Vignette Two, perhaps?

    I got a Daily Deviation on Deviantart a couple of days ago while I was away. It was a nice surprise to come home to, I must say. I also got into National Honor Society, which would be exciting if not (basically) everyone that got nominated was accepted. I feel like I wasted time putting effort into the application.
    In any case, school is going pretty well. Better, at least, than it was in the first few weeks of September. Gifted and Talented Seminar, our independent study and thesis class, is a pain, though. Our teacher is having us read William Zinsser's On Writing Well, which would be more aptly titled On Writing the Way William Zinsser Wants You To.  His "bare bones" style of writing frustrates me; at some point he advocates taking out all adjectives and says that in terms of words, "shorter is better." I suppose it works for someone who wants to write about a dog that "jumped over the bridge," but for someone who prefers a dog that, "in a flurry of suicidal rage, flung itself off of the rickety wooden bridge," it seems ridiculous to cut down on adjectives. Don't get me wrong, there is no point in using redundant adjectives describing the "brown" dirt, but getting rid of something that would describe the dirt as being the color of rust? Well, that's just silly.

    But yes, enough literary criticism (I don't even know if it can be categorized as that), and onto some more exciting things. I started writing what might become the second vignette of my play (I really need to get a move on things, I have a lot of December 1st contest deadlines, and it'll be devestating if I miss them), and I hope to get everything finished by mid November, which is hopefully not too much of a stretch. I need to make a chart of deadlines, too, now that I think about it.

    In any case, here's a small preview (it has nothing to do with the first vignette, which is why I might end up just leaving it out and starting something new that fits in with more of a general theme):

(ROSE and MARTHA enter the high school bathroom, both holding purses and books and continuing a conversation that began out in the hallway. The bathroom is decorated with typical blue tiles and cigarette laden sinks, complete with lipstick messages on the wall—“Joanie Rich is a prostitute,” “Alana Carter has a fat ass,” etc.)

MARTHA: She’s such a bitch, I can’t even deal with it.

ROSE: What are you going to do?

MARTHA: (hands here a purse) Here, hold my bag. (fumbles through her pockets) Shit… hold on a second. (grabs the purse and ruffles through it; pulls out a permanent marker) Ah, good.

ROSE: What? What? Let me see, what are you doing?

MARTHA: Just drawing a mural in her honor. (stands up on an upside down garbage can and scrawls something on the wall. Steps back and admires her handiwork once she’s finished.)

ROSE: (reads the writing) “Sarah Campbell was part of the Watergate Conspiracy”?

MARTHA: (beaming) Yep!

ROSE: You didn’t consider writing something more exciting?

MARTHA: Like what?

ROSE: (sarcasm) Oh, I don’t know… “Sarah Campbell caused Pearl Harbor”?

MARTHA: Rose, don’t be upset because you can’t get back at her for calling you a whore.

ROSE: That was in fifth grade, I didn’t even know what a whore was.

MARTHA: (turns to ROSE and raises her eyebrow) Bet you do now.

ROSE: (glares) Stop being such a little child.

MARTHA: Sorry, did I fail to mention that I’m sixteen?

ROSE: (scoffs) I have to pee. Hold my books. (hands MARTHA her books and goes into one of the only two stalls.)

    I'm not sure about where it's going yet; I was thinking Sarah Campbell could walk in and i'd split the stage up into two parts (the bathroom and the stalls). I'm just having a hard time believing I can get this all done in time to send it in to competitions and get it put on at school. Argh!
    Melanie (my co-head editor on our school newspaper, The Dawg Print) and I need to get a move on the first issue of the paper-- I think that we have most of the articles in at this point. The deadline was today, so they'd better be in! I wrote my first column/opinion piece of the year about my quitting Myspace, and I still have to write the editorial by Friday.
    I never even realize how crazy my schedule is until I make posts here. I'll probably tell you all about the USY Leadership Training Convention I went to last weekend tomorrow or something, I should get a move on my AP US homework.

Au revior, everyone!
Charline