Anyone from the ‘burbs remember these days?

Script done.
Movie poster done.

Still have term paper due
and news stories due

Okay, so it’s home for the holidays and we’re supposed to be having fun, right? Well, let’s see. I’m working on my homework around the clock and Dad’s getting pissed because I’m on the computer all the time. Where else can I write a term paper, a screenplay and an InDesign portfolio of projects? It’s all COMPUTER WORK! *sigh*

That, and I play like 30 minutes of Final Fantasy X and he freaks out like I broke the 11th commandment. He’s always like this when I come home. This is the path I’m going down as a copy editor. I’m going to be working many nights a week from 3 to midnight, where my free time will be in the morning – which is when I will play games and sleep. I don’t think he can accept that. If I can, I’m moving out of the house when we move back to Chicago. Even if living will be rough, I want to run my own life – not have my over-conservative father dictate my free time while I’m 22 years old.

So yeah. We’re mowing the lawn again today. For no real reason except to get me off the computer. I miss my friends, being allowed to talk to them. The internet fucking sucks here! It goes out at 11 pm every night – and NOBODY CARES. Not my parents, not the city council, not the ISP. I can’t talk with Aidan hardly at all, my games online are moot cause when everyone else goes to be and its the right time to play, THE INTERNET GOES DOWN.

So while I’m working offline, my screenplay is nearly done. It has undergone numerous small revisions, and for the moment it is so large that I have considered taking a route many in the class are taking. Many of their plots are very detailed like mine, but in performances they are broken off at a climax or halfway point. The idea seems to be that we can get away with writing One-Act scripts, but the plot doesn’t have to be resolved in that one act. So, I will be submitting a script that has the action leaving the audience hanging and wanting more, and write the second act once I no longer have a dozen deadlines hanging over my head. Calcifer would do well to remind me to keep working on that. Easy way, shmeazy way. It’s still 30 pages longer than the next longest script, and the majority of my written action is kept in Act I. I’ll be content to get all this work done in quality time and effort.

There’s gotta only be like 3 people still reading this, and maybe another once every few months. What is everyone up to these days if they don’t feel like commenting? Has the whole world but me died in a nuclear apocalypse?

BTW, Dota .49b is the shit. Too bad my computer overhearts every minute or so. Another thing on my RL to-do list. *sigh*

Lawnmowing time. At thanksgiving. What is the world coming to.

NEWS FLASH:
John, I am able to come to your place for winter break – but it won’t be for very long. My parents did not want me to stay there for too long. I have plane tickets set for me to arrive in O’Hare Airport on December 28th. I will be picked up on the morning / afternoon of New Year’s… aka January 1st.
That gives us roughly four days to spend with each other partying. I tried to ask for a full week, but it didn’t happen. Make plans accordingly if you can. I’ll get you more details as they come in, such as time of day to pick me up.

Working on the script rewrite. Will take several days.
Have a term paper to write. Will probably only take one day.
Have three design projects due after break. Ordered InDesign to work on them over break. Will take a few days.
Have three newspaper stories to write during break. Will probably take a few days.

Work
Student Government / Senate follow-through story
Apportionment Board follow-through story
Biology Department Graduate Student story
RSO Funding story
Cultural Diversity Requirement story

Class
Media Management term paper
Advanced Playwriting script revision

Creative
Calcifer online dialogues
Silverheart’s story fiction
Tiamat’s story fiction
Paladin’s Quest revision
D&D adventures fiction

Journalism major, Creative Writing minor
I’m in for a world of writing, I hope.

Been a fool, been a clown
Lost my way from up and down
And I know, yes, I know
And I see in your eyes that you really weren’t surprised at me
At all
Not at all
And I know by your smile
It’s you

(“Adieu,” from Cowboy Bebop;
Emily Bindiger)

Twelve-pack of Pepsi                                                                              $4

Chubby’s medium pizza and cheese sticks                                                $15

Two packages of printer paper                                                                 $40

21,000 words of formatted Word text                                                      15
hours

Seeing your screenplay come to life in performance                                   Priceless

So after spending all night looking over and finishing my screenplay, I ran it by Calcifer (God bless his soul). We enjoyed most of until the second half, which he and I agreed to be pretty weak. So the ending sucks. Fortunately this is only the first draft, and I have all the rest of semester to revise it.

