blog: inspiration from a web series called "Feathers & Toast"

It's nose to the grindstone here. A psychic told me that I'd be stepping into a "100 mph zone" in April and how can that happen if I'm still sitting at my desk?

So I'm working away on the rewrite (as are Mr. Green and William M. Hoffman when it's their turn) and it feels like we’re getting close to having a draft to take out on the road (trumpet fanfare)!

One of the few diversions I permit myself is to watch other shows for inspiration. Feathers & Toast is a charming, intelligent and completely unique web series. It's the craziest version of a 'cooking show' ever. (Talulah teaches you how to do things like poach an egg and make 'hot water, lemon and honey'.) Meanwhile all hell breaks loose on screen and behind the scenes.

Feathers & Toast has texture, wit, style and the tone of an I Love Lucy show all in around five minutes an episode and its creators, Mhairi Morrison and Holly Payberg, are in the process of pitching it as a half hour comedy show for tv. I'm putting my money on their getting a deal. Take a look!

(Now just in case you want a second opinion from someone you trust, Mr. Green is a huge fan of Feathers & Toast. Click on the first video below, which is only 111 seconds long.)

Go Big or Go Bust: Ready or Not, Here I Come With My Pitch

Now that I've memorized this pitch and gotten the go-ahead from both Mudd Lavoie and Mr. Green, I'm unstoppable. Sheila invited me up to her place:

Scott listened to half of my pitch in person and then the whole thing on the phone.  Roni came over here and let me try it out on her.  Mr. Green told me to stop practicing, that I was going to ruin it.

I never took the obedience vow when we got married so Mhairi Morrison and Holly Payberg of Feathers & Toast and I pitched to each other over Skype. As you can see, we had fun.

L to R Holly Payberg, Mhairi Morrison and me, the wee person over in the corner

There's still more writing and memorization for questions I may have to answer but it feels like I'm in the home stretch.

I'll keep you posted.

Meanwhile, early Valentine's Day present from me to you if you scroll down a little and click the Like button ...  (this is just a picture of it.... the one to click is a little further down the page)

And, if you want to leave a comment and run into any problems, here is advice from the people who run Squarespace:

Thanks for checking in and cheering me on!

Go Big or Go Bust: Day 236 (on social media for the socially challenged and advice from Feather and Toast's Holly Payberg, Glossi Girl's Stephen Dimmick and Mudd Lavoie)

With two twitter accounts, two facebook, two instagram, one tumblr, two youtube, a Seed&Spark, Vproud, vimeo, stumbleupon, pinterest, reddit, linkedin, ello, digg, myspace, metacafe, daily motion and more, you'd think I have A) an army of interns B) the body of Kali or C) mental health issues. 

The answer is D) None of the above.  I'm simply a misguided and exhausted producer trying to get some traction.  

When we started making The Louise Log, I'd upload an episode to youtube and send the link to my address book.  If people are interested, I figured, they'll watch. 

Sometime in 2008, groaning that there wasn't time for the rabbit hole of facebook, I joined up only to be browbeaten (thank you Mary Jander) into getting onto twitter.  And so began my life on social media.

Only thing, I have this little issue with being a workaholic and was treating all this like 'media', forgetting about the 'social'.  In real life I have friends, none of whom I see enough of anyway cause if you're a control freak making a low-budget web series, you basically don't have time to sleep. 

My habit was to, once a month, post the links to the new episodes and call it a day.  Sure I'd talk back to people who talked to me if I happened to notice, but my attitude was that all these social media sites were billboards, places to put up the videos.  The 'social' aspect of it seemed like icing on the cake, fine for the teenagers who had nothing better to do than avoid doing their homework.  I was busy being my own production studio.   

My dear old friend Stephen Dimmick advised me (in his gorgeous Australian accent): "Anne, it's a converSAtion." My coach and advisor Mudd Lavoie encouraged me (to the point of hoarseness) to talk to people on facebook and twitter for at least fifteen minutes every day.  "You can't find half an hour??" And the answer to this day, I say red and shamefaced, more often than not, is 'not always'. 

I intend to!  I've even come around to wanting to.  At this point, I know a lot of not only cool but generous and amazing people through social media.  People I've never met.  People whose work I love and admire.  And believe me, I want to have started this new program of being active on social media yesterday (naturally).

The problem comes down to three issues: poor impulse control, difficulty with transitions and an inability to let go/perfectionism.  Whatever the job is, this blog, yesterday's photo shoot, a phone conversation --  even with my little egg timer ringing, with the alarm on the phone going off, the days get away from me almost every day.  Whatever activity I'm involved in, I'm 'finishing it up'.  And then it's past bed time. 

Holly Payberg of the wonderful web series Feathers and Toast wrote a very clear and smart step-by-step approach to succeeding on social media this week.  I recommend that you read it.  And having now bared my soul about my anti-social social media behavior, am hoping I will change tomorrow once and for all.  Tonight, even!  Crossing my fingers.