I'm smart. No doubt about it, I only threw myself out of a running for a job that would give me a fair bit of cash. Then again it would be in a job, I don't want to do.

There is really only one job that I want to do.

Do I feel bad? Not too much. Did I get told off? Kind of. Did I get upset? A little, but it was my own fault.

I don't want to be a receptionist, so who gives a fuck. I could've had today off if my colleague wasn't such a dick.

Office's are not my habitat.

Time to wait for my Temporary role to disappear me thinks.

I guess I'm just smart in a different way.

Bastard Watch

Sometimes just talking about shit with another friend who writes is great, especially when alcohol is involved. In the middle of a conversation with my novel aspiring friend, I pitched an idea for us to work on in the future. That future is 2014, let loose Bastard Watch.

Progress

I spent my hour lunch break reading extracts from Creative Screenwriting magazine on the ipad, looking to get inspired. Maybe come up with Prog's name for my next project.

Success was at hand as Prog has a first name at least, not too sure about the surname. I don't think I will ever top Court Weissberg. It is nice to put a name to a stick man, so I can start to understand the character.

Prog is obviously short for Protagonist as 'Prot' seems a bit shit. Despite there not being a strict antagonist in this piece (at the moment) they would be called Antog. This is how I slowly start to formulate ideas, and not the characters until the timing feels right.

Thank fuck for that. Now I can finally write myself out of this hole.

Thought of the day

Exercise can go suck a dick, it's too cold.

Writers I like part 2

So that post has had five views recently, posted almost a year ago. There are some dreadful typos, but then again I don't edit because I cna't be bothered (that was intentuinil). It had three clips from three tv shows that I adore: The Wire, Mad Men and The West Wing.

Here is a clip from Southland. All hail the new Wire.

Well, shit

So I have been subtely told to apply for a permanent role at my current workplace. The money is significantly more, the responsibilities are bigger, the slacking is lesser. There is no escaping this.

So much for moving from place to place and just doing my own thing. I really need to start making shit with my life, thankfully things are in motion.

At least the money will allow me to actually do things. Like learn how to drive, go travelling or learn how to make films. Hopefully all three.

Since the lottery chooses to get the correct numbers wrong quadweekly, I suppose I have to end up in a job. at a desk. wearing a tie.

I promised my younger self that would never be me.

Well, shit.

Good film

If there's one thing Scorsese has to answer for it's all the gangsters films with V/O.

What have I been doing in the last few hours? Finding out an easy way to learn languages, make the perfect fire, the most effortless way to swim and making easyish food.

It's all in one book. My body is tired, but my mind is wide awake.

Any book that quotes Carl Weathers from his role in Arrested Development is fine by me.

So what's been going on with me lately. Well someone's nicked my ipad mini before it even arrived and now I'm dealing with a gruesome twosome of the courier and apple. Whom both suck in their own special little ways.

My current job is only until the end of the year, which hopefully will give me time to write a screenplay in between jobs.

I have a new job, and I think it's time for a change. I'd been happy to leave my old job, but the whole idea of working for people is not where my life will go. I prefer the idea of doing my own thing and to magically have enough money to do it.

So I see myself having this job for a little while (half a year at most) and so I'm looking for hacks (shortcuts/tricks) into doing what I want to do in my current job. SO the first step is to buy a very small notebook.

I see myself hiding all sorts of things around the office to help me, but just a simple notebook is a worthy start.

Fortunately my commute has been cut by at least an hour a day, the time I have to get up has decreased by an hour on some days. It's strange to think that there was a point after my dissertation where I was sick of writing and had didn't want to do anything for a while. Now, I feel that writing would give me better perks than the job I've already got, because it's true.

I have benefited from my past two jobs, yet my life feels farcical.

I shall take the following six months to accumulate and eliminate what works for me and what doesn't, the final elimination being this job. I get paid by the hour to do things that don't interest me? That is not life, that is life imprisonment with pocket money. Why save for a life of future enjoyment when you can't have that enjoyment now?

The strangest thing I've noticed since I've finished university, is how much I don't care about comics anymore. I used to be obsessed, spend copious amounts of money on them. There are only a few comics that I like, but I don't really spend money on that kind of thing anymore. Funny how people change like that.

Operation: New Job is success

It won't be long until I'm moaning about my next job, I'm sure.

Lies, lies, lies

Remember the thing I said about reading just scripts for a month? Absolutely impossible. I haven't read any novels, but I have been reading books which could be called self-help. Despite me not doing when they say, I prefer to think of them as bio-hacking (which they are all focused on in some way).

Anyway, I've noticed in order to get through tough to read books (I'm looking at you Ellroy) I need to have another book to read at the same time. Not sure if other people do this or not, but I find it helps. I've read 350 pages of a book by Tim Ferriss and about 60 pages of Joe Campbell this weekend.

I'm now fed up of video games for a while.

I'm slowly writing things that will become screenplays. This is good news. Because without screenwriting I start to lose meaning.

This is a relief because I have been doing nothing with my free time, just floating through the tedious worker bee state of mind. I am ready to be liberated from my job.

So I watched Goon a few nights ago. It'll keep the story brief, it's a comedy starring Sean William Scott as a hockey player. I laughed, I enjoyed, I recommend everyone see this film.

Application under consideration...

I am not staying in my current job for much longer.

What have I unleashed?

My word, this night has turned into a hailstrom of blogposts. I have decided to finally read ALL of Syd Fields book on screenwriting, this is something I tried to do in 2008 to no avail.

Meanwhile, I'll be referring to my Fantastic book on writing treatments to prepare for two projects. Projects by me, just me. I recently sent a message to my friend informing him that our creative venture of a show would be taking the back burner, because I wanted to do something more me. It really is time to write, but I won't say that it will be easy.

