Mind of Migg

This'll be getting plenty of use the next few months.

Working two jobs isn’t very difficult, especially when they are in entirely different industries. I’ve been able to easily balance life between Tulsea and the day job without one affecting the performance of the other. This only works because I fit production work in wherever I can, responding to emails here and there, reading scripts after work, and staying up late when I need to. The flexibility allows me to do both.

It becomes completely different when I’m writing though. I have a great story that was supposed to be a rough draft script by now. The problem is, I can’t write tidbits of content here and there throughout the day. It really isn’t possible to sit down and write for 10 minutes, walk away, and write for 10 more the way I could with, say, an email.

Now I have the challenge of writing an entire script while working full time during the day. Sure I’ve done some TV scripts for fun since returning to work, but this one is much more involved. I’ve never written a feature while holding down a day job. So I’ve set up a couple rules to make sure I don’t go crazy trying it.

1. Set specific writing times

This should be a given regardless, but when I wasn’t doing anything but writing, I had the luxury of moving my times around. If I wasn’t feeling it in the morning, I’d do something else and then write in the afternoon. No more. 8pm to midnight are my new hours.

2. Set rough deadlines

Writing deadlines are always tough for me. If I know when something is due, I will wait as long as possible before getting it done. But if I tell myself I should finish Act I by the end of next week, it’s a little flexible. Maybe I’ll reach Act II by next Thursday, or maybe I’ll wrap up Act I next Saturday. It’s open, but I still have some general direction.

3. Don’t overdo it

I plan to allow two late night writing sessions a week, where I can write until the crack of dawn if I’m on a roll. I’m not going to force myself to stay awake, but at least on those nights, I can let the story take its time. The other nights of the week I plan to be in bed at a reasonable hour (if we count 1am as a reasonable hour).

4. Take breaks

I’m not going to have a whole lot of time, but if every waking moment is spent working, I’ll go crazy. On my non-late night nights, I plan to get in some good reading and watch a couple of movies (while also catching up on Dexter. I’m halfway through season 3). I’ll also get in some writing once or twice a week unrelated to the script. There are a couple side projects that I’m very excited about working on once this draft is done and getting a head start on those would be nice.

5. Drink lots of coffee Stay healthy and energized

I will limit my caffeine intake as best I can, maybe even try to exercise or go for walks to keep the energy up, but I won’t make any promises. I’ve never written a feature script under these conditions.

These are 5 simple rules to juggle work with writing. Overcoming writer’s block, online distractions, and a swelling fear of self-doubt – those are topics for other blogs. But at least I’m set to take these next two months head on. This may be rough.

We were really sad to leave Redondo.

Moving sucks. The cost to pay people to move all your junk (a lot of which should’ve been thrown away years ago) far outweighs the savings of doing it yourself. If only I had the money. Sadly though, I didn’t. So we moved, for the third time in three years.

When we left a place we really loved in Redondo Beach back in 2008, we moved everything into storage. That’s easy, you throw everything into boxes and you’re done. Violet lived with Britt and Andrew for three months and I spent time in Phoenix, Santa Fe, and couches (rough time, long story, involved a three month job in Vancouver that fell through).

We found our new place in West LA and only had to transfer big boxes out of storage to the new place. A year later, we moved from a one bedroom, to a two bedroom two doors over. That didn’t even require packing. We mostly just carried things here and there over the course of a week.

So we may have done a lot of moving, but it was never really “moving”. Until this recent move, we never had to load up, unload, pack, and unpack, all at once. It’s exhausting.

West LA was never our style. It’s crowded, loud, and expensive. Moving back to South Bay was always in the back of our minds as Violet was finishing up at Pepperdine. When our plan of moving somewhere new, like New York or San Francisco didn’t happen, we knew we were still moving.

A move allows a chance to make a fresh start. Unpacking allowed me a chance to go through reminders of road bumps overcome along the way:

• My acceptance letter to the Chapman School of Film and Television for 2004, and provisional acceptance for 2005, neither of which I was able to accept.
• Bottle of anxiety medicine to help me sleep post-accident back in 2004. I saved the last pill to prove to myself that I didn’t need it.
• My 8^th grade short story assignment – 3 pages were required and I turned in a 20 page story.
• The first chapter of two other stories I started as a freshman in high school.

Strangely reassuring to see little mementos I saved to remind me of my passion and motivate me to get healthy. Strange too to see snippets of my writing style so early in the few pieces I did when I was young. A little sad that I stopped writing altogether after those unfinished stories until five years later when I realized economics wasn’t for me.

Now that the new place is unpacked and livable, I’ve realized I don’t need to save everything. The writing samples are fun, but the painful motivators are no longer necessary. I read a quote earlier today, from a screenwriting motivation blog:

“Finishing unfinished business casts us into the next phase of our lives.”

