With 36,744 words written so far, it doesn't look like I'm going to make 50,000 by the end of Wednesday. I could, by blowing off any of the things I would normally blow off in November. I think I went into this last week.
I've set my time for leaving as Saturday night. That means, among other things, that it might be responsible not to make the writing push that would be necessary to win NaNoWriMo this year.
I'm not giving up, though. I am allowing myself an additional seven days. That will still require some pushing, since I don't expect to have much time to write Monday or Wednesday, and after that I'll be packing, but it's doable.
Monday, November 28, 2011
Monday, November 21, 2011
I choose crazy
This is shaping up to be a crazy November, and I'm saying that as a person who has actively sought crazy Novembers since 2007. Normally it's crazy because of the writing. The rest gives. This year it's crazy because of the moving. And the writing. Because of the moving, anything that gives in November I will have already done for the last time in Seattle. That's why I tried out Pathfinder Society at The Dreaming this week. Normally that would have been a crazy thing to do in November. It's still a crazy thing to do in November, but it's also an impossible thing to do in December, so I chose crazy.
Likewise it would have been sane to let my jujutsu training lapse this month in light of NaNoWriMo, except I just started this year, and I'm just now feeling like I started to make progress. Also, I like it, and I like the people, and I don't want to blow them off. So I'm still doing that twice a week.
As consequence I'm about 7,000 words behind with this year's novel, which I think is the farthest behind I've ever been, barring the two years I started and gave up after a couple of days. Naturally, I don't want to fail. At anything, though. So I don't know if something is going to have to give.
Also, Girlfriend is coming back for Thanksgiving, and that's exciting. I wonder how much I'm going to want to write while she's here, though. Lately I've been spending whole weekends either writing or putting writing off. (Ironically, this counts as putting writing off, but I've promised you, faithful readers.)
I am as nervous as a [too nervous to come up with a metaphor] about the move. I'm going to be okay. I mean, more things will have to go wrong for me to have reason to actually worry. Even so, I'm moving across the country to be with my girlfriend. I have a job here, and not one there. I know here, and I don't know there. So it's a little crazy. But, among other things, do I want to die having never done anything even a little crazy for love?
Okay, I need to stop, because that was 369 words I just wrote that won't count toward my novel. NaNo-Ho!
That was awful. My apologies.
Likewise it would have been sane to let my jujutsu training lapse this month in light of NaNoWriMo, except I just started this year, and I'm just now feeling like I started to make progress. Also, I like it, and I like the people, and I don't want to blow them off. So I'm still doing that twice a week.
As consequence I'm about 7,000 words behind with this year's novel, which I think is the farthest behind I've ever been, barring the two years I started and gave up after a couple of days. Naturally, I don't want to fail. At anything, though. So I don't know if something is going to have to give.
Also, Girlfriend is coming back for Thanksgiving, and that's exciting. I wonder how much I'm going to want to write while she's here, though. Lately I've been spending whole weekends either writing or putting writing off. (Ironically, this counts as putting writing off, but I've promised you, faithful readers.)
I am as nervous as a [too nervous to come up with a metaphor] about the move. I'm going to be okay. I mean, more things will have to go wrong for me to have reason to actually worry. Even so, I'm moving across the country to be with my girlfriend. I have a job here, and not one there. I know here, and I don't know there. So it's a little crazy. But, among other things, do I want to die having never done anything even a little crazy for love?
Okay, I need to stop, because that was 369 words I just wrote that won't count toward my novel. NaNo-Ho!
That was awful. My apologies.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
I spent almost as much time thinking of a title for this post as I did writing the post itself
I had to stop reading Beowulf because it was making me want to write Hengist too much, and that's not what I'm writing now. The good news, I suppose, is that I have a source of excitement for that project waiting for me at the other end of November.
This is my obligatory post for the week. Today I pretty well have to write 2,000 or more words, and definitely more if possible. However, if that comes along, I may be back here, taking a break from writing by writing. At least blog posts don't need a plot.
15,340/21,667/50,000
This is my obligatory post for the week. Today I pretty well have to write 2,000 or more words, and definitely more if possible. However, if that comes along, I may be back here, taking a break from writing by writing. At least blog posts don't need a plot.
15,340/21,667/50,000
Sunday, November 6, 2011
B minus 3
It would probably be best to make my word count before bed, rather than make this a long post, so that's what I'm going to try to do.
