In a recent post, blogger JGF (acuallly, that acronym could stand for so many things…) made the point that, in Richmond, it’s almost impossible to find a girl or a guy who hasn’t slept with someone he knows or has met in the past. I’m sure he’s right about that, but I’ve found that it also applies to other areas of a person’s life besides their sex life. In the nine months that we’ve been doing MashUp, we have met, interviewed, chatted up and had a great time with many artists, musicians, filmmakers, photographers and generally creative types. And, without fail, as we go about our non-MashUp personal lives, we run into them again and again.

Once you’ve met a few of rva’s creative finest, it seems inevitable that you’re going to run into them everywhere; it’s just not that big of a place. And as anyone can confirm, few artsy types are only involved in one artistic endeavor. This is a music town and if you play in one band, chances are good you play in other bands, too. Likewise, tattoo artists, photographers, designers and just about everyone else play music. A First Friday is a solid guarantee that I’ll see people we’ve interviewed. A show at the National means I’ll run into a musician we’ve featured. Hell, eating a grilled gouda sandwich at Ipanema is as sure a thing as you could ever hope to bet on. And if I’m going to run into people from whom I’m only separated by a few degrees, I’ll take interesting artistic types over people from my friends’ sexual past any day. Not that I don’t still run into them, too…