Words of inspiration from a fighter

I've never been a big fan of team sports. I'm from North Carolina, so I'm legally obligated to have a favorite college basketball team (Duke) but really I'm a fan of the individual athlete. For one thing, individual sports tend to have fewer rules for me to try to remember.

My favorite sport is easily MMA, which you know if you follow my Twitter feed at all. There's a lot to love about the sport. It's more than just two guys beating each other up. It's a battle of wills and strategy where on any given day, a fat guy can knock out an Adonis with one well-placed overhand right. One fighter can be winning round after round, but he slips up for half a second and suddenly he finds himself tapping out in a triangle choke. There's a lot more intelligence involved in an MMA fight than most people realize.

Dana White, who runs the UFC, has a saying: "Never leave it in the hands of the judges." He means, knock the guy out or submit him. Don't count on points to save you. Don't calculate, beat his ass.

I always think about that when I go to write a script. It's obviously not so cut and dry in writing, but you can always go into writing something with the attitude that you will knock it out of the fucking park. Don't calculate the points, submit that son of a bitch.

And that was fine until this last week's Ultimate Fighter. Coach Chael Sonnen gave an amazing speech about failure that kind of blew me away. One of his fighters who is an amazing talent, expressed doubt about his skills. After giving the kid a pep talk, he sat for a moment alone with the camera and said the following:

"When doubt seeps in, you've got two roads.  You can take either road.  You can go to the left or you can go to the right, and believe me, they’ll tell you failure’s not an option.  That is ridiculous. Failure is always an option.  Failure is the most readily available option at all times.  But it’s a choice.  You can choose to fail, you can choose to succeed.  And if we can plant seeds and let him know 'Move your feet, keep your hands up, stay off the bottom,' that is the road to victory.  Or -  self-doubt and negative talk.  And that is the road to failure.  But failure is always there, and it’s okay to recognize that."

Failure is always an option. There's a moment where you decide whether or not it's the option you're going to take. You can wallow in it, or you can accept it as a possibility and then move on to figure out what you need to do next.

Let the Holiday Hiatus begin!

 I hope you guys have a lot to be thankful for tomorrow. I know I sure do.

This year I was able to quit my day job and focus on writing, and even though I have yet to be paid, my loving husband has griped about it far less than I would have thought.

I have in-laws in town, so between the cleaning and cooking and general family gathering, I haven't had a lot of time to physically sit at the computer and write pages.

But that doesn't mean I'm not writing.

Part of writing is the planning, and I'm doing that all the time. While I'm mixing up pie batter, I'm working on a story idea. Waiting for in-laws at the airport - I'm reading a script. So at least I know I haven't wasted my time.

In Hollywood, this is the time when everybody starts winding down, so if you're new to these parts, don't expect anything to happen between now and January. There will be reading, though. Lots of reading.

Franklin Leonard created the original Black List because he was an executive looking for recommendations on what scripts he should read over Christmas vacation, so that's exactly the purpose it serves. Execs and agents and managers will all be reading scripts from the list while they're on vacation. That probably means they're less likely to be reading your script.

So the best thing to do right now is stop worrying about who's reading and when they'll get back to you and what they think. Just eat, drink, be merry, hang out with your relatives, then retreat to your computer when you're tired of them and get some work done. But don't spend your time waiting for a phone call, because the likelihood of that is pretty slim until 2013.

And in the meantime, Happy Thanksgiving!

When your parents don't approve

Whew. Last week was bananas. I had no idea that posting that article on Scriptshadow was going to create such a shitstorm.

But buried in the comments was this question from Astan:


This morning my folks (mom) said to me that "writing films, doing this film thing, trying to do any business, trying to get some big hit was all a fantasy. I'm living in a fantasy world." Then she implied I need to wake up and give up fantasies altogether.

How would you feel if your folks or someone important to you said something like that to you?


And I think this comment deserves some attention because I bet a lot of people can relate to this.

Personally, I say FUCK IT.

In the beginning, my mom was totally against me coming out to LA. She believed I should be a teacher, that Hollywood was a pipe dream, that working in movies was a waste of my talent.

