I've just written a 15-minute screenplay over the past two days. It's for a film that a friend's fledgling production company is doing - a collection of seven shorts that will make up a full-length film that will go straight to DVD and be marketed to church youth groups.

At first, I thought the stories generally had to have the themes of grace and redemption, so I came up with a story idea and wrote part of a screenplay around those themes. Then I discovered that there was a specific logline on the distribution company's website that all the shorts have to interpret, and my story didn't quite fit the logline. So I came up with a second story and wrote part of a screenplay based on that logline. Then I discovered that the DVD's intended audience will be youth groups, and I thought that the story I was working on might not have much youth appeal. So I came up with my present story and wrote a screenplay based on the logline and intended for youth.

Now I just have to do some editing and submit the script. The good thing about all of this is that I now have two additional story ideas that I can turn into whatever I want to turn them into. One thing about creative writing: You can't have too many story ideas.

Over the past week, I've had ideas for scene revisions and for entirely new scenes for my screenplay developing and taking root in my head. Today, I actually got to sit down for some solid writing time - two-and-a-half hours at Starbucks! Interestingly, the scene I wrote today, which replaced the better part of another scene, came together as I was writing it and was not related to all the things that had been ruminating in my brain.

It amazes me how that happens. While all of the pre-writing stuff that we writers do is important, nothing beats getting in some solid writing time where you tune everything else out and seem to actually enter your story. The results can be exciting and surprising.