Obsession is good.

In the past month I've taken full advantage of the time I've afforded myself in my drastic life changes.  I've read and reread Syd Field's "Screenplay".  I've read and dissected Cormac McCarthy's novel "No Country For Old Men", and Thomas Thompson's "Blood and Money".  On at least one occasion I've done several critical examinations of the following films: "Chinatown", "The Ghost Writer", "The Social Network", "Zodiac", "All The President's Men", "Minority Report", "The Departed", and "Collateral".  I want to be one of the best American screenwriters, and I've been tending to my craft.  By critical I mean that as I watch the film I examine, often times typing out a word document as I watch, to keep track of items such as inciting and key incidents, plot points, narrative arcs, subtexts and how/when they are discussed or integrated, historical context of the film and cultural milieus from which they arose, blocking, cinematography (camera movement, mise-en-scéne), editing, lighting, color schemes, and sound.  Basically, everything.

I've been keeping myself on a steady diet of daily reading and writing of varying intervals.  I'm currently working on two stories, one a feature length script entitled "Raccoon City" and the other a novel, tentatively titled "Polemic", though there is a slightly more incendiary title floating around that a few have heard me mention.  They will be done by the end of August, I promise you that, and I promise myself.

There has to be nothing else but this in order to be the best, and that's what I want to be.  I don't care if I go broke and have to work at a gas station because it's all that's available to support myself, I'm too close now, nothing is going to stop me.  I will have this.