I hate it when I have a really great idea and then I misplace it like sunglasses or car keys.
For example, I was heading down the I-35 at 70 m.p.h. to Sulphur, Oklahoma for my weekend yoga retreat when I finally punctured through one of the last remaining blocks on my comedy pilot. As I recall it was a brilliant piece of physical theater that neatly tied in with something in the cold opening. And because of its unarguable brilliance there was no need to write it down. No need, whatsoever. Especially not doing 70 miles per hour in rural Oklahoma, at dusk. I mean if I had had a wreck I would have found myself in a Stephen King novel, and who wants that, especially when you can have a yoga weekend instead? Comedy pilots don't get finished in Stephen King novels, in fact comedy in all its resplendent forms is banned in Stephen King novels. So if a purveyor of fine humor is found trespassing, even by (car) accident in a Stephen King novel the consequences are quite severe. And that's an understatement. Let's just say that Kathy Bates and her sledgehammer is just a warm up. Caan gets off lightly. Seriously, If Jack is all play and no work, where's the story in that? Shelly Duval shivering in a meat locker with a knife makes perfect sense because, a.) meat lockers are cold, and b.) you need a knife to hack off a shoulder of mutton. It's just not scarry, unless you are a vegan. But then you would react with outrage, not fear. You would sublimate all that white middle-class guilt that made you want to be a vegan in the first place into organizing a grassroots campaign. And you would drive to the protest that you and your college buddies organized in the Honda Civic Hybrid that your parents are making payments on, wearing the Simple Shoes your grandma bought you at the mall last summer. And there's just no story in that. None.
