"I should really post something on my blog."
A
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Friday, March 19, 2010
Life in Brief
Actually working a LOT this last week, on what I hope and pray is the final pass on the "Spec w/ Emmy Award-Winning Producer attached" (but probably won't be, seeing as the latest round of notes has added almost ten pages of new material to a script that's already widely perceived as being overlong.)
***
MEANWHILE...
When I've come up for air, I've found myself...well, to be honest I've been sad. I'm not renowned for my upbeat demeanour, but my usual default position is anger, which at least has the possibility of some entertainment value. I haven't given it much thought, but it seems to me right now that righteous fury is the best place to be on the negative side of the emotional spectrum. It's energizing, it gives me some clarity of focus--something good can come of it.
But this week, I'm not angry, I'm just depressed. I happened to stumble across two situations, one I'm not involved with at all but which nevertheless upset me, and one slightly closer to home, which upsets me even more. I've done what I can re: the former, don't know what I can do with the latter, other than dwell on it and feel awful for the various people involved (and myself, which is selfish, but there it is), which is what I've been doing. Forgetting to take my pills this morning didn't help.
***
THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY WEEK
It hasn't been a totally awful day. At the Harbor, we generally listen to 102.1 "The Edge", a Toronto radio station for background noise, esp. the 2:00-7:00 (Toronto time) weekday slot, which is hosted by long-time friend of Happy Harbor, Fearless Fred. Fred's a huge comic fan, to the point that he's working to create some of his own. He's also one of the more surreally amusing radio announcers I've ever listened to (not that that's a huge pool to draw from, seeing as I only listen to the radio at and on my way to the store.)
Yesterday, I half-heard Fred talking about the weather in TO, specifically a snippet to the effect of "It's such a great day I'm trying to combine beautiful and glorious into one word."
Naturally, I spent a ridiculously long time mulling this idea, and eventually came to the conclusion that the best option for such a combination was "Globeautrifulous" (pronunciation: glo-BYOO-tri-flus.) Having gone to the effort of concocting this abomination, I of course felt compelled to e-mail it to Fred, who promised to use it during his weekly examination of upcoming films. For a couple hours, I waited with baited breath. It was a fairly slow day in the shop, not a lot of people around, nobody at all for the twenty minutes prior to the movie previews.
And then, of course, a couple people walked in the door just as Fred started the segment. One of them came and stood silently in front of the till as Fred preemptively spoiled "The Bountyhunter" ("Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler? They get together in the end. I just saved you ten bucks and two hours of your life.") and Diary of A Wimpy Kid ("It's funny because it's ALMOST TRUE!"), before wading into Repo Men, which, given the time he'd spent on the segment already, I knew had to be when he'd say globeautrifulous. And indeed it was, or so I'm told, because it was exactly four words from the end of the segment when the customer in front of the till decided to start talking.
Fred mailed me, saying "Please tell me you heard that." I replied with pretty much what I typed above, with substantially more swearing.
The next time there was a break between songs and commercials, Fred came on and managed to work globeautrifulous into a sentence. And he did it in such a way that I couldn't possibly miss it, regardless of who might be talking at the time. He didn't yell it, but it wasn't that far from it.
That was without a doubt the highlight of my week. Which probably says something about the week I've had.
***
STILL READING?
There are better things out there you could be reading. If you're an aspiring comics creator, I can even tell you what one of them is: IDW editor Mariah Huehner (ANGEL, THE LAST UNICORN) has spent part of her day on Twitter, tweeting about creating comics in general and the role of the editor in particular. Semi-related: Dark Horse editor Rachel Edidin (THE MARQUIS: INFERNO) has some tweets along the same lines, usually under the #makingcomics hashtag. Both are worth following, if following people on Twitter is your thing, but especially if you're thinking about getting into the creative end of the comics biz.
A
***
MEANWHILE...
When I've come up for air, I've found myself...well, to be honest I've been sad. I'm not renowned for my upbeat demeanour, but my usual default position is anger, which at least has the possibility of some entertainment value. I haven't given it much thought, but it seems to me right now that righteous fury is the best place to be on the negative side of the emotional spectrum. It's energizing, it gives me some clarity of focus--something good can come of it.
