Well, right now, I am indulging in one of my favorite activities: Morning time.

My call isn�t until 3pm today, which means that I have to be at work til 3am, but that�s fine. These days, I�m beginning to think that Church of the Sub-Genius book was right. It�s all about slack.

So, I�m having the morning coffee, the morning lounging around, and the morning writing, and the weather is beautiful.

As longtime readers know, all of this adds up to One Happy Bill. If only there were chocolate here. If only I had just kissed Sally goodbye on her way out the door to work.

Let�s get all of us caught up on a few things, as I have the time and you have the inclination:

I am be-auto-ed.

Yes, for the first time in my life, I own an automobile. I never had my own car in Chicago, as it was completely unnecessary, but you kinda sorta need one to get yourself around in a �city� that is essentially a series of freeways with some buildings thrown in here and there.

At my interview for Buffy, my boss asked me if I had a reliable car. I replied in the affirmative, caught a ride home from one of my then roommates, and rented a car that weekend. I ended up buying the car I rented.

It�s a white 1997 Geo Metro.

The bitches love it.

Actually, it�s 100% no frills. Power nothing, a stereo with no tape player (yet), and it doesn�t even have a single cup holder.

I jam my thermos of coffee in between the passenger seat and the parking brake. It works.

It�s not the sexiest transportation in the world, but it is an excellent starter car. It has no dents, only 60,000 miles on it, and it costs me $10 (yes) to fill up the tank once a week.

They wanted $2850, but I got it for $2200.

I think I did good. Ronnie?

As for my living situation, Jonny is my new roommate.

My old roommates were great guys, but I�m fairly certain that with Jonny I�m not going to walk out into the living room at 7am and find him watching porn �just to test the new DVD player.� The other thing about Jonny is that I know he won�t be referring to black women as �chocolate� and using the word nigger without irony.

In other words, I think I upgraded.

So, Jonny and I just found a new place to live. A two bed, two bath in a building with a pool. For the last two weeks or so, I�ve been crashing at his tiny one bedroom, and he�s been super accommodating. The original plan was that I just camp out on his couch for the duration of my stay here. He�s a good enough guy, though, that he rearranged his entire living room for me so that it could fit my queen size bed, sparing me from couch hell.

How cool is that? Simply put, the man is good people.

As for my work situation:

I remember one time I was watching my beloved Conan. He saved a few minutes at the end of the show to say goodbye to a staff writer who was leaving him to go work on Caroline In The City. �What an idiot,� I thought to myself. �Why would anyone leave a show like Conan to go work on that cheesy sitcom?�

The point is, I�m leaving Buffy to go work on According to Jim.

Yes.

Earlier this week, as I was well into several of my consecutive hours of photocopying, I swore to myself that, next year, I would work for a half hour show. I had just expressed this thought to someone in an email when I sent it, and then heard the beep from my cell phone that let me know I had a voice mail. It was from ATJ, and she said she would have a decision on who she would hire for a new PA by the end of the week.

That interview was weeks ago. Remember? I had completely forgotten about it. Last night, she called again and offered me the job.

I know, I know. Buffy has a bit more cache and the stories on Buffy are just a teensy bit more layered than on ATJ. I know that this is going to cause Jamie to retract the marriage proposal she offered when I started working for Buffy, but that�s OK. I�m kind of glad to have my first Hollywood marriage out of the way. From now on, no more women who love me only for my money or my job.

Good thing I signed those pre-nups.

There are several reasons I have to leave Buffy.

1: The shooting schedule is grueling. There are eight twelve hour days to every episode. I have no time for anything. Anything. I want to have new scripts ready for the next staffing season, and with Buffy, I don�t have time to write them.

2: If I�m going to be out here pursuing a career, dealing with everything I left in Chicago, then I�m going to need to be happy. I�m not happy now. At all. Again, it�s because of time. It�s a quality of life issue. I don�t have it in me, I�m not settled or comfortable enough out here to work 12 hour days, go home, sleep, and do it again, without having a few hours in there to write or enjoy the city in which I actually chose to live.

With ATJ, I�ll be working normal eight hour days. On hiatus weeks, when they don�t shoot a show, we work 8:30am to 5pm. We stay late on Fridays when the show actually tapes, but never much later than 11pm. In a way, it�s like working together to put on a new play once a week.

3: I want to write half hour, three camera comedy. Buffy is a one hour, single camera drama. If I�m at Buffy, rising through the administrative ranks, I�ll be rising into a genre to which I don�t really want to be connected. If I want to write for the next Seinfeld, or Cheers, or Simpsons, or even Friends or Will & Grace, I best be in a place where I can meet people who are going to help me move along that path, rather than people who are going to move me forward into the next Felicity or Dawson�s Creek.

So, that�s that.

It�s interesting. I�ve never had to make a choice quite like this. I suppose I�m lucky I have the opportunity. Buffy is clearly the show that appeals more to my personal tastes, but ATJ has the schedule and the potential for advancement with which I can be happy.

I have to go in today and give my notice to Buffy. That means that before I get there, someone from the show will find FadeIn and tell my boss before I can. Hi, girls.

Now let�s just hope that ATJ doesn�t get cancelled any time soon...