It's perfect Autumn weather out there. Crisp and cool and sunny and wonderful. Perfect walking in the woods weather. Well, that's what the dog thinks, and who am I to argue?
At night, the tree below catches and strangles any living creatures that get close enough, but even it looks practically normal on a day like today.
The greenery in the background is buckthorn, which we're trying to eliminate as an invasive species. We're right now accumulating an enormous pile of the stuff to burn, which you can see below and in the topmost picture...
The burning won't be on November the 5th this year, because that's the Beowulf premiere......
I just read your 30-second scary story and thought it was a lot of fun. You're right: it was scary.
Is there any possibility that you will be publishing the 90-second REALLY scary version anywhere?
So I looked and it's up at
http://weekendamerica.publicradio.org/programs/2007/10/27/_ten_tales_of_terror.html
but do me a favour. Don't read it now. Wait until it's dark, then click on the link and listen to it...
I wish you could read or hear the original, longer version. But I kept cutting it and cutting it to get it down to 30 seconds, and didn't save as I went. I guess I could write a new version, but then I'd be expanding, if you see what I mean. (And there were people who handed in 70 second stories!) (Shakes head ruefully.)
The title is theirs, incidentally. And the editor has trimmed pauses or sped it slightly, to lose four seconds. (I think if I were doing a show like this I'd suggest people write minute-long stories, if only to allow for the pauses. If you're telling a scary story, it's the pauses that make the listeners do all the work, allowing them to build up the picture in the silence, and scare themselves.)
...
A couple of people have written to ask if I have to stop writing completely when the writer's strike starts. Nope. As a WGAe member I have to stop writing any film or TV, and can't discuss future work or option anything new with film or TV companies -- per http://www.wga.org/contract_07/StrikeRules.pdf The basic principle behind these Rules is very simple: you (and your agent or other representative on your behalf) may not pitch to or negotiate with a struck company, and you may not provide writing services, sell or option literary material to a struck company.
But I'll keep writing things that aren't film or TV...
Labels: season of mists and mellow frightfulness, writer's strike