For once in a very long time, I don't have any major plans for this weekend. I have drinks with people on Sunday evening, but Friday-Saturday my only plan is to work out in the park at 8am, same as every Saturday morning.
If you ever want a free workout that will kick your ass and you live anywhere around Commerce, email me and I'll tell you where to go. The Beefcake will show you just how out of shape you truly are.
Anyway, I'm glad I don't have plans because it leaves time for my newest obsession: House Hunting. So far we found the perfect house except it's beat to shit and in a neighborhood where I'm more likely to be murdered walking to my front door than to be able to find a parking spot on the street.
It's fun looking for houses though. There are so many out there right now, and so many of them stuck in the middle of renovations. You can see what happened - somebody had this great idea to remodel the kitchen so they took out a second mortgage to buy the appliances, then all hell broke loose and suddenly they're homeless. It sucks for them, but somebody's got to take that house and I don't mind finishing their kitchen if it means I get a house for $300,000 less than it used to cost.
So I will be driving all over Echo Park this weekend, scoping out property. What I like to do is go into the back yard of vacant houses we're considering and steal limes. The beat up house in the bad neighborhood has a lime tree, a lemon tree and a fucking avocado tree already planted in the back yard. Plus an aloe plant. I'm still debating whether or not it's worth the murder risk to have access to free guacamole from my property.
This doesn't have anything to do with screenwriting of course. I tried to think of a way to connect it, but I got nothing other than the fact that this obsessive house hunting is what's taken my brain away from my story, except it hasn't because I've still been writing slowly. Like half a page a day.
I don't know if I'm going to have this kind of time when I begin refinishing kitchens, so I guess I should write a little faster.
I've also been reading a lot more. Carson of Script Shadow fame posts a script review every single day and it makes me want to read almost every script so I've been reading about two or three a week thanks to his diligence.
Anyway, I don't know where I'm going with this. I'm reading, I'm writing, I'm staring at granite countertops. Occasionally I squeeze in some cardio or my actual job. That's how I roll.
Of course guacamole is worth murder risk - it's guacamole. Juliana and I are doing the real estate shuffle too. It's hard not to when buying is less than renting.
ReplyDeleteof course house hunting is linked to screenwriting. Maybe you'll randomly select a beautiful, innocent-looking house and when you move in, much to your horror, you find out that 10 people were murdered in the basement and then you get all sorts of nightmares, which'll inspire you to write the next best greatest horror film of all time. Amityville, baby!
ReplyDeletehaha, no really. good luck with finding a nice house!
I'm buying a lemon tree and an avocado tree. Full-sized ones go for about 400, I am told, plus planting them right so they don't die. Like the house, you can buy trees.
ReplyDeleteIt's odd, isn't it? People start redoing the whole house in gold plate, WITHOUT FREAKIN' HAVING THE WHOLE COST FIGURED OUT. Boggles the mind. Good news for you!
I finish summer school tomorrow. let's go somewhere Sunday with Beefcake.