I told her I really wish she felt differently, then I moved to Hollywood. I taught school - that made her happy - and in the meantime I just kept working on scripts. I sent her my finished drafts. She'd shrug - my work isn't her cup of tea. She didn't change her mind.

Then I was working on a period piece about a time in which she's an expert, so I called her up and asked her to help with research. She really liked that idea. Then she started going out with her girlfriends and telling them the story I was writing. Then she started giving me story notes. Then objecting to plot points I wanted to change.

Then I put her now-deceased best friend into one of my scripts, and she loved it. Then I got repped. I told her - and this is true - that the character based on her friend is one of the reasons people loved the script so much.

Now, she tells everybody who will listen that her daughter is writing movies.

In the beginning, I think parents are concerned because screenwriting is such an insecure business. They'd much rather you not going into something that crushes your soul and pays you nothing. Nobody plans for their kid to be a starving artist.

But everybody loves movies, except for crazy people. Non-crazy people, even the ones who don't watch movies that much, really enjoy feeling like a part of the process. Make your mom a part of the process.

I imagine this won't work for everybody's mom, but you can try. I bet she's got a story she thinks should be a movie. Let her give you ideas. You don't have to do anything with them, but tell her how much you enjoy her input.

My mom now sends me newsclippings about stories in the local paper that she thinks I should write about. Every now and then she'll hit on something.

Sometimes it takes some time for parents to come around. Sometimes they never do. Either way, live your life for you, not for them. They'll either get over it, or they won't.

Writing!

The project I'm working on right now is three years old. I wrote it and revised it and then put it away and now I'm getting it back out. I never stopped thinking about it. Occasionally I'd ask someone to read it and give me some advice, and then I'd put it away again to think about that advice.

Recently I spent a lot of time compiling the perfect outline of the story. I wrote down all kinds of specific details, did full character bios, filled in all the gaps, pondered the most effective story choices.

Then I had surgery. Before my surgery I could type for maybe 15 minutes with slight pain. I still usually typed for an hour at a time then rested, but that last 45 minutes was excruciating. I was cringing with every letter, which makes writing comedy extra challenging. It's fun writing hilarious action sequences when it feels like a professional strong man is repeatedly slamming a hammer into your wrist at top speed.

After the surgery the doc gave me an assignment: Type, text, play video games. So I did. First I finished LA Noir over the weekend.

Then yesterday I typed and typed and typed. And it didn't hurt at all. A little stiffness after a while, but no pain.

NO PAIN. I can write with no pain. You have no idea how amazing that is. I've been alternately crying with joy and laughing like a maniac for the past four days as I discover new things I can do now that I used to take for granted. Watch me unlock this door! Watch me put on a bra! Watch me brush my hair! IT'S AMAZING!

Remember all that work I put into planning this story? And now I can write with no pain? Fuck yes, kids. I just ran with it. I wrote 10 pages in 2 1/2 hours. I cranked the tunes and just typed and typed and typed and the words flowed out of me like never before. So far it's a shitload of dialogue for an action flick, but I'll fix that on rewrite. I'm just excited to throw those words up on that screen.

And today when I went to see my doctor he told me I was making amazing progress. "I typed for two and a half hours yesterday," I said.

"Yep, that's probably what did it," he said.

So how about that? Screenwriting is good for me.

And thank you to everyone who has wished me well during this process. I appreciate your kind words.

Post op

Today my doctor told me that in 17 years of medicine he as never seen a wrist as fucked up as mine. The majority of his clientele is professional athletes, so I feel a dubious pride in knowing I did the most damage ever in the history of his practice. "I did some amazing work in there," he said. Apparently my ligament was twisted and torn and littering debris across the inside of my wrist. It was ugly.


So it's pretty cool to know that after therapy I'll be able to do normal human things like pick up a mug of hot chocolate or brush my hair. The best part is that for the next few weeks I can't pick up anything heavy, but I must type. I must text, play Xbox, and Miss America wave. Yes, I am under doctor's orders to play video games. But no washing dishes or taking out trash. Oh, the humanity.


I can type now - I'm supposed to type now. It's good exercise, I'm told. This week I'm going to go kick this screenplay's ass.

