This tickles me, so I share it with you

This is a Cookie Monster cupcake.

I love the fuzzy-looking detailing on the icing and the cookie in his mouth.

I hope this brightened your day.

"We did acrobatic interpretations of Russian novels. I spent 7 hours on a trapeze in a overcoat."

The Burn Notice game went well last night. I felt especially good going into this one, partially because I was so excited to get back to this game, and partially because I was feeling very well-prepared. Jared and I had hammered out a particularly well-thought-out storyline this time around. While normally I do try to be very thorough, I usually have some gaps in what I've settled on that need to be filled in on the fly, but for this plot things were about as fleshed out as they possibly could be. I have Jared's help to thank for that.

Probably the thing I love best about this game is how the players play off of each other. The original three, Bernie, Matt, and Kindness, have established these awesome relationships between their characters that they roleplay so well together. And even better, before long Michael was clicking into it too, and I had an entire table to fun, funny, dynamic players who did interesting things, had fabulous interactions, and interspersed so much humor between the more serious plot moments of the game. Seeing as getting that going was my whole purpose in starting up the game, I am ridiculously pleased.

I still sometimes think I'm the world's lamest GM, given that I forget stuff like action dice and sometimes have to say, "Okay, GM break time," then go hide in the bathroom and rock back and forth muttering "What do I do? What do I do? What do I do?" But of course, there is no scenario you can entirely plan out, because players always always do things you don't necessarily expect. Still, I think I did a good job of expanding the concepts I already had to give responses to the actions they took. The one thing I'm a little disappointed with myself over is how I handled the investigation of the red herring in the plot. They were supposed to look into it and figure out that it wasn't actually the solution to the mystery, but unfortunately I couldn't find a way to tie in any actually useful clue into that investigation. I guess that's not unrealistic, but I didn't want the players to feel as if they'd wasted all that time. Not sure they did, but I think I could have handled it a little more skillfully.

What I want to do from here is activate more of the personal and meta-plots for the characters. I planted a couple of seeds for future things here and there, but they need to start factoring in. That will require a lot more planning on my part, but it will make the story and world so much richer.

So many friends!

This has been a nice week for seeing people I have been missing. The early part of it saw lovely friends crearespero* and aurora_knight* coming to Waltham to visit, which involved playing on playgrounds and nice dinners and a trip to go swimming and a lovely long walk. I've missed both of them terribly, so this visit was really lovely. Jane could only stay for one night, but Frances only just leaves today. She is going to spend a little extra time with katiescarlett29* before the whole gang of us goes up to her place this weekend. On Friday I will get to see nennivian* when she joins Jared, Bernie, and I to drive up to Long Island together. Steph is finally back from Argentina and has invited us all to visit her and see a Shakespeare in the Park performance of Measure for Measure. And that means that not only will I be reunited with Steph, who I have been missing painfully since she shipped off for Argentina, I will get to see Plesser and thefarowl* as well! So a good chunk of all the people whom I haven't been able to spend time with in a while will all be in one place. I'm really grateful to Steph for inviting us, because it will be so wonderful for us all to get together again.

Writing productively

Well, yesterday was the first truly productive day for writing I've had in a while now. Jared helped me hammer out the final details of the new current plotline for the Burn Notice game, which makes me feel like I'm in pretty good shape for tonight. Jared and I have always been good at working together on this sort of thing, which for me is pretty rare and special since I'm usually a pain to collaborate creatively with, at least when the project is my brainchild. That's the reason I wanted to have him as my brainstorming partner and occasional NPC rather than as a player. All that really remains to do is today before the game I want to write out a rough outline of the events to consult during runtime and draw up some NPCs. I may also send out some back story info to the players for context during the session; since their characters are all pregens they don't always already know everything. Tonight's storyline will be Riker-centric, a notion I've had in my head for a while, and since this will be Michael's first session playing as Riker I thought it might make him a nice entree into the campaign.

