To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive

Today I dropped the kitchen timer in my bowl of soup. It still worked...for a few hours. Now it is dead. Sigh.

I downloaded this very cool freeware screenwriting(/storyboarding/lighting and stage diagrams/god knows what else that has to do with pre-production, plus templates for live theater scripts, audio plays, and novels) program* yesterday for writing MY MUSICAL, which apparently I am doing. Actually, apparently what I am doing is writing scenes in script form and then writing them again in prose form. Gah.

I'm much more comfortable with prose, and to be honest I think I'll probably end up writing this that way once I get all the scenes that are buzzing about most vividly in my head written in Celtx, but the writing in script format has been instructive. (Far more so than the one I wrote for the screenwriting class back in undergrad...perhaps because that script was so terrible that I've tried to forget it ever existed.) I'm much more aware of needing to transmit information to the audience when working with only what can been seen/heard on screen than I am in a prose work, where it's all much more, hmm, organic, maybe? In the first couple scenes, for example, I was constantly aware of having to have someone say the characters' names, because otherwise no one would know what they were, which is obviously not a problem in prose.

On the other hand, things go a hell of a lot faster in script form, especially when you're me and like to write paragraph upon paragraph of description when given the opportunity. Also, I have a three-page outline to work from, and I've...almost never written fiction from an outline before, or at least not one that was more than a dozen words. (Admittedly, it helps that this is not shockingly original. It's basically an excuse to screw around with some romantic comedy tropes I enjoy, so there aren't a lot of hard decisions to make or resolutions to agonize over.) I need to see if I can try to take some of that mentality of being driven by what information needs to be revealed at given points along the timeline over to my prose-writing, because it seems to be a good way of keeping myself on track and maybe finishing the damn thing someday.


* In what is possibly its best feature ever, it also allows you to copy and paste between it and Word and respects the formatting of both programs. Amaaaaaazing.

Because I know you're all so interested in the saga of my burnt finger, here is an update.

I somehow managed to get to sleep last night, and when I woke up, the pain was entirely gone. It was like magic. (Well, okay, it's not too happy when I move my finger.) I...am hoping this just means it's healing rather than that it has progressed into a third-degree burn with associated nerve damage. I figure if I still have feeling in the fingertip, it can't be that bad.

So all was going well, and then I smacked my hand against the wall in the shower and boom--no more blister. Yeah, I'm brilliant.

The blister was pretty disgusting, but I think it looks worse now. Well, it does when I can see it, which is rarely, because I have packed this thing up under two layers of gauze and...you know, at the moment I think there's more Neosporin (antibiotic ointment) on my finger than there is finger. Despite my precautions, my inner hypochondriac is exercising its right to go crazy at two in the morning, and is screaming about sepsis and tetanus.*

Please, please heal without further excitement, little burn. Srsly.


* Yes, I know I will have plenty of warning before sepsis sets in. I will go to a doctor if things get red and painful.

OW OW OW OW OW OW

SECOND-DEGREE STEAM BURN TO INDEX FINGER OF DOMINANT HAND OW OW OW

MADE MORE PAINFUL BECAUSE HAVE ONLY SELF TO BLAME FOR OWN STUPIDITY OW

OW OW OW OW HAS NOT BEEN GREATEST DAY OW

SEND LOLS?

ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow...

I was right. Today does hurt. *pokes sore shoulders*

Today hurts more because Senior Week hates me. As I was walking down to the FRA for "graduation rehearsal" (aka a verbal description of events), I ended up falling on the sidewalk and cracking both my bum and my head. A security officer happened to be there, so of course it became a much bigger production than it needed to be, with bags of ice, an athletic trainer coming by and emulating Janet Fraser with a penlight I had to stare into and follow, etc. etc. Obviously, I need to do this kind of thing when other people are around. The previous two times I've fallen in the exact same way and injured myself in the same manner (on ice, those times) on campus, I got none of this. *g*

I swear, the back of my head must be made of iron.

Now, if I can just keep myself in one piece for graduation, that would be good...

Ice skating today was...interesting. I nearly killed a couple little kids who fell down in front of me. I couldn't stop in time, so instead of skating into them, I was nice enough to fall down backwards instead. I better get some karma points out of that, man.

Then Meg caused me to fall down twice more by spinning me around and around unexpectedly. Ow. I was already feeling the whole afternoon in my butt and thighs by dinner; I can't imagine what tomorrow will be like. Painful, I'm sure. Ballroom tomorrow night will be interesting. In less humiliating news, I did figure out how to do one of those split-second turns where you're facing forward one minute and then are backwards the next. Not at speed, mind you, but even stationary is good, I suppose. :)

Fiesta food was, as always, wonderful. Mmmm, Fiesta.

