for my two fellow geeks winners who, for the record, came out looking far better in the photos than they did in real life. As for me? The photos, let’s say, were not exactly flattering …

… so thank heaven I was “only” on the magazine cover AND in the inside when the contest edition was published two months later … and that said magazine was passed around the entire law firm where I was then-working. The editor’s opening paragraph of the article is actually quite amusing, it begins — and I quote — “I know, I know, up until now WordPerfect Magazine has never had a need to show you a lingerie program, …”

Here’s a titillating little bonus lingerie programme that I did after the store owner decided she wanted to “kick it up a notch” for one of the evening shows [sketches also by Yours Truly ... why they're not hanging in a national art gallery defeats me] and asked me to be the show coordinator doing everything from selecting the outfits to interviewing additional models, etc. [at least I got paid a lot more]. As you can see, I had my usual childish fun with the titles:

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Needless to say, my then-husband was a lot more amused by the cringe-worthy photos than he was by the aforementioned male model.

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[Click on images for larger view]

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 9th, 2010 at 10:29 am and is filed under Humour. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.