Most of this sounds like reasonable advice. I will warn however, that if you go to the Chamber of Commerce, be prepared to have a lot of people misunderstand what you do (no matter how you frame it) and to get a lot of time-wasting inquiries wanting you to fix their Windows problems for peanuts, even if what you do is, say, graphic design. Likewise, my experience with things on meetup.com has been terrible. It felt like mostly desperate people all trying to connect with anyone at all, and nobody who actually needed a service.
There are good groups on Meetup, at least in my area, but you do have to sift through a lot of chaff to find the wheat.
EDIT: "a lot of time-wasting inquiries wanting you to fix their Windows problems for peanuts"
If OP is as desperate for short-term cash as he says he is, Windows problems are another opportunity. Also, when dealing with people who see all these unrelated issues as "computer problems", establishing trust is more important than demonstrating skill. As a result, you'd be surprised how often fixing Windows problems can lead to actual development work, either as your client grows, or through referrals.