Fandango was actually a lot classier than I thought it was going to be. (Fandango is an annual event wherein seniors and professors get together and party. The main attraction is generally the free booze.) Everyone was all dressed up, they had these amazing strawberries dipped in milk and white chocolate to look like little tuxedos, not to mention other food, and one of the professors is in a jazz band, and they were playing (loudly) some pretty decent swing and hustle stuff. Peter, you should've stayed longer! Meg and I danced a fair bit, and I bopped around by myself for a while. There weren't very many professors there, though; the only ones I knew who I ran into were Doc and my Fiction professor. Most of the English department seemed to be boycotting for some reason. Alas. I wanted to ask Matz to dance. *g*

I ended up playing a vicious round of air hockey with Meg in the game room next door (I lost 14-22, I believe; today is not my day for ice-related activities, apparently) before coming back to the flat. While I was walking back, I passed by one of the Kokes (I think) doing a countertenor rendition of "Loch Lomond" on Middle Path, which seemed the perfect end to things.

Ah, Kenyon. I will miss you.

The first Saturday in December is always the busiest of the year in a non-academic sense. The choir concert is tonight, which of course meant rehearsal this afternoon. Ballroom's big winter dance is also tonight (after the concert), which generally means setting up after rehearsal, but they finished pretty quickly this year, so I only ended up staying about twenty minutes. Anyway, tonight is busy. I imagine I won't get back before two or three. Oof. Ah, well. It's worth it. I can't wait to see Svetlana and her new partner do their five-dance exhibition. Oooooh, pretty.

However, it does mean being on my feet pretty much all night. So what do I go and do on the walk back from dinner?

If you guessed "twist my ankle," you'd be correct. There are few things more pathetic than falling off a perfectly innocuous, ice-free sidewalk into a thin layer of snow and leaves, then wailing for a few minutes into the empty night. Just in case you were wondering.

*headdesk*

It would be nice not to be so klutzy...as well as to not have pants that are slightly snow-soaked. *sigh*

So the big news for today is that I ran afoul of a bog.

Of course, there's backstory to this. Ellen and I decided to spend a day on Dartmoor as my last bit of Devon before I leave the country for good. We went first to the Minature Pony Centre, where I nearly imploded from the cuteness, especially of the foal that made him/herself my special buddy. There are many pictures, which I will share at some point soon after I get home (and have access to my webserver again). These things are smaller than some dogs I've known. It's crazy. There was a baby goat that was roughly the size of a small cat. It was all definitely geared towards the under-five set, but cuteness is for all ages, is it not? We were, however, wishing we'd worn shorts instead of pants, as it was quite hot out in those paddocks. (And I cannot believe I'm calling what could only have been 75F at the most "hot." I'm going to die when I get back to Nashville.)

Anyway. Then we continued on to the place we did our first Dartmoor hike and took the same path for a while, this time taking a different fork than the previous October. Saw a nice bridge, saw a bunch of cows, lots of sheep, etc. etc. Climbed a small tor, which was entertaining. Watched the mist roll in, because oh, wait, it's Dartmoor, and it isn't Dartmoor without mist.

After the tor, we decided to take what we thought was a fairly well-marked shortcut back to the town. There was practially a straight line between the tor and a part of the path closest to the town, but the real trail took us on a big loop before connecting, sort of like the two legs of a triangle versus the hypotenuse. To continue the geometry metaphor, we took the hypotenuse, which kind of turned into a sheep path, and then not a path at all. We didn't get lost (well, not exactly...not for more than a few minutes, anyway, and that was mostly because we couldn't see over the hill to where we knew the path was), but we did kind of run into a bog. And there was no way to get to the real trail except to go through the bog. Now, it is, technically, possible to get through a bog without getting too wet as long as you can quickly figure out which plants have root systems and are thus solid enough to step on and which most definitely do not. Hint: Tall bushy things? Good. Reedy things with bits of cotton fluff stuck to them? Very, very bad. However, if you're not entirely cognizant of the fact that there is a bog there, and not just a very enthusiastic stream, it can and will get muddy. Me not quite so much, but Ellen was having serious issues up to her knees.

My boots were already on their last legs and needing to be replaced within a month or so (three years of love, including wearing them for much walking daily for five-month stretches, will do that to a pair of shoes), so this was just the proverbial nail in the coffin. Hey, at least I don't have to pack them. This totally served a purpose in helping to eliminate the amount of stuff I need to shove into suitcases tomorrow.