Silence Will Fall

When you see me next ask, me what happens when a show that has 168 (called) sound cues needs to perform without a working sound program.  SPOILER:  It's an experience.  The story is much better in person with wild hand motions and a myriad of sound effects, or I would post it now.

That's the teaser; the meat of this update is a status report with NaNoWriMo, now that November has started and I've been through a week.  Write or Die is the only way to do it.  As the catch phrase says, it puts the "prod" in "productivity" (I saw that a few days ago and I still find it hilarious).  I always set it to 500 words in 30 mins and sometimes I struggle to make it through and end up with around 400 and sometimes the words just fly from my fingers and I end up with 600.  Interestingly, I usually have more trouble with the first chunk of the day and just fly through the second portion.  This is nice because while I may not have 500 every 30 mins, I consistently have 1000 every hour.

Which is to say in plainer terms, I have been making good progress despite my busy week thanks to the useful tools at my disposal.

I did fall behind my personal goals for the week and certainly fell behind what's "par" for the course, but I still feel good about what I squeezed in and am hopeful for the month as a whole.  What I've written so far is absolute rubbish, but that's the whole point of this thing.  Keep going, no matter what.  I've made a lot more progress in six days than I would have in six weeks if I kept trying to make it unrubbish.  (Please forgive me as I modify an extremely British term for my purposes).  I'm already a winner.  So here are my stats so far copied from the very helpful chart on the NaNoWriMo site.

My Average Per Day: 1,004
Target Average Words Per Day: 1,667
Words Written Today: 2,023 (it was a pretty good day)
Target Word Count: 50,000
Total Words Written: 6,026  
Words Remaining: 43,974
Current Day: 6
Days Remaining: 25
At This Rate You Will Finish On: December 19, 2011 (yes, I know I have some catching up to do, but I think this morning I was poised to finish sometime in January)

NaNoWriMo

I'm diving into a new adventure this year or, more precisely, tonight at midnight.  I decided to participate and am determined to complete National Novel Writing Month, better known as NaNoWriMo.  Every year thousands of people all over the world take the 30 days of November and write a 50,000 word novel.  Every one who reaches 50,000 words wins.  This is one of those situations where a You Showed Up! Prize is quite appropriate, because the goal is steep.  NaNoWriMo focuses on quantity over quality based on the idea that sitting down to write is the hardest part and you can't go very far without a first draft.

I first heard about this in 2005 when a friend threw out the word NaNoWriMo as if it were a common part of the English language.  I thought it sounded cool, but I never had the discipline or motivation to do it and some years I literally did not have the time (I know, I know, you make time, but Cyrano consumed everything).  This year I figured, whyever not?  Let's see what I can do.  I know that I will be starting at a disadvantage since it is tech & performance week on top of my "day job."  November 1, 2, & 3 will be 9:30am to 11:00pm days for me, so I don't anticipate much of a word count in those early days, but the show ends Sunday which should give me the rest of the month to aim high.  I don't really know if I'm prepared or not, never having done this, but I'm hopeful.  If I'm super motivated, I'll post updates meaning my current statistics, not anything more involved than that.

Here are some statistics I need to meet:
Daily Average -- 1,667 words
Week 1 -- 8,335 words
Week 2 -- 11,669 words
Week 3 -- 11,669 words
Week 4 -- 11,669 words
Week 5 -- 6,668 words

(weeks end on Saturdays, except for Week 5 ending on Wed the 30th)

Using Write or Die, I can squeeze 500 words into half an hour.  More realistically, 500 words will take 45mins to 1hour for a total of 75-100 hours throughout the month.  I plan to use Write or Die for that extra push (if you pause for too long it will punish you based on the settings you've chosen -- annoying messages, horrible music, or deleting your text one word at a time) and see how it goes!

Wish me luck, and I'll see you in December.

Johnson City, Texas

Anniversary

It needs to be said:

A year ago today, I graduated from college.


More thoughts to come...

Extreme Makeover: Blog Edition

Hello!  Just a quick note to say that I completely revamped my other blog [scribbles and snapshots] so that it looks a great deal more awesome.  Check it out!

I am also, obviously, playing around with this one as well.  This one was actually a bit trickier to find a good background image.  So my question is, too orange?

USITTTT in Pictures

Lisa and JoJo, my conference buddies

Designer humor... it's the little things in life

Carl and his awesome handiwork

Vending machine at the airport. I still find this incredibly strange.

USITTTT: Day Four

Success!

Stage Expo: There was a continental breakfast at the stage expo, then I decided to tie up some loose ends. One of these ends happened to be me introducing myself to a man I had met briefly when he visited my SM for Christmas Carol who referred me to a different theatre in California who decided to interview me later in the day. The interview went well, one of the best I've ever had, but I was afraid they may not have what I wanted since they were interviewing for internships. However, they have a opportunity for a tour stage manager at a level I would feel comfortable taking on. No promises yet from them or from me, but it's wonderful to have options again.

Session One: Interviewing. Something I'm not that great at, something I don't have a lot of experience with, something I certainly want to improve upon. This session though? Fail. It was poorly organized and became almost entirely question/answer. The questions mostly related to portfolios and resumes which I have a good handle on both. Any interview-related questions were barely answered. For example, one girl asked for go-to questions that the hirers on the panel liked to used. One person gave us a question, then they moved on. Not helpful. There were tiny nuggets of information in the session, but it was far from a gold-mine.

Session Two: Stage Combat. My first major experience with stage combat was over the summer at Shakespeare New Jersey and the fight director was excellent. He trained the actors well and I took copious notes throughout to prepare myself for the show and for future engagements. This session expanded on what he did in practice and showed me just how excellent his direction was. The three panelists were extremely knowledgeable on the subject of stage combat and how it related to us as stage managers. It was almost impossibly well-organized, absolutely informative, and intelligent. Unfortunately, I had to duck out early to make it to the airport on time, but I left feeling good about the new information I had and my understanding of the subject from my previous experience.

Overall, this was a fantastic year to be at USITT. The two best sessions were the very first one and the very last one I attended, which gave a great bookend to the conference. I am so so grateful that I was able to come.

The bus trip to the airport was relatively painless, as was getting to the gate. My flight was flooded with conference people, which was not all that surprising. I am currently in Atlanta (may I mention how absurdly short the flight between Charlotte and Atlanta is?) and in about an hour I will be on my way back to Cali. For now, I am going to land the plane, so to speak, on this blog post so that I can enjoy some overpriced Chick-fil-A before I go. All the best!