But this week, I'm not angry, I'm just depressed. I happened to stumble across two situations, one I'm not involved with at all but which nevertheless upset me, and one slightly closer to home, which upsets me even more. I've done what I can re: the former, don't know what I can do with the latter, other than dwell on it and feel awful for the various people involved (and myself, which is selfish, but there it is), which is what I've been doing. Forgetting to take my pills this morning didn't help.
***
THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY WEEK
It hasn't been a totally awful day. At the Harbor, we generally listen to 102.1 "The Edge", a Toronto radio station for background noise, esp. the 2:00-7:00 (Toronto time) weekday slot, which is hosted by long-time friend of Happy Harbor, Fearless Fred. Fred's a huge comic fan, to the point that he's working to create some of his own. He's also one of the more surreally amusing radio announcers I've ever listened to (not that that's a huge pool to draw from, seeing as I only listen to the radio at and on my way to the store.)
Yesterday, I half-heard Fred talking about the weather in TO, specifically a snippet to the effect of "It's such a great day I'm trying to combine beautiful and glorious into one word."
Naturally, I spent a ridiculously long time mulling this idea, and eventually came to the conclusion that the best option for such a combination was "Globeautrifulous" (pronunciation: glo-BYOO-tri-flus.) Having gone to the effort of concocting this abomination, I of course felt compelled to e-mail it to Fred, who promised to use it during his weekly examination of upcoming films. For a couple hours, I waited with baited breath. It was a fairly slow day in the shop, not a lot of people around, nobody at all for the twenty minutes prior to the movie previews.
And then, of course, a couple people walked in the door just as Fred started the segment. One of them came and stood silently in front of the till as Fred preemptively spoiled "The Bountyhunter" ("Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler? They get together in the end. I just saved you ten bucks and two hours of your life.") and Diary of A Wimpy Kid ("It's funny because it's ALMOST TRUE!"), before wading into Repo Men, which, given the time he'd spent on the segment already, I knew had to be when he'd say globeautrifulous. And indeed it was, or so I'm told, because it was exactly four words from the end of the segment when the customer in front of the till decided to start talking.
Fred mailed me, saying "Please tell me you heard that." I replied with pretty much what I typed above, with substantially more swearing.
The next time there was a break between songs and commercials, Fred came on and managed to work globeautrifulous into a sentence. And he did it in such a way that I couldn't possibly miss it, regardless of who might be talking at the time. He didn't yell it, but it wasn't that far from it.
That was without a doubt the highlight of my week. Which probably says something about the week I've had.
***
STILL READING?
There are better things out there you could be reading. If you're an aspiring comics creator, I can even tell you what one of them is: IDW editor Mariah Huehner (ANGEL, THE LAST UNICORN) has spent part of her day on Twitter, tweeting about creating comics in general and the role of the editor in particular. Semi-related: Dark Horse editor Rachel Edidin (THE MARQUIS: INFERNO) has some tweets along the same lines, usually under the #makingcomics hashtag. Both are worth following, if following people on Twitter is your thing, but especially if you're thinking about getting into the creative end of the comics biz.
A
Monday, March 15, 2010
Steve Perry needs your help.
Sometimes you're feeling sorry for yourself, and then you read something that affects you. And you still feel sorry for yourself because that's just what you do these days, but you also feel like a self-centered jerk because, at least on an intellectual level, you know your life could be substantially worse. I read such a thing a few minutes ago, a blog post by Steve Bissette on writer Steve Perry's considerable troubles.
It was linked to by Dark Horse editor Rachel Edidin, whose blog post I've cut and pasted below because any attempt on my part to explore this further would almost instantly degenerate into an incoherent stream of profanity and implied death threats against selfish, soulless, teabagging pricks. So:
"Steve Perry is a writer (in comics as well as other media). He's no longer living out of his car, as he was a year ago, but he's still extremely ill--dying of cancer--and has no insurance, no money, and a very young son.
