I thought I’d take a break from my video essay, which has been going surprisingly well–all I have left to do is record my voice over and I haven’t really run into any issues so far, to do some of the writing assignments people have submitted.

The first one I wanted to do is Lisa M. Lane’s Seven-character Story Treatment. For this assignment, she asks everyone to choose seven characters and develop the plot of the the movie or pilot they’d be a part of. She said she chose seven because she “once heard that all the good (and some not so good) shows have seven main characters is a basic configuration.” How convenient that my closest friends and I happen to be a group of seven hopelessly co-dependent people who would be perfect for a fake sitcom.

Eat Shit and Die (ESAD) follows seven friends, Kaley, Matthew, Jordan, Noah, Kathryn, Ryan, and Rachel, trapped in the historic cesspool Fredericksburg, Virginia. If the gang can’t plan (and follow through with) their escape by May 7, they’ll be stuck there for eternity.

Next, I decided to do a few haiku it up assignments. Sometimes I find myself making up haikus about every day occurrences (seriously…), so I thought this would be fun. I limited myself to the first page of the Daily Shoot or this short break from my video essay would have turned into an all night diversion.

flickr.com/bztraining

Close enough to smell,

why must you taunt me like this?

I just want my treats.

flickr.com/We.Are.Ouisa

Feeling blue today.

Trapped behind glass, made of glass–

Full of emptiness.

flickr.com/aswedlove

Places to go, but

no feet to take us. Life sucks

if you’re shoes like us.

Hmm. Well, those haikus were a bit melodramatic, but that’s sort of been the theme of the night. I think I’ll call it quits on the writing assignments, as fun as they are, so I can go ahead and finish up this video essay. Look for a Blue Valentine video sometime in the middle of the night. I’ve finally watched that movie so many times that it doesn’t make me sob uncontrollably for the last hour any more. This was a concern when I started out because I thought the tears might make the voice over a little difficult.