Hanging out

One of those mellow lazy days when I feel like hanging out. Had breakfast at Nobby's and wanted to just hang around the neighborhood, coffee shop to coffee shop, people watching -- but it's more fun to hang out with somebody, in particular with someone with whom you have enough history that a lot of non-verbal communication happens. Alas, I've outlive all the candidates except for a few down in L.A. So I came on home to try and do some work.

I have two novels in progress, both based on personal history, what I think of as the Sally novel and the Cold War novel, and though I like both, I'm not wild about either. So I'm turning to the concept about which I am wild, NAILS IN MY COFFIN, the collection of stories as novel, all set in a retirement center, each chapter about the death of a character. A dark comedy, lots of unexpected behaviors among the geriatric set (to which I seem to be sprinting). I'm very, very conscious of time these days, not only because of my age but because both of my parents dropped dead on the spot without warning and I don't want to discount a family tradition therein. It's not like I have all the time in the world to write this and then that. I need to focus on the projects that excite me most and right now COFFIN excites me more than either of the novels in progress. So I am going to start building the characters in this work, and their stories, and we'll see if my excitement survives.

The new video is slow going, mostly because I still need a cast and even then my own time is more limited due to teaching, let alone scheduling shoots around every one else's schedules. So my goal is to finish before Christmas. Hopefully sooner -- I'd love to shoot it in October, but I have no idea yet what folks' schedules look like. Also, I may be doing more weekend shooting, something I didn't do on the summer projects.

Took a peak at the Norway-Germany women's soccer semi-final, hoping Norway would make a go of it. Alas...the defending champs looked damn good. I think the U.S. may have its hands full with Brazil tomorrow.

Good Saturday football games coming up: Cal at Oregon, UCLA at Oregon State and USC at Washington. I'll be rooting for Oregon, UCLA and Washington.

A week from Saturday we see CABARET. Looking forward to it, been a while. I've seen about 4 productions. It was on the amazing Fornara season I wrote about. No response from the editor yet, knock on my wooden head.

Still a lazy day, work to do or not.