It’s amazing how a couple of days can change things.

One day I’m sat there having a laugh and a joke with Paul about being his PA for the evening’s performance of Spaceboy – which for the record I thought was absolutely incredible – and within a couple days I’d taken on the role as part of Paul’s ‘Summer Internships’ programme!

I guess I’d better tell you a bit about who I am for those of you who don’t already know.

My name is Tom Fidler, I go to Riverside Youth Theatre and am a keen actor – though doesn’t necessarily mean I’m any good – and met Paul there nearly three years ago.

We’ve been good friends since.

It was really the idea of getting into play-writing that allowed me to help to help Paul in the position I am now, and I will, in the future, write some plays with added expertise from some playwright called PAFoster…

But that’s for another time, this is Paul’s blog and so from now on I’ll keep it about him and my role as his PA for the summer.

When my exams are finished I will have all the the time in the world and hopefully the added assistance of a Macbook Pro to help me along with assisting Paul and keeping you up-to-date with any progress either on new or existing projects.

With my (and Pete’s) internships underway, there will be some changes to the way things are done, so to keep up-to-date on projects and any important information on the play front then I recommend you become a fan of the facebook page PAFoster – Playwright and also follow @PAFoster on Twitter.

My friend Pete (*PW) and I (*TF) will be tweeting as well as Paul on all things PAFoster-Playwright related.

Paul’s personal twitter is now @FuckingMangoes which incidentally is the name of the latest play Pete and I will get a sneak preview of on 26th June, and not some sort of sexual fruit fetish, lol.

Oh, and you can of course follow me on twitter too if you like: @TomFidler

Anyway, be sure to look out for my posts and tweets in the future, but until then, this is it for my first blog post at PAFoster.com.

I have to say if you’ve read this far, you’ve done well (and so have I, lol) as in all honesty blog posts aren’t my speciality considering I’ve only ever posted two before.

Until next time, sayonara!

So here it is: http://www.facebook.com/pafoster.playwright

And if you haven’t already, please become a fan!

I’m going to do the same. Facebook and Twitter are permanently there in my browser, and I’m always checking them, ‘liking’ something, commenting on something else, and updating my status, replying to a tweet, or adding my own pearls of wisdom for my followers.

I enjoy it, and when I’m in a normal frame of mind, that’s cool, but I have to write.

I’m in the middle of writing a new full length play. There’s loads in my head, and I really need to get it out. And although I can write and multi-task to certain extent, I often find myself checking something online, researching etc. And whilst there, it is too easy to click the facebook bookmark, or indeed twitter and just check in with the world.

And then, well I get distracted, and before I know it I’ve lost my train of thought and find it difficult to get back into the scene I was in the middle of.

My full length play is my ‘graduation piece’ for my Nuffield Theatre Writers Group. It’s due end of January.

Now I know I’m not going to make that one, hardly surprising based on my personal mental hell of getting through the last six months of 2009, but I’m aiming for the 18th February, since that’s when I’m due back at the Nuffield for two important meetings.

Now add to this another deadline; I’m applying for a ‘writing job’. It’s only £350 and tbh, I’ll be lucky if I get it as my CV isn’t exactly bursting at the seams, but the important thing is, there’s a deadline. 14th February. And that means having to write. Even if I don’t get it, I’d like to think that I could have done it, had I got it.

So I really need to start working on my dicipline. And that’s not going to be easy. I’m moving from the ‘wannabe playwright’ to ‘professional playwright’ and if I end up getting a writing job, and people are paying me to write, I need to come up with the goods when they require it.

So, I’ve decided, with all credit to the wonderful Stephen Fry, that I’ll have a hiatus and switch off most of my connections with the outside world while I finish writing the first draft of the current play.

Once written, it’ll hide on my hard disc for a few weeks, and I’ll come back and say hi, knowing it’s safely fermenting, waiting for me to return, edit, redraft, rewrite etc.

