A Year o' Freelancing (And Weirdest Moment)

Today is more or less the anniversary of becoming a freelancer. In the past year, I've done contract work for a lot of interesting clients, with the emphasis now decidedly (about 98%) on fiction and nonfiction like book reviews.But in honor of 365 days of freelancing, I give you a post from last year about my weirdest freelancing gig, reproduced below the cut.I think enough time has passed since the moment I'm about to describe that I won't get bit in the butt for relating it…When I first started freelancing this year, I jumped at any gig I could get. One of the leads was to write retold Bible stories for teens. It was work-for-hire and the resulting book supposedly would be sold in chain bookstores.The creative director insisted on a conference call to suss me out, along with an assistant and the owner of the company.I get on the phone and the creative director, in a style I can only describe as old-school Hollywood–I could just see him chomping down on a cigar–tells me "This isn't like writing for your penny-dreadfuls, Jeff. This is the big-time. This is for real.""Okay," I say. "How about you tell me about the project."Creative Director: "I used to work at [big comic book company], I know what I'm talking about. This is for real."Me: "I'm looking forward to it. Do you have a particular slant?"Creative Director: "Just think of Adam as being Batman except without parents and you'll do fine."Me [thinking]: …But Batman had parents and…Creative Director: "Just remember this isn't those penny dreadfuls you're used to writing for. This is a real audience."Me: "I understand it's updated Bible stories."Creative Director: "Yeah. The snake is called Stevie and he tells fart jokes. The kids love the fart jokes."Me: "So what do you want from me?"Creative Director: "Pitch us the Tree of Life, Jeff. Pitch us the Tree of Life."Me: "Green? Leaves? Large?"At that moment, or maybe it was well before, I realized I was never, ever going to write for these people.And, in fact, I never did.