That's not funny. Is it?

Last night our writing group met and I took Secret Identity Crisis, my script turned prose story. It’s a bit of a parody and meant to be comical. It’s not something I normally write. In fact, as I’ve mentioned before, my writing group was actually making fun of how tragic my stories usually are. So I guess I thought of myself more as a dramatic writer rather than a comedy writer.
Although, I must admit I love comedy. I think comedy writer’s have to be incredibly intelligent to know what will make a person laugh. Tina Fey is one of my writing role models, and it was actually Mean Girls that inspired me to write Secret Identity Crisis. And for the record, I am not a fair weathered fan. I was admiring Tina Fey long before she was doing an almost scary impression of Sarah Palin.
Anyway, I never really thought of myself as a comedy writer, but I do like to write comedy, I attempt to be funny and sometimes it does make people laugh. I just don’t really think that I’m funny. But I took my comedy story to writing group mostly because I didn’t have anything else finished and I thought I would take a silly story to show them I wasn’t a completely depressing writer. I didn’t really go with high expectations.
What shocked me is the writing group’s love of the story. They thought it was funny and they liked it. One of them said they thought it was my best work thus far. Another said I should seriously look into submitting it because it was so unique.
To be honest I was shocked. I got really excited and started thinking off all the possibilities for it. Maybe I could make it longer. Or maybe it could be a comic book or movie.
Then I realized something. The first story that I got published in a literary magazine was Sweaty Palms, which was humorous, not a serious story. My most favorite thing that I’ve ever written and the story I thought had the most promise of anything I’ve ever worked on was Behind the Naugahyde, a comedy. There were agents who actually wanted to read more after a query.
So maybe comedy is my thing. Maybe I’m not as bad at it as I thought. It’s definitely something to think about.

T.V. troubles

Tonight is t.v. night. Thursday and Monday are the two days a week that I succumb to the calling of the glowing box with people living in it that sucks the life out of all that are entranced by it, including me. When the t.v. is on I get absolutely nothing done and I get hooked. I cannot walk away. So now I just don't turn it on. It does seem lonely without the chatter of others but the radio fills in the silence and allows for focusing on other things.

I'm in love with the Thursday night comedies on NBC and come to think of it the two shows I watch on Monday are on NBC. And I'm excited they're having a green week, which has been pretty interesting.

I know that soon my t.v. nights may resort to reruns. I don't pretend to know enough about the writers strike to give an educated opinion or even a summary. I haven't been keeping up well on the news lately. I do see that Tina Fey seems to be the person they refer to the most. Probably because she's really the only recognizable t.v. writer and that's due to her acting as well as writing.
I love my regular t.v. schedule and I will be completely annoyed by reruns. I also think that generally people in the entertainment industry are overpaid but if actors and directors are getting there fair percentage then writers should too. Where do you start if there's no writing?

So I'm off to watch 30 Rock. I know some people may not agree but I think Tina Fey is a hilarious writer. And it seems to be rare to find funny women that make it anywhere, not that women aren't funny they just don't seem to get as far in their comedy careers.
But regardless of who starred in Mean Girls it was hysterical and true. I really appreciated the sketches and comedy that were more aimed at women when she wrote for SNL, like the Barbie sketch where they joke about the giant brush and Barbie losing all her shoes. I doubt many guys would understand it.

Well anyway, I hope it gets worked out so the world doesn't go mad from reruns. Although, I'd probably get more done if shows went into reruns. But then again if it was a particularly good episode I'd just watch it anyway so maybe not.

Frustration and anonymous poetry

Today I heard back from the magazine that had given me a list of things they didn't like about my story. They offered me the chance to change them and send it back. I changed nearly everything they had suggested because most things made sense. I did keep a few things that I thought made the story what it is.
I opened the letter and found another set of comment sheets signed by the same people as last time. What did they say? Good story but here's what we don't like about it. As I read further I imagined they would say something about the part I didn't change but I was wrong. They didn't even mention it. They just made a whole new list of things, none of which were in the last letter. And to be honest they were very vague things like "a few paragraphs don't flow well".
It's really great that they give feedback because most people don't. I just think that sending someone a list of comments and saying "fix these and we'll reconsider" and by reconsider we mean giving you lame excuses and more things we dislike, is a little confusing. If they had wrote back and said they didn't think I changed enough or had mentioned the part I didn't change I would be okay but don't say "this part sucks and I, as an editor, didn't notice it before". I guess mostly I just don't understand. Well, actually, I do. It's a crazy business but it is still frustrating.
My complaining probably sounds ungrateful and unreasonable, if it makes sense at all. I'm just annoyed.

On the other hand I did something a little odd. I know several times I've mentioned poetry and how I don't get it. Mostly I don't understand the "techniques", but with all art I believe it is the message, not the skills and training, that matter more. And every now and then I have something to say that isn't a short story or comic book. I'm not sure what it is . I just write it and it kind of seems like poetry. Anyway, it's not my goal to get it published I just have something to say. So I joined one of those on-line poetry websites in hopes of getting some feedback. I'm not going to say my pen name or which site because I'm not brave enough to let people who know me read it. I know that sounds weird but that's me.
The only problem is that I feel to get feedback I should give some. I'm horrible at commenting and as I've mentioned many times before I don't know poetry. I guess I'll just have to comment on the message I get from the poetry. To me, that's the most important part anyway.

Just watched: 30 Rock (Tina Fey is one of my heroes!)