I can write quickly. The ideas are all there. I can spend hours and hours typing the words, but I’m going to have to do this without distraction.

This play has come out of my head in a very different way to my other work. It is a much more professional piece. I’m already proud of it, and it deserves my time and undistracted efforts in getting into the world, being the best it can be.

So, adios.

I’ll be off facebook and twitter for a while, and I’m turning off my MSN too. Temporarily of course; I’ll be back.

I’ll update my blog with progress when I can, and intend to keep my One Word posts going too. I’ll check my email, and you can always text or call me!

Laters xx

PS: Guilty as charged. I just checked my facebook again, and there was another couple of tweets on my Twitter too. This is gunna be hard.

The result is the ubiquitous and indeed ugly use of the possessive adjective their.

A shame then that the app Question Time has chosen to use the adverb there instead.

Oh, and having now seen the access page, to which I declined, I wonder if you can spot the other errors:

Allowing Question Time access will let it access your Profile information, photos, your friends’ info and other content that it requires to work.

Question Time

Answer Yes/No Question’s About Your Friend’s.

Is it any wonder that young people these days have problems using simple elements of the English language when even facebook apps can’t get it right? (Or is that ‘write’?)

Whilst I applaud the developer in being able to write a facebook application – I know I certainly couldn’t – surely she has a duty to ensure the correct usage of the English language?

Failing that, surely the people behind facebook have a responsibility in checking these apps before they are unleashed? (According to the reviews, this app is basically spamming and doesn’t even work properly anyway!)

Amirite? or shood I just giv up an just except that the use of propper english in print (electronick or otherwize) has no rellevence any moor?

Discuss…

PAFoster – Playwright, my fan page on facebook, has now topped the 100 fan mark.

I created the facebook page to promote me as a playwright and promised here on my blog that I’d reward my 100th Fan.

I’m pleased to announce the winner to be Rob Elliot, from London.

Thanks Rob! £10 HMV voucher on it’s way!

Funny then that I should be tagged twice by friends from two different social networks within a few hours of each other.

So for Helen Eastwood and Alex Dowding, here’s my effort.

Mind you, this post was first started about three months ago, so I doubt you’ll even remember you did one, let alone tagged me, lol!

And if you’re one of the twenty three other fb friends I’ve tagged, then may you have fun in telling the world your twenty five fascinating facts.

Anyway, here’s the obligatory bit to cut and paste…

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Rules:
Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I taggd you, it’s because I want to know more about you.
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And here, in no particular order, is 25 things about me you’ve always wanted to know but were too afraid to ask…

1) I went to school and college with current cabinet member Yvette Cooper. I asked her out at a disco (she declined; probably knowing something I didn’t at the time, lol) and her mother taught me A’ Level Maths.

2) I have a recurring nightmare of the handbrake on the car failing. I am constantly rolling backwards out of control, desperately trying to avoid numerous parked vehicles.

3) I have a MENSA qualifying IQ of 155. (Cattell IIB – max 161) I took the test and joined to prove I wasn’t as “lazy and unintelligent” as my mother said I was.

4) I love my Mac – nuff said.

5) Grieg’s ‘Piano Concerto in A minor’ is my favourite piece of classical music but I doubt I will ever learn to play it. I can play ‘Fur Elise’ and ‘Chariots of Fire’ though.

6) Being bipolar (type II) means I regularly see a psychiatrist and psychologist and spent 3 days in a mental hospital when I had a mixed episode in July 2007.

7) I love books, but am very careful about reading them. I read paperbacks quickly and without damaging the spines, and I have an aversion to marking them – even with pencil.

If I buy another pair of sunglasses this summer it will be the third pair I have bought in my adult life and it will again be a pair of Raybans for about £100. Having said that, the first pair I bought 20 years ago seem to be quite popular again.

9) My mother is due to marry for the 4th time. Her 1st husband was my father, the 2nd was the 1st’s brother-in-law, the 3rd was the 2nd’s best mate and the 4th has the same name as the 1st.

