Letter-Writing Week

Hello again. Time flies. This week was busy at work, and Thursday was Girl Scout night (cookie sales coming up). I felt good because I had pretty well stuck to the healthier eating plan, even if the scale wasn't reporting anything--yet.

Then I got a new digital scale on Saturday and weighed in.

Discouragement! I weighed the same that I weighed when I went to the doctor a few weeks ago. Very upsetting.

So this morning I weighed, and the scale said I lost about 3lbs. That's what I felt like I lost. So yay!

One of my loseit.com friends suggested that I weigh at the same time when I do weigh in so that the fluctuations don't make me crazy.  Excellent idea!

The second week of January is National Letter Writing Week. So far, I mailed off two cards for relatives. Letter-writing is one of my resolutions. I was going to write last week, but never quite got going.

When I was a teenager, I wrote quite a bit to my grandma and friends, but I fell away from that as I got older. Then phone calls got cheap, and it was just easier to call people.

But there's nothing quite like the feeling of getting a letter or card in the mail. You open the mailbox and see something other than bills, and you feel a little excited that someone cared enough to send a personal note or card. You don't dread getting mail so much, since a letter might be in there.

So write your friends or family a letter. You never know how it might brighten someone's day. :)

Updating at last

Yikes! So I didn't do so hot updating my blog in January. January is kind of one of those blah months. I can actually feel a bit of hope that Spring is coming, right around the corner, in spite of the 7 inches of snow on Friday, and in spite of how foggy it is outside right now. LOL

We're watching the Superbowl, hoping for the Giants to upset the Patriots. Neither DH nor myself can stand "America's Team." Heh. Go Eli Go!

DD spent some time outside today, but the snow was melting. It's been a kind of a stay-at-home day. I have a few loads of laundry to do. DH fixed nacho cheese dip and chips and some hot wings for us to eat.

I've had a lot of fear about writing. I can hardly bear to open my paper journal. The blank page stares out at me and I am paralyzed. Writing used to be so important to me. I journaled in my paper journal no matter what. I really can't say what made me fall away from it. (I've always been an on-again, off-again blogger!) Too many days are left unrecorded now. Sigh.

All I can do is pick myself up, dust myself off, and get back on the horse. So here goes nothing.

It's that time of year again

Nanowrimo time! Go join the hysteria.

I have not much to say as to where I've been for the past several months. Is it really October? And is it really MID-October?

My last remaining grandparent, my mother's mother, passed away on August 12. That required a quick trip to Florida and back.

My youngest sister got married on Sept. 29. Thank the gods that's done and over with.

DD has been sick all this week with some kind of flu.

Nano starts in three weeks and I have no clue what I'm going to write about yet.

I've started to sell things on Ebay, and have started collecting Himstedt dolls.

Sticky: NaNo Progress

Finished!

Well, as you can see by the little sticky post dated Nov. 30, I am an official Nanowrimo winner, with 55,058 words, as verified by the verifier thingy on the website.

Yay!!! I have worked so hard to get to that point. My story is even completed, not just 50,000 words. Sure, it needs a heck of a lot of work, but the important part is that I have a rough draft of something that could be shaped into something better.

I also cannot believe it's nearing the end of November. Time flies when you're trying to write 2500–3000 words per day.

This is my second Nano completion in five attempts, and it sure has encouraged me to take a look at those Nanos I did not finish. My other year of success was 2004, and although I met the 50,000 goal, I did not actually complete the story. So this year, for me, was a double success: I surpassed my previous word count AND I completed the story. It has a real beginning, middle, and end. I can't help but be quite proud of my accomplishment.

The Bitter End

Looks like a lot of people have dropped out, while cruising the Nano forum postings. People on the forums started off at a tremendous pace, much like I have done throughout the beginning of Nanowrimo, but it seems like once they learned how doing 4,000 or 5,000 words per day caused them to burn out, they quit writing.

I also read posts from people who described how their lives were interfering. I remember back in that first time I achieved Nanowrimo's goal, in 2004, I had many entries that I had to catch up on because I was 'too tired' to write, or whatever. What I learned from doing this Nano, however, is that it's much more motivating and inspiring to write every day, even if tired.

I watch that blue bar on the website grow ever closer toward 50,000 and I keep on keeping on. It helped, too, that this year, I had my chapter-by-chapter breakdown. I never had to sit and wonder what I was going to write about because all I had to do was look at my 'outline.' There are still nine days left in this month, and I will still continue to write every day on this story. I had thought I might do two Nanos; I had it planned out that way, but I was never quite able to do 3,000 words per day, which is what it would have taken. So at least I will get this one completed by the end of the month, which has been my true goal all along.

Blogger was down

Couldn't post. Didn't feel like writing. Plan on going to bed early. Still have 3000+ words to go before I'm done with Nano. More tomorrow.

Stalled

I guess I wrote so