writing/ Criminal Minds/ job

Nov. 14 Writing: Today I'm kind of in a bad mood. So that producer Josh Miller finished reading my script. I sent it to him back in March, and he rejected it. Then I sent the new version to him in October, and today he got back to me. He said:

"On a positive note, I think you have a sense of narrative and were able to provide some insight into this sub-culture.

As a critique, your main weakness is dialogue. It is expository, unnatural and you haven't discovered each characters' 'voice.'"

That is the second time that someone told me that I needed to work on the dialogue. Yeah, the truth hurts, but I need to hear that to improve. He told me what Conni Massing said; write shorter stories before you do big ones.

Nov. 15: It did make me think of TV shows like The Sausage Factory. It was on Comedy Network and I loved it back in 2002. There was only one season of 13 episodes, and I watched it multiple times. I even got Patrick into it. However, my sister didn't like it.

It was a half- hour sitcom without a laugh track and they have so much going in a 22-min. story line. It reminds me of how TV shows like 7th Heaven don't have much happening in a 45- min. episode. I also saw that awful Freddie Prinze Jr. movie Down to You on TV. Two hours of nothing happening. It was mainly a string of scenes put together.

Funny: So yesterday I asked Justin this question: "Which is worse? A teenage girl who gets pregnant by accident or on purpose?"

Justin (laughs): On purpose. They're like those girls on those TV shows where they say: "I want to have a baby."
That's another vote for on purpose. My friends Ray, Leslie, Angela and I voted that.
By accident have been chosen by my little brother Patrick, friends Silvia, Jennifer.
Maygen was in the middle saying it was a case by case scenario.

Crazy: I remember reading the "Ripped from the Headlines" thread on twop.com about the show Law and Order: SVU and how they always steal story headlines for their episodes. One post said about throwing in the headline of that 10- yr old boy being a father, and mixing it with Octomom and how he's a father to all 8 of her kids.

Criminal Minds: Here's how to brainstorm. Think of one thing and add a whole bunch of other things into it. I can imagine how I would write a TV show. What if the Behavioral Analysis Unit from Criminal Minds went to my old jr. high school Ottewell? It's about that girl who's in a religion that doesn't allow her to talk to boys. Apparently, the teacher who told one class of students about this girl, the teacher has been murdered and it's a student who killed her.

The reason is that the student wanted to know who the girl was, but since the teacher won't give up that information, she was killed. The BAU unit has to find the girl before the student finds her. The BAU team finds the girl and is able to protect her. However, the student ends up kidnapping another girl, and the team has to find out who the student killer is. They catch the student, however, it's the wrong student. Then later they are able to figure out who the student really is, but the problem is trying to find him and the kidnapped girl.

I don't know about you, if you even watch Criminal Minds, but that is kind of the format of the show. A murder or a missing person occurs. They have to find the killer, protect the next would-be victim, and throw in a red herring and go in another direction. Another crime is being committed at the moment, and the BAU team have to find where it's occurring and be able to stop another murder from happening.

You could say it's too ludicrous to have FBI come. Maybe the Law and Order: SVU team could be handling this case instead.

Nov. 16: Looking back, a good writer asks questions: "Why does he go and kidnap the other girl instead?" Because he found a file on her and what her secret is.

Rant: So I tried to sell my Careless in Red book to Wee Book Inn, but the book wasn't in good condition so they wouldn't buy it.

Job: Well I don't really like this call centre job. I know that if I quit this job, I can never come back. If they fired me, I can't come back. I would be more likely to come back if they fired me, then if I quit.

My mom asked me if I wanted to go to Europe with her and dad. I would have to pay $2000 to go there for two weeks. I would rather go there, than Hong Kong as they often have asked and gone by themselves. She did say that I can't go if I have a good job, and not the one I have now.

I passed out over 100 resumes this year to get this call centre job. I'm probably going to have to start the whole job search again this month to get that bank job. It's a good thing I didn't quit the Soup place because I still like it.

Today at work, I called up this guy, and he started yelling and swearing at me. I told him that he was rude and then he kept disrespecting me. I then hung up in the middle of his spiel.

Afterward:
Rob (supervisor): Tracy.
Me: Yeah, I know.
I had a talk with him and Jaspal.

Winter festival: The other day there was a winter festival at Churchill Square and I managed to watch the fireworks. It was beautiful. I haven't seen fireworks in years.

Sarah Palin: She was on Oprah today. I haven't seen that show in months. SP is alright. She talked about how when she first came out, there was a lot of research done into her past like how the media was able to find out that her daughter Bristol was pregnant though they didn't tell the media.

SP says she likes Levi Johnston, the guy who knocked up Bristol. She says she doesn't like shopping. They showed her house and her family. It was a good ep.

Relapse: I'm going to admit that I watched the first 12 min. of Dr Phil today. It was because my shifts this week are 5pm-9pm and I managed to watch this. It talked about that family way back when the show first came out in 2003. I quit in 2006, and the last I saw of them was where everybody was happy and the issues seemed to be worked out.

Cut to three years later, and the oldest daughter's life is back to being a train wreck. She did get pregnant when she was 15 and kept the kid and raised it as her own. Now she wants a divorce from this guy. This is a sign to stay away from this show.

Nov. 18: I did watch the first 10 min. of Dr Phil yesterday too. However, it was about investigating a rape case where one high school girl Margarita called the cops and saved a girl's life. Then I went to work.

Job search: Today I went and passed out 10 resumes this morning. I did pass them to banks, travel agencies, an insurance firm. I passed them to the same places months ago, but it's good to have tenacity. Pass the resumes the second time around.

I was reminded of CSI: NY. There is this character played by Sarah Carter and how she was trying to get on the team and she passed her resume to them 3 times. She was very persistent.

Job rant: It annoys me that when I didn't have any completes in 3 hours, they send me home. Yesterday, I didn't have any completes, and I was moved to another project so I could get completes and I managed to get 3. I was offered that I could go home at 8:30pm, but I stayed until 8:45pm like I was supposed to. I needed the money.

Yesterday I also worked at the Soup place because they needed me. I got to know the new worker Lisa well. I passed my resume to the World Health Club and they're looking for casual workers. By all means, I could probably end up working there if Malatest keeps giving me these night shifts.

50 Cent: The rapper/ actor 50 Cent was on Conan O'Brien last night. He was funny. Cut to a picture of 50 Cent with Bette Middler.

50 Cent: When my grandma saw that, there was a new energy to it. She said: "That's when you know you finally made it."
The audience laughs.

They talked about his cologne called "Power." Also how he suspects that a guy at the record company leaked his music before the release date.

50 Cent: It's probably a guy who makes $25,000- $30,000 a year, and leaks my music so he could make money off me.
Conan: What are you going to do?
50 Cent: I want to kill him.
The audience laughs.