I'm alive

I just wrote a whole post about surgery and how awesome my perfect doctor is and my mom has been cool enough to detail my kitchen and make most of my thanksgiving dinner while I slept. Then my supposedly smart phone deleted my post to go update my Groupon app. So suffice to say it is weird to be talking to a guy about tequila and my mom having a panic attack trying to drive in LA traffic, and the next minute I'm watching my doctor pass out flyers for his book signing while a nurse offers you the world's most necessary apple juice. I hope to be back to writing soon. The goal is to type for hours with no pain. And to do push ups. And maybe if I work really hard in therapy I can punch a heavy bag again and learn Jujitsu. That would make me happy.

Eye surgery and epiphanies

They* put valium drops in my eyes but did not give me, the person, any actual valium. I could have used it. They did, however, give me a stuffed moose doll to hold. I squeezed the non-life out of that thing.

The hard part was when the doctor cut away the flap over my iris. Your eye goes completely black for 9 seconds, during which time you can hear him cutting into your flesh and smell it burning. I strangled that moose and panicked internally.

After that, no problem. It was actually really easy. No pain, just a red light and a green light to stare at until they were done, which was in 3 minutes. Literally. Whole thing took about 3 minutes per eye.

So now I can see stuff. It's pretty cool. I got my first pair of glasses in the 8th grade, so being able to actually see things without help is fucking amazing. I woke up in the middle of the night and just stared out the window at all the stuff I could see.

On the way to my check-up visit (20/15 in one eye, 20/20 in the other), I suddenly realized what's wrong with Burnside. Burnside is my Civil War script, my labor of love, my non-commercial beauty that nobody will ever make ever because it involves all the things executives hate taking a chance on - female protag, period piece, interracial sex scenes, ambiguous good guys, heroic bad guys, etc..... But it's my greatest challenge to make it sort of like Killing on Carnival Row - a script nobody can make, but everyone has read and loved. If it takes me 50 years, I will make this happen.

And today I suddenly realized that I have the wrong protagonist. As soon as I realized that, most of my biggest problems just fell by the wayside. I realized that I can keep almost exactly the same story, but if I tell it from someone else's perspective, things that felt wrong start to make sense. My protagonist becomes the antagonist and a lot of those non-commercial things I mentioned a minute ago disappear. Suddenly, as I realized this, I also started to realize that my script might not be as unfilmable as I thought.

I have four projects circulating in my mind right now, including the wedding script I'm currently typing, but someday, somehow, I will return to Burnside and I will fix it.



*LA Sight is the name of the place. My only negative comment is that the bathroom key did not work so I had to go to the third floor to pee. Other than that, stellar chaps over there. I trusted them with my eyeballs and they delivered.

Eyeballs

I have to take another short break from posting and writing, but it's for a good cause.

I've worn eye glasses or contact lenses for 20 years, and today they're out of my life until I get old and need reading glasses. I've wanted Lasik forever - even did a project on it in anatomy class in high school back when it was brand new and still experimental. Today is the day my dream comes true. Soon I will be able to swim in the ocean and find my towel when I come out of the water.

I can't type or read for at least a day or so. I'm very excited. I've never been so stoked about someone poking around in my eyeballs.

I'll be in and out in half an hour, and by next week I should be back to writing. I'm going to try to crank out a couple of pages today to make up for the time I won't be writing over the next couple of days.

Tomorrow I plan to tell everyone I know: "Now let me look upon you with my own eyes."

Sorry I missed you: I'll return tomorrow

I've had guests at my house for two weeks, but today is the last day. First it was my niece, then my parents, then Beefcake's parents.

We did lots of touristy things, then we fixed the house and spruced up the yard. Because that's what parents do - they come to your house and then take you to Home Depot SEVEN TIMES in four days. The lady in the paint aisle now knows my name and my mom's name and my mother-in-law's name and much information about our lives and household chore needs.

Tomorrow I plan to watch two weeks worth of TV. I will take a two-hour break in the middle of the day to get back to writing and I will try to work out, but my day is primarily devoted to vegging out, because I am emotionally drained.

It's been so long since I saw my screenplay, I don't even know what it's about anymore. Something about a wedding dress, I guess.

My trip to the ER

I put my hand through a window last night. Stupid old 1947 windows - did you know that if you smash on them with your hand they break? Who designed this weak shit?

