Being Amber Rhea

Just reposting what Thomas wrote, since it applies to this site as well.

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Got a notice from Dreamhost that the web server that hosts my blog (that’s this blog, this one right here) is going to be undergoing a physical move from one data center to another on Friday night, from 10pm PST until 6am PST the next day. In all likelihood, this isn’t going to be a big deal and everything will be right back to normal by Saturday afternoon.

Of course, if the Prius (or Mini Cooper or Yugo or some other mode of vehicular transport) carrying my web server gets a flat tire or something more detrimental … well, we’ll just try not to think much about it and hope for the best.

The bad (awful, horrible, heart-wrenching) news it that on December 10, blogger and sex worker Razor Mick was stabbed six times and left for dead in a dumpster.

The good news (well, good given the situation) is that as of December 28, Razor Mick has been moved out of the ICU, and it’s looking like she’s going to make a full physical recovery.

It seems crass to remark on the closeness of this attack to the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers, but the proximity of the dates did enter my mind as my stomach lurched.

Please keep Razor Mick in your thoughts, prayers, or whatever other goodwill-invoking mechanisms you prefer. Feel free to stop by her blog to leave some words of support, as her friends are passing all supportive messages along to her.

[Via Ren]

Until further notice, anyone who needs to email me should do so at my Gmail address, instead of my gapodcastnetwork.com or tangerinecs.com address. The latter two are forwarding-only addresses that forward to Gmail, but because of the reasons outlined here, it’s been taking hours or days for me to get messages sent to either of those addresses. That being said, if you’ve sent me any emails in the past few days and I haven’t responded, this is probably the explanation. (Or, laziness on my part.)

Just a quick semi-update: on Monday, I spoke with the CEO of Platinum Stages. It looks like they are possibly going to make things [somewhat] right, in the form of replacing my jacked-up pole with one of their 4′x4′ stages with built-in pole. I have to return the pole and parts, and once they’ve received all that stuff, they’ll send the new item. One downside is I have to pay shipping for the return.

I’m taking the day off work on the 28th anyway, so I figure I can arrange for FedEx to come pick up the packages that day. So I won’t have my new pole until early October - but at least things are moving in the right direction. I’ll blog about all of it in more detail once I’ve got the new pole.

I finally wrote a letter to Platinum Stages and am mailing it today. I figured I’d post it here, too. So here it is. (Keith Scheinberg is the CEO.) It’s long and potentially boring so I’m placing it below the cut, as they say on LiveJournal.
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I ordered a pole from Platinum Stages because that is where the poles at the new studio came from. Previously, I had planned to order from Markstaar, because that’s where the poles at the old studio had come from; but I decided to go with Platinum Stages because I liked the ones at the new studio, and I knew they could provide very tall (over 12 feet) brass poles. I also thought it was a good thing that they focus specifically on dance poles (rather than generic brass tubing, like Markstaar).

As it turns out, Platinum Stages has terrible customer service and obviously does not care about “the little guy.” They might be good for a studio that’s ordering lots of stuff, but for an individual? All I can say is STAY AWAY.
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