Monday, August 31, 2009

Stress

I can take a lot but sometimes things can just get a bit much.

Treatment for the Clones collaboration; rewrite of Tec, the TV pilot; story ideas for Traitor the TV-related project; shooting of the scenes from Monsters (even though the majority of the work is being dealt with by people other than me); and all this simultaneous with things getting "interesting" in the day job (they're asking for overtime); the Teacher going back to school; the Boy going back to school; the Daughter redecorating her room and looking for work; the dog being a pain; constantly regenerating housework.

But you know what the real killer is? Unfinished tasks. Every time you have an unfinished task it hangs up in your head, it lurks there going "I'm not finished, you need to finish me now, and I'm going to sit here nagging until you do it." You might not hear it, but it's there all the same.

And it can get to such a state that you just don't know where to start = overwhelm.

Friday I go to the overwhelm stage. And Saturday was a bit hellish. I turned into Mr Nasty - the Teacher would no doubt say I'd been that way for a while, but it was Saturday when I noticed it. I resolved that something should be done.

Sunday we went to Anglesey and spent several hours on a wind-swept beach with a few other hardy souls (ah, the English summer). We flew stunt kites, walked, talked, paddled, explored, allowed the dog to run off his pent-up energy. Getting some distance between you and the overwhelm is always useful for settling the mind.

Today we worked around the house. Tidying, finishing those unfinished tasks (like replacing two main light bulbs that blew months ago). There's still all those other jobs to be done but the overwhelm is gone.

One decision that had to be made, and gone over with the Teacher, is that I'll have to move my writing to the office - rather than the more sociable location of the dining room. Turns out that I just can't concentrate with the to-ing and fro-ing of the downstairs area.

So this was good.

On a positive note, I have been going into more detail on Tec and really sorting it out: More character work, more plot work, really fixing-up the behaviour and actions of the "bad guys" so it all makes sense and can be tracked back by the detective.

And having finished going through all the existing episodes of the Traitor project, I have managed to collect together a fair number of ideas that should turn into reasonable stories that I can pitch.

This coming week is looking busy: Apart from doing 1.5 hours extra per day in the day job (I do get paid extra), I have a meeting on Thursday evening with the Director and DoP, probably have to go direct from Sheffield to the meeting location in South Manchester. Then on Saturday we're doing the auditions for the school kids. Without the right girl the first scene could be appalling - which would not be good.

Probably won't get any actual script written this week ... but I just have to accept it and continue all the preparatory stuff until I get to the point that I can start writing.



What's on the turntable? "Human behaviour" by Bjork from "Debut" courtesy of Spotify.

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