There are few things in this world that I can talk about with full knowledge and confidence, but with my writing I am invincible, it is all I know and all I conspire about.

Plus co-writing a project with no real sense of direction is harder than you'd think. I want it to work, but the lack of communication makes it hard, I feel like someone doing chest compressions on a person and no ambulance is coming. It isn't a one way street and it is also selfish of me to think of it that way.

I suppose this is the way of ronin, no sense of direction.

Writing something for me, would help me out. I'm not suffering writers block, my lifestyle is the block.

We'll see how it goes.

I wonder what the fuck life will be like if I read this post in the future.

Deadlines save lives

Handed in the first 24 pages of my tv drama. Man, I barely got it in on time. About two hours before the cut off for handing in work, I decided to do a third draft. There were minimal changes, but the way I operate is: start from scratch, type it up, don't copy and paste. I think I improved it, then legged it to Uni to print it out and hand it in, with 20 minutes to spare. My heart was pounding. This is probably the first time in a long time, that I am happy with what I handed in and almost exactly a year since I've handed in a script to be marked.

I haven't been paying much attention to this blog, but after the post I just y'know posted, I read my first blog post.

A time when I decided that I would keep it private and build it up and then kind of tell my friends. I won't lie, it still feels like someone in a dark tunnel saying "hello? hello? is anyone else here?" and only getting a mocking echo in return.

I think the idea of writing now has no consequence for me, it gives me no drive.

There are few things that could get me to write. As I started typing this I realised a fantastic one. Ask my Dad to throw me out if I don't write a certain amount of work over a course of time. Fuck, that is a fantastic and daft idea. I might give that ago.

Further reading on my first few blog posts tell me about myself. I've forgotten almost totally about my horrible neighbours, way too over confident when it comes to my writing and what I'm capable of.

There is something quite cruel about coming home to the place you were never truly yourself, but I had no where else to go. Nobody else to stick around with.

I don't like the things my generation should. Probably because some of these people are idiots. I am retreating from society, because I don't think I have anything in common with them. Where is my tribe?


I used to talk to smart people who were in the room. Now, I'm the smart person in the room. I don't consider myself smart to the point that I would find ways to disagree with such a nice compliment. I just don't see how people can be so stupid. We have a new member of staff join us last week, I was talking about the Mexican drug war and he had no clue, but it's cool, he does tattoos and shit.

I'm starting to see why everyone is runs away to London.

Where is my tribe?

I fucking hate the pickle I am in. The second application I sent off was met with success followed a few days by sucks ass. This week is an open day type thing for a job at a cinema, great. A few problems, I am one of forty eight people invited to attend it what seems like a bullshit decision, because some one could not be bothered to meet everybody individually. It becomes harder when they decide to start it at 10am and finish it at around 2:30pm, due to the fact that I work 7:30am to 4:30pm. Skipping work is impossible at the moment, and not many jobs are on the horizon yet. I presume they'll pop up next month. It's no big loss that I'm not attending the intermosh, they didn't advertise the hours, just as part time. Fucking NEXT put 4 hours for a shitty job and shit pay as part time, someone inform these people of fractions.

Aside from being stuck in a small room, with nigh idiots who listen to shit music for a living, in what seems like a sitcom without jokes and producers who don't like half the characters, so there is a windmill door thing (forgot what it's called) of people coming and leaving. The funny bit, I'm still here.

So where  is my tribe? I want to write, really bad. So bad, I'll choke a kitten for that opportunity. When I'm working I really want to do it. Then when I get home from work or the weekend off, I doss about. At least when I was at Uni, I could talk to people about stuff that interested me, like, films, and thinking about writing.

How do I get out of this funk, I don't know what I want to do. I'm just earning money. That is not fun, I don't like a job that asks nothing creative from you. A blunderbuss of bag eyed, miserable, free coffee vending machine chugging people that actually look down on you because you happen to work in the post room await you. I don't know if success is supposed to taste like that, but this is draining my will to be anything. I am more sarcastic than should be neccesary, like someone overdosing on vitamin D (no, I don't know how this sentence works)

Deadends, full stops and mornings that look like night. How did my life become so?

You can't reinvent the wheel, but building a wheel is quite fun. In a metaphorical sense, obviously.

motherfuckers...

So Operation New Job stumbles as I'm turned down at the first opportunity. I'm pretty pissed off. I'm probably going to be stuck in my current job for longer than I can possibly imagine. The people I work with are unbearable morons and I'm losing 10-11 hours for something that will not help me in anyway. I get money. Money is not worth this time.

Fucking cunts.

First and Last

Operation New Job is well under way with an interview later today. I am going to blitz it, murder it.

Operation New Job

So my job sucks, what more do you need to know?

I don't enjoy it. The money isn't enough for the hours I do, and for the hours I have to be up. I find it pointless to do a job that takes 11-12 hours out of my day when I want to do something else.

So it is time to start looking for other work, preferably closer and less hours.

I have seen the evils of temporary work, I have seen the evils of employment agencies. I've made some money, but money isn't the target any more. Although, I'm not making enough.

Time is something, I've come to appreciate. We only have a limited time until we're all dead. Why should I waste it working for idiots and for tuppence?

The temps I have worked with are from all walks of life and intelligent people. It was good, to work with new people every few weeks. If I lived closer, I might've carried on with it. If I didn't have to work with the senior staff, I'd still work there.

My body still currently works there, but my mind does not. I refuse to be dumbed down into the lagoon of what if in twenty years time.

I got what I needed from this job, but if you're treated like shit, then don't say thank you.

The ideal me would be sacrificed if I remained.

I don't exercise as much as I should. I don't write as much as I should. I don't do enough of anything. My sleep sucks.

This is a pep talk to myself.

