Update to the Update

I think I mentioned that I decided not to bother with Open Open Open now that Sing-for-your-Supper was back up and running.  So I decided I would focus on trying to get a piece written for that, but the deadline was the 27th.  Work has been really heavy these past couple of weeks, and I more or less worked through the night yesterday.  On top of that, I was working pretty furiously on the Final Exam.  Mostly the script but also all the pieces that I need to pull together to get it produced, and that is still uppermost in my mind.  I have made some progress on that, making headway on getting another actor involved.  I also went to a Production 101 session hosted by the Fringe last night, which kind of points out just how much I still have to do, though I was pretty much in the middle of the pack, which was somewhat comforting.  I didn't really recognize anyone in the room, as most of the artists I know didn't make it into the lottery.  My situation is definitely different from the others though, as mine is a site-specific piece, so my questions are more specific and I'll just email them to the Fringe.

To sort of add to my mental confusion (of last night), I can definitely see the start and middle of the piece, but I just couldn't settle on the ending.  Do I want a funny or ironic or tragic end to this piece?  I think the answer would be just to sit down and write it and see what develops, but I didn't have time.  Perhaps if I had the ending (or some ending) in mind, I could have forced myself to get moving, but I bailed.  I'll just aim for next month, and hope that the parody piece I submitted way back in Dec. gets taken (I resubmitted it, since they have been on hiatus and probably misplaced everything from before).

What I just barely managed to do is to turn my short play Double Sabbatical into a short story for the Toronto Star contest.  I know it won't win, as it is far too dialogue-heavy, but I just wanted to feel I had accomplished something out of all those deadlines I had.  The deadline is today in fact, and I'll have to drop it off in person on the way to work.  A couple of years ago, I managed to drop it off after work on the day before the contest ended.  So cutting it close is nothing new to me.  Like many people, particularly academics, I pretty much work to deadlines and not much else.

Today, I have a bunch of library books to deal with, and I'd like to finish up two book reviews for the blog, but I suppose if they don't get posted it's not the end of the world.  After all this, I probably need to do nothing but focus on Final Exam, which is basically uppermost in my mind (aside from work periodically...).