So I smash my hand through the glass and I yell "Oh my god!" and then I think maybe it's okay. I mean it really feels like I didn't hurt myself. Then I pull my hand back into the house and see the enormous gash on the inside of my wrist.

My neighbor yells out "Are you okay?"

And I reply with "No!" even though at first I wanted to say I was fine but realized that a normal person would not think this was fine. I grab a paper towel because those commercials always tell me paper towels are really strong and would probably soak up lots of blood.

My neighbor shows up and thank god she did because otherwise I would have been found a day later being eaten by my dogs after I passed out from blood loss over my computer as I googled emergency rooms. A year and a half I've been living here and I still have no idea where the hospitals are.

So my neighbor tries to call 911 and I'm like "Hell no. That's expensive!"

So she grabs her sweater, hands me a dish towel my future in-laws gave me as part of their big Christmas package - sorry, Rita - and we drive to the emergency room. I haven't been to an emergency room since my first year in college when I rode in the ambulance while my best friend struggled against alcohol poisoning in the back. That was the night I discovered ham and pineapple pizza, so maybe tonight will also have some kind of positive outcome.

There's a lady passed out over a couple of chairs and when they call her name she doesn't budge. At this point my hand finally starts to hurt. My neighbor fills out my forms and I try to sign them. The intake nurse vaguely glances at my wound - a giant gash right next to my vein and going in the correct direction for suicide, but she just tells me it will be a few hours. I wonder if I pass out will I be seen sooner? Everybody else in the ER is there for a stomach ache except the passed-out lady. I wonder if any of them have a surprise pregnancy and are in labor.

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution is on the TV. Why am I not recording this on the DVR?

A security guard comes out and wakes up the passed-out lady. Her face is soaking wet and she can't walk. She barely knows her own name. Somebody had apparently dropped her off along with an empty pill bottle and then left.

The bleeding has stopped as long as I don't move my hand. The wound is really gross. I think I see nerves. I know what those look like because I saw 127 Hours in the theater.

A woman comes out of the ER shaking, miserable, like death. Everybody feels bad for her and my hand doesn't hurt so much. While her husband runs and gets the car we wonder what she must have been like before, because they're releasing her but she looks awful. Her husband picks her up and carries her to the car because she can't walk.

After about two and a half hours I finally see the doctor. The nurse asks me how I am and I say "I'm an idiot."

"How many times have you been in for stitches?"

"This is the first."

"I've had them twelve times. I'm an idiot."

Some nurse in the hallway is on the phone. "His mom dropped him off. She says he's hearing voices. I believe he is a danger to himself and others."

Then I start feeling pukey. I've been looking at this nasty gash for a while so I think it's the hospital smells that are getting to me. But I don't puke. I pull out my Nook and read Roots, which gives me the opportunity to tell the nurse how much I love my Nook.

I know it's one of the most basic things they do, but I am always impressed with doctors' ability to stitch with pliers. I can't even sew buttons with my hands.

My hand's all wrapped up and I go home and decide not to worry about all the blood or the busted window and just watch Tron Legacy. It's better than I expected it to be.

I also have a cold.

EDITED TO ADD: My neighbor just sent me the picture she took with her phone. Yes, I am in my pajamas.

I'll miss you, vacation

I've had three weeks of holiday vacation and it's been fantastic. During vacations I always turn into a professional screenwriter as much as I can. I read scripts, write pages, watch movies with a critical eye, catch up on all my industry contacts, try to attend a function or two. I sort of pretend my day job doesn't exist.

During this vacation I managed to do almost the entire rewrite of Nice Girls and I'm much, much happier with this version than I was with the first. I finished yesterday after two days of marathon writing sessions, just in time to send it to the group for notes on Sunday. That leaves me four days to get my shit together to go back to work.

That's all great, but it makes it really really hard to actually go back to work.

I like my job. I like the kids, I like the control I have over how I spend my time, I like the fact that I get to talk all day about my favorite subject. I like having full health benefits and a livable wage. I hate the homework and getting up early and the time it takes away from writing.