A funny thing, I've been battling with the idea of dying since I was sixteen and my lecturer unleashed existentialism on us. What I mean by this is worrying about death, I'm over it now. Fuck it, I die, I die. I've got more important things to worry about than that. Such as figure out how to make films for a living without shelling out grands worth on what might be pointless education.

The great thing is I've never tried that hard with anything, so I know I can do anything.

And now I wait for calls about new work, and do something more interesting.

I finished yesterdays moviethon with Red Hill (a must watch)

I start today with 127 Hours, it gets me every time!

You might have noticed, I haven't been doing titles for the blogposts. It's just.. I find it so blasé, you know?

It's been a long while since I've watched films back to back.
Today, I've got through

The Killer Elite (amazing film)
(500) Days of Summer
Rounders

and currently Face/Off.

I'll probably get through another film before the day is through.

The Ideal Me

So, what's been up with me lately?

Injured my back at work, went to see friends for a couple of days, got drunk, gave too much money to an alcoholic tramp, went swimming, ate ice cream travelled the countryside and got stuck in Norwich.

Now that I have done these things, it is time to make a change. Time to streamline my life. I have stated that I want another job, easier, full time to earn money. As of yet nothing has arrived. So I am coming up with ways to make change happen.


Part of this includes the ideal me, how I want to be. This isn't personality wise, but just a few changes.

The rest is essentially work output rather than the input that I am accustomed to. Figuring out how to take advantage wasted moments.

Although I am also aware that rest is a big deal in life. Not enough of us sleep enough, comfortably or at the right time. I want to figure out how to get the most and feel refreshed. This past week, I have been a zombie.

Not only this but I need time to relax my mind and body. So change is coming.

Why the fuck did I give that tramp £10?

As of this morning, I am the only temp in my department. This means I'm the third most senior member of staff there. By this, it means I'll be doing almost all of the work.


Yes, it is time to seriously look for work elsewhere.

Fine, my retired  running trainers are called The Champions.

Go listen to Best Coast.

Great scene.

An OIL TANKER.

From what's left of the twisted metal sub-frame flames twenty feet high scorch the night, like the maw of hell on earth.

James stares, transfixed by the burning... the imprint of some insurgent's plan.

His face hardens now in a way we haven't seen before, and as the fire flickers on his features he seems lost in a privatre war of his own.

The insurgents are out there somewhere.

Ahab and the Whale

The best script I've read this year

I've read a lot of scripts and a couple of plays over the past two months. Since I'm taking a sabbatical from prose and non-fiction and spending a year just reading scripts (10 months to go!)

I have about twenty pages to go in the best script I've read this year* and it is a pretty great film by James Mangold. Copland. Go read it.

This is saying a lot, because I have read some fantastic scripts this year:

Sunshine
Thank You for Smoking
Michael Clayton
Goodfellas
American Beauty

and a couple of great plays:
Farragut North
The Farnsworth Invention



When I read scripts, I am benefitting from it. I have several books on how to write screenplays, barely got through Syd Field and I never read the rest.

Thank fully I have plenty of scripts to get me through the next ten months. Including China Town, Taxi Driver, Batman Begins, Memento, Out of Sight and loads more. Plus lots of plays by Pinter, Mamet, Mcdonagh and a Sorkin.


On a side note, since I have started working at my job, three people have left my department (granted one of them I replaced) but that says a lot about where I work. Everybody hates it here, except the people who will die here.


*best script I've read this year so far.

Isaac and Ishmael

Quite possibly my favourite one hour done in one episode ever. It is the season 3 premiere of The West Wing.

A few things about it. It was made in two weeks. Two weeks following the September 11th terrorist attacks and was a counter-attack to the people baying for bloody revenge, and also wasn't. As a single episode of a show, it introduces all the characters as if for the first time.

There is an A story and a B story. There are very few sets, and they oppose one another. One that is trying to make sense and differentiate a religion versus extremism and another trying to quickly find whether a staff member of the white house is a terrorist by linking relgion and terrorism together.

There is resolution. People come to their senses. The guy who aggressively tries to dins out if the staff member is a muslin returns and basically says he over reacted. People did over react or did they. Catastrophic tragedies have huge backlashes, somewhere to drive their  sometimes misjudged or uncontrolled emotions.

It doesn't spend much money. You could only see that episode and never see the rest of the show. Just track it down and watch it.

The Barefoot Revolution

I've probably already mentioned this, but I wrote a one hour single drama for tv based on the book Born To Run about ultradistance runners searching for some sort of distillation of what makes humans natural runners.

Some creatures are in capable of it, some can but can't last long. The thing which makes us different to our competitors in the animal kingdom is our sweat glands, we don't overheat and so forth.

So this post is about death and rebirth. The death of my Saucony Pro Grids, ones that I bought in 2008 and proceeded to murder up until a few weeks ago, where we finished an 8 mile race, which would retire my former pristine white trainers that had devolved not just in colour, but in it's sole. Slowly my running has worn it down over the course of these years, where I have accumulated at least 700 miles in them. A smart person, would've bought a new pair of trainers after a year, but I wanted to keep wearing them until the day whilst running they crumbled off and it was just my feet padding the ground instead of my former protective shell, breaking out of the cocoon.

That weird fantasy did not come to pass, but upon the end of my 8 mile race, I was exhausted, out of breath, injured and all I wanted to do was take off my trainers hold them above my head and walk around in respect to them, much to the bewilderment of the crowds. But I just hobbled back to the car. I took one week off from all training, and then one week off from running.

My Grids and I have been through an evolutionary phase in my running. I used to be a heel striker, I used to get injured more often, with shin splints usually being the main culprit. Then my dad said I had to read a book called Born To Run: The Rise of Ultra'running and the Super-athlete Tribe. I got through it in that summer, it was about an adventure of these runners trying to find a legendary Mexican Indian running tribe intercut with research and brief interviews about the evolution of the running shoe and how it has become overcomplicated and heavy. I slowly started changing my running strides and I was a part convert to the book. It all made a lot of sense, but I was not going to throw away my Grids, I can't throw things out that fast. We were going to see things through.