A new place let’s me do that. A few letters to send out, a few things to throw away, a new phase to start. It’s good to be home.

There’s a couple quotes floating around about what to shoot for, but I find it best to stick with the original:

“If you shoot for the stars and hit the moon, it’s ok. But you’ve got to shoot for something. A lot of people don’t even shoot.”

This quote is saying that if you aim as high as possible, you can still end up hitting something pretty big. The other version is:

“Shoot for the moon and if you miss you will still be among the stars.”

This one is saying to aim for something big and far (but not the biggest or furthest) and you’re bound to hit something large.

The original gives a sense of having a plan, the other sounds like throwing ideas out hoping to strike it rich. So it should be no surprise that the original comes from Confucius and the latter comes from a motivational speaker. When you aim as big as you can, you can hit nice big things along the way, but if you aim big, hoping to hit anything and become a star, then you’re bound for failure. You have to have a plan, especially when you have big goals.

Don’t expect one swing of the bat to get you there

There’s nothing wrong with singles. So don’t step up to your first major league at bat, or even your first AAA at bat for that matter, thinking that all it will take is one swing to hit the longest shot out of a stadium. You’re not going to write the most epic script ever your first time opening Final Draft. You’re probably not going to make the highest grossing film of all time in your first attempt.

That’s not to say you shouldn’t expect a home run. But even if you do, hitting a single home run doesn’t guarantee you a spot in the Hall of Fame. Maybe that night’s highlight reel, but not much else until you produce over many seasons.

My point is, you can’t swing for the fences from the start without appreciating the ability to get a lucky slap single, hit a nice double to the gap, or even be the ultimate team player and take a sacrifice. If you think all or nothing, you’re likely going to end up with nothing.

Know what it takes to have a successful swing

Worse than going for nothing short of a long bomb is doing so without knowing how to swing a bat. You can’t assume that just by reading up on how to swing a bat means you know what you’re doing. This is true even if you think all the other players are swinging it wrong. They’ve still spent countless hours taking batting practice. Sure the theory of your swing may be genuis, but you won’t know until you take a couple of live pitches. When you stand in that batter’s box for the first time, don’t lower your expectations, but respect what it takes to simply get a hit.

There’s no shortcut to the moon.

It’s a long way up there. Further even to the stars. Moving away from baseball analogies and into NASA, think about it this way: we can’t get the stars until we get out of our solar system. We can’t get to Mars until we can comfortably get to the moon. And we couldn’t get to the moon until we could make it out of orbit. There’s a path to greatness. Yes, you should aim for the targets way out there, but have a plan for the steps along the way.

Shooting for the stars doesn’t mean you take one giant whiff after another. It means you have a plan to lofty goals. You need to have the guts to take the chance, but you also have accept that it’s a long process. That’s why it’s not so bad to wind up hitting the moon, when you realize how far away it truly is.

Goodbye Tennant, hello Smith!

David Tennant was my Doctor. Sure, Christopher Eccleston paved the way for the reboot, but I saw most of season 2 before season 1. So I was all about Tennant. I was skeptical heading into series 5 that things would never be the same.

Then Matt Smith made me smile after a tragic regeneration scene to finish the 2009 specials. I tried to stifle the smile, not wanting to appear a traitor to Tennant. It nearly worked, except that the series 5 teaser trailer blew me away. I found myself excited for Doctor Who all over again.

The season premiere episode did a great job of defining the new quirks of the Doctor and companion as well as paying homage to the previous Doctors. It was a strong episode and had the Steven Moffatt flair for adventure that I was hoping to see in the new season. It’s hard to describe how I felt about this season – it was familar, but different. Actually, I guess that wasn’t so hard.

Moffatt appears to go more for entertainment value, less for dramatic epicness the way Russell T Davies did. I love both approaches so it’s hard to choose a favorite, but I do miss some of the moments where Tennant’s Doctor would stand up and save the universe with a wink and a nod. Smith’s Doctor prefers to point out he’s brilliant in smaller doses and is much less cheeky about his actions while saving the universe. Still, he has that Doctor charm.

My favorite episodes, in no particular order:

• The Eleventh Hour – Great intro to the new Doctor and new companion.
• Amy’s Choice – The Doctor holds a mirror up to his darkest side.
• The Hungry Earth – Excellent characters and lots of suspense and adventure.
• Cold Blood – A strong finish becomes tragic with a crazy surprise ending.
• Vincent and the Doctor – One of the most touching episodes of Who I’ve seen. I dare you to not choke up a little at the end.
• The Pandorica Opens – All kinds of epic. Sets up a great finish to the first season of the Matt Smith/Steven Moffatt era.

Of course, there’s things I didn’t like about this season. Sometimes it felt like the ‘science’ aspect of the ‘science-fiction’ was sacrificed in the name of entertainment. A few of the episodes felt a little to rushed, or problems too easily solved, like in “The Beast Below”, “Victory of the Daleks”, and “The Lodger”. And don’t get me started on the finale.