Steve Bisette explains the situation in a little more detail here, and provides a PayPal address: http://srbissette.com/?p=8259
If you can afford to, please donate--even a little makes a difference. Whether or not you can afford to send money, please at least help to spread the word. And then maybe write a representative a strongly-worded letter about the need for better safety nets and universal healthcare."
(I just know if I wrote that last sentence the word "bombs" would have been in there someplace.)
A
It was linked to by Dark Horse editor Rachel Edidin, whose blog post I've cut and pasted below because any attempt on my part to explore this further would almost instantly degenerate into an incoherent stream of profanity and implied death threats against selfish, soulless, teabagging pricks. So:
"Steve Perry is a writer (in comics as well as other media). He's no longer living out of his car, as he was a year ago, but he's still extremely ill--dying of cancer--and has no insurance, no money, and a very young son.
Steve Bisette explains the situation in a little more detail here, and provides a PayPal address: http://srbissette.com/?p=8259
If you can afford to, please donate--even a little makes a difference. Whether or not you can afford to send money, please at least help to spread the word. And then maybe write a representative a strongly-worded letter about the need for better safety nets and universal healthcare."
(I just know if I wrote that last sentence the word "bombs" would have been in there someplace.)
A
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Oh, you look BEFORE you leap...
I just tweeted a mildly sarcastic comment about someone I assumed was a dead celebrity I'd never heard of but turned out to be a 2-year old kid who just died of cancer I'd never heard of.
I deleted it as fast as my fingers and wifi would let me when I realized and tweeted an apology, but... Yeah. Feeling like a bit of an ass right now. And by "bit of an", I mean "total".
The new pills aren't working so well this last couple days.
A
I deleted it as fast as my fingers and wifi would let me when I realized and tweeted an apology, but... Yeah. Feeling like a bit of an ass right now. And by "bit of an", I mean "total".
The new pills aren't working so well this last couple days.
A
Friday, March 5, 2010
New Pills
Half busy, half miserable. Started a post based on a series of tweets that got...out of hand, but haven't finished it yet and as it stands it's really whiny, even by my standards, so I might not bother finishing.
If you're interested, my twitter feed is here --that's actually where I've been doing the bulk of my online writing lately. 140 character bursts are substantially easier to handle than complete sentences, at least when you're in the mood I've been in.
However! That mood seems like it might be changing, because, you guessed it! I'm on some new pills. Actually, I'm back on some old pills which were really good for a year and then gave me insomnia for a couple months, after which I stopped taking them and became less alert and, I strongly suspect, less pleasant to be around. I've only been taking the new/old meds for a couple of days, but I can already feel myself evening out a bit emotionally.
Which is good, because like I said above, I've got a fair amount on my plate right now. In addition to the various pitches I've got floating around a number of editorial offices, things seem to be picking up on the screenwriting front, too. A producer with fairly extensive credits is working with me and Scott O. Brown to develop a screenplay based around a comic we wrote eons ago that never got published. Actually, it's based on a concept SOB pitched solo that I was brought in to help co-write in a form quite a bit different than what he'd originally intended. Naturally, Mr. Bigtime Producer's take on the property is pretty much the one SOB'd originally wanted for it anyway, so now he gets to write the story he wanted to do in the first place, but he's got the dubious joy of having a co-writer he didn't have when he originally proposed the story. I'm actually kind of surprised he's still talking to me, now that I stop to think about it...
Last time I checked, I was quite proud of the comic version we wrote of the piece in question, and hope that we'll someday be able to get it out. SOB and I retain the rights to the underlying but non-existent comic property, which is potentially problematic, but realistically, we weren't exactly rocketing towards a finished comic as it was, and, well, if you want a career as a screenwriter (I'll take one as any kind of writer, even copy), when someone as big as Mr. Bigtime Producer's willing to develop a screenplay with you, you've kind of got to take the shot. Even if taking the shot is likely going to be hours and hours and hours of your time for no money upfront--a scenario I've been getting used to over the last ten years in general and the last year and a half especially.