It's that getting up early thing that's the real bitch. Everything that happens in this town seems to happen on a Thursday. Parties, screenings, panels. It's like everybody in town sleeps late on Friday so they consider Thursday part of the weekend. I can't do these things because I get up at 6am and have to talk on my feet all day to a bunch of volatile teenagers.

So since I have one more Thursday before I return to early rising, I'm taking advantage of it tonight. I'm going to a double feature of The Town and Gone Baby Gone at the Aero with a Q&A by the director between films.

You know who the director is, right? Right. I honestly cannot wait to see what he has to say because I love most of his work. People can say what they want about Ben Affleck, but the man knows his business.

It's stuff like this that makes me wish even more that this was my job. Every day that I sit and write and send emails and sign up for screenings makes me sigh and say "Why can't someone pay me to do this?"

You and me both, right?

I keep reminding myself that I'm at a point where all I have to do is make this script great. It's commercial, original, interesting, and in a genre that sells pretty well. I have people ready to read it who can get it where it needs to go. So if I just make this the best script I can, this may be the way to making my vacation life become my real life.

Thanksgiving writing

Hope you guys have a happy Thanksgiving! I have a whole week off, so I'm cleaning, running errands, picking people up from the airport, doing laundry, and at some point every day, writing.

I got to the final scene of my vomit draft and had no idea how to end it - big speech? Heroic sacrifice? Humorous prat fall? - so I decided to go back to page one and fill in my missing scenes so I'd have a better idea of what my characters would do when they got here. That means it's time to write the less interesting scenes.

Today I had to fill in a scene where a coworker convinces my protagonist to stop by a taco stand to pass on information to the owner of said taco stand. And what do you know, in the very next scene I'd already had her eating tacos. Complete coincidence, unless you take into account how much I love tacos.

Tomorrow I'm cooking a turkey for the first time. Wish me luck.

I would like to beat severely the asshole who invented this virus

I've been missing from the online social scene for a little over 36 hours because four days ago Yearbook Computer #2 came down with a case of Win32 Vitro, the nastiest virus I've ever seen, and for the last two days I've done nothing but try to eradicate it. These damn kids and their downloading of videos.

In the words of one Billy Bob Thornton, it's a global killer, and in the words of one Michael Biehn, I'm going to have to take off and nuke it from orbit.

Unless this next thing works. I've been saying that for four days - I'll give up when this next thing works. It's like a crack pipe. Any goddamn minute I'm gonna give this up and go to bed, I swear, but first, just one more hit. Just one more boot in Safe Mode and I'll have it, I know it.

Tomorrow I'm giving up and calling for backup. Seriously though.

In the meantime, check this out. It's silly fun: The Bayifier.


*Edited to add: No Mac trolling please.

The time I blew off party ettiquette

The UK has its own version of Law and Order now starring Doctor Who alum Freema Agyeman and everybody's favorite Battlestar pilot/lawyer/commander Jamie Bamber. It's a lot like our Law and Order, but with accents.

The problem I have is that each time I see Jamie Bamber I feel like an ass. I need to get this off my chest.

Be prepared for shameless name dropping.

I was invited to a screening of a Battlestar Galactica episode at the Cineramadome once thanks to a friend's awesome pull. I sat next to the lovely Jane Espenson and pelted her with questions about what it's like to write for James Marsters. Apparently just about every female actress who ever came on the show wanted to have a romantic storyline with Spike.

Anyway, Jane had my ticket to the after party and she stormed ahead after the screening where she was frequently stopped by fans. She was extremely gracious to everyone. In case you've ever wondered, she's every bit as awesome as you think she is.

At any rate, I'd talked to Mark Verheiden a couple of times at a few gatherings, and as I passed by him on my way to the party he waved me down and said hey. I smiled at him, then realized Jane was disappearing with my ticket to the party, so I kept moving even though he clearly expected me to stop and talk. I realized later what a giant asshole move that was. To Mark Verheiden. Who is just about the nicest guy ever, and also very talented and writing for shows and My Name is Bruce and about a million other things I wish I could do. And I didn't stop to talk to him because I am a moron. I doubt it has affected his life in any way, but I still think about it from time to time and slap myself in the head.

