Monday, February 27, 2006

A Script Query Letter that Worked

This is a query letter that resulted in a couple of dozen requests to review the synopsis or the full script of THE KNOLL FRAMES. One request resulted in a solid relationship that is still moving forward. It also generated a couple of requests to read more scripts. Thought I'd share how brief and to the point it was.
Peggy

Title: 'THE KNOLL FRAMES'

Genre: Suspense/Thriller

Writer: Peggy Eldridge-Love -
plovewriter@gmail.com

Watching the president's motorcade from the
janitor's closet wasn't
exactly what young Myra envisioned.

Neither was spending the next few decades of
her life cowering in fear.

THE KNOLL FRAMES is a suspense-filled thriller
about secrets, pride, deception, greed, and insanity.
It's the story of white lies and small
deceptions becoming national secrets and major
catastrophes. It's what happens when you
underestimate, but what unshakable love can almost
certainly overcome -- almost.

I am a screenwriter who made the semi-finals in
the Chesterfield and the second round of the
Monterey County Screenwriters Competition. This WGA
registered screenplay was a winner of the
CinemaTalk Screenwriters Competition at the Kansas
City Writers Place. I am an award-winning poet
and a produced (staged-reading) playwright.

I can provide the script by either e-mail or
postal mail. If you'd desire
more information, please contact me...

Taking the Hill

Chin in hand, elbows resting on my desk, I realized that I had drifted away for a bit, and, when I returned to the present, it was with a sense of disquiet.

Life has been quite peculiar of late. All manner of difficult to fully comprehend circumstances here and there. Historically, when life begins presenting a host of situations that require more than just passing attention, I'm being prepared for another level of existence - whether I want to be or not. I've certainly hedged before, tried to ignore change, to side-step hard decisions, to sugar coat pain or injustice just so I wouldn't be required to do anything about it. But I try not to stay out there - head buried in the sand - too long now - it's a part of the being authentic thing that I promised myself I always want to be. So, I'm going to just swallow deeply, and listen intently to what my life is telling me. It might be something as simple as lose ten pounds, or it could be something that requires much more disclipine. Regardless, I'm going to be true to myself. Truth and trust go hand in hand,especially when it's with yourself.

Monday, February 20, 2006

Wow!

LiseLotte-Morguefiles.com


You crossed my mind with a wand of color
so rich I spun around in a blur of need
trying to catch a whiff of your
momentary presence.
Thank you.
©2006 Peggy Eldridge-Love - All Rights Reserved

Saturday, February 18, 2006

Watching a Princess Reign

When you encounter someone who just never stops giving you can't help but notice the quality and quantity of their own existence. That's how it is observing Linda Dominique Grosvenor. If she's not creating a venue for aspiring writers to interact and met other writers who are at various stages of their own writing careers (ProlificWriters Yahoo Group), she's teaching new writers the ins and outs of promoting their works (Bestselling Authors Know Promotion aka Guerilla Promote 101), or, most recently, she's giving them a showcase on her newly launched Princess Dominique Show!

The interesting twist to this is that she somehow manages to continue to write and deliver a host of bestselling works of her own. She's the author of The Hamptons, Pretty Boys, Fever, Like Boogie on Tuesday, Sometimes I Cry, and a collection of poetry entitled Love Lingers and a relationship manuscript entitled The Plural Thing. These are some of the works already in print and I know that I've no doubt forgotten something and am aware that there are a few other projects currently in the wings.



She's affectionately referred to as princess by many of us who know her, but I'm compelled to say that this is one selfless lady that long ago graduated to the rank of a Queen.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

Java Caper



I just enjoyed an excellent cup of coffee, probably my hundredth since the great java caper that took place a couple of weeks ago. It occurred on a day when I was short of time, short of patience, and, at the moment, short of ready cash. I remembered at a late afternoon moment that I'd ground the last of my Columbian beads that morning and would be out the following morning unless I broke from my writing and went to buy some. That was a frightening thought.

Two immediate issues arose though. I'd put myself on a budget that I'd already exceeded (I'm trying to focus on saving money now rather than spending it) and not every nearby store offered coffee beans rather than ground canned coffee. Another fact was that recently, even when I traveled to my favorite grocery store, the coffee I preferred was often sold out. I needed to come up with a creative solution that would circumvent unnecessary travel, fit within the cash I had in my weekly reserve, and meet my taste bud's demands. It occurred to me that the closest place might be a nearby hotel/shopping complex known for its trendy shops and restaurants. They had to have a Starbucks, I thought.

Turned out they didn't. Still determined to find someone with some beans I stuck my head in several of the coffee shops and bakeries located throughout the complex. Finally, one young employee said, "oh yes, we sell coffee beads, but I need to call my manager because I don't know how to do it."

I didn't want to create a problem for her, she was in the shop alone, so I told her that was okay, and decided that I'd better just go on to my grocery store and forget my not-so-good idea that I'd find coffee beans in the hotel. Before either of us could speak the "manager" walked in, a nice young fellow, all smiles, and he said he'd be happy to help me. I told him a pound of Columbian would be just fine and then both he and the young hostess revealed that there was another employee who normally handled the coffee beans who was out ill and neither of them really knew what they were doing. He did know the price of a pound though. It was $11.28 and while I paid him he instructed the hostess to go get my beans.

As the cash register rang out my sale she asked him what bag she should put the beans in. He told her one of the white ones. In a moment she came to the cash register with my purchase and proceeded to staple the bag closed but it was so full she could barely close it. I laughed and said, "Oh no, there are far too many beans in there! That's a lot of beans!" The manager just smiled and nodded. "Our problem," he quipped. "We don't know what we're doing, so this is what you get for your money today." He wouldn't hear of my continued protests and ushered me kindly out of the shop.