I think paradox’s are fun when used sparingly but I felt the paradox used to get the Doctor out of the Pandorica was a huge cheat. For all the setup of the outstanding previous episode, I was let down by the finale. Strange too, that I had no problem accepting that one word, connected by a psychic link can defeat the Master, but when Amy uses her memory to bring the Doctor back I was disappointed. Maybe the entertainment over science? Maybe the low key epicness? Maybe I’m not fully connected to these characters yet? Maybe a lack of execution? I can’t decided so I’m going to go with all of the above.

Make no mistake, despite my criticisms I loved this season. It has a strangely nostalgic feel. The way so many shots were framed and just the overall vibe of the show feels like a throwback to the older seasons. I’m excited that the mystery of “the silence” wasn’t solved this season and along with the mystery of River Song, will unfold over the course of next season. It’s nice to have a sense of continuity with all these new characters. And one more thing…bow ties are cool!

Well, you don’t have to be your job, if you don’t want to. A few months back, I was speaking to a friend who had recently been laid off. Here’s how the conversation went down:

Him: “So how’s it going?”

All I need - headset, coffee, and a reminder that the job could be much worse.

Me: “Well, I have a job.”

Aaaaand, cringe. Only I didn’t mean it to be rude. It was a sigh of resignation because I had recently returned to a “day job”. The way I meant it was that things weren’t going so hot for the stuff I truly had a passion for. It was one of those moments where I wished I could hit “undo” on the words coming out of my mouth. (side note: my friend is brilliant and has since found a job that is not only better than his previous one, but he found the time to do some amazing writing work and come up with a great concept for a new feature during his time between jobs.)

Being a creative person who needs a day job to make ends meet is tough. Too often, we are labeled by the positions we have. We allow it to define us. But that’s not fair. I can still call myself a writer, even if the only time I’m writing is when I stay up late, get up early, and spend weekend afternoons struggling to get in writing time because I have to work 40 hours a week in a completely unrelated field.

Many times I would doubt myself. I’d hesitate to refer to myself as a filmmaker or a writer because I didn’t feel I had “made it” yet. That is backwards thinking. You don’t need an external measure to decide who you are and what you do. I write, so I’m a writer. I make films, I’m a filmmaker. I recruit financial advisors (which I do well and don’t mind), so I’m also a recruiter. And that’s not the end of the world.

Even if the job you have is your dream job, you eat, sleep, and dream it through other actions. If all I did was write and make movies, eventually I’d run out of things to share. My life would be confined to such a limited scope. I’ve realized that trying to fit work into every waking hour is counterproductive to my goals. So I travel. I play sports when I can. I cook. I read (scripts and books). I try things outside of my comfort zone because when I look back, I almost always tell myself, “yeah, that was worth it.” Even when it’s not worth it, the experience gained becomes hindsight for later stories to tell.

People are more than the work they do. Having a mundane job, an exciting job, or not having a job at all doesn’t determine personal success and satisfaction. There’s a lot more to it than that. Experience. Share. Cringe. Have fun.

This guy knows how to engage.

One of the great things about an iPhone (besides all the awesome apps) is that when you have one, you can always look busy.  Or at least give the appearance of being busy.  Ok, it really doesn’t fool anyone, but when you’re the one standing alone in a corner because you’re incredibly shy it helps give peace of mind.

I used to think this shyness was only the result of preferring the written word to the verbal one, but then I realized I even do it online.  I hesitate to comment on blog posts I read, I retweet people I admire, but don’t make an effort to speak to them directly, and I even keep my blog in it’s own quiet corner.  I don’t promote it, I don’t talk about it, and I’ve just quietly written personal notes here and there without really letting anyone know.

That all is going to change.  I’ve redesigned this site to be a little more organized and speak to an audience.  I really don’t expect the audience to grow beyond its two regular readers on its own either.  That will be the biggest difference.  Too often it’s easy to become passive in life, thinking a break will happen on it’s own.  I forget that things are only going to happen if I actively create my own big breaks.

One of the most important and inspiring things I took away from the (DIY)stribution and Marketing Symposium at the LA Film Festival a few weeks ago was the need to engage – engage an audience, engage other filmmakers, engage anyone who will listen.  It started with Ted Hope’s talk and became a word used several times over the course of the weekend.  It really resonated with me.

So this new launch of my website is the beginning of my attempts to engage.  I’ve got cool categories on my main page, mostly focused on film and writing.  I’ll still throw in the occasional post about the Phoenix Suns or what I’m doing over the weekend, but they won’t even necessarily pop up on the homepage.  I saved some of my favorite posts from the last two years, although I apologize to anyone who’s commented, because I couldn’t save those when I moved to WordPress.