I also made some real progress on a play. I was initially going for just a ten-minute piece (I have settled on trying to write a new one every two weeks to set an achievable goal) but my idea bloomed into what could easily be a real full-length. So, because of this, I am allowing scenes of larger works to count for the purposes of a piece-every-two-weeks. I made a lot of progress on two different scenes for this larger play, though sadly managed to finish neither of them. Still, I feel pretty good about what I have. I am hoping to complete at least one of them by the end of the week, and then post it here on LiveJournal. You are of course welcome to give whatever opinion you may have if you take the time to read.

Why can't we all write a Warhorse?

One thing that I found really frustrating during residency was the constant hammering of the notion of keeping your play as basic as possible because otherwise, nobody would want to produce it. Keep your cast tiny. Keep your sets minimal. Your milieu inexpensive. Your themes current. Make sure the audience understands it and blah blah blah. It was kind of maddening to me, as it seemed like unless you wanted to write some more fucking Beckett-style nonsense, nobody was ever going to be interested in your plays.

But today my mom told me about this new play on Broadway called Warhorse. She said that it's a meditation on wartime about a boy whose beloved horse is drafted into service in War World I, and he follows him through the war to take him home. She said that the show portrays horses with gorgeous, fully articulated puppets that move and behave so much like real horses that it's mesmerizing. She suggested I look them up on Youtube, and my God, I was amazed.

Look at this. This is magic. This is fabulous theater. I am in AWE of how much those puppet draws me in. They are huge and gorgeous and they move like real horses. They are so fucking beautiful and ingenious and perfect that I can't imagine how much more powerful my theater experience would be going to see this because of that touch.

And this play demands it. The heart of the story of Warhorse is about how the best in the human spirit is brought out through the love of horses. You don't FEEL that on a visceral level without the force and shape and awe-inspiring presence of a horse right there to drive it home to you. But how would you ever get a horse onstage? Does this story not belong onstage because that's an impractical thing to write into a show?

But the play was good enough that somebody made it happen, regardless of the difficulty. And this show is a smash hit. I think it just shows that if your play is good enough, people will make it happen the way it needs to happen. Yeah, we are certainly not all going to get lucky enough to get such a big budget, or even any attention at all. I just can't help but think why teach people to write a worse play just to handle concerns of ever getting off the ground?

New workspace

Some of you may remember me talking about setting up a little additional workspace in my office, like getting a small table to put in the corner next to the door that would give me a little more surface area to work on than my somewhat crowded computer desk. I've been trawling Craigslist for the last couple weeks, and finally found something suitable in my price range that I could bring home. It's not set up to work at just yet, but here's how it looks right now:

It's made from what I would guess to be ash wood and measures about four feet wide by two and a half feet deep. It's at a height such that I can comfortably sit in at chair at it and my mini-fridge fits underneath it. I like how sturdy it is, and the neat little drawer in the front. I'm quite pleased with it, and actually was pleasantly surprised by how much workspace I could actually get to fit in this area.

I confess, I was not as meticulous as I should have been in regards to making sure it would fit the space before I bought it. I did take measurements for how much could fit into my desired area without interfering with the low closet or opening and closing the door, but didn't have them on me when the seller for this table responded to me. So when I said I wanted to come look at it I wasn't a hundred percent sure it was going to fit. Laying eyes on it in person for the first time, I was not optimistic; I was pretty sure it was too big. But the price was low and the seller was in Roslindale, which is a bit of a drive from Waltham, and I was more affected by the desire to not come home empty-handed than was totally wise, so despite my concerns I went for it anyway. I spent most of the drive home calling myself an idiot and brainstorming what the hell else I could do with the thing. But when I actually got it into the room I lucked out! In fact, it's about exactly as big as could possibly go there without getting the the way of the doors.

So I am pleased with how the whole enterprise turned out. This will be my sewing table, and my larp packing table, and the place I do any project that doesn't require a computer. I'm looking forward to having a designated space for that stuff so it doesn't take over my whole room.

My long important project list

There are so many things I need to get working on.