I'm a keeper, so I had a few vacuum coffee bags of my own at home. When I got there I began to fill a few of them from the now bursting at the seams white bag. A few turned out to be six coffee bags -- filled to the brim. I'd been given no less than eight pounds of coffee for the price of one. It wasn't Columbian, by the way, but it is a divine flavor that I assure you is now my favorite. Still, as much as I enjoy and have enjoyed every cup, I do so with a sense of guilt. But ah, the aroma and taste of this guilty pleasure!

Monday, February 13, 2006

Refreshed and Ready!

I'm excited. I've gotten a project completed that I had no idea was taking up so much of my person. When I put the finishing touches on it in the wee hours of Sunday morning and hit the send button I could literally feel my contenance lift! I've spent time since resting in an unusually peaceful way, then rising with great energy and a zest for polishing and dusting, stirring and cooking, and laughter and conversation.

My next project looms, definitely, but I'm really anxious to get back to it. It has new momentum. Someone is waiting on its completion, and, if I'm capable of putting just the right dash of humor into this otherwise very dramatic screenplay, it will probably be a go. That was the recommendation over a year ago after the screenplay received a very good analysis and recommendation by a key producer. I put it on the shelf at the time behind the just completed project which seemingly was then on the verge of taking off. I am very, very fortunate that the interest still prevails. That surely is not always the case. I won't sit on it this time. I'm more than ready to go!

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Writing Partners

I did the 'restore' thing with my computer this morning. I took it back to the past to a time when my Internet Explorer didn't crash on me every ten minutes and I didn't have the type of deeply intimate relationship I have recently developed with my virtual memory. It's a little eerie really. All the instructions assured me that anything I've done after the date I took it back to would not be affected by this procedure, but my poor computer is in crisis. It doesn't know which end is up!

I really don't have to go through this trauma. I can go downstairs and use my husband's computer, but I don't want to. I want to use this one. This is my comfort zone. All my junk surrounds it. All my favorites are in it, not to mention my addresses, my research links, and the trillion other little nuances that I've taught it this three or four years we've been together.

I'm hopeful that the restoration will buy us a little more time as a couple. I've got about a dozen projects in various stages of development nestled within it that I'd sure like to see through to completion. But, I guess it's time for me to start hinting that it's time for a
new computer
(I didn't want to say that too loud) to friends and family. Maybe if a new one just shows up I won't feel like I'm a betrayer. So, hint, hint, hint. It's just about that time.

Sunday, February 05, 2006

Tom

The real world has encroached and crowded out my worlds of fantasy for now. The unexpected death of a close relative made this a most challenging week. As always with death, I become introspective, and then realize how selfish that response is. I selfishly feel sorry for myself because of how much less of a world mine will be without this loving soul here on earth to love me, I selfishly evaluate the contributions I've made in comparison to the volume of meaningful contributions this loved one made and gave, and I selfishly determine to reach down deeper and come up higher with whatever I think I'm purposed to give and be until my own day arrives. I berate myself for these selfish responses until I remember how often and how intensely Tom and I explored the elements of the lives we were priviledged to live as children of an evolving world, particularly an evolving world of color, and how certain I am the world is a much, much better place because my precious cousin Tom was in it.

Until we meet again...

Wednesday, February 01, 2006

My One Nerve!

Wow! This has been a rough one. Countless little things nipping at my heels like a rabid Chihuahua! Stuff has nearly driven me to the brink this day. It seems as if I drifted off into the land of pettiness, which has to be close to the village of condesention, which is no doubt surrounded on both sides by the sea of mean-spiritedness. The truth is, folk have really gotten on my nerve today!

©Nudgies


For a couple of years I've dealt with a group that consistently implies that you have not done what you say you've done, or have not provided what you say you've provided. They will take you to the mat arguring, signifying, and berating you until you simply provide them with the paper trail that clearly details that every insult they have leveled was unfounded, and that they, not you, are unorganized and inept. This has absolutely nothing to do with money, nothing to do with employment, bills or credit -- this is something voluntary and uncompensated that has other positive ramifications for more than just me -- which is why I continue in it. Today was another bout with the crazymaking nomes. I think I won, but, what an unpleasant battle. Don't know how much longer I'm good for this!

So, having dispensed with them all should flow smoothly, right? Nada! A couple of affiliates apparently decided February 1, 2006 was the date to send out the rah rah letters. Affiliates? I'm not an affiliate savvy type of gal! Heck, these are affiliates that I must have signed up with when I first jumped on the net a dozen or more years ago because I no longer even recognize the email address that they are sending their "you're not making that much money for us" letter to - because it's one that forwarded to a forward to a forward. It has me scratching my head.

When I finally realize I have absolutely no idea who they are or what it was they were selling or even if I'm truly an affiliate, I also realize that I abhor the tone of their letter. Obviously, it's a marriage (if there ever was a marriage) that needs to be immediately dissolved, based on the whinning, and, of course, that is exactly what I do! Now that I think of it, I think these were a couple of people who were around when everything on the net was free, you know, before the net came crashing down around all our feet and a Palo Alto garage that used to rent for $400,000 went back to costing $150 a month.

It's senseless to continue with this complaining, even though these are just a couple of examples of the nonsensical stuff my day contained. I choose instead to salvage some part of this day to tip things back in a positive direction. I'll make myself a late pot of coffee and steep myself in the horrific events of the day on cable news for a few hours. That ought to do it. That ought to make me feel like my problems are few and I have no reason to complain about anything.