I wrote a spec of it for class at University, it must have been the first forty page script I had ever written. I still feel guilty for my friends taking part in my readthroug, that was a slog. 


Fast forward to today, I knew I wanted new running trainers, I'd cut the laces off my Grids, like it was an ubilical cord. I went out searching for the mystical pair of trainers that would fit all my needs. The theories that the book was pushing is still very much a sub-culture and there are a few minimal/barefoot running shoes from different companies. I wanted something different to my Grids, I didn't know what but all the regular running trainers felt too heavy and looked more like an 18 wheeler truck. Like a kid with their drivers license trying out the most expensive car, I tried out some barefoot trainers.


Minimus, I had to go through three pairs before I got the perfect fit. They are more like gloves than shoes in the way they have to fit. I tried them out of the treadmill, it was like running as a gazelle. It felt good, I bought them.




Now, the thing about changing from regular running trainers to barefoot/minimal shoes is that it takes time for your body to get used to the new way of running, because they are as light as a feather and make you land on your forefoot because there is hardly any cushioning.

It should be faster for me, because I destroyed so much of the cushioning on my grids that I was basically do a not far off version. I can't stand modern trainers in the way that they bounce when you run, it feels like I'm on the moon, not running.

So yeah, I did a two mile run earlier, I sprinted, I jogged, I ran uphill, I ran downhill, I ran on the road, I ran on the mud, I ran on the grass, I ran on stones, I ran slow, I ran fast. I tried them out throughly. 

It is tough, but a new journey in my running.

I mourn the loss of my Grids

I welcome my Minimus' 


I don't know why I get attached my running shoes. It is pretty weird, but at least I don't give them names.

Previously on...

I ran in an 8 mile race, did amazing for the first 6.5 miles and then tore my adductor (inner groin muscle) and forced myself to sprint and stop the rest of the route. I finished in 1:10, faster than my try two years ago on the route, where I didn't tear my adductor by ten-fifteen minutes.

I saw Springsteen in Manchester yesterday, it was okay, the acoustics sucked. Stopped my uncle from getting in a fight and had a free burger.

Update

My new notebook commenced idea absorbing a few days ago. Vol. 4 has begun. I have new ideas, I'm working towards them at a snails pace, because I have to play Max Payne 3 again.

Dear past me...

... You suck. I just beat your two mile best in 14:53, 38 seconds faster than you. Also, I'm five pounds lighter than you at your fattest.

With regards present me.

Lunch Break and The Money: A Blog in two parts, but in one post. So really just a regular blog post.

Before I get into the Lunch Break and The Money, there is something I feel like saying. When I went running today, it felt like I was losing Summer. Another Summer lost, that I can never get again and immediately time is fleeting and I am wasting it. Maybe my friend Al helped start this thought to settle in my thought due to a text last night.

"So, long shot, but is anyone free enough to be in southampton this thursday coming?" He texted with an intent of keeping literacy alive through mobile communication.

The following day (That's today) I was warming up and sent him back a reply.

*Writer's note: I hope you noticed that this blog is not going to be about what I intended*

Being one of the masses, one of the worker bees of a dreadful society that we were shielded from whilst at University, because we were writers. Work feels like the film Brazil, where as I dream of it being more like The Hudsucker Proxy (You know, for kids!). Still at this point in time I find time to write or think about writing, a bit less than I used to but enough to keep pushing forward. Two to four pages in a lunch break is good, otherwise I read.

*Writer's note: This train has got back onto the right track*

Whilst warming up for my relaxing five mile jog, I had a brief back and forth with Al. I informed him of my current predicament, I inquired to a mutual friend of ours who didn't pass the third year with us, because he pandered about with what to do as his feature script. I said at some point to some one, this person likes films a lot, but he doesn't want to write them, he just wants to be involved in the process. Anyway moving onto this year, and his second third year has come to an end.

Did he hand in his script this year? No. I thought this year would be different for him, the group not being around anymore. Not being pressurised by all of us to write. Perhaps this year, he could do it, he had a summer to mull over ideas and even start. He had a month less of the academic year to finish it. I don't know how he spent his second third year, and not write or finish a script.

To me, my script was a right of passage. Saying to myself I can do this, and to others fuck you, I can do this. All of third year, my mind was on writing, excluding the essays about weird transgressions.

*Writer's note: I was close to bringing it back, but no I'm going somewhere else*

I spent my third year: Not sleeping, weight training, writing, thinking about writing, karaoke, seeing films and watching babestation at lunch time. But I still got stuff done. Granted he has a job and I didn't, granted he has a girlfriend and I don't.

Writing is compulsive. I find it compulsive. You know how men are thinking about sex every seven seconds (or some obscure number of seconds) well, I spend that time thinking about writing. Then I think about sex.

Either you want to write or you don't. I find this pretty simple. I don't think I've ever met anybody who thought "how can I earn a living, I know I'll be a successful writer!"

What I have come to understand through this is that if you don't put the time in you won't achieve anything (except winning the euromillions, but I've been working on that so I will have earnt it by the time I win.)

I love the fact that I don't want to do my job for any amount of time, I'll do it. I make a small amount of money for a job, but good enough for a first job. I don't feel like I'm making enough money, it's not that I feel the job is slave labour, it's just that I deserve to earn a much more amount. I suppose it says alot about my generation and this feeling of entitlement and arrogance. But, fuck you, I deserve better!

*Writer's note: Rule of three broken*

I have mentioned one of my mantras: Don't be Elisha Gray.