I want to get started with my schoolwork. The natural starting place seems to be to do the reading, but my teacher hasn't yet sent along the packet of ten-minute plays that I must respond to for my first assignment. I guess I can read the craft book I need to review; just ordered a copy of it now.

I need to finish planning the revival session of my Burn Notice game for this coming Tuesday. We will be joined by the fabulous Mr. Michael Hyde, who has graciously agreed to take on the role of Riker, the nerdy hacker who remade himself into the ultimate cool guy (or so he thinks.) He will be coming over for dinner tonight to discuss the particulars of the campaign and how best to fit into it. Hopefully it will inspire me a little. I like the sessions to be extensively planned out so there's a lot of detail and possibility, which requires a lot of forethought. I also like to emulate the way the show incorporate personal hooks for the characters into an otherwise caper-of-the-week plot structure, but that can be tough. No wonder I can't manage to run this as a weekly campaign; I could never churn out that level of work in that short a period.

I do, however, want to get serious about writing a ten-minute play a week. I think it would be beneficial to my development as a dramatist. The problem is right now I am totally stuck for an idea. I've always had this problem. When I have an idea, I've no trouble coming up with the project to match it, but when I know the project I need to do, I really suck a coming up with a fitting idea. I might have to cut it down to a ten-minute play every two weeks if it's going to be this tough to come up with something to write about. Suggestions welcome, I suppose.

I need to finish the final edit of Merely Players. The show is so close to being finalized it's painful, I just need to buckle down and make it work. I am endeavoring to add back in the stage manager character I had to cut for a lack of lines, but now I think I can include him if I make him a pantomime character who is totally silent for comedic effect. Also, I want to have an initial blocking plan made up to go into the process with. The show is supposed to be really funny, which the blocking must support, and is also intended to work outside the conventions of traditional theater. It has a cabaret sort of atmosphere, so the fourth wall is a lot less firm, for example, and the "actor's space" is not confined to a separate area understood to be the "stage." The blocking must take full advantage of that freedom, and be sufficiently unusual to create the proper effect.

I want to find a good beginner's sewing reference. I will be FINALLY getting my sewing machine at the end of the month, as that's when I will be next visiting home and my parents discovered the thing would be exorbitantly expensive to ship. In the meantime, I would like to cut out pattern pieces and study up to be ready for the machine. There's a lot about technique and terminology I am completely in the dark about, so might as well use the time before I can actually start sewing to read up on the matter and be prepared.

Sadly, I think I should probably be putting my new larp idea on hold. The Roman Empire game, which I am thinking I'm going to call Imperium, is very exciting to me right now, but sadly I think I need to be prioritizing dramatic writing and more immediately relevant writing instead. Of course, knowing me, I'll be struck by ideas for it anyway, which of course I will be obliged to record lest I forget them even if I'm not actively working on the project. Nice as it would be to have something new to debut at next Festival, I need to balance my love for larp writing with writing I can make greater use of in a career as a writer. I hate saying that, but my current portfolio is kind of unbalanced and that needs to be corrected.

So those are my major concerns right now. Looks like I have a lot of work ahead of me. Let's see what I can do. *cracks knuckles*

Jared in As You Like It!

I totally forgot to mention this, even though it's cool news and it happened a while ago now. Jared is going to be in a production of As You Like It! He will be playing Oliver, the wicked older brother of the hero Orlando who initially betrays his brother but ultimately learns the error of his ways. The production is being put on by Theatre@First, a well-regarded local company whom I first became aware of when I saw oakenguy* in their awesome Shaken Up Shakespeare show, a pastiche of pieces by the Bard and reinterpretations thereof. To make it even cooler, usernamenumber* is also in this show, playing Touchstone the fool, probably my favorite character in this play. I have a soft spot for fools, you know. :-) I think he'll be really great at it, which makes me even more excited to see it.

