"I've Got Six Weeks, You've Got Seven Weeks" (With Apologies to Rodgers & Hammerstein)

Earlier this month, I was hanging out at everyone's favorite dive bar with one of my fellow Olympians Festival playwrights. I asked her how the writing was going.

"Well, I'd like to have a first draft finished by mid-July."

"Wait! Isn't your birthday in mid-July?" I said.

"Yes -- I kind of thought it would be my birthday present to myself."

I thought this was a fantastic idea -- and it just so happens that my birthday is also in July, one week before my friend's. So we clinked glasses and made a pact to finish the first drafts of our plays by our respective birthdays.

July is coming up fast, though! We have just six or seven weeks to get this done. And when I realized that, I felt a song parody coming on.

I sent this to my friend last night, but I hope she won't mind if I post it here. By announcing this pact in public, it means that if you read my blog and know me in real life, I want you to pester me about my writing and hold me to my promise. Plus, this may serve as an explanation/excuse for why I'm blogging less these days. Also, I'm damn proud of myself for finding a rhyme for "Pleiades." So, here goes -- to the tune of "Sixteen Going On Seventeen":

We stare, dearest friend,
At an empty page
Which we know that we must write on

Lest we stare, dearest friend,
At an empty stage
When the Festival turns its lights on

So...
I’ve got six weeks, you’ve got seven weeks
To write our Olympians plays
A month and a half
To write a first draft
And finish by our birthdays

I’ve got six weeks, you’ve got seven weeks
I think your idea is wise
We'll write in a hurry
A frenzy, a fury
And then have time to revise!

Six weeks to finish Pleiades
(I hope it will be fun)
In seven weeks you'll be at ease
Joe Ryan will be done!

Here's our deadline
Coming up quickly
And so we mustn't shirk
You've got seven weeks, I've got six weeks
Let's get down to work!