Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Oops, I've done it again

Look at that. Not a single post in close to a month. At some point I honestly may stop trying to convince myself that I'll post with anything resembling frequency but until that day I'll do what I can to remember I have a blog in the first place. I'm working on what can only be described as life-changing work at the moment, hence my temporary departure from the land of the living. It may not seem like much to the non-writers of the world, but for me it is a major league event:

The completion of my first full screenplay.

Technically it would be my second since I banged one out in 72 hours in college because I was on page 10 on Friday night and 110 more pages of it was due that Monday. But the one was a feeble skeleton held together by cliche and rote whatever, not to mention the caffeine bender from hell, and I think the professor gave me an A on it out of sympathy more than quality. I'd tell you what the details were but I honestly can't recall that weekend. There's a giant blank spot where it was and I had to rely on my ex-girlfriend's account of me walking into the college lunch facility wearing my pajamas to assemble anything close to a full memory.

As it stands, this is one that I've been working on for close to a year off and on and since I've finally, finally, finally decided to stop being, well, an indecisive tosser and actually be a writer, then it helps to finish one project before moving on to the next. The result goes something like this: I finish this script in either by or during this coming weekend. I print the entire monster out (which should be between 110 and 130 pages) then I'm going to let it sit on my desk for one entire week. If I have thoughts about it, I'll make notes and stickie them to the script. But I ain't making a single edit until exactly 168 hours have passed me by.

At which point, comes the re-write. Followed shortly thereafter by the polish, then the re-polish. During the one week interim period, I intend to get cranking on fine-tuning two outlines I've played with on additional scripts. One is a detective thriller and the other is a horror film. God only knows why but these things pop into my head and won't let go, so I may as well give 'em a chance to run around and play.

During this time I've been working as a substitute teacher to bring in additional funds to the household and believe me when I say there is a gigantor post coming about those experiences. I've also been burning through movies and should start posting those reviews shortly. In the meantime, know that I'm still around, alive, and actually working on being a professional at all this which includes my current job search for full-time employment. I have some good leads, applied to one in particular tonight I'm anxious about, and here's hoping I'll have something by my birthday in a few weeks.

For now, it's off to sleep and tomorrow I'll keep writing.