It’s not going to be the little blog in the corner anymore.  I’m going to be more active in engaging in real life and that will give me more experiences that I won’t hesitate to share.  I will make an effort to engage with like-minded people, not just through writing this blog, but through as many outlets as I can find the time for.  No more hiding behind a phone, absentmindedly checking my email every minute.  Nope, I’m going put the phone away…and then continue standing in the corner, but slightly closer to the crowd.  One step at a time.

When I was a freshman in college, I had an internship that I walked away from because I was unsatisfied.  The internship was through an organization dedicated to placing talented minority youth in business positions.  I walked away because I felt it was training interns in how to be middle management, instead of truly successful leaders.  I wanted more.

Read more…

The annual NALIP Conference is this weekend.  NALIP is the National Association of Latino Independent Producers.  It’s a group that has been a huge support in my development as a filmmaker.  I attended their Writer’s Lab in 2008 and their Media Market where I was able to practice pitching my project in 2009.  This is also the fourth conference I’ve attended.  And yet, there was something not quite right while I was there today.  I’m not sure what it is, but I have a bit of an idea.

Read more…

I failed completely in my first attempt at NaNoWriMo last November.  I barely completed two chapters and maybe a few thousand words.  Actually, let me see how sad my word count really was…still looking…saved them as separate documents…there it is…3024.  I also wrote three chapters, not two.  Still, a sad performance.  But I loved the idea of trying to write an entire novel in only one month.  After the poor first showing, I felt the need to redeem myself.  What better way than to return to the familiar – screenwriting.  Yes, it’s time for Script Frenzy!

Script Frenzy follows the same idea as NaNoWriMo, only the goal is to write an entire screenplay in one month instead of an entire novel.  Difficult for some, easier for me.  Okay, let’s be honest, a script rough draft is easier to spit out than a novel.  There’s less pages in a script and the more white space on your page, the better.  Does that really make it easier?

At first I thought it would.  Then I remembered exactly what I enjoyed about branching out to fiction pieces the last few months.  You can wander more and feel your way around a longer piece.  Nobody flips to page thirty of a novella to see if there’s an act break.  Writing a script requires some form of outlining and structure.

Unfortunately for me, I didn’t get into much outlining.  I’m going to wing it.  I focused more on my new writing playlist than I did on my plot points.  A mistake?  Only time will tell.  I have two characters, a mood, and a few ideas.  And a shade under two hours before April 1 to OUTLINE LIKE CRAZY.  We’ll see what happens.

Two days is a long time to go without meat, let alone two weeks.  Violet and I decided to try it anyway.  We finished up a two-week period with no meat in our diet (save one exhausted night where I failed to associate a can of tuna with meat and mixed it in with pasta and vegetables, but that doesn’t count).

Why did we do it?  The basic idea was that we want to reduce the amount of meat in our diet.  Don’t get me wrong, I love meat.  LOVE IT.  But we’re making an effort to follow Michael Pollan’s general rule, “Eat food.  Not too much.  Mostly plants.”  Too often, when we don’t have meat available as the centerpiece of a meal, we opt to go out instead of creatively throwing vegetables together to make a dish.

We wanted to try some new vegetarian dishes and get used to less meat.  The first week was a lot of fun.  I made risotto, butternut squash chipotle soup, and eggplant Parmesan.  Violet made an awesome meatless chili with cornbread.  Then I got the new job, we didn’t go grocery shopping over the weekend, and the second week turned into a long craving for our meat on Saturday.

Being a vegetarian requires some thought and prep to have filling food available.  Mixed greens don’t cut it, especially from fast food places I ended up going for lunch in my first week at work.  I didn’t necessarily eat healthier, but I think my stomach adjusted to smaller portions and I realized that a veggie burrito isn’t all that terrible.  We had Indian food multiple times.  It was the easiest place to go with vegetarian food that wasn’t just a salad or mixed vegetables.

Finally, Saturday arrived and my mouth watered imagining the steak I’d be eating at Victor and Gen’s wedding reception (sidenote – awesome wedding.  Had a blast.).  Before the meals, there were appetizers, so my first taste of meat after two weeks was actually some grilled chicken on stick.

It was fantastic.  The first thing I noticed was the texture.  I’d never had an appreciation for the texture of meat.  The flavor was great.  It was like eating a special treat.  And that’s the way we’d like to keep it.  Not only is it healthier, it means we can afford to buy meat that’s organic and all natural.  Our plan is to have higher quality meat only two or three times a week.  We hope this helps in building good habits for better food in general and healthier eating habits.

On a related note, there is a new show out, “Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution”.  It airs Friday nights on ABC.  I turned it on by chance and instantly became hooked.  The basic premise is Jamie’s desire to teach children about food and healthy eating.  You can watch him outline his wish at his TED prize talk here: http://www.ted.com/talks/jamie_oliver.html.