BTS 2: of The Studio Viewing

Saturday the 4th, 2026

Dear diary... no, I'm kidding. So, I'm going to level with you guys, this El Nino heat wave is absolute torture, and living in Portugal, temperatures have been around 40°c and honestly, my apartment is a fucking sauna. The fans that we have are just blowing around hot air at this point. What I'm trying to say is... Listen, okay... my body is trying to survive this heat, there's no way I'm going to be putting on clothes to film behind the scenes video of the Short Story Monday stories whilst this heatwave is passing through. YOU CAN'T MAKE ME! If I want to be naked in my own house I will be, okay? Okay!... Sorry for the mental images... So my idea was, for these next few weeks while I keep up the weekly challenge, whilst also trying to not die from overheating, I will be writing blogposts about how the story came together and the stories inspiration. I hope that's sufficient enough.

The Studio Viewing felt much easier to write than my first Short Story Monday. I feel like this for several reasons. First of all, Split Tongues and Grey Walls was the first Short Story Monday that I wrote, it was the first time trying out the challenge, and getting used to it. The time constriction was really fucking with me. Being neurodivergent I HATE time limits I just end up with anxiety and my brain turns to mush. However, the second time round I was a little more mentally prepared for this limitation, I already understood that (at this point of the challenge) an hour and a half is enough for me to, at least, put together a five to six minute short story. Which is, for now, sufficient. Again, it's not about being perfect, it's about getting it done. It's about a creative outlet without my personal restraints of perfectionism.

Secondly, I decided that the inspiration for this weeks story would be of a dream I had over the previous weekend. In other words for my first Short Story Monday I wasn't building the story in my head as I went, I had already, in a way, imagined the story, I already had the visual happenings in my head as I wrote because, in my head, it had already happened. There were a few things here and there from my nightmare that I had changed so it wasn't so WTF (it was a nightmare, there are a lot of things about dreams and nightmares that just don't make sense). So, for the story to flow and remain consistent without random shit happening, like, the creepy woman in the story then turning into a cardboard cut-out that was then stuck to the wall (which is what ended up happening in my actual nightmare, after she did her weird, creepy ass crawling across the room). Or, how after the creepy lady turned into an ugly cardboard cut-out, the protagonist and the friend decided to sit on the floor and have a fucking picnic. So, yes, I decided to make some adaptations for the story to remain scary, and not turn into, WTF? Like a lot of dreams often do.

And lastly, I found that this story was much easier to write than the first one, as I wasn't worried, concerned, focused, or thinking about the filming part. Which saved me quite a bit of time at the end, in comparison to the first story I wrote. I was writing for like 10 minutes and thinking, "Oh, I should change the angle of the camera now." or "Oh, I can film b-roll of this and that after this." Instead I was just focused on the writing part, which made this weeks challenge a million times easier to put together within the time limit that I had, and I could focus entirely on the story and not other things happening at the time.

Also, I feel much prouder of this weeks story in comparison to last weeks story. It feels creepier, more detailed, more put together. They say artists tend to be their worst critics and honestly, I feel that.