At this point in time, that is hard to do. Not being in the industry. Another one of my mantras is "Write  yourself out of the hole". I picture someone in a well looking up as he types on his typewriter. Metaphorically speaking this is how I feel, because it takes too much time and effort, and money to find a well, get in it with a typewriter and have someone take a picture. I'm going to need a piece of paper otherwise the picture is just lazy.

Back to my friend, it just shows me how much of a waste of potential talent is there. If people want to waste what they have, that is up to them. There are better writers than I, and will be better than me in my entire life. There is one thing, I am willing to keep going. 99 percent perspiration, 1 percent inspiration.

I have less time to work on what I want to do. This means prioritizing, and I am slowly growing accustomed to it. It is hard, really hard. My freedom is gone, I'm fighting to get it back.



On the flipside, I like getting money. I'm not attached to it in any way. I could just not spend it and wouldn't care. I still bought a big tv though. I like it. The job has it's perks with the money. There are things I can be which I haven't been able to before. I really do like this. I am scared that I will be seduced by this. There are two people in my department who have been here for twenty years, they see Temps come and go. They will never leave this job.

One of the reasons why I know I will leave is because I don't try to talk to people or get to know them. I won't get too attached to the people, because I won't know them. It'll work. I get up, go to work, go home, earn the dollah. I will finance my own projects from this job.

How to some up this blog post: similar to my first few, in a stream of conciousness but going no where crappy kind of way.

When I write

I feel like quitting, this is torture. The first draft is the hardest thing to do in the writing process for me. I really need to become a student on structure.

I love cigarettes and other short stories

I don't know if I dreamed about this last night, but might have been smoking. In the dream. It is by far the most relaxing recurring dream I have ever had. In real life I consider it a filthy habit, that as far as lungs are consider are akin to trying to give CPR to Weezer from Pokémon. Let me describe the scene, I am casually smoking a cigarette surrounding by a black abyss and the smoke is clear to see. Yes, I am wearing clothes, but that is not the point. Then again, there might not be a point.

Anyway, I turned a year older a week ago and immediately started a full time job. To make it short and sweet until another in depth post: it is school. Working in an office is school all over again, those people who you left there as you went on to meet people at university who were just like you (all of you thinking, where were these people in school?) and you didn't look back? Well they just stepped to your right and as you turn, there they are. Wunderbar. I did not miss them. The money is the consolation prize. More importantly, these are people ripe for poaching for writing. You know what? That is their own damn fault. People that are too lazy, are get away with other people doing their job every day. Someone who refuses to be wrong, even in the case of Killer Bees exisiting. Numerous fag breaks being abused as the non-smokers (in real life) are left to get on with the work. I have to keep telling myself this is a milestone and I am making money. But money has always felt unimportant to me.

So to sum up the last paragraph, work is like being back at school, and I am a University Graduate. What does that mean? I am above such petty things, aside from doing impressions and accents and goading people to moan about others. Am I a puppet master or just one of them.

I saw Black Sabbath in Birmingham, it was amazing.

I am back to wearing shoes, there is no novelty to wear off.

I feel connected to my friends from university through blogs, just as we were at Uni.

I am now at a point in my life, where I have to figure out how to plan my spare time. It isn't easy, but I've pretty much done a first draft of a sitcom just without the jokes.

I wake up at 5:40 every weekday. Do you want to know the last time I had to regularly got up at that time? Never.

I've pretty much stopped reading comics, I can't explain why. It is something that was a huge part of my second decade, now I just don't care.

The Raid is one of my top films so far this year alongside Avengers and The Grey (Stole my TV drama title).

I find it ironic that Laura has lots of free time and I don't. It was never like that at Uni.

I used to be a slacker, now I yearn for that role to return to me.

Brightside - Writing more.

Darkside - Watching less.

I'm going to be making short films in the future. My wages will most definitely be the budget, I am fine with that. I have no other information apart from that.


I know how to write one of my tv shows and one of my novels. One will suck, it will be the novel. The TV show, could be interesting, probably preachy.



Oh, and Laura really should reply to my texts.

This blog is ruined

Seeing as how most of my posts are me lyrically moping around not getting a job, and since I may now have one. It kind of destroys what the blog was intially made of.

But on the bright side, money. On the dark side, early mornings.

Strange...

So, I just got a call from the temp/employment agency I signed up with a few months ago, which got me an interview as a temp. It was the worst interview I've ever had. I won't go into detail, but I didn't hear anything back about it.

Cut to today, and the employer has the same role available and needs someone to fill it ASAP. I did not expect that to happen.


If I don't get it, at least I'm seeing Black Sabbath on Saturday.

RIP Caballo Blanco

Sad news for Born to Run readers as the former self exiled ultramarathon runner Caballo Blanco died whilst running. It just reminds of what a bad 1 hour drama I wrote about the story featured in the book, but Caballo Blanco was larger than life and in that case, life couldn't contain someone like that for long.

Running

Months of preparation and weeks of illness lead me to the 10k race that I took part in yesterday.

So, how did it go? Good question, I hated it and kind of liked it at the same time. Running alongside hundreds of people tome is a horrible feeling, it psychologically plays with my mind, because I run alone and rarely see other runners. If I do see runners, we are never running on the same route for very long.

A thing that annoyed me was the person who works at a gym to go up on stage to warm us up, I just turned on my ipod and listened to music. I'd already warmed up. But she was doing stupid movements that don't really prepare your body to go running. I and the rest of the Red runners (Club and faster runners) do our own warm ups, my usual jump squats and lunges.

So when I run alongside people, I feel like I've been running longer than I actually have. Ten minutes felt like forever.

Was it tough? I has been years that I have ran five miles at a single pace. But I have been running 5.5 miles every week with a interval timer, so the distance was not the problem.

