But my faith in love is still devout

Yes, much like Backstreet, I am back. And I daresay the time between posts was much longer than the time between pop releases from the aforementioned Backstreet Boys.

And in the same way we all questioned their whereabouts while they were gone, I'm sure you've been wondering where we've been during our hiatus. You're also probably wondering how far I'll take this whole Backstreet Boys thing.

I'll just say that sometimes online shopping is easier after 35 hours of stress a week than trying to stay creatively motivated and I apologise, dear Readers (Reader). I can't afford to be as creatively uninspired as I have been. Topshop has a new collection...back.

I'm still sort of working on the basic structure of our Great Gatsby homage, so that episode I feel is getting closer to being ready for first draft status. But more character work is required, I feel.

In the meantime, here's some random scribblings and vague, half-formed musings.

I came up with a really lame joke and I thought a character could think it's hilarious, even though it's completely dated.

Remember those 'Jesus is my Homeboy' and 'Mary is my Homegirl' t-shirts? Wouldn't it be hilarious to have a shirt that says, 'Google is my Homepage'? Ha? Geddit? See? Ha - humph.

I get a kick out of awkward situations I'm not really part of, and awkward jokes are quite hilarious. It's why I tell so many of them.

A Short History of the World

Eventually I suppose we'll have to write a pilot and introduce the shit out of our main characters. I've been thinking more about the Gatsby episode and to me that feels like it's episode three or four. Yes, I think about the order of episodes. You gotta, am I right? Am I right?

So, I'm thinking:
We start with Samantha's weird dream (see post with section marked Zonkeys on the Gaza Strip), and we see her room filled with boxes marked 'clothes and shit', 'books and shit,' etc. Then she sees her sister sneaking out of the house to go to school.

Stuff happens, she moves in, blanks to be filled in with the assistance of my colleague.

But I thought: could Sam's stuff end up in another state? Say she splashes out on removalists and they take it to a city interstate with the same name?

the last scenes over the end credits could be of the removal van driving along a country road, stopping at a farm and leaving Sam's boxes on the front verandah?

I had an idea for the structure of the episode. Surely you mean the Three Act Structure, you all cry out. Well, yes, I suppose so, if you want to be boring and...conventional...sigh. No. I mean, how we construct the narrative and by that I mean, which film are we going to steal from to base our episode on.

Could we start with a housewarming party as the frame for the story of how our protagonists moved in, by recounting how each of them got to the party? Yes, a reference to the film Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang. Incidentally, that is what my American friend and I would both like to do to Robert Downey, Jr. The magic of a student exchange really is finding people from all over the world with the same interests.

United States of S

The two characters I feel are different versions of myself are most definitely Samantha and Rebecca. Samantha is the frustrated writer in me, who wants to write but struggles to feel creatively motivated and lives in constant fear that her desire to write is completely unequal to her actual talent. While Rebecca is the unwitting career girl in me, who enjoys the security of a steady income but is frustrated by the monotony of working in a job she's not passionate about, and being drawn into the politics of a workplace she doesn't see herself being part of in the long-term.

I wanted to combine some of my coping strategies - online shopping and Facebook - with the ones I imagine Rebecca would use - like sitting in the toilets and crying on her lunch break. And working in admin, I've come to realise that meetings and forums and office gossip are great material for writers. Just ask Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. I thought that maybe Rebecca's obssessions outside of work would change as each coping mechanism becomes unsatisfying. We were talking about 24 hour gyms and I thought this could be a new thing for her to try. Maybe laughing therapy or Tai Chi as well.

So...I really thought I had more to offer after all these weeks than that, but here we are. End of inspiration. Or is it? I hope not.

Have you always wanted Kraftwerk to cover Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen? Of course you have! Watch this and your dreams will come true.