About
The story of how this blog came to be is a three-step history of my life and interests.
It first started as Stage Savvy.
Named after the column of the same name I started in June of 2003 for KC Stage Magazine, it came about thanks to the NEA Arts Journalism Institute in Theater and Musical Theater I attended in 2010 that encouraged me to market myself.
KC Stage – for the most part – was for the actor and technician in and around the Kansas City area, and the column was started back in June 2003 as a way to bring in the audience as well. It was an “ongoing series to try to bring what we do behind the stage and on to the audience – a sort of Theatre for Dummies without the copyright infringement. These articles are to be a primer, a way to get those unfamiliar with certain aspects of theatre a working knowledge of what goes on.”
As the column continued, I started including articles for people such as myself who weren’t professional theatre people but participated more as a volunteer. It became more of a guide to various aspects of the performing arts, including marketing tips, editorials, and business management ideas. When I created the blog, I included these columns as well as my reviews of the performing arts I attended.
However, I then moved to Los Angeles in 2013 to pursue my MA in Specialized Journalism: The Arts. I had been getting burned out of covering the performing arts in Kansas City, and after a conversation with one of my teachers, I realized I did still have a passion for my geek side, whether it was Doctor Who, Sherlock, or podcasts.
So, G33K Out was created as my thesis. The goal was to focus on the culture of geek media (e.g., comics, television shows, movies, gaming, online media, science, etc.) and includes original critical analysis of geek works, interviews, trends, and stories on the creative process.
We all have something we’re obsessed about, and there is a desire to explore that obsession in every way. G33K Out is geared towards enjoying our obsessions in a fun way, but still managing to look at it through a critical lens.
And yet, during my time at USC, I also came across the need to have a website to highlight my published work. So I created this site originally as just a portfolio to share.
I was also writing the occasional piece that didn’t quite fit into either the performing arts or geek culture, reviews of books or movies that also didn’t quite fit in those categories, as well as tales of my travels in London over the summer of 2014.
I had a LiveJournal for this content, titled Contents May Vary after a literary newsletter I created back in the early 2000s. I wanted to include these as writing samples, and also knew it was good marketing to keep content fresh. So, I renamed my main site and added those items.
This blog now is the culmination of all three blogs. I felt it was only appropriate to keep the name Contents May Vary since it was a little bit of everything. And thus this site as it is now.