This is pretty cool because this marks Jared's first role with a company other than Hold Thy Peace. It makes me really happy for him that what he learned working with HTP got him to the point where he could audition for a Shakespeare play for a director who didn't know him and sufficiently impress that person enough to earn a part. The show will be going up September 8th through 11th, at 8PM the first three nights and a 3PM matinee on Sunday, at Seven Hills Park. I am planning on attending all the performances if I can, and would love to get a group together to go support Jared and Brad. HTPers, you in particular I'd love to bring along. So mark your calendars now and come out with me to see our lovely and talented friends. :-)

Cream halter dress

During a rare break I had between classes during residency week, I wandered around the area near to Porter Square and discovered a really neat little vintage shop called Raspberry Beret. I can never resist a thrift store, so I had to go in and look around. I discovered in my rummaging a lovely cream-colored dress with gold brocade-like detailing that had the good fortune to come in my size. So, for about thirteen dollars, I got to take this pretty thing home. Here is a picture of it on me.

I really like this dress. I love the details, like the shape of the bust, the way it joins in the center almost like a bow, the band at the waist, and the halter styling, with big long ties that join behind the neck. Here is a closeup of the bodice.

I also think I like it because it reminds me of the white dress I wore as Cordelia. It too was made of a sort of brocaded fabric, though all in white, with a close-fitting bodice and a skirt that came out in fullness at the waist, and the same sort of halter back. It was a costume from the Brandeis theater department found by Marissa, a complete mess of safety pins and lousy snaps, but its design was lovely and I loved wearing it. There aren't many pictures of me in it, and the few that exist have it covered by a black shawl to hide its imperfections, but maybe this will give you an idea of the similarity.

I like it so much that I was seriously tempted to wear it to the wedding I went to on Sunday, but did not because wearing white/ivory/cream would be a huge gaucherie unless the bride specifically says it's okay. Still, I found myself wondering what she would be wearing despite my better instincts. And of course she showed up in a a very sharp suit with a brown tie and a green shirt (matching that of the groom, I might add.) I should have known. Still, it would not have been classy to wear it. So yesterday, morethings5* was kind enough to ask me to sit for him to sketch me, giving me a chance both to have my vanity flattered (I love being his model!) and to wear my new pretty thing that probably won't get to come out and play all that often. Thanks, Jonathan! A pleasure as always, and your company was of course lovely.

The only thing I'm not sure I like about it is the little fluffy trim made of some kind of netting attached along the bottom of the skirt. It may compromise the elegance of the rest of the dress for me, so I'm considering removing it. Still, Jared likes it, and doing that means I might ruin the really nice blind hem it's got going. Not sure I could put it back in so neatly and cleanly. Maybe I'll leave it, I haven't decided yet. But overall I really love the dress, and hope there's some event or play or larp I get to wear it for in the near future.

Residency concluded

I have been away from the blog for quite a few days now, thanks to the intensive ten days I spent in classes for graduate school. Intense was really the word for it, given how long the days were, packed with two-hour-long class after two-hour-long class back-to-back from early in the morning till dinnertime. Excited as I am to get going, this week was often very emotionally draining. Though overall a beneficial experience, improving as the week went on, It was extremely frustrating at times-- things I wanted to do and were important to me creatively were often dismissed by instructors and classmates alike, and unfortunately it looks like I am going to have to do some reevaluating of my plan of what work I'm going to generate this semester. Sigh. That's kind of discouraging. But looks like I don't have any choice, so I'll just have to make the best of it. I don't want to waste the time I'm going to be spending in this program, so I'm trying to focus on the positive, something I'm admittedly not very good at doing, and just resolve myself to generate good work of another kind anyway.

Now I have a small mountain of homework to get done between now and the first week of August. I had a wedding to attend directly after the residency period, so I took the Fourth of July off from responsibility to just have a day to relax and do what I wanted. Now I am back at work (they graciously gave me all of last week off) and will have to start incorporating homework into my routine. Today I want to make a study plan with benchmarks for what I will accomplish when. I have a lot of reading to do, mostly short plays, and then I will have to write intelligent responses to it in addition to creating the first draft of a ten minute play. Then there's my independent study into iambic pentameter. This'll take some real focus, but hopefully the plan will help. That will be the first thing I do when I get off of work today.