Spontaneous decadence

What happens when you walk out a door with one thing in mind and shortly thereafter enter another door with something very different on your mind? I left the office thinking I would walk to the nearby Vietnamese restaurant for a bowl of egg noodle and tofu soup -- but instead entered the local bar and, in a loud smoky room filled with a zillion TVs for sporting events, had steak and eggs, a late breakfast for lunch. And it was excellent!, the ground sirloin perfect and, best of all, the hashbrowns actually hashbrowns, as opposed to what many restaurants pass off as hashbrowns today. I've gotten diced, chopped, mashed and fried and all variety of potatoes served with breakfast and called hashbrowns. This was the real thing!

Loud rock played, TVs silently showed a soccer game, various students sat with burgers and beers, and one old guy sipped wine alone at the bar. Ah, nostalgia! I spent many an afternoon in joints like this as a grad student, minus the TV, minus the sports, where instead all the talk was of classes, books, ideas, and sex.

Came back to the office to find a fan letter! Nice to get, always. This one had read a screenplay the ending of which had "chilled" him -- and damn if I could remember the ending myself! It had been written that long ago. So I went to my archive and looked it up. Yeah, nice ending. Here's the opening scene:

FADE IN:

EXT. COUNTRY HOME - KITCHEN - NIGHT

BOBBY SHARP, 50s, a bear of a man, holds a carving knife
to his throat.

Across the room, ALICE, 40s, dressed like an Earth Mother,
approaches cautiously.

ALICE
Bobby, give me the knife...

BOBBY
It's the best thing I can do for
my career, Alice. The world likes
their writers dead.

ALICE
You have good work to do yet ...
put it down ...

BOBBY
I'm not going to win.

ALICE
You don't know that. And it
doesn't matter if you don't. It's
just one judge's opinion.

BOBBY
That young punk is going to win.
I'm old enough to be his father.

ALICE
We laugh at writing competitions,
remember? Do this, and it looks
like you take them seriously.

BOBBY
Jesus, you're right.

He lowers the knife.

BOBBY
It plays right into their
philistine hands, doesn't it?

Obviously I had a ton of fun writing this one! But you'd think I'd remember the ending. Jeez.

So here I am, with 90 minutes to kill (work, meet with students, read, whatever) before I show Casablanca, making today a very easy day.

And I'm only a few pages from finishing the screenplay draft! If not here, in the next hour, then surely at home very soon.