I tried almost every one of my running tactics to finish and get a good time. I noticed I could beat my time when I finished the first lap at 20 minutes. After a massive hill climb and the long winding roads, I knew the route and I knew I could run the second lap easier. Immediately I started running behind someone moving at a steady pace, staying with him for about a mile. Then the second hill run begins, I always go slow up hills because if I go fast, then I'm wasting energy on the flat and prior to the hill there is a big dip down a road, so I just let gravity push me fast down there.


By the way, the worst thing about running in races is if you stop for a second, forty people will overtake you.

Anyway I did alright, beat my previous 10k time by about 3-4 minutes. My legs still hurt, I didn't have fun (well I did, but...)

It is impossible for me to write a serious covering letter

I have a problem, and this problem may be keeping me from getting a job.

I have spent the last hour working on a covering letter for one thing, yes this is how considerate I am. It is a snarky, self absorbed, meta cover letter. I will in defence say that most websites with covering letter advice say to be "unique" I don't think they mean this much.

Honestly, it is not be intent to write these kind of covering letters but I do. Perhaps, it is due to the boredom of doing something conventional, why not be the Charlie Kaufman of covering letters? Oh wait, that's right, I won't get a job!

This is a huge problem, because I have no idea if it is the right thing to do and I cannot write a normal covering letter. It is impossible, it is inexplainable as to why it is so hard.

In creative writing, the blank page is not as scary as writing a covering letter. Why? Because in CW I can do anything. For a covering letter, I have to convince people that they have to hire me, argh FUCK YOU PAPER AUDITION!

I'm currently thinking of metaphorical things to stab in my metaphorical eyes, this is how tough it is. In my minds eye I am rolling on the carpet from side to side with a slow building scream.

I understand the whole process of hiring, and I may be the least hirable person with a Bachelors with Honours. Except those poor stand-up BA students, but then they may be funny in the workplace.

There is no form of proof that hiring me will pay off. Non.

It is like I'm throwing myself out there whilst thinking will they like me, whilst also not giving a fuck. I can pretend to be a nice person and do a good job, that is easy, but convincing people is tough. These personalised covering letters which I was told to do and is common practice seem too personal.

This whole unique aspect of applying for shit jobs also means one thing, you're being hired for some shitty mundane job. People will know I have plans past working at labotomy retail store #439.

This is not as bad as writing application forms, but still, there is an aspect that trying too hard will mean I will fuck it up entirely. I don't know these people, I don't know their sense of humour. I am probably getting blacklisted by every company I send a letter/email to.

Why do most shows sound almost exactly like other shows?

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/tv-pilots-2012-complete-guide-287221

I am particularly cautious of the show that is "House as a vet"

Almost true to my word

Today is an anniversary. On the 6th of May 2011, I handed in my screenplay as my dissertation. I have briefly scoured my blog from the beginning, and I might've said some things that I will not stick with.

No. 1: I said I would try to be a writer until 2015, if that didn't work out then I would do something (probably kill myself, but I wouldn't bother with that) probably be miserable and glum. I have things to write for a long while and when I become a professional is whenever, there is no end date.
No. 2: I would send off something on this day to the BBC Writersroom every year...

And here is why. Writing at University burned me out and I needed some time and still do to really sit down and write something worth while. I'm progressing by centremetres, not by miles, this is fine. I can't go forward with half-formed ideas, I just can't. So I have been slowly planning my scripts.

Anyway I wrote a sketch last week and slowly spent this week working on it. I showed it to a few friends and got some feedback. I have then uploaded the script onto a website and entered it in a competition. Will I win? That would be nice, it is a small competition and I have never entered one. The thing I'm glad about is that I wrote this sketch, and it worked fine. I don't feel any attachment to the script nor care what happens to it. This is a nice feeling, there are so many stories in my head that I am invested in, that it is nice not to give a fuck and throw something out in 30 minutes.

So I kind of sent something off, just not to the writersroom. What's the hurry, I might as well spend my time trying to get it right without people noticing than fucking up and getting plenty of attention.

That screenplay was a bitch.

It's almost time to say goodbye

No, nothing bad happened. I'm not going to kill myself. I know, I just let down my readership/reader down... again.

I've talked a little about my notebook, how I like having it, but it is just a piece of paper for me to write on. Blank paper usually has smaller value compared to the opposite. I am coming to the conclusion of finishing notebook #3, as usual the notebook more or less takes a year to fill up. I am fourteen pages away from finishing what I started from May 2011 and will no doubt conclude in May 2012.

It is kind of cool, of the past year I think ideas for stories has doubled my last list, which is pretty shitty. I haven't really been writing, just note taking. Note taking is neccesary for me to build the stories, despite not really writing any for almost a year.
The notebook is neccesary because I take influence from another story (The Shield, IT Crowd, The West Wing) and transplant them into one of my stories. Effectively I use these projects as templates, and I sometimes build characters, setting and so forth of these projects. From my note taking and my mind constantly being ON about writing, I slowly begin to deviate from my templates.
So now I am bringing my own ideals to the story and it just organically grows away from what it is descended from, this is not any asexual reproduction that we are forced to consume, this is creative sex between my imagination and something that is already out there.

It helps give me a sense of where my projects would be in the marketplace. This is where the fun begins because at a certain point I won't need these projects as inspiration any more, and I find that in my head and on paper, I can define these tales succintely.
 Not only this, but I do not want to put out half baked ideas. I derailed my feature film script dissertation for uni, by lack of sleep (but we're not talking about that) and I got caught up in trying to figure out how to write a TV pilot.
The pilot was okay, but rushed, slightly generic and needed some time to slumber prior to its release. I try not to rush story, because that means it could become boring at certain points. When a film or TV show is on, your mind must be racing with it. Your mind should have all sorts of thoughts about what might occur next. That doesn't happen often enough in my opinion.

