Wed. June 21, 2023: Pages Stacking Up
image courtesy of Jerzy Górecki via pixabay.comWednesday, June 21, 2023
Waxing Moon
Pluto & Saturn Retrograde
Cloudy and humid
Summer Solstice
I plan to enjoy the summer solstice rather than worrying about work, especially client work. Today’s post on The Process Muse is simply a celebration post, not a deep dive.
Today’s serial episode is from Angel Hunt:
Episode 43: The Protection Spell Works
One who wishes to cause harm cannot enter.
I was up early yesterday, and back at it to work on DEADLY DRAMATICS episodes. I got a handful done before I had to take my mom to the doctor’s appointment, and took the binder with the episodes I worked on these last few days along.
While she was in her appointment (and flirting with the very cute male nurse), I managed to edit the first 12 episodes. I’m finding quite a bit that needs the logic smoothed out, or some detail checking done. The early drafts had way too much passive language. While I caught a lot of it and tightened it, I’m finding even more. I’m also seeding a couple of details in this as throwaway lines that will pay off in future seasons.
The doctor is very pleased with my mom’s progress, and will handle the insurance company’s idiocy about the pills. They ran a few tests; whatever it was that made my mom sick enough to go to Urgent Care, it wasn’t a COVID variant. So that’s one less worry.
Masks are no longer required at the facility, but we wore ours, some others wore theirs, and so did my mother’s doctor.
The old white dude sitting across from me was sneezing like crazy, without a mask, and I was ready to wallop him with my binder.
Stopped by the store to buy a lot of blueberries (they were on sale, and we love blueberries), bread, coffee. I did one more pass on “The Dressing Room” short play and got it out to its target market. Now I can work on “Summon Thee” and not stress. There are some other playwright submission calls I want to take a closer look at later this week; I might have something.
Then, it was back to DEADLY DRAMATICS. I’m in the last arc of this season. I can tell, in the initial drafts, that I hadn’t done any outlining, because some of the logic is all over the place. So, I’m smoothing things out and rewriting a lot more on these episodes than some of the earlier ones, which had more time and attention. I’m also creating some new episodes, so it doesn’t jump around as much, which takes more time. I hoped to have the entire season finished by the end of yesterday, but no such luck.
I got news of yet another delay to the grant money. By this point, they’re just fucking with us, and they’re not even trying to solve the problems of the delay. They claim they process in the “order received.” I was one of the first to turn in my paperwork, so why am I one of the last to be paid?
I was very depressed for the rest of the day, plus having bad bouts of sense memory stress.
Yoga was great. The studio closes down for two weeks while the teachers go on vacation, which is great, and exactly how it should work (rather than worrying about trying to find people to cover). But these upcoming weeks are fraught for me, with sense memory stress, so I have to get my daily home practice back on track.
I can’t believe today is the Solstice. And it’s not “the start of summer.” The Solstice is MID summer. Starting tomorrow, the days get shorter. By August 1, the first harvest, it will be quite noticeable.
I’m deeply grateful it hasn’t been as hot and humid as the last couple of years (like when we moved). But I also feel as though my summer hasn’t yet started. A lot of that is due to the delay in the grant money, and the fact that so many projects had to be pushed back or scuttled. I can’t do them during the winter, because we’ll be stuck here, due to the weather.
Got good news about the collaborative poem, though; the honorarium is bigger than it was last year. The fact that they respect us enough to even give us one is great.
I love sitting in the conservatory in the mornings and evenings, and enjoying just being there.
Weird dreams in the night, for a restless night and not a good quality sleep. Up early this morning, out to the laundromat. I brought the DEADLY DRAMATICS binder to keep working on the edits.
I bought and put in a new ink tank on Monday, and I already have to head out this morning after breakfast to get another one.
I really need the fucking grant money so I can get my laser printer fixed. Among other things.
Still no client work coming in this week, so I’m using the time to focus on the serials. I want to finish DEADLY DRAMATICS, get the edits done, get the ANGEL HUNT edits done, get ahead on LEGERDEMAIN, all this week.
Legerdemain drops new episodes Tuesdays and Thursdays. Angel Hunt drops episodes Wednesdays and Fridays. I really want REP’s episodes to drop Mondays and Thursdays, once that’s ready to go later this year. I was going to do Tuesday/Friday for DEADLY DRAMATICS, but that means both days of Legerdemain would have another serial as distraction. So I think DD will drop Wednesdays and Saturdays, starting in late July. I’m not sure how weekend drops work, as far as audience, but we’ll find out!
Good thing I have my giant wall calendar!
The whole story around the missing submersible around the Titanic has so many layers of awful. The most important thing is that they are human beings facing a horrible death and need to be rescued. Someone made a comment about rich people doing grave tourism to other rich people, and then becoming the attraction for further grave tourism, which seems apt (they said it better). The fact that the attention is on the wealth, and not the crew or the humanity of everyone trapped is rather stomach churning. The fact that, even with all the information about how unreliable this particular submersible was, and they still went down in it, is further stomach churning. The slant of the coverage, the salivating over death, is revolting. Also, they had the resources to have rescue options on hand, and went down anyway without them, which is less than a good move.
But then, as fascinated as I am about sunken ships (other than Titanic, I’ve always hated everything around that tragedy, including the movie), the thought of going down in a small vehicle to poke around does not appeal to me. I mean, I got a good look inside the Alvin at WHOI, when I lived on the Cape, and wouldn’t go down in that, even if I had the qualifications, and even though I think it’s great that other people are excited to go down in it to further scientific research.
The whole thing is tragic. What’s even worse is that it was an avoidable tragedy.
Other than getting more ink (I’ll do an ink run after breakfast), today I will focus on DEADLY DRAMATICS. And do the rounds for today’s Angel Hunt episode.
Have a good one.
