Thanks, Sophia.

Shannon

It's a great exercise to go to a coffee shop or a mall and just take down notes on conversations.

Of course, fiction then has to make the conversations better than in real life -- most conversations are pretty boring. 🙂

Shannon

You realize the danger and try to hurry, but like a doomed sniper victim in a movie, just when you think you're going to make it:

"Yeah, your car wouldn't start because the carburetor was clogged-- "

"Oh, we had so much fun last night clogging!"

"Right. Well, you're carburetor is clogged because you always wait until you're on empty before--"

"I remember we used to go clogging in Colorado."

"--you get--"

"Remember that time when we filled up and forgot to pay first then we forgot we didn't have any money? And we didn't have any credit cards? And the guy was gonna call the police on us?"

"--gas."

Also, you can never, never stop in the middle of a statement to carefully consider your words :

"It's hard to say. I liked The Hunger Games okay, it's just..."

"Jennifer Lawrence's crooked teeth."

"No. I didn't notice her teeth. It was really..."

"Because one of her boobs was bigger than the other."

"No. What? No, forget Jennifer Lawrence. She looked fine. I'm talking in the broader sense that..."

"Woody Harrelson always plays the same guy in every movie."

"Stop it. It just seemed that..."

"If the Hunger Games was about starving districts competing for more food, why did the rich kids from district one and two even bother?"

"Uh--yeah. That's exactly what I meant to say."

"Stop what?"

Thanks, Eliz!

Good deal, Sheri. I like doing an edit just on the dialogue to make sure it's sharp (I can't always juggle all things at once).