Got some work done this weekend. Good stuff. About 1/3 of the way through the new draft, and finding ways to improve every scene. I’m still averaging about one page an hour.

Today I got an insight into one of the characters, which is always both delightful and startling. A fictional character can sometimes be like a real person: I discover something about them that I truly didn’t know before, total suprise, and the discovery is so CONVINCING that it feels as right as rain. Then I step back and realize, well, it’s all made up anyway; it could be any way I want it to be. But there’s the golden choice that instinctually one can’t argue with.

The new surround system is way awesome. And the fact that it was reletively cheap only makes it more awesome. Yesterday I listened to “More Songs About Buildings And Food” all the way through, and it was so vivid it was almost overwhelming. Classical stuff sounds great too.

To test the limits of the system tonight we’re going to watch “The Towering Inferno.” Andy tried to convince me that “The Poseidon Adventure” would be better, but to my thinking a movie with skyscrapers and fire and Richard Chamberlain on fire cannot be surpassed.

Tomorrow is a workday, alas. Some sort of training for Brandon and I. Blech.

Finished Davy Rothbart’s book of stories. Awfully good. The last story is amazingly sad. I wonder what he’s working on now.

EDIT: My sincere apologies–it is not Richard Chamberlain who catches on fire, it’s Robert Wagner. Richard Chamberlain falls 140 stories to his death.