Tues. June 11, 2024: An Efficient Start to the Week

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Tuesday, June 11, 2024

Waxing Moon

Pluto Retrograde

Cloudy and mild

I hope you had a delightful weekend!

Friday was a good day back on the writing front. I wrote 18 pages of the new weird screenplay idea. It flowed well.

I needed to stop then, and make some notes. I have more of a sense of the shape of it now.

I did a library run. I had to sign a new contract with the script coverage agency (they are under new ownership, and contracts are renewed – or not – every three years).

I read Geena Davis’s memoir, DYING OF POLITENESS, which was a lot of fun and very interesting.

Did a bunch of cleaning, especially in re-organizing my office. I need to get more file folders. And some more project binders.

I might have an editing job coming up. Someone asked me about hiring me to edit his new book; I asked for a sample, so I can give an estimate. We’ll see.

Made an early dinner with the rest of the Bok choy, mahi-mahi in Asian spices, and mashed potatoes.

Got my act together and headed to Main Street for First Friday. I stopped in at the gallery show my colleague curated. It’s really well done. One of the advisors from the cohort was there, because one of the artists in the exhibit has been staying in his artist residency house while working on the pieces for the exhibit – and now plans to move to this city! I talked to her for a bit, about textiles and writing and how supportive the community is around here. Also ran into someone from tarot group, who is a freelance writer covering the show.

Headed up to some of the other galleries, peeking in here and there, and then to the bookstore for the poetry reading. The person who put it together has impressive publishing credentials, and hopes to make it a series. However, I was a little irked when he talked about “bringing poetry to North Adams” as though we don’t already have poets and a growing poetry community here. The bookstore has a writers’ group with some wonderful poets in it. The Boiler House Poets are in residence in autumn. And there are others. It’s not like we’re in a poetry desert.

I appreciated the chosen poems as far as craft, and learned a lot. I bought one book from the group, and had found a couple of other books browsing around.

I’d walked there and back, since it’s not that far. Fortunately, it only rained when I was doing things inside the various places.

While I was waiting for the reading to start, I got an email from a company in Los Angeles interested in one of my plays.

It was cool enough to get some decent sleep. I was up early on Saturday. I signed the contract, with one requested change. Let’s hope they accept the change, and we’re good to go.

Annoyed that the scanning app now wants me to buy the right to download and save what I scan. The printer is too old to scan directly, so it has to be through an app, and I don’t want to pay for something that’s supposed to be part of my printer. Found a different scanner app that’s supposed to be actually free all the time. Urgh.

Spent most of the day cleaning and tidying up, including things like cleaning mirrors and the tops of doorway moldings. The apartment looks pretty darned good. In spite of the fact that the vacuum decided to stop working in the middle of it all. So I had to rely on a combination of dusting, sweeping, and mopping. Just like in the days before vacuum cleaners existed.

Did a quick run to a local bakery to pick up some good for the following day, since I don’t want to bake.

Read over what I have for THE VICIOUS CRITIC so far, and it holds up. But then, I spent a lot of work on the outline.

Good sleeping weather Saturday into Sunday, although work up to pouring rain on Sunday morning. Did one final tidy through the place, shut some things behind doors, settled in to wait.

Our friends came by mid-morning, and we had a lovely visit. Willa was surprisingly friendly. They headed back to Greenwich, CT And we just relaxed. The weather cleared up, which was nice.

I read Sara Paretsky’s TUNNEL VISION, which is very well done, and still difficult and emotional (for the right reasons).

Posted the videos for the final two episodes of ANGEL HUNT, which run this week, and scheduled the binge video to go up next Saturday. Also scheduled a bunch of “Last Chance to binge” posts for DEADLY DRAMATICS.

I did the video for “Personal Revolution” so it’ll be ready to drop on June 17th.  It’s a short from the backlist that has a dead body wearing the uniform of a Revolutionary War redcoat, so I tend to promote it from mid-June through July 4th weekend. I did all three formats – TikTok, Wide, and Insta.

Cooked dinner and made two batches of vegetables stock, since it was cool.

Good sleeping weather, although Charlotte was impossible. She’d slept all day, so she was perky and playful when I was ready to go to sleep at night. I finally got her settled down, but she woke me at 1:30 and then again at 4:30. Not a restful night.

It was cool overnight and cool in the morning. Since later this week and next week it is supposed to get very hot, I’m trying to get the apartment as cool as possible, to give us a few extra days before it’s miserable and we have to decamp in the afternoons to spaces with air conditioning.

I wrote about two pages on the weird screenplay. I adapted another chapter of “Too Much Mistletoe” for MURDER BELLS.

I struggled to export a PDF of one of my Cerridwen Iris Shea annual articles first into PDF and then into Word; but I found the manuscript copy on an old flash drive in .wps and found a place to convert the file to .doc and download. I’m going through all the annuals, looking for them by title, then figuring out where/how I can download them into a single folder, and then I will sort them into categories. It will probably take about a year. Some pieces I have as clips, and maybe I can just convert them from PDF into .doc (although when I tried, on the computer, I was told the file was “too large.”

Rights revert to me after three years, so I’ll sort everything from 1994-2020 into little books by topic, and I should be able to assemble several little books by next summer. There are quite a few articles, because sometimes I wrote multiple articles for multiple annuals in the same year. I’m also making sure I give the original attribution for each article.

I went through a bunch of email and updated my expense tracker. I submitted two plays to two different calls.

I finished the first draft of “Fire Askew” which is a 10-minute comedy about a Winter Solstice bonfire gone wrong. I need to let it sit for a few days. I think it might be too specialized for the submission call to which it’s aimed, in that it talks about things that aren’t in the mainstream without explaining them. Hopefully, the context does enough, and the deeper issues move to the forefront, but it’s a 10-minute play.

I started the Llewellyn article. Took a look at the editing sample. I’m trying to figure out the sweet spot for an estimate that will work for both of us.

Turned around two script coverages, which took longer than I hoped, mostly because it was hard to stay focused. When that happens, it usually means I need to figure out what element of the script isn’t holding my attention, so I can give a useful note.

Leftovers for dinner. I went to bed early, tired from all the mental exertion of the day. It was good sleeping weather (I had to add another blanket), and I’m enjoying it, since later this week and next week are supposed to be miserably hot.

Up early this morning, and out to the door to the laundromat. I was the only one there, which was wonderful. I got about 60 pages of TAPESTRY edited. I hope to finish it early next week, put in the changes, and get it out to my editor, along with the style sheet.

On today’s agenda: writing, adaptation, finishing figuring out the estimate, and two script coverages. I also need to pick up the CSA box this afternoon, and then 2 hours of yoga tonight.

Have a good one!