Understandable concern.
How about you think about the foundation of this thread as practice, instead.
Review headlines and think of a story logline based on each one.
You can do this each and every day.
http://www.nytimes.com/most-popular-viewed
1. A Statement Rocks Rome, Then Sends Shockwaves Around the World
The pope’s announcement, made at a routine meeting, came “like a bolt out of the blue,” said a participant.
The Vatican's in an uproar after a dying ex-Pope's last confession to his successor includes, among other petty sins, that he has been gay since childhood.
2. OP-ED COLUMNIST The Ignorance Caucus
The G.O.P. refuses to live in an evidence-based world.
The FBI, Homeland Security, and CDC bear down as the G.O.P. machine is devastated from a firestorm of Alzheimer's cases burning down through the leadership ranks.
3.Young, Liberal and Open to Big Government
In a trend that is surprising pollsters and jangling the nerves of Republicans, a majority of young people embraces President Obama’s notion that government can be a constructive force.
Wealthy philanthropist Democrats battle with working poor ultra conservative Republicans for voter control of the city council.
4. Successor to Benedict Will Lead a Church at a Crossroads
Pope Benedict XVI’s choice to resign sets up a struggle between conservatives, who advocated a smaller church of more fervent Catholics, and those who feel the church can grow its reach.
Things get ugly behind closed doors when depth of reach vs. breath of grasp is debated among top clergy.
5. Menendez Backed Donor on Port Security Plan
Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey discouraged any government gift of port security equipment to the Dominican Republic, citing concern for a company run by his friend, a major campaign contributor.
Rookie NJPD detective Danny Costello fights an internal affairs charge of cronyism while investigating three murders linked to billion dollar local government contracts.
6. OPINION Relax! You’ll Be More Productive
To be at your peak, don’t work so much.
Buddy Slaxx's doctors can't explain to his wife why the more he lays around the house doing nothing the healthier he's getting, and she ain't too happy about it.
7. EDITORIAL Quietly Killing a Consumer Watchdog
Senate Republicans are using the filibuster to stop regulation of financial abuses.
CSPAN was never this funny before Mississippi Senator Ruby "Popcorn" McCoy started spilling all the beans on her "friends across the aisle."
8. THE LEDE Latest Updates on Pope's Resignation
The Lede is providing updates on Pope Benedict XVI's announcement on Monday that he intends resign on Feb. 28, less than eight years after he took office, the first pope to do so in six centuries.
In learning who to vote for the newest cardinal learns more about his friends and associates as they all present their own agendas for a multitude of shadowy, radical micro-factions.
9. A Call for Drastic Changes in Educating New Lawyers
A task force says it is time for radical changes in the regulation of law schools, including cutting curriculums, requiring on-the-ground training and licensing legal technicians.
Attorney Dewey Cheatham faces loosing his licence if he doesn't pass the new competency test, but his menopausal wife, unmarried pregnant daughter, and hormonal teen son couldn't seem to care less.
10. Samsung Emerges as a Potent Rival to Apple’s Cool
After sweeping the market with the iPhone and the iPad, Apple has only one real competitor. And Samsung, unlike Apple, does think people know what they want.
Nerd wars rage for high stakes between high tech competitors as corporate espionage goes ballistic when new school collides with old school spycraft.
11. THE APPRAISAL Why Buy a Condo You Seldom Use? Because You Can
The higher the price in the New York City market, the more common are absentee owners based in places like Monaco or Texas.
Many will show but only one broker will sell, or die trying, the most scandalous condo in all of the city.
12. FIVETHIRTYEIGHT New Rove Group Could Backfire on G.O.P.
An analysis of Republican Senate primaries in 2010 and 2012 suggests that money is usually the least pressing problem for the establishment candidates whom Karl Rove's new "super PAC" might be inclined to support.
Virginia Hamilton thought she was doing her governor-candidate husband a favor by hosting a campaign fundraiser among the state's wealthiest businessmen. Lord, they are a rowdy and perverted bunch of lascivious heathens!
13. OP-ED COLUMNIST The Conscience of a Corporation
Stretching religious freedom to the breaking point.
A young woman and her middle age mother make arrangements, endure a procedure, and heal together while watching the TV news of their father and husband battling a court case in public against abortion.
14. Speculative Bets Prove Risky as Savers Chase Payoff
Brokers used to promote bad investments mainly to people trying to get rich quick, but with traditional portfolios losing value, more ordinary retirement savers are being duped.
Brokers, investors, and loan shark collectors contend over who gets the biggest return on just another hump-day.
15. Last Pope to Resign Faced Division Within the Church
Pope Benedict XVI’s announcement on Monday that he was stepping down because he was too elderly and infirm for the job was the first papal resignation in 598 years.
Corn takes sixteen hours from throat to throne, and other things you (don't) wan't to know BUTT are too scared to ask about: A mocumentary on the Pope's poop!
16. NEWS ANALYSIS Obama’s Turn in Bush’s Bind
A onetime critic of his predecessor, President Obama finds himself justifying muscular defense policies while detractors complain that he has sacrificed core values.
There's no more room in the Oval Office's closet where the current President tries to hide the administration's new skeletons among the old trying to get out themselves.
17. Mice Fall Short as Test Subjects for Humans’ Deadly Ills
Mice have been the species of choice in the study of human diseases, but a new paper offered evidence that the mouse model has been totally misleading for sepsis, burns and trauma.
Someone's getting the small end of the cheese when crafty rodents create inventive ways to outsmart the "Grabbers" in an attempt to free their little pink progeny.
18. CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK Grammys Measure Present by the Past
The structure of the award-giving, in which representatives of yesteryear weigh in on the acts of today, precludes the Grammys from capturing the shape, scale and range of modern music.
The music industry is bent on it's ear when a pair of bespectacled, PhD, blonde bombshells poured into business suits descend upon its judging process by court order with "logarithmic quantification constraint parameters."
19. OUR GENERATION The Death of a Prodigy and the Limitations of Talent
As a young reporter, the author believed that talent provided immunity. He later learned otherwise.
A reporter documents his co-worker's fall from grace as he elects to go off his anti-depressant meds in order to pursue a more holistic end to "this corporate servitude bullsh!t."
20. BITS Disruptions: Where Apple and Dick Tracy May Converge
Though such a device has been lost to science fiction comics and spy movies of a pre-smartphone era, the smart watch might soon become a reality, in the form of a curved glass device made by Apple.
A lowly intern at a leading high tech multinational is assigned to plunder comic books and graphic novels for viable tech development. Pfft. These people are crazy, right? Maybe. Maybe not.
Good luck!
Oh, yeah...
And P.S:
http://www.screenplayfest.com/logline-competition
http://www.screenplayfest.com/archives/category/logline-competition
http://www.moviebytes.com/ContestDetail.cfm?ContestNumber=2612
http://www.moviebytes.com/ContestDetail.cfm?ContestNumber=2610&tab=tab4&SubmitInterviewForID=2610
http://www.scriptdoctoreric.com/logline-friday