OU

Nagged By Your Notebook (it could have been a novel, you know…)

by

Apologies if you’ve been deafened by my manic laughter. It’s the heady feeling of freedom, you know. That’s what’s to blame. Yes! My advanced creative writing course – and Diploma – are now over. Done. Ended. Finito. Now I just have to wait with fingers crossed to hear whether I’ve gained the right to be an incredibly sad muppet who puts Dip CW after my name.

I fear most people will think it means Care Work and try to drag me round to Auntie Rose’s house to change her colostomy bag because it’s come loose and it smells funny. Sigh…

Meanwhile, some things never end. And one of them is my love of stationery. ArtyDaughter came back from town the other week with a delectable little bit-smaller-than-A6-size project book in different shades of blue. This will be perfect for my handbag – small enough to fit in snugly, and with those lovely dividers so that my random thoughts can be organised for easy access later! Perfect.

And a few weeks earlier, ConstructoBoy got a box full of Waldo Pancake goodies for his birthday. (Be still, quivering heart; how can I not have known about these things before?) Amongst these treasures was a notebook:

Waldo Pancake Notebook - I could've been a novel.

 

Yes, I know. The front cover is enough to make your writing procrastination guilt come hotfooting it through your door. But the worst is yet to come. This quote is unfinished.
And when you turn it over, you see the end.

…instead of a stupid little notepad, which is what I am.’

You see? It really is a notebook that nags.
And they have other weapons in their arsenal too, these Pancake people.

There are others, but these were a few that I thought all the writers out there could relate to… 😉  In case you’re tempted, you can buy them – and lots of other funky bookmarks, coasters etc – here

ConstructoBoy, great writer though he is, has not taken the hint and started a novel (though he did consider it. Bless the boy.) Instead he is writing down the details (lined pages) and drawing relevant pictures (plain pages) of a computer game he is designing. It features a lot of tanks of different kinds, and he is determined to get every fact right…

Thank heavens for the internet and Usborne’s Second World War cards 🙂

J is also for joy – yay! SHE LIKED IT!

by

Yesterday evening I got unexpectedly early feedback on my 1000 word novel excerpt (plus commentary detailing where I am so far, how it’s changed etc).

And Yaaaay! My sci-fi/fantasy-loathing tutor liked it!

‘The strengths of this piece include a definite hook’

‘I loved it’

‘Okay, going to give you a big compliment here: I was actually briefly disappointed not to have more. In a marking situation, that is rare’

Just had to share the joy, really. She gave some really good feedback on potential editing/revising to make it better, so I’ve come away confident that I can improve the beginning and go on to submit a really good 4000 word start for the examinable piece (which is worth 50% of this year’s course mark, so the fate of my Diploma pretty much rests on that).

Woo-hoo!

Weekend Wonderfulness

by

After a few weeks of complete madness – just tooooo much to do – this weekend it’s been nice to chill. Not that I’ve really chilled in the typical sense, but I’ve felt chilled because there aren’t deadlines breathing down my neck. I got the latest OU assignment in on time on Thursday, despite spending more time at work than I expected to, completed the most urgent paperwork for work, and sent off my submission for the ‘100 Stories for Queensland’ book (albeit a little late).

On Saturday I had a really enjoyable OU tutorial in Cambridge. Once again, considering there are about 24 people on this course in what must be around a 25 mile radius, there weren’t that many of us, but it was great to see familiar faces and a couple of new ones. Caron Freeborn is not only a good tutor, she’s also an interesting person with a great sense of humour. Must remember to buy her novels and have a read 🙂

We had a lot of fun with one of the exercises – we voted on a setting (I was quite chuffed because it ended up being an opera house which was my suggestion!), did some descriptive work, and then Caron made each of us pick a Secret Slip of Paper…this was the character we had to be in the monologue she asked us to write. And of course, the challenge was for everyone else to listen to it afterwards and guess who you were meant to be!

A really interesting exercise, but I was a bit unnerved, as I found it disturbingly easy to write as my character – ‘a 40-year-old alcoholic woman in need of a drink’! Lovely to spend a few hours with fellow writers though.