In addition to that, the managers are working on notes for what I'm promised will be The Final Revision of the spec I've been working on for the year and a half this weekend, so that should hopefully see my part of that process come to a close soon, at least till someone wants to pay for rewrites. Well, not "wants to pay for rewrites" so much as "will pay for rewrites regardless of whether they want to or not." And I've also been given a deadline for a revision of the spec pilot I wrote a couple years back that everyone loved until they decided it needed to be changed significantly. And after that, I've got deadlines for the Christmas thing outline, the supernatural thing proposal, the other supernatural thing proposal (which I'm probably going to pull because "Hollywoodizing" it enough to make it sellable would turn it into something I don't really want to write.)
And when I'm not working on that stuff I've usually been painting. I really need to get some more hardboard to paint on. The 2x2 foot or less scale I've been forced to work in recently is really dragging me down. 3x4 feet's the minimum dimensions for a real painting. And someday I will get back to the art college scope of 6x10 feet...someday...
So that's why there hasn't been much blog activity from me lately. If the way this little note unspooled is any sign of what's to come, that might change in the near future. But I wouldn't count on it.
What's new with you?
A
If you're interested, my twitter feed is here --that's actually where I've been doing the bulk of my online writing lately. 140 character bursts are substantially easier to handle than complete sentences, at least when you're in the mood I've been in.
However! That mood seems like it might be changing, because, you guessed it! I'm on some new pills. Actually, I'm back on some old pills which were really good for a year and then gave me insomnia for a couple months, after which I stopped taking them and became less alert and, I strongly suspect, less pleasant to be around. I've only been taking the new/old meds for a couple of days, but I can already feel myself evening out a bit emotionally.
Which is good, because like I said above, I've got a fair amount on my plate right now. In addition to the various pitches I've got floating around a number of editorial offices, things seem to be picking up on the screenwriting front, too. A producer with fairly extensive credits is working with me and Scott O. Brown to develop a screenplay based around a comic we wrote eons ago that never got published. Actually, it's based on a concept SOB pitched solo that I was brought in to help co-write in a form quite a bit different than what he'd originally intended. Naturally, Mr. Bigtime Producer's take on the property is pretty much the one SOB'd originally wanted for it anyway, so now he gets to write the story he wanted to do in the first place, but he's got the dubious joy of having a co-writer he didn't have when he originally proposed the story. I'm actually kind of surprised he's still talking to me, now that I stop to think about it...
Last time I checked, I was quite proud of the comic version we wrote of the piece in question, and hope that we'll someday be able to get it out. SOB and I retain the rights to the underlying but non-existent comic property, which is potentially problematic, but realistically, we weren't exactly rocketing towards a finished comic as it was, and, well, if you want a career as a screenwriter (I'll take one as any kind of writer, even copy), when someone as big as Mr. Bigtime Producer's willing to develop a screenplay with you, you've kind of got to take the shot. Even if taking the shot is likely going to be hours and hours and hours of your time for no money upfront--a scenario I've been getting used to over the last ten years in general and the last year and a half especially.
In addition to that, the managers are working on notes for what I'm promised will be The Final Revision of the spec I've been working on for the year and a half this weekend, so that should hopefully see my part of that process come to a close soon, at least till someone wants to pay for rewrites. Well, not "wants to pay for rewrites" so much as "will pay for rewrites regardless of whether they want to or not." And I've also been given a deadline for a revision of the spec pilot I wrote a couple years back that everyone loved until they decided it needed to be changed significantly. And after that, I've got deadlines for the Christmas thing outline, the supernatural thing proposal, the other supernatural thing proposal (which I'm probably going to pull because "Hollywoodizing" it enough to make it sellable would turn it into something I don't really want to write.)
And when I'm not working on that stuff I've usually been painting. I really need to get some more hardboard to paint on. The 2x2 foot or less scale I've been forced to work in recently is really dragging me down. 3x4 feet's the minimum dimensions for a real painting. And someday I will get back to the art college scope of 6x10 feet...someday...
So that's why there hasn't been much blog activity from me lately. If the way this little note unspooled is any sign of what's to come, that might change in the near future. But I wouldn't count on it.
What's new with you?
A
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