Something that caught my attention whilst watching yesterday: Cabin in the Woods
Something that didn't catch my attention whilst watching yesterday: Dark Star

Last week I was scouring my usual messageboard reading the writing threads, advice about writing threads and ask the professionals threads. One fantastic bit of planning I came across was, if you are stuck in what to do next in your story, write ten possible outcomes. From that pick the one which you think sounds best, don't be afraid to write some stupid possibilities. I'm using this tactic for fleshing out my characters, trying to figure out their backstory by writing above them "why is ---- a dick" "what are --- trying to hide" and it has been a huge improvement. Usually the ten choices kind of start to mesh together to build different layers to this person and this was unexpected.

I think this is a new constant in my approach to writing. Which is nice.

Plus I get to buy a new notebook, nothing moleskin and nothing you can buy from a stationary shop.

Bye.

I have nothing to say anymore

I usually write a blog post a month.

These are moments of my text that breaths catharsis and distill a sense of meditation in every reader (all one of you). But, deep down, we know that's not fucking true.

Sure, I can do a ranting blog. That would mean, I would need to take a break from my exile from the world outside my door, that is asking a lot.

I could write in a vague, abstract way of what I am doing, or might not. I'm probably lying. "Hey, I'm getting closer to my target" to "oh fuck sticks, I'm not getting closer to my target" all the way through purposefully not mentioning my endgame, because quite honestly THERE ISN'T ONE.

And another thing, who the fuck are all you people from Asia and Europe and Australia, and why are you reading my blog. Now I know that blogs are open for anyone, the question is why bother reading mine.

In my last blog post, it was about Lovefilm. Something is very broken with that. There is no structure to this blog and I might let it continue that way.

As of right now, I have fuck all to say. Now, I know you all want my opinion on a 3d projection of Tupac. I would have preferred a plasticine version, we shall never talk on this subject ever again.

I want to be a professional writer, but lack the ability to consistently follow a word with another word so that a story emerges.


Before I finish this detailed, yet slightly ambiguous post I have one more thing to say.


The Word of the day is Hegemony.

Who the fuck in Singapore wants to read this shit?

Oh LoveFilm...

I think this is my new found addiction. It is cheaper than buying dvds and blu-rays at this point as I did seem to buy a lot before. This just means I can watch all those things I didn't want to spend money on. So I now have 220 dvd and blu-ray titles in my rental que, I'd be saying goodbye to life if I had one.

So anyway, the first two blu-rays sent to me were Valhalla Rising and Red Hill. So why were these my first two choices?

Well, Valhalla Rising was directed by Nic Winding Refn (director of Drive and Bronson) The bracketed films, I'd previously watched and liked/loved them. So judging from the trailer of Valhalla Rising, Refn would be gorging on some Peckinpah bloodlust. That is only for a little bit, the production is fantastic but it does have a similarity to Drive in the silent protagonist. Sadly I was actually bored, I understood almost all that happened. Don't go in thinking of Drive. The violence was awesome though.

Red Hill. The only other Aussie Western I've seen was The Proposition, unfortunately it's been a while since I saw that, I seem to recall lending it to a friend and never getting it back. But anyway

It is rude to call Red Hill generic, but it is definitely a paint by numbers job transplanted into a slightly different locale. That is not a bad thing, I really enjoyed it. It was predictable, but I like watching it. I had fun watching a film. That is something that as we grow older, the thing we forget about. We want logic and realism. I want films to be fun as well. There were some unrealistic moments, but at the same time worth a watch.

I'm back

Ten months and I have finally started writing again. It looks like my first draft for the sitcom is going to have a feature length script that is going to be cut down to about 25 pages when I'm done. Let the horror begin.

I liked John Carter (of Mars)

It was kind of sucky, the storyline rushed and generalised, but the humour was actually funny and there was loads of blood.

That was why I didn't like The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. You had a massive battle with minotaurs and shit, but no blood.

Also, John Carter is a gold digger (Nuance!).

It could've been much, much better.

The action was good, the CGI was not lacking at all.

I still liked it. I will buy the blu-ray. Good enough.

Also, if we can have a film set on mars without the title indicating it, I want the next Harry Brown to be set on Mars. Oh, and Antwone Fisher, he can finally have his Charlie Kaufman moment.... on Mars.


*Spoiler below*



He totally married for the title.

What I wish I wrote (Unofficial Hate #4)

Doing online applications for business' is the most annoying process I know. The main point is when they ask why I want to work for them or a short personal statement to support my application.

I'll make it nice and simple for them.

Money. I want your fucking money, and I want to use it for my own gain. Like every fucking person in the world.

Here is what I wrote first:

The fact that you require a personal statement alongside my credentials to support my application is ludicrous. What is the point of going through when applying for a low paying, low respected, no future careers as a sales advisor. Would it be better if I record a blood sacrifice and posted it to the HR department in Gloucester, where I strangle a chicken and make a vow to Satan to bind my soul with the economical enterprise that is your company? Why do you require this much convincing, businesses such as yourself should stop convincing yourselves that working for a business means you are a fanatic convert to the point of evangelical cashiers at Tesco. You are asking people to do a mind numbing job, this is a matter of respect and a completely lack of humility on the side of businesses.

I did not send that, I wanted to though. The next time some company requests that, well, I think I'll send a better draft of this.

Fucking bastards.

Hate #3

My neighbour who sings in the morning. You are a horrid, horrid singer and yet you do it every morning.

I funded Wastelander Panda

I decided to get it out of the way. Despite exceeding the Aus$20,000 I threw in £10. Plus I get HD downloads of the three episodes.

Post-Uni

It's almost a year since my friends and I left university. I don't think any of us expected post-uni to be the way it has turned out.

It's like being on the worlds biggest rollercoster, slowly going up the steepest incline known to man, and we're no where near the top. In some cases, the rollercoster has stalled or gone back a few metres. Will we ever reach the top?

