Halfway, and I'm not even close . . .

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Well, looks like I made a couple of mistakes. They are as follows:

1. Setting the bar way too low. If you tell yourself you need to write at least 10,000 words (when the real goal is 50,000), you will probably only write about 10,000 words. Even an over-achiever working toward 10,000 is only going to hit about 15K, max.

2. Thinking that a new apartment and new job would afford me a ton of luxury time in which I would wax poetic, pontificate, and write write write. BIG mistake.

3. Have cable tv/netflix/internet access for distraction. Plus cleaning that needs doing, unpacking that needs doing, and random unnecessary tasks that oh-so-really don't need doing. Next year I'm going to retire to a cave with only a typewriter and enough water and canned food (and, let's be honest, chocolate) until I get my 50,000 words.

Ah well. And maybe I should be writing my novel instead of blogging, too.

The end of day one, and not (quite) defeated

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Ok, so the first day of NaNoWriMo is drawing to a close (is that a too-trite phrase?). After just a tiny start at midnight, I had to head home for my much-much-needed beauty rest. I had to be in Sactown from 7:30 am (well, I made it at 8, anyway) until 11 am. I came home and wrote my novel, er, took a two hour nap. Then I got up and sat for a while. Then I wrote 490 words, and fell into a self-pitying stubborn funk and put the laptop away. After a snack, I laid back down, since you can't be too careful about keeping well-rested during NaNoWriMo. Or maybe I have it exactly wrong - and I shouldn't sleep so much . . . just when I was envisioning giving it all up on the FIRST DAY (!!!), I checked the website, and got some inspiration from the successes of my comrades. So, I started again, and the story started to flow, and voila! over a thousand words. Still below the needed quota, but a good first day nonetheless. Now I am waiting for the maintenance folks to call (less than a week in my new apartment and already the upstairs neighbors' shower is pouring through my bathroom ceiling). I'm probably done writing for the night, but in much better spirits than I was a few hours ago. Probably it was the second nap.