sent from: The High Street, Esher, UK. destination: Long Beach, California, USA

As I struggle to address the number of comments in time to present work to the director next week, feeling the sense of judgement and disappointment as I present ever-improving but not-yet-perfect works in progress, I happened to listen to the screenwriter for Toy Story 3 [Michael Arndt] talk about the long process of shaping the story Pixar had devised into a workable screenplay. It took many months of writing and re-writing, of getting stuck on problem areas, of fortuitous accidents, of tiny inspirations and collaborative ruminations, a process no one would consider unusual. Yet, as I push into areas that could truly be considered largely uncharted waters, somehow progress must be immediate, predictable and utterly without flaw. Something’s wrong with that picture.