That moment of dread

I knew this day was coming.  I may have mentioned that Final Exam, my newest play-in-progress, was inspired by Bennett's The History Boys.  (I'm not going to reread the play right now, but maybe after I have finished Final Exam I'll go back over The History Boys and try to tweak my work in places to make sure I am not lifting anything directly from Bennett.  Along those lines, I think it is all to the good that I have set this play in a posh private school in Toronto (that accepts boys and girls!) and getting into Oxbridge is not really a major concern of the students.  For most of them Trinity College at U of Toronto is what they really aspire to.  That should be enough to set the play apart.  Of course the main themes of Final Exam are literally millions of miles away from the concerns of the boys in Bennett's play.)

Anyway, this weekend I managed to get 10 pages written (the opening scene and the ending), which feels like a very good start. If I can convince enough actors the project is worth pursuing, then I'll pitch this to Seven Siblings.  I only have a couple more weeks, however.  If all these things continue to come together, I wanted to share with the actors a copy of the radio play version of The History Boys, which I taped off BBC radio ages ago.

Well, this no longer exists on my computer or any portable hard drive. (I've lost a couple of computers since that brief moment when I lived in Cambridge!)  However, I know that I burned it to one or two data discs, since I was pretty good about backing up stuff like that.  But this is going to be a complete needle in a haystack search!  I must have well over a thousand data CDs and DVDs downstairs.  I guess I knew this moment would come, but it doesn't make it any easier.

I won't launch the search for a few more weeks, since it is far more important to keep writing and then doing whatever is necessary for the pitch to Seven Siblings, but after that, I'll be down in the basement.  (Maybe it will have warmed up a bit more outside, so it won't be quite so cold in the basement.  It's better than the previous house, however, which really was like an icebox.)

As long as I am doing that, I'll keep an eye for any standard music CDs that have gotten mixed in.  I've tracked almost all of them down, but there are still 5 or 6 that have been misplaced.  So that will be a lot of fun...