Anyway, I managed to get into the party where I stood right next to the ridiculously tall and stunning Lucy Lawless (See? Name dropping!) and my friend and I end up in a circle with Jamie Bamber. I held an intensely condensing drink in my hand, and right as my palm was completely wet my friend introduced me to him. "My hand is wet," I said. He said he didn't mind and made some kind of joke about wet drink hand.

So at this moment I could have wiped my hand on my pants and shook his hand, or just shook his hand with my wet one and gone about my business. Instead I shook his hand THEN wiped my hands on my pants. As if to say, ew, water I can handle, but Jamie Bamber hand is gross. Which is, of course, not what I meant because Jamie Bamber hand is sexy. But I could tell by his facial expression that I had just offended him beyond repair.

He and my friend got into a long conversation about Horatio Hornblower, which I've never seen, and I faded into the shadow with my now less wet hands. Jamie Bamber seemed annoyed that I was still standing there.

Had I been less of an ass that night, would my life be different? Probably not. But I'd feel less like a moron now every time I see Jamie Bamber on screen.

Neurosis

Well heavens to Betsy. Yesterday my stats took a leap up the charts, higher than when I posted about seeing Michael Rosenbaum at a party but not quite as high as that time all those Russians thought I was that hot blond actress in the mini tube dress at the WGA strike rallies.

I now feel very pressured to perform, but not in a mini tube dress.

So the other day I talked about how I got this great new idea I was so excited about, and ever since I've been world building and thinking and loving it and feeling the joy of seeing all the different directions you could take your story.

But then when I think about telling someone my brilliant idea the insecurity sets in. I'm going to get this out of the way now so later on I can just write without interruption from my brain.

What if someone else has done it and it was a shitty B movie and nobody saw it except all the people who will immediately think of it as soon as I say my idea?

What if someone with a big fancy name just finished a draft of the same idea and any minute now the trades will be abuzz with this genius new screenplay by Alex Garland or Alex Litvak or some other writer dude who may or may not be named Alex?

What if my idea is Most Often Pitched? What if everybody in town has seen this come across their desk at one point and deemed it unmakeable?

What if it's just a dumb idea? What if I can't think up good ideas anymore? What if I'm a hack who spends the next 50 years hopelessly writing script after script and throwing it into the blackhole of Hollywood while people just shake their heads and walk away?

What if all this neurosis causes a panic attack and I die right here on my couch and the cat eats my fingers while thanks to his new habit of peeing the dining room nobody notices the smell of my rotting copase'/B2gweDScccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc

Red Tape

So I've spent the last two days mired in red tape. It was like a scene from The Hitchiker's Guide.

Ever stand in line for an hour and then finally get called to find out that you don't have the right form in triplicate so you'll have to come back tomorrow and wait in line again? Oh and while we're at it, even though we're your employer and are in complete control of how you get your money, we can't take a check from you for that fee we've imposed for that thing we required you to have so you can keep your job. We'll pay you, but only if you give us money first. But not in check form. And then you'll need these other three forms too. And then you'll also need to come back in two weeks with the original copy because we can't keep this fax on file on account of regulations. Oh and the guy you're supposed to be meeting with is on vacation so you'll probably have to come back and talk to him because there is no way in hell I'm going to remember having this conversation, which is why there's a decent chance that despite your money order and all these appropriate forms and your waiting in line and your parking validation that you might still be fired. Have fun sitting in traffic!

Tomorrow I want to talk about Thunder Soul, a terrific documentary I saw Saturday night. Then I've got lots of other cool plans for the week because I am now officially on vacation. But first I have to wash off all this tape.

A confession

The Internet is a funny place. We read these little snippets of information and think we know people. I know someone I've met in person and liked for the most part, but when I read a comment he posted on a board I used to frequent I was so disgusted with him I immediately turn off when his name is mentioned. I know people who think I am a super bitch based on things I've said online, and when they meet me are completely shocked that I'm not a harpie.

Hell, in person I'm gentle as a lamb most of the time. I stop arguments from happening. In the classroom I am deft with words in the midst of brewing conflict and have talked angry boys out of punching each other. I've been called a bitch by teenagers and gotten them to apologize without any yelling on either side.

