Wicked little characters

So I'm still taking time off from writing and trying to get my house in order (literally; I rearranged my apartment because I needed to find space for 35 boxes of papers and books coming from San Antonio) and I'm driving along to the freight company to pick up my second load of boxes when, just as I'm slipping onto the freeway, who should pop up but Gretta (a character from "The Lyons' Den") with this hysterical idea for her background.  Well, since I'm still an old-fashioned writer who still keeps paper and pen around so he can scribble ideas down, I grab a sheet and am writing her comments in the worst scrawl imaginable as I'm clipping down the road at 65 (speed limit's 55).  And I'm laughing.  And it's trying to snow.  And traffic is caught in that ludicrous mix of people screaming along at 80 while an ungodly number of older folks are toodling down the road at 40.  So for a moment I feel like I'm playing dodge-ball with 2-ton vehicles on my left, right, back and front.

I think I wound up with a couple of more "blond" hairs.  And now Gretta was laughing.  The bitch.

BUT...once I got off the freeway and got my last set of boxes and had a chance to pause and reflect and look at what I'd written...I got to laughing, again.  Gretta's an off-beat con-woman-floozy-slut in the book (and play and script) but now her actions make sense to me.  And she did it in such a way as to make me look like a crazed fool.  I'm sure the guy at the freight company thought I'd been run out of Texas on a rail for psychosis, or something like that.

Ah, the joy of writing.  It's best to live alone because that way no one's around to question your sanity...except in your own mind.