Yesterday's writing was pretty darn easy. I had this idea in my head of "what kind of bizarre family Christmas traditions might what's-her-name have?" and I came up with a couple that would be hard for me to tolerate. The one yesterday was some kind of competition to see how much of Luke Chapter 2 people could remember. It was only meant to be a small part of the story, but I decided to make one of the siblings insanely competitive about it (my, but I hate people like that, from those who give enough of a shit about the team they root for that they'd fight the fans of another team over it, to those guys who you don't want to play video games with because they take it so seriously it's no longer fun or a game), to the point where, unless you're actually the family I'm parodying in this story, you SHOULD think, "This is not right, guys. I don't care how much you love X-mas."
This story has gotten so long (I checked, and the darn thing is now 8500 words), that it's lost all comedic value at this point, and has become one of those Judd Apatow movies on DVD where they've put all the bits they cut out back in so the Comedy is now two and a quarter hours long.** And it's not even Black Comedy anymore, despite what I intended it when I started it. I guess I too was infected with the holiday spirit, and did what I could to make it a little Christmasier . . . but still not Christmassy enough for the Hallmark Channel.
Today, I haven't written a darn thing (well, I think I managed 11 words earlier), and it's already past midnight. I finished editing our "Delusions of Grandeur" episode, and then recorded another podcast with Marshal, and once that was done, instead of writing, I did my run, which I enjoyed way more than I would have writing. But let me think about that for a minute.
The jogging will not accomplish a doggone thing, and absolutely no one will benefit from whatever shape three months of exercise have put me in (still pretty bad shape, I'm afraid, but again, nobody is around to care). But if I wrote this Christmas story and put it out there, it might get read by, oh, I dunno, three or four people, maybe even five or six if I die in the next year. And that should make me want to finish the story so I can publish it, or even podcast it, in which case, up to eleven or twelve people might hear it. Even more, if said death occurs.
And yet, I feel really good after my run (at least I did until I made the mistake of watching the second week of that newly-engaged couple's Vlog, which I may talk about in a moment*), and then I had to do laundry, which takes a while, so I put on an old Podcastle episode where Tim Pratt wrote a Scrooge story, because I wanted to get in the Christmas mood to finish this story I'm working on. If anything, it just showed me the power of short story writing, and more specifically, how talented Pratt is (and Heather Shaw, who co-wrote it).
Like I said, my story is now too long (and no longer funny), so I doubt it'll be like a Tim Pratt holiday story, but I'm determined to finish it and move on to something else. And since I just wrote another five hundred words on it, I guess I get to complain about this engaged couple that have vowed to do a video every week for the next year. Yay!
Truth be told, I based two of the characters in "That's The Spirit!" (just a tentative title, but it's a fine one) on this young couple, who are both dubiously attractive, and almost-as-dubiously in love. I was trying to describe them in today's writing (they have on matching His and Hers holiday sweaters), and I couldn't come up with the word, but now I think it might be saccharine. In the first video, there was a bit of them driving, and they kept doing this phuqued-up speaking-at-the-same-time bit where either they're so on the same wavelength that they finish each other's sentences (and the middle of the sentences too), or they're TRYING to show how close they are by doing that. And it ended up being a less amusing version of that couple that Fred Armisen and Kristen Wiig played on "Saturday Night Live" where they'd come out and sing a song they wrote together, but it became obvious they were just making it up as they went along.***
You know how you feel when you read somebody's diary or your sister is on the phone with her best friend and you listen in on the conversation? I sort of feel that way watching this video (and guys, I know they would not want a bum like me watching it anyway). But I also feel slightly unwell watching it--because these two are so lovey-dovey and so good-looking and just trying so goddamn hard (there was one bit where they put sweet old timey music under a segment of them frolicking together [who was filming this, and why on earth would you do so??], where I felt tempted to look away like you would from a drunk guy singing bad karaoke or a drunk lady adjusting her thong or a dog taking a dump . . . except it's not gross and the editing is more professional than anything I have ever managed myself.
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| Can't believe I got to use this image again. |
Truth be told, I had to pause the video several times and do something else. I CANNOT afford to go to the dentist again this year (once a decade is enough, thank ye very much). But you know what "Saturday Night Live" sketch it reminds me of even more than the one I just referenced? In 1991, there was an episode that Linda Hamilton hosted, and there was a sketch where she and Dana Carvey were on a double-date with Phil Hartman and Julia Sweeney, and the latter couple were very reserved and unromantic, while Hamilton and Carvey became increasingly overt in feeding each other, to the point where Carvey starts sucking on her fingers and pretending to be a baby. It was funny when I first saw it all those years ago, and it's still funny in my head all these years later ("Baby wants sauce, baby wants sauce!").
My favorite bit in that sketch was always how Julia Sweeney, jealous of the affection the other couple is showing each other, asks if her husband might like to try her food, and he snaps at her, "We ordered the same thing!"
Big used to encourage me to do videos on YouTube, even going as far as to say that I was funny and talented when I would complain that they were too hard. But I have no idea why this couple is doing this, except that they are aware of how pretty they are and that goes a long way. It does make me wonder (I wonder, [I wo-wo-wo-wo-wonder]...) how I would document a year in a romantic relationship, were I in that enviable situation.
Except I'd like to think that mine would be funnier, and get way fewer views.
Words Today: 1027 (and I'm within a hair's breadth of being done)
Words In May: 5826
Push-Ups Today: 55
Sit-Ups Total: 215
P.S. Don't know why, but each day I post one of these:
Day 36. Oh, this one's easy: "F**k You" by CeeLo Green. Such a great song and a karaoke favorite, back when I still did karaoke.
*I'll tell you what: if I get some writing done, I will reward myself by getting to complain about their video. But if I don't write, then I don't get to say anything. It'll be like "may you speak now or forever hold your peace" bit in a wedding . . . my favorite part.
**Oh, shite, I just wikipedia-ed Judd Apatow to make sure that was him that did that, and then I wasted time checking to see what he's made lately. Oh, and he was behind a lot more movies than I was aware of, and then I checked out the ones I wasn't familiar with, which wasted oh, about a month of my night.
***I never appreciated that bit when it was on, because it (like so many of the SNL characters) was just so samey, repeating the exact same schtick every time they appeared . . . which was a little too often.
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