But here on the Internet I get more angry than I do in my life. Why? I guess it's because we don't have the benefit of a whole conversation or facial expressions or intonation so one comment can spiral out of control thanks to different writing styles. And we have these personalities - not our real personalities, but these creations we're developed on the web. If I were to suddenly start talking about how I actually liked The Notebook, would anyone believe me? Would people make fun of me? Would that change the persona I've developed?

I used to run before I had a foot injury, and one of my favorite songs to haul ass to was Brittney Spears' "Toxic." Yes. Brittney Spears. And I own a Rage Against the Machine album but it's a lie. Don't tell the Beefcake, but I don't actually like Rage. I only bought that album to help maintain my badass image in college, but I find all that aggressive screaming less enjoyable than a Justin Timberlake / Nelly collaboration. Do I like to kickbox? Absolutely. Do I cuss like a sailor and watch movies with explosions? Yes sir. Is my kitty's litterbox pink with hearts on it? Why yes it is. Know what else I like? John Mayer. Fuck off. He's talented.

I have layers. Like an ogre.

I had a Facebook page for like five minutes until someone I barely know sent me like fifty thousand flowers and kisses or whatever. I got the hell out of there. I had a Myspace for ages but never stopped worrying that my students would find it. Today I deleted it. I stopped posting to a popular message board months ago after I realized I was getting angry more often than I was laughing. I have fallen for many a troll in my day because I don't like to keep my mouth shut when I see shit that pisses me off.

But now I'm thinking about the whole thing. This blog. All blogs. Craig Mazin's most recent post to Artful Writer made me think about it even more. Which is kind of ironic.

I'm not trying to get people to say "Oh no, don't leave we love you" or whatever. I actually don't enjoy that kind of thing. What I like is honest discussions that don't get personal, where people are polite and respectful of each other and their opinions. When I think someone's being disrespectful I'll call them on it when I guess I should just ignore it or delete it entirely. There's no reason to let someone else's Internet persona upset my reality. My goal as a person is to become a zen being.

I like this blog. It's weird sometimes when I remember how many people I've never met have an idea of who I am, but then I remember how many friends I've made through this thing, and how much I've enjoyed having this outlet for my thoughts that can lead to a discussion of ideas. But I have to think about where I want it to go in the future and what kind of person I want to be when I'm here.

Do you guys know what I mean?

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution

I've been excitedly watching Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. It airs Friday nights on ABC and I think everyone in America should watch it.

Jamie Oliver is a British chef who ran a similar program to great success in England as the one he's attempting here. He has come to a town in West Virginia where the eating habits are some of the worst in the country. Despite much resistance, he aims to change the nature of school lunches so we can start teaching our students to eat healthy diets. A kid who eats healthy normally grows into an adult who eats healthy.

This is a project near and dear to my heart. A few years ago I decided I wanted to eat healthy, but had no idea how, so I started studying. I read every book on nutrition I could snag and started changing my eating habits to reflect a healthy lifestyle. I still eat tasty food, and I still have cookies, but I make certain that I never put anything toxic in my body. Except that time I decided to taste the juice from the cactus in my yard - do not do this ever.

Anyway, ever since I learned exactly what food does I've been fascinated with how many of us have no idea. If I did learn anything in high school about the different fats and why you eat fiber I don't remember. I know most of my students never learn anything about eating habits. In fact, I'm not sure they learn anything in health class because they don't seem to learn anything about herpes either. But I digress.

If you watch the show you may be astounded by what you learn about what kids eat at school. At most public schools in America kids are offered pizza and fries every single day. And they eat them. At our school the kids are also offered chicken nuggets, cheap prepackaged PB&J on processed white bread, and lots of chocolate milk. They usually supplement their meals with hot Cheetos. I occasionally see an orange or maybe some lime juice squirted over the Cheetos.

But I never in a million years thought our administrators actually thought this food was good for the kids. When Jamie Oliver put out a pasta dish with seven different vegetables in it, the woman in charge of the food service for the county's schools told him he needed another vegetable. She looked at the pasta and decided the kids needed a separate vegetable to make sure it met certain guidelines, so she insisted he put out french fries.