But good lord… I’m tired of writing. For now. I am burned out, exhausted and ready for a break.

Tallyho
~ Chris

Okay,

So, I haven’t updated in nearly a month. I haven’t died, but my life’s become extremely busy, and much busier than I ever expected. Taking three one-credit elective classes in place of one three-credit was likely my biggest mistake last year, but here I am. Taking 90 minutes of tennis classes every day, reporting two days a week for the DEN, maybe three, copy editing the fourth night, and somehow managing to factor in school assignments into it all. Oh yes, and sleep. That’s a rather rare commodity lately.

So big and good news: I’ve quit raiding. Officialy. No joke, and it’s not gonna last just a week this time. It’s the end of the schebang and I’ve ensured it by pretty much severing my ties to my World of Warcraft raiding friends. Harsh but necessary. So ya. No more raiding four hours every night. I know I know, It’s about fucking time. Obviously, having all of the classwork and journalism work stated above, I can’t afford to let twelve hours of my life go by each week just to take a break.

I’m writing a screenplay that is an adaptation of the stories I’m writing with Aidan Tan (aka Calcifer Rauthe, or Relaeth on xanga). The stories of Shinryu, Silverheart, Calcifer, Impi, Bahamut, Tiamat, and the others – theyre all getting a big showcase in the screenplay I’m writing as a one-act. It kinda sucks, all the work I have to do… and yet, it is the greatest pleasure. Class, obviously because it’s mandatory, has motivated me to move forward with these ideas at full speed. No longer are the AIM chats shared with Calcifer just recorded transcripts – they are moving their way into full first-draft scripts. So the news for today is… I have 120 pages of the rough draft still to write by Wednesday. I am thankful that I am not copy editing or reporting late nights tonight and tomorrow night.

Hmmm I have a new dragon for that matter. Silverheart is giving way on center stage to Tiamat, who is both the villain and the love interest in the dragon circle Calcifer and I weave. She’s vastly intelligent, devious, seductive, powerful beyond measure, and playful in the right (and wrong) ways. Recently, though not to spoil too much, she is undergoing a potential transition of becoming the protagonist of my writing. Redemption comes to mind. Who knows – Aidan and I are exploring the details every few nights when we have time away from work and class. And sleep – we love sleeping, yet get so little of it.

I am very hungry. I’ve run out of cash again and need to go to the bank, but it’s closed after I get out of class. Grrrrr. Now going to Thomas-Andrews for pizza and hopefully breadsticks. I need my roommate to pay me back the $20 I lent him – some Domino’s pizza for the next two nights might give me some badly needed brain food for all the script writing I have tonight.

I have to get going on both of those things. Just wanted to thank the few people who still read this – rediscovering friends after quitting WoW is among the many things on my to-do list. Thank God that Aidan stuck with me through it all – he’s been the most patient friend I’ve known all these years. Thank you, Aidan, and we’ll take later tonight after I break for a rest in my writing.

Till next time, fellow bloggers,
~ Chris Walden

“Boulevard Of Broken Dreams”
(Green Day)

I walk a lonely road
The only one that I have ever known
Don’t know where it goes
But it’s home to me and I walk alone

My shadow’s the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart’s the only thing that’s beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
‘Til then I walk alone…

HOLY FUCKING CRAP!!!!

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath/index.xml
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath/index.xml
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath/index.xml

The fight against Arthas, the Lich King, and the most anticipated expansion is next on the Blizzard Spotlight!
HELL YEAH!

Hopefully it comes out sometime after I graduate so I can make my return when I don’t have grades to worry about.