Don't be Elisha Gray

Elisha Gray is the person who invented the telephone, well, almost. Elisha Gray submitted his patent the same day as Alexander Graham Bell handed in his patent, by how many hours and minutes, I don't know.

Every since I read Aaron Sorkins play "The Farnsworth Invention" this has been in my mind.

Don't be Elisha Grey.

I think I'm going to print it out and put it on my noteboard.

I've been through it before, so have my friends. We come up with ideas, then within seconds, days, weeks etc. Someone else has made the idea and got it out there. There is a feeling of loss, the idea going up in flames usually.

It is becoming more and more apparent to me, that as soon as you have an idea, there is a clock ticking away until somebody else releases it as well.

Yes, two people did release a video that was similar to an idea of mine and it hurt. I'm in the planning stages of a project, I don't have a camera and haven't done any extensive planning. These people did and did it better than I would've imagined and better than I could've. But my idea is different in some ways and I don't think I have the budget that these people had.

 I will carry on with the project, despite this. Mine will be distinct, but it won't have the same significance (to me) that it once did.

I'm going to print out my new maxim now.

Further musings on Wastelander Panda

I’m not going to lie, I’m obsessed with the idea. It feels like a comic book idea transplanted into television, which is only a good thing. The production company has chosen Pozible, an Australian Crowd funding website in order to get a budget to film however many episodes they have planned. It could just be a pilot, to show off. Crowd funding is one of the gifts that the internet has given us, and I believe one of the new ways to finance both film and television among many other things. Kickstarter, for example showcases ideas from films, novels, magazines, theatre, inventions, photography and board games. I am not going to say that Crowd funding is easy, you have to sell your idea to people but not give them the idea for free.

Living in a democratic nation, we are given choices. We can vote for our governments at ballot boxes, vote with the pound and vote with the remote. To be honest with you, I’m not a fan of some of the things people are willing to vote with their remote, we have some shite television and a lack of creativity to get anything interesting made. With crowd funding, not only can you get production costs for a small amount of money from a lot of people, you are already building an audience, packaged for a presentation at whatever television channel.

It feels that most television shows don’t get made because of the budget, or the idea is different and people will not believe that it could work. What production companies want is small budget, good writing, good cast, high ratings. An example of this to me would be the anti-sitcom Louie on the American channel FX. It focuses on Louie CK’s life and the first season was made on a budget of $250,000.00, Louie stars, writes and sometimes directs and edits. His salary and everything else was in that 250,000 dollars. It is worth watching, and would’ve sucked if the team who made the show accepted 300,000 dollar budget, because they would start getting notes from FOX executives, if you get the opportunity to do something you want to do, for less money and no censorship, I would do it.

Another form of funding these days comes from joint production companies, such as BBC and HBO collaborating on Band of Brothers or Rome. They were big and are still great shows to watch today. They are particularly lucky to be able to do their own thing and HBO are now notorious for making expensive television, which was why Rome only had two seasons, they didn’t have enough money at the time. But now, Game of Thrones, Boardwalk Empire and The Pacific are grand stories being made to great acclaim. Hollywood budgets for Television shows.

Another step in this direction and slightly newer is companies such as Netflix getting involved, an internet rental company that can ensure its distribution rights on such things as Lilyhammer and the return of Arrested Development. Times have changed for sure.

If you can’t find a company to sell your idea to, just go somewhere else and you might get it made. It worked for Ché Part I and II by Soderbergh, no American companies wanted to get into bed with him (not surprisingly) but he got the money from Spanish and German production companies. I quite like those films.

It feels like crowd funding is similar to charity, it goes to a good cause and you see the benefits, but you won’t benefit from it yourself. It’s like a tailor made scholarship, a grant. Charity and crowd funding of course have different agendas.

It’s not the gifts that grab people’s attention, it’s the ideas. Someone will want to see it, it just doesn’t have to be supported by the big production companies.

Novelists are pushing themselves away from publishers, to an extent, I think TV and Film may as well.

Stork

Saw a Stork on my shed earlier, never seen one in real life before. It is something amazing, it seemed way out of its way. I was in awe for a little bit. A shame, I couldn't get a picture. I wish I had a proper camera to take a picture.

Always carry a notebook, always carry a visual device so you can record something that is unplanned and comes out of nowhere. It can change your perspetive, if only for a moment.

Wastelander Panda

This is another good pitch, do a little short and release it. It could garner plenty of attention, which is what I'm trying to do with it as I want to watch more.

Now, this is an interesting pitch

http://video.comicbookresources.com/cbrtv/2011/cbr-tv-cci-mike-costa-jon-armstong-use-magic-to-sell-smoke-and-mirrors/

Unfortunately, I can't embed this into the post. This is a great way to pitch an idea, you tell the story in a different fashion, it hits all the points and answers questions and does one important thing, it is fun to watch. Most Pitches are the same old story, if you could bring a little bit of theatre to the meeting, that would give you an advantage to someone who summarises the story.

Think differently, and you'll be remembered.

Writing Competitions

I've never quite understood this about writing competitions, how they'll make some odd request about what has to be in it or the theme.

"Write a short story (750 words or fewer) based on the prompt below.

"You return to the house where you grew up, only to learn it has been condemned."

How about you just ask for short stories and get pleasently suprised, by something that differs to most of the entries you have received. The readers won't enjoy reading very similar stories about condemned houses for days on end.

The First Notebook

I'm currently typing up notes on my computer. My first notebook is surprising, in what I have written. It is stuff that doesn't make sense.

For example: "Guy is rejected from heaven because he is half-robot"

What does that even mean?

202

It's funny when inspiration comes flying at you, even when you're not doing anything productive. Although, it does pile up the work, I haven't done yet. Just making it harder for myself.

Happy new year

It's a lot like last year, what with the fireworks and the music.

One simple difference, this is my year. I don't want to be in the same place in a years time, and I'm not gonna be.