Refills

[donteatpoop]

So one of us at least is getting some writing done.

Here is what I have so far. Check it out at your convenience. This one, guarunteed, will be finished. How can I guaruntee it, you may be asking; especially when looking at my track record...

Well, because it's already finished in a notebook. I'm just converting it and editing it, adding and subtracting as I see fit.

Let me know what you think so far. I'll be updating this almost nightly.

[Leblanc4prez]

Sweet. i wish I had as much drive as you... I suck...

[apotheosis]

I suck...

That's what she said.

[xnull]

"Published Author", That's what Baconfuck said.

You do realize your status, Apoth...

[Leblanc4prez]

That's what she said.

Who?

Was she hot?

[donteatpoop]

I added another decent chunk to it last night. Will add more this evening.

I figured, since you're all asking about it; that I'd give you some background on the play. This is sort of like the BEHIND THE SCENES of writing it.

This script is actually a merger of three other ideas I had been toying with.

The first idea, which was to be called "Bar Flies" was going to be about a few guys who hung out in the bar all the time, making wise cracks and what-not. And Amish guy was going to show up and they (or at least one of them) was going to mock him, and eventually there would be a conflict between them and the Amish guy, and the Amish guy would whoop their asses. And in the end they would become friends with the Amish guy. The problem with Bar Flies is that I couldn't come up with anything else. I couldn't figure out what they would talk about, and I couldn't come up with anything else to occur, except for maybe a massive bar brawl ending when someone launches a barstool through the window. But that was it. So I set the idea on a mental shelf and came back to it every now and then to see if I could find a knew twist to throw into the plot.

The second idea I had, which did not have a title; was going to be about a guy who was about to propose to his long time girlfriend, but when he shows up to her apartment on a surprise visit, he discovers that she is cheating on him. (a dude wearing nothing but a towel around his waist answers the door). This leads the protagonist into a long period of depression. Admittedly this is not the most original concept, but I wanted to play with that genre a bit and see what sort of twists I could throw in to make it unique. Unfortunately, aside from rampant drug use; I couldn't come up with much of anything. I breifly toyed with making him a painter who painted beautiful landscapes, but turned to a darker and more twisted artist after the break-up; but I quickly tossed the idea out because I felt that it detracted from character interaction and would also add a boring "look at my art" aspect to the story. Much like Bar Flies, I couldn't come up with much of anything to add to the plot, and I shelved it next a multitude of other ideas.

The third idea, which was meant to be thrown as an added twist into something and was not intended to stand on its own at all; was the Taco Bell "free refill" gag. I wasn't sure what I was going to use it with, and I figured it would only take up one or two scenes. Clearly I was wrong on this, as you will see as I continue to write Refills. I put the idea on the shelf.

One night a brainstorm tore through my head, scattering the neat piles of papers that I had on my shelf all over the place. I tried to put them back together, but when I did I found that I they were too mixed up and intertwined to ever become seperate again. I took out a notebook and wrote the outline in one night (32 pages, my hand cramped like a mother fucker), some scenes I filled in a few lines, other scenes I just wrote shit like "he gets a refill, guy behind the counter bitches, he leaves".

Then I started filling out the details. I dropped the "Catches her cheating" aspect of it, in favor of using an ending that would tie directly to the beginning. I used the "depression" as a reason for them to hang out in the bar. And I used the Taco Bell thing, which ended up not only taking up a good six or seven scenes, but contributed (in part) to the title. The title is also meant to imply a sense of 'rebirth' that can only happen when someone decides to pick themselves back up off the ground and start walking again.

One more note that may be of interest. The "set" of the story actually takes place in a house I used to live in back when I was a bachelor. The house sat on a corner in a small town, there was a bar directly beside it, and across the street was a business with a large parking lot. For the sake of the story, I have converted that story into a Taco Hut (went with Hut rather than Bell just in case they try to pull some royalty bullshit).

This house is the "Big White House in McDonald" that I have referred to in the "tales from our collective past" thread.