French fries. With a straight face and with complete conviction, the woman told Jamie Oliver that french fries are a vegetable. I suppose she considers ketchup a fruit. It never occurred to me that anyone actually believed french fries counted as a vegetable.

I'm doing my part. I talk about nutrition constantly, and when my kids open up their chips I read the labels and explain to them what they're putting in their bodies. Now the kids have started coming up to me and asking whether or not the snack they've chosen is healthy, which tells me the kids want that kind of guidance.

The Biggest Loser makes a big deal about healthy eating but in reality, the way they lose weight on that show is not healthy, and most of their features about eating habits are thinly veiled product placement segments, so I'm thrilled to see a show that gets to the core of the problem. This is a huge issue in America, one we've allowed ourselves to ignore for too long.

I have a student in my class right now who is so hyper he's almost uncontrollable. He shows up at 7:25am bouncing off the walls and does not know how to be quiet. I asked him what he ate for breakfast. Candy bars, sodas, whatever sugar-filled item he picked up that morning. I asked him to do me a favor and eat something with fiber in the morning instead. The next day he came in with a banana. He was calm, attentive, still wide awake and energetic but without the out-of-control behavior. And it's not just him. Whenever I have a student behaving erratically I'll ask what they ate for breakfast and about 95% of the time it was a sugary drink or snack. I don't think we realize how much what we eat affects how we behave, and it's amplified in kids who have less self-control to begin with. And that doesn't even bring up the long term effects of poor diet like Diabetes, bad skin, heart problems, failing livers, poor sleeping habits, indigestion, lack of energy, and the numerous other complications that can come from poor eating habits.

Your meals should be colorful. If your food lacks color or is all one color it's unhealthy - and no, candy doesn't count. You should have at minimum five fruits or vegetables per day - and no, fries don't count - and lots of water. This seems common sense, right? Apparently not. There are people who've replaced water with coffee or soda or who go through an entire day without eating a single vegetable.

That's why Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution is one of those rare shows that can have a genuine impact on society if we let it. It's something many of us desperately need.

Green

Yesterday when I realized I got the job I was like yay!

I was kind of excited.

But then today I was driving down the 405 and remembered the little girl who won a contest when she was 12 by writing a story about her dad. I think that was when I decided I wanted to be a writer.

So here I am, so many years later, finally getting an opportunity to prove I deserve to be here. In the meeting I was told I wrote amazingly well for someone so green. Green? I wrote my first book when I was 9 and sold it to some girl for 5 cents. It was about how a girl could get a boy to like her. I used to make up stories about my stuffed animals and draw up a newspaper for the town they lived in. Most kids were playing with Legos. I was inventing news with this old ass typewriter my parents gave me as a toy. I have a masters degree in creative writing.

And yet I'm still very green to some degree. We're all a little green, aren't we? Even if you write something brilliant, don't you have moments where you wonder if it's garbage? I would think so. But I think she meant I was green because I'm new to screenwriting when compared to every other working writer. I'm a nobody. I write pretty well for a nobody.

So when I was driving down the 405 thinking about how badly I wanted to be a writer, I started randomly cheering. There may also have been some singing along with the radio.

Switching work schedules

Now I'm on vacation. I'm taking a class online so I have to do work for that, and the yearbook needs another couple of days of work, so I'll be doing some of that and I have to grade essays that were turned in this week to give back on our return to school, but since I don't have to spend any time yelling at kids or making lesson plans, I can now get back to screenwriting.

This is actually the toughest time to get to work, oddly enough. I haven't had a regular writing schedule for a while - I just wrote on the weekends whenever I could. And since I've had the script out gathering notes, I let myself relax and not write for a few weeks while I waited and then digested the suggestions a couple of people sent me.

So I got out of the habit. I have to establish a schedule again. Get up, do some chores, check the emails, do my coursework, work on stuff for my job, then screenwriting. After that I can work out or go to the store or walk the dog or whatever. But it helps to have a set schedule even when it's not a paid position.

I think far too many people only write when the mood strikes them, but it's no way to get things done. If I want to be a paid screenwriter, I have to practice being a paid screenwriter.

So I'll start that tomorrow, right after I finish staring at my cute dog and watching The Biggest Loser. Today is celebrate being on vacation day. Tomorrow the work week begins.