I Have A Couple of Friends That Call Me "Whiskers"...

Wow, where to begin?

I tell ya, this year. Talk about highs and lows. In many ways, never been higher, never been lower. But it's my own fault, really. I recalled today that for the bulk of 2015, a constant prayer of mine had been "Please, Lord, help me to grow up."

I'm an introspective, socially-isolated type of person. I've sifted my personality and over-analyzed the findings so thoroughly over the past two decades, it must be counter-productive in the extreme by now. It's in my wiring - I need to understand things. Everything needs to make sense or it drives me crazy. I can't rest on an issue until I know which mental shelf to put it on and why.

It's as exhausting as it sounds.

That having been said, here are the highlights and lowlights of the past two months.

First, the positives...

I finished the first draft of Momentum, the feature script I've been working on for the past year or so, with the illustrious Rob Dey. We're going to meet this week to begin discussing rewrites. The draft is over 200 pages long. We're going to tweak it into two versions. One feature version that will be rather drastically pared down. And a series version, breaking this script into episodes, and keeping more of the content. We've actually renamed the project, but I can't divulge that info yet.

In fact, I can't really share anything else about it at this time. But it is a huge, great feeling to be done with the first draft. I've written short scripts, and tons of plays, but this is my first full-length script. Can't wait to see how this project evolves.

There is a second big positive, relating to writing, but I can't talk about that at all yet, lol. And two other possibly big developments, also under wraps.

Man, I thought I'd have more positives to share!

Before I ever-so-briefly hit the lowlights, here's some fun stuff for you...

Here's a classic from SNL with Will Ferrell doing his Harry Carey impression for the skit Space: The Infinite Frontier...



Awesome.

And here's a recent Conan segment with incomparable John Cleese and Eric Idle...



There, that should take the edge off.

The first lowlight was an intensely personal one, which seemingly cost me two friendships. I don't make friends easily. I have a reasonable amount of acquaintances, but very few people I would call friends - as in, when things are rough, I call and/or go see him, and talk things out, etc. I had two, and both were radically affected simultaneously. It was, as one might imagine, very disillusioning. I've never been one to claim to understand people very well. I thought I had a good enough handle on it to at least maintain a select few friendships. I learned the folly of that mis-assessment.

HOWEVER!

During the course of dealing with that (a very ugly time), I learned some very positive things about myself and about people.

In other words, God seems to be answering my prayer from last year, about growing up.

I will be writing all of the lessons I learned in this journey down at some point. I may even share some of it here, since it might be of interest to you.

The second lowlight was, of course, the election. I'm not going to get my political ramble on, fear not! I will limit myself to a few easily-skimmable sentences only!

I was not a Hillary fan, but I thought Donald Trump was a joke. Now he's our President. I lost my composure on Facebook and stomped on toes on Election night (and E-Day +1), and cut loose. Then I realized the futility of it all, and deleted my posts (and all the replies), with some embarrassment. My stance at this very moment is that of (I believe) everyone else that voted for him (which I did not). We have absolutely no idea what he's going to do. That means, there's a possibility (no matter how slim) that he'll be ok as President, and not a complete, unmitigated disaster. So for my own sanity's sake, I am clinging to that impossibly slim hope, bolstered by two things... first, the knowledge I gained about myself and people from my personal crisis (referenced earlier), and the 60 Minutes interview Trump gave, where it seemed he presented himself quite well.

I'm not a fan, but I'm not flabbergasted any longer. We shall see.

Wow, the lengths I could go to, in elaborating on both of those topics! I shall spare you. And by "you", I mean my mother, who is likely the only person who still reads this blog...

Hi mom! I love you!

The Christmas Play at Mt Zion is on the razor-edge of having the plug pulled. I wrote the script, cast it, and had the read-through. Then a cast member dropped out and another expressed concerns about finding time to rehearse, and now we're about 5 weeks from performance. Christmas is on a Sunday this year, so we need to put the play on the Sunday before (December 18)... I don't know if we can do it.

Here's a question I've been pondering lately. Is it possible to tell whether an author is male or female, by the writing itself? I think I can tell. It's a gut thing... what the author decides to say and how...

Dude, I keep writing more and then deleting it, because what I'm trying to say isn't coming out right. It keeps sounding like I'm taking a shot at female authors. I'm not. I guess I won't elaborate on this, then. Bottom Line: I think I can tell author gender by the storytelling choices.

Lol... man, that was like opening the door to a room, seeing something frightening, and then slowly backing out, and closing the door again... I should just delete the topic altogether... *shudder*

Oh,man, do I have a bunch of great ideas for time travel stories... just saying...

What else..?

Just filmed more for BTI this weekend. And THAT is all I can/should say about THAT. I will provide a more robust BTI update as soon as I feel bold enough to attempt to navigate that minefield again...

I think I'll end with this compelling (to me) video essay from the YouTube channel Lessons from the Screenplay...



Great insights for a writer, me thinks...

So, how to wrap up this post?

Highs and Lows, just like everyone else. Thanks for your patience and understanding mom! And to any non-mom readers wading through this morass, thank you as well. Here is something I'm learning, as I grow up...

Take care.

Dave the Tedious