Tuesday is my birthday. I'd rather not get any older but if my girlfriend is going to keep aging then it wouldn't be fair of me to hold out on her. I started opening birthday stuff, because she and my parents have super-obligingly sent me multiple packages. Girlfriend got me Howell Chickering's translation of Beowulf, and that is pretty cool. Hwaet.
This year's NaNoWriMo is five days old, and I hit the second week slump pretty early. Or perhaps it's too early to call that; let's just say I fell behind on day 2 and 3. I think things are picking up, though. Soon I'll be able to introduce some more characters (there are only two right now) and more things will happen.
I'm being shamelessly self-indulgent, as I think is appropriate. The real question is whether the sort of things I write when I'm indulging myself are the sort of things other people would want to read. Much like when I meet people in person, the salient question becomes whether I am being tiresome or entertaining. For now, I don't have to worry about it. I enjoy writing meandering sentences, or palindromic clauses like: "One year, in deep winter of the deepest winter in many years..."
It's nice to be back to Myrddin now, although once I get my brain going I seem to be beset on all sides with ideas for other projects which I can't work on this month. I invented a useful curseword for Hengist & Undine the other day at work, and then had some intriguing thoughts about the biology of planet-sized jellyfish. The story that that second thing fits into doesn't even belong to me anyway.
On a less cool note, I've gotten confirmation that "Burned at the Stake" will not be appearing in Machine of Death 2. Because the editors dangled the vague hope of picking from the same submission pool for possible subsequent volumes, I'm not sure I ought to post the whole thing here, but the gag order is off, anyway, and people who know how to ask can see the story if they want to.
I know one problem with the story as I submitted it (meaning one thing I would have work on if I had had more time). I found myself wondering if I would have been more or less disappointed if I didn't have a flaw in mind. If it had been perfect, so far as I could tell, would I have been shocked and disheartened to see it rejected? Or would I shrug it off, privately convinced of the story's merit.
Either way, this was my first big boy rejection and it's something I'll have to get used to. There will be more of them.
I do wish I had finished that one story before November started, so I could send it out. I would probably be looking it over again in December regardless, so it comes out to about the same thing, I guess.
6,401/8,333/50,000
Tuesday is my birthday. I'd rather not get any older but if my girlfriend is going to keep aging then it wouldn't be fair of me to hold out on her. I started opening birthday stuff, because she and my parents have super-obligingly sent me multiple packages. Girlfriend got me Howell Chickering's translation of Beowulf, and that is pretty cool. Hwaet.
This year's NaNoWriMo is five days old, and I hit the second week slump pretty early. Or perhaps it's too early to call that; let's just say I fell behind on day 2 and 3. I think things are picking up, though. Soon I'll be able to introduce some more characters (there are only two right now) and more things will happen.
I'm being shamelessly self-indulgent, as I think is appropriate. The real question is whether the sort of things I write when I'm indulging myself are the sort of things other people would want to read. Much like when I meet people in person, the salient question becomes whether I am being tiresome or entertaining. For now, I don't have to worry about it. I enjoy writing meandering sentences, or palindromic clauses like: "One year, in deep winter of the deepest winter in many years..."
It's nice to be back to Myrddin now, although once I get my brain going I seem to be beset on all sides with ideas for other projects which I can't work on this month. I invented a useful curseword for Hengist & Undine the other day at work, and then had some intriguing thoughts about the biology of planet-sized jellyfish. The story that that second thing fits into doesn't even belong to me anyway.
On a less cool note, I've gotten confirmation that "Burned at the Stake" will not be appearing in Machine of Death 2. Because the editors dangled the vague hope of picking from the same submission pool for possible subsequent volumes, I'm not sure I ought to post the whole thing here, but the gag order is off, anyway, and people who know how to ask can see the story if they want to.
I know one problem with the story as I submitted it (meaning one thing I would have work on if I had had more time). I found myself wondering if I would have been more or less disappointed if I didn't have a flaw in mind. If it had been perfect, so far as I could tell, would I have been shocked and disheartened to see it rejected? Or would I shrug it off, privately convinced of the story's merit.
Either way, this was my first big boy rejection and it's something I'll have to get used to. There will be more of them.
I do wish I had finished that one story before November started, so I could send it out. I would probably be looking it over again in December regardless, so it comes out to about the same thing, I guess.
6,401/8,333/50,000
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