summer fade.

June is the slippery slope month. Oh, it's all fun and games that last week of May--the whole summer is ahead of me, and it's not even June yet! And then June 1 hits. And then June 2. And 3rd and so on. And now we're getting close to June double-digits. This is just like how fast kids grow up! Stop this roller coaster and point me to the carousel.

I've ordered an HP Chromebook, which is supposed to be here tomorrow. SO excited! I researched them and people rave about them, so fingers crossed. Really, I just need internet access and a writing tool. A friend and I are starting a writing project this month--we have an idea for a television show (aka "a pipe dream"). We have a whole world to share with people, and we think it's fascinating (possibly because we live it) and funny and we have seasons and seasons worth of material. Seriously--I've researched television writing/production/etc, and it appears one of the problems with tv is that it eats plot. Not so for this, we think...first, the plot practically writes itself, and second, so do the characters. And, in my experience as a story writer, characters are what drive the vehicle. You can have a great plot, but without interesting characters, it just doesn't work.

So I've been doing a lot of research for many months--reading a lot of television scripts, lurking on the Writers board over at imdb.com (omg, friends, have you BEEN there?? I don't get involved; I stay out of the frequent dysfunctional frays..it's for the best--who has that kind of time? not me), and we've emailed/called each other with different pitches for episodes or things we'd like to include in the overall story arc. (I like to throw show business terms like "pitches" around, because I think it makes me sound very Hollywood) (Hollywood would chew me up and spit me out-I'm way too nice-but please not until I have cocktails with Clive Owen at the Roosevelt, okay, Hollywood? Thanks.).

At any rate, one of the things that's kept me procrastinating (aka "researching") this long, besides a laptop on the skids, is the fact that I'm a story writer, not a scriptologist. I can tell you exactly how to craft a short story, but trying to sit down and type in script format? My brain isn't sure right now.  But I've also been watching copiously DVR'd episodes of The Sundance Channel's THE WRITER'S ROOM, and I love these people they feature. I watch these shows and think: Why did I go into education? This is not my tribe--the people THE WRITER'S ROOM have featured: that's my tribe. I wish we could go out and drink coffee and talk storytelling shop and beat drums and crap. But no. Poop. I have to go talk about place value in a few weeks and talk about "she said she was my friend but now she's not and she told her not to play with me and she said I wanted to kiss Juan Carlos" and tell people to stop eating the crayons and no you can't go to the bathroom, you just got back from it 3 minutes ago. Dammit. Hanging out with this tribe all day is like...like...being zebra caged with chimpanzees. I'm sorry. It's after midnight here. That's the best analogy my brain can come up with.

I've never written a script. I've been told I'm good at writing dialogue. But I've only ever written dialogue in short story format. How do you tell a story via only or mostly dialogue? Thankfully, I see some scripts have a lot of stage direction, and that's helpful to this story writer. Anyway, I decided to stop over thinking it (like I'm doing right now) and, once the new laptop gets here, I'm just going to sit down and start typing. The first draft is always shitty (says my hero Anne Lamott), so fine. I'll do a shitty first draft and then friend A and I can put our heads together and make it a crappy 2nd draft. And go from there.

Really, it's just so I can put out a tweet and use the hashtag #amwriting. It seems to be popular.

Speaking of twitter! (I'm sorry--I did say last time I'd stop.)  THE WRITERS ROOM retweeted my mention of them today. And I've gotten favorited by a bonafide television script writer. That's exciting progress, right? Jason Isaacs continues to ignore me. I sent him a fabulous birthday message--I read a lot of birthday messages people sent him yesterday and, honestly, not a single one of them wished that he'd get an Oscar nomination this year for his birthday. And I meant it when I typed it--a WHOLE Oscar nomination. For him! Maybe I should have just said "an Oscar." sigh. Frickin' actors.

It's okay! It's okay, Isaacs. Don't feel bad. I wrote my mom a really fabulous Happy Mother's Day super long paragraph on Facebook last month and she totally didn't respond to it, either. I tweeted my brother the other night and he tweeted me back and then I tweeted him back and then he ignored me after that. I'm totally used to being ignored on social media. My own family does it.

At any rate, I'm getting braver! So, so brave. Is it weird that I feel like this tweet-a-total-stranger thing is like an online version of ring the doorbell and run away? (Oh, wait! That just reminded me of how, when I was 14, we'd order pizzas for neighbors and then giggle our ridiculous heads off, watching from the bushes, as the neighbor and the delivery guy got all confused.) (Teenagers. What can you do?)

Miss M starts Swim Nazi lessons on Monday. I'm nervous. She has no idea what's about to happen. Occasionally, she checks with me to make sure Ms. Kim isn't going to make her put her head underwater. I may need to take earphones/earplugs, because I'm certain now there will be screaming. Screaming like Medieval torture chamber screaming. But watching her at my sister in law's pool the other day? Phew. Girlfriend has GOT to girl up. (I keep telling myself I'm doing this to save her life--how can you not know how to swim?? You HAVE to know how to swim.) She loves the pool, she loves water...clinging to the sides, hanging out on the steps. Take her out into 3 feet of water and it's like we're waterboarding her.

Where was I? Swimming, twitter, scripts, writing. Yes--I'm starting a script on Sunday or Monday and I have never ever written one before. I feel like I'm about to jump out of an airplane, praying the parachute works.

It's 1:30 AM and my brain has officially stopped working, so I'm ending this very very abruptly. I don't know why I titled this entry "summer fade," since there's nothing really fade-y about it.... (...except these elipses...)