10) I am ashamed to say I only get to brush my teeth about once a fortnight and am very lucky they have stayed in reasonably good health, despite my inablity to clean them.

11) There are (far too) many times when I don’t leave the house for three or four days at a time. These are generally the days when I stay in one room, sleep, and don’t answer the phone.

12) I will either die of old age or I will commit suicide. Since I am very protective of my brain, it would be somewhat ironic if I died of a brain haemorrhage.

13) I’m not superstitious.

14) I have lived with my partner Richard near Woking in Surrey for nearly 14 years. We have a parrot (who will probably out-live us both), but have never had carpet on the stairs.

15) My mental health renders me pretty much unemployable and so I’ve been self-employed (if you can call it that) for the vast majority of my adult life, and have only ever earned enough to pay income tax twice.

16) I am Sagittarian and my favourite colour is purple.

17) I keep a blog, Stephen Fry is following me on Twitter and I have my own Fan Page on Facebook.

18) In 2005 I finished writing a musical using 27 different Erasure songs. The lyrics are excellent and there’s a great story there if you get the songs in the right order. Took two years to complete it though. Watch this space.

19) I spent the majority of my fourth (somewhat solitary) year at secondary school (Year 10) writing a horror novel entitled ‘Leonsean’. It filled four and a half science exercise books.

20) I have always enjoyed being around young people. From working in various youth clubs and schools to helping out in a youth theatre. It’s amazing what you can learn from them, if only you take the time to listen.

21) I will one day have a play produced at the Royal Court, an afternoon play broadcast on Radio 4, and a musical running in the West End.

22) I finally accepted my sexual orientation when I was 22. I was 27 before I had the courage to tell anybody else, lol. I will never have children – and that really pisses me off.

23) I spent a year in America as an au-pair during which time I wrote, produced and directed what was reported in the Boston Globe to be America’s first pantomime.

24) I attempted to run away a lot when I was a teenager, but eventually gave up trying when my mother started packing my suitcases for me.

25) I am teetotal, I don’t drink alcohol at all. I did until I was 20; I prefered lager, had a particular fondness for Guinness, and avoided bitter and spirits like the plague. I have smoked five and a half cigarettes and never taken any illegal substances. (Okay, so I’m boring, lol!)

Oh well, that’s it. Your turn…

Yet another Facebook note thingy doing the rounds; though I happen to quite like this one, so thought I’d have a go…

———————————–
Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, cleverly answer these questions. Pass it on to 10 people you like and include me. Try not to repeat a song title. It’s harder than you think…
———————————–
Pick Your Artist: ERASURE
———————————–

Are you male or female: Boy

Describe yourself: Drama!

How do you feel about yourself: Precious

Describe where you currently live: Home

If you could go anywhere you wanted to go: Chertsey Endlos

Your favourite form of transportation: Ship Of Fools

Your best friend: Gloria

Your favourite colour is: Blue Savannah

What’s the weather like: Rain

Favourite time of day: I Love Saturday

If your life were a TV show, what would it be called: Carry On Clangers

What is life to you: Surreal

What is the best advice you have to give: Let It Flow

If you could change your name, what would it be: Grace

Your favourite food is: Dodo

Thought for the Day: Love Is A Loser

How I would like to die: Leave Me To Bleed

My soul’s present condition: Tragic

Motto: Mad As We Are

The thing is with Twitter, you either get it, or you don’t.

Thankfully loads of people just don’t get it! They can’t get there heads round it. And that’s great, ’cause it’s big enough as it is! As soon as more people try it, get it and follow people with it, then there are going to be some problems!

There are plenty of celebrities on Twitter, and you can easily talk to them as if they were your next door neighbour, but it won’t be long before these guys all lock down their profiles so only those that are currently following can do so.

With a few thousand or so people following you, you can just about keep up with all the @replies from your friends, but add in another few thousand ‘fans’ as well and I can imagine it becoming a bit daunting.

Stephen Fry mentioned Twitter on the Jonathan Ross show last week, and his followers have more than doubled since then. He’s approaching 100,000! (Incidently as I write Jonathan is tweeting about recording tomorrow’s show. He’s just gone into make-up.)

I started tweeting after hearing Stephen Fry mention it last week. I’d heard about it before, lots of times, but I’m a keen follower of Stephen Fry anyway, since like me he deals with Bi-Polar and is a writer too, (oh and openly gay) so when he talked about it I thought I’d just give it a go.

And yes, it does take a little bit of common sense and a few brain cells to understand what the concept is, and indeed isn’t, but once you get into it, get a couple of followers and start following others, then it really is great.

I now have 11 followers, some people I know (Tom, Chris, Clare, Lianne, Claire – all new Twitterers) and some I don’t (Hi to Susan, Vikki and John as well as Flashlight Worthy, Enterprise Cafe and of course, Richard Madeley), and they all know what I’m doing as when I tweet what I’m doing or @reply to someone I’m following, that ‘tweet’ goes to them all, and then anyone of them can tweet a reply to me too.

Admittedly, all my current update ‘tweets’ currently feed into facebook too, but I’m going to stop that soon I think, cause I only really want those who want to follow me to know what it is I’m doing. And facebook isn’t really the place for that.

Facebook is a different way of social networking. (The same, but completely different; a bit like MSN being the same, but completely different as Facebook chat.) Facebook happens in the ‘past’ whilst twitter happens in the ‘present’ if you see what I mean – and if you don’t then don’t worry, lol!

Twitter is one of those things that is easier done than said. I’m following a variety of people, as well as the BBC Business News – 140 characters at a time is great way to keep up with the economy!

Hang on, Jamie has just asked if I can give him an OINK if I’m watching ‘Jamie Saves Our Bacon’ tonight on C4….

Right, done that, lol!

Now where was I? Oh, well on the subject of Jamie, I was partaking in a ‘small’ Q&A session last night. Luckily I was already following him when he decided to go ‘incognito’.

He originally had his photo and his name and website on his profile, but then decided he was getting too many followers and changed it all. He’s doing another Q&A after the programme tonight.

Oh, and Stephen Fry has just been talking about all the press interest:

Papers are asking me to write articles on Twitter. I’ve declined. Twittermania will calm down I hope. Forgive multiple tweets, but … … I just know, although I don’t read papers, that the “arentcha just sick of Twitter?” “Who cares what Fry ate?” articles will begin … … Even though the only people talking about Twitter are the papers, the rest of us are just quietly doing it. It’ll calm down though… …and we’ll be able to get on with it without all this nonsense. Rant over. xx

Right, time to go. Hi to all my Followers.

Follow Me on Twitter.

And to be honest, give it a few weeks (and it’s only been a day so far) and I think this will really grow on me.

Now, I like facebook; I have 125 friends, various groups that I’m admin for, and even my own fan page, but I’m also liking this Twitter thing.

Not sure how long it’s been going, but it seems a lot of people are using it. They say it’s ‘micro-blogging’ and as a blogger myself, I can understand that and think it’s great!

Basically, you blog, in micro-chunks of 140 characters; technically called a ‘tweet’. You ‘follow’ other twitters, which is akin to subscribing to an RSS feed on a blog, and can ‘reply’ (make comments) to their ‘tweets’ (posts). You can do this direct on your own twitter homepage on the web, or from an app on your computer desktop, or from your mobile phone either via the many phone apps, or even via text message – though not sure of the cost implications of text – so check before you go for the SMS option.

So, for me anyway, it’s a cross between my facebook, and my blog and I like it. Obviously, there’s a lot more to it, like getting everybody’s tweets (status updates) sent as text messages to your phone, straight away, so you will always know exactly what your friends are up to – or what they choose to tell everybody they’re up to!

Now, I have to be honest here, no one is actually ‘following’ me at the moment. Well not yet. And I’m only following two people; Stephen Fry and Jonathan Ross, cause I don’t know if any of the people I know are twitters (yet). Are you? But I can see this really catch on. And if it’s good enough for Stephen Fry, then it’s good enough for me!

So what’s Stephen up to? Well as I write (Sat am), he’s just finished reading the last three chapters of Thunderball (Crime and Punishment next!) and has now gone for a walk in the West End.

And me? Well I’m blogging aren’t I!

So if you’re a Twitter, please let me know! Follow me and I’ll follow you! And if you’re not, then go have a look. I can see this getting really big! And it won’t be long before somebody else nabs your easy much-preferred username and you’ll be stuck with some hideous over-long email type thing. Go on, try it!

Follow me on Twitter
Wiki it

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Update – Just added the Twitter app to facebook, which is great cause whatever I ‘tweet’ now will also become my facebook status! Yay! Can you see I’m getting excited!

So come on the rest of you! Get tweeting!

- PS: With apologies to my blog readers using an RSS feed who will now have got this post twice; blame facebook!

I’m ramping up the promotion of a certain playwright going under the semi-pseudonym of PAFoster – yep, me!

Oh and that’s PAFoster with no dots or spaces. Pedantic, I know, but I’m creating a brand here, as in the url of my website.

I have created a public page on facebook that anyone on facebook can become a ‘fan’ of, and as such receive updates from me about forthcoming productions of my work and any other relevant news.

So far, I’ve gained seven fans: Jon Genet, Rianna Dearden, Claire Leonard, Claire Hubble, Peter Williams, Mark Forrest, oh and a guy called Adam Workman; someone I have never met or even spoken too. Which is great! Hello Adam, and thanks becoming a fan!

The intention is of course that as my work becomes more and more known then more and more people on facebook will be come ‘fans’ and I can then promote my work more and more and eventually offer special advance info discounted tickets to productions of my work, signed photos, and other such ‘fan-clubby’ type things. (Okay, maybe not signed photos! lol )

In fact, come to think of it, I haven’t become a fan of myself yet.

Perhaps I should! If only to see what happens when I update the page, etc.

How vain is that? Actually, if there’s one lesson in life I have learnt, it’s blow your own trumpet – cause nobody else will. (Actually, it would be useful to know what happens when I update the page, and becoming a fan will mean I’ll get what everybody else gets.)

All my blog posts in the category ‘Writing’ also feed into the page as facebook notes, which is great too.

So, here we go; the most shamelessly audacious plug ever…

Please, please, please, please, please (is that enough pleases? – okay, one more – please!) become a ‘fan’ of PAFoster-Playwright on facebook by clicking this link and then click the link Become a Fan (top right).

And if you really love me and think I’m brilliant (which I know you do really, lol) then click Share And ‘post’ the page to your profile so everyone can see you’re a fan, oh and while your at it, use the Share link again to tell all your friends too…

Yay! Viral marketing at it’s most simplest!

And if that plug wasn’t enough, here’s an incentive…

Announcing the Fans of PAFoster-Playwright FREE Prize Draw!!

I must be mad – or desperate – one of the two! (I heard you! Not both!)

When I reach One Hundred ‘fans’ I will randomly select one to receive a £10 iTunes card or a £10 book token (or even a £10 ‘store’ token – your choice) as well as a special winner’s blog post announcement.

You will have to be one of the first one hundred fans in order to be entered into the draw. All the fans are listed in reverse order of becoming a fan so it will be easy for me to know when I reach the magic century and who to include in the draw.

So there you go.

Don’t delay any further – Become a fan of ‘PAFoster-Playwright’ RIGHT NOW!

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Oh and there are SIX links to the PAFoster-Playwright page in this post, so you have no excuse!

Actually, that’s SEVEN now, lol!