My shoulders are itching; I didn't realize that I'd gotten such a burn on Sunday. They were uncomfortable yesterday, but today I think I went over the edge because I decided to use the rowing machine at the gym. I wanted some sort of cardio that didn't involve just using my legs, and I remember rowing being kind of fun.

It was fun, though not as much fun as the rowing machines they used to have at Bally's, where there was a little video screen with a digital rowing guy representing you and another digital rowing guy representing your competition. You had to race this little guy for a predetermined amount of time. It was competitive and it helped pass the time.

Today, I didn't even turn on the TV while I rowed. I have a bunch of things to sort out (most of them theater-related) in my head, and when you can't pick up a book or read the internet or talk with someone else, it's a good time to think.

Unfortunately, rowing also uses your shoulder muscles a lot, which means the skin on top of those muscles gets shifted around a lot. I used to get these sunburns when I was younger where the underlayers of my skin would get burnt, and after a few days, they'd crack and peel (like the top layers of skin do), and cause a huge amount of itching and pain.

When I stopped sweating and hit the shower, I knew that was happening again. It probably would have happened without the rowing, but I think it sped up the process. I could barely blot myself dry after my shower, because my shoulders were yelling at me. The towel seemed like it was made of sandpaper. My very soft black shirt was suddenly an irritant.

Back when I was a kid, the dermatologist gave me Valium to settle me down, because the itching was so bad that I'd literally go out of my mind with it. Either I have a higher threshold of pain right now, or it's not as bad as it got back then. I'm still ready to peel the skin off my shoulders, but there's not a whole lot that can be done about it at this late hour.

Besides, I take Klonopin, which is basically the same thing as Valium, only stronger and longer-acting. I doubt my old dermatologist's treatment would do me any good tonight.

Other than the itching, I've been in a very creative mood tonight.

The laptop has been opened and closed all night long, as I've been writing down snippets of the "Mike/Will Play." It's going to come together, but it's not being written in the way I normally write a script. I generally start at the beginning and end at the end, editing as I write. This one is made up of moments which I'll have to knit together into a cohesive whole. It's interesting and new to me. I have a couple of explosive scenes, and I'm anxious to know how I'm going to segue into them. The story is there, the beginning, midpoint, and ending are all set; it's the small moments that are going to have to be finessed.

I've also been going through my archives, looking for pieces to incorporate into Are You Happy NOW? (formerly titled 8 Stories I'll Never Tell My Mother). I've read and seen great one man shows and dreadful ones, and I'd like to fall closer to the former, should I finish this and decide to do it in front of an audience.

The easy part of this project is finding stories to relate. The difficult part is to make it into something more than just a confessional. If a play is going to be about depression, it can't only be about depression. There needs to be an arc, and the arc can't simply be, "I was clinically depressed for most of my adolescent and adult life, but I got better." There has to be more of a thread holding it all together, and I'm not sure if that thread exists, at this point.

If nothing else, I have a good number of monologue pieces I can use for auditions. They're easy for me to perform, because I don't have to get into any character other than myself, and I've been playing that role for quite some time now.

Tonight, I'm "itching" to do something visual. It could be a photograph, it could be a drawing, or even blocking out a stage play. Something that has little to do with words.

My digital camera is sitting right next to me, and the tripod is in the back seat of my car. I could go outside and take some pictures, but my night shots aren't the best, or at least the ones I could manage to take just outside my door aren't all that interesting.

If it wasn't so late, I'd pack up the camera and head to the beach. Revere Beach isn't too pretty during the day, but it gains a lot as it gets dark. I can see the old beach architecture in my head right now, and I bet I could get some great shots of the ocean. It's a cloudy night, though, so maybe I should wait until a clearer sky and a fuller moon.

The site is ready for a redesign. I'm tired of the green and the eggs. They served the purpose of ushering in Spring, but it's looking a little twee for my tastes right now. I don't know what, exactly, I want, but I know it's going to look very different than the format I have right now. Still words on a page, but I'd like to do something more visually interesting with all of it.

Today, I unexpectedly started an e-mail exchange with someone I've admired for years. I didn't expect a reply to my "fanboy" e-mail, but got a gracious response. I, in turn, thanked him for his response, and he said that an ongoing conversation would be welcome.

I wrote a long, rambling letter that didn't make all that much sense, in retrospect. What does one say to someone he has never met, who doesn't read your journal, and has no idea of who you are?

I've checked my e-mail far too many times after sending out my painfully-bad message back to him, just to see if I've gotten another reply. I suspect he's not freakishly obsessed with his e-mail as I am, so I'll have to wait and see if he writes back again or if he writes me off as a nutjob.

I'm itching for a response, but I don't think I'll get one tonight. Best to get to bed.