And today was pretty great too, because thanks to a tweet from Simon Whaley, I found there’s a longlist (well, more of a shortlist!) up for ‘100 Stories’. And – yay! I’m on it. Very chuffed.

A Book That Changed My Life

by

p> Countryside road

A Book That Changed Your Life

Such was the challenge laid down by Plinky recently… so, here goes.

Paul McKenna’s ‘Change Your Life In 7 Days’.
I borrowed it from a friend just before she moved miles away 4 years ago, and have repeatedly forgotten to give it back (which isn’t at all like me – honest – but these days I’m normally on my summer holidays when I drop in & visit her, and I’ve forgotten to pack the book in all the excitement!)

Anyway. The book. It did change my life in 7 days – and that’s without using the cd. Perhaps I should go and do that now…

It changed my life because it freed me of the guilt I felt for wanting a happy and successful life. At the risk of sounding all deep and meaningful here – heaven forbid! – I had been brought up with the ‘if it’s not broken, don’t fix it – and be glad you’ve got it, because that’s all you can expect and you certainly don’t need or deseve any more’ rule.

That rule stinks.

In reality, a far better rule is ‘if it’s not broken, but it doesn’t work properly – or as well as something else would – then for God’s sake sort it out before you’re too old to truly appreciate the result.’

In the words of Captain Sensible:

You’ve got to have a dream

If you don’t have a dream

How you gonna make a dream come true?

Within a short time of reading that book I had signed up to restart my degree with a creative writing course, and had put my house on the market. A year later I had moved 100 miles away.

That book really DID change my life, you see…

Powered by Plinky

Old MacDonald Day

by

On Friday there was a meeting – not of minds, but of both my jobs. We took our preschoolers for a session at ‘big school’, where I also work. It was Old MacDonald Day so everyone dutifully dressed in jeans, boots and checked shirts!

Even though it’s only a few  minutes walk from one to the other, we were drowned by the time we got there. Of all the days for the heavens to decide to open with a whoosh! But the children had a lovely time – they made animal masks, went on a farm animal treasure hunt in the hall, dressed up as animals, made funky horse masks, coloured in farm pictures, and of course they played with the toy farm as well. Oh, and sang Old MacDonald whilst learning the Makaton symbols for the animals. Lots of enthusiasm!

In a rare moment of relaxation (although it kind of crossed over to writing work as well) I finished the Writer’s Tale 2: The Final Chapter by Russell T Davis and Benjamin Cook. Great entertainment, lots of laughs, a behind the scenes look at Dr.Who and an insight into Russell’s writing – who could ask for more?

Personally I think he served an OBE just for the book, never mind ‘services to drama’! Reading it was like sitting ion the midst of a cosy chat – it’s all emails, save for the ocassional text message, so it really feels like you’ve just pulled up a chair…
The downside is, I had that really bereft feeling you get when you come out of a ‘book world’ you’ve been so comfy in.

Never mind. Thanks to my lovely husband, supplier of all things Christmas-booky, I have already betrayed the memory of Russell and Benjamin, and floated into Mr.Fry’s Chronicles. Armchair, anyone?

I have a horribly busy week ahead, and the playscript is still not finished. But I’ve made progress today, and the back is feeling a bit better. So there’s hope for me yet!

Steve is back!

by

If you were mourning Steve, fear not. He has returned!

Having listened to Jane Rogers talking about film adaption – and thinking back to the minimal dialogue approach discussed by Mark Ravenhill – I completely redrafted the beginning of my play, getting rid of a whole clunky bundle of exposition by dramatising a small scene in the main character’s past. It really helps with the set-up and feels far better.

I must be turning into Russell T Davies, because until I was fairly happy with the start, I couldn’t concentrate on  the rest.

Hopefully now I can get on and write the Steve scene – his dialogue can now be succint and important. Although I should warn you, I may go back to calling him Pete, as he was in the original story!

I’m part way through Linda Seger’s excellent Making A Good Script  Great, and just got her The Art of Adaptation: Turning Fact and Fiction into Film. Which means I have no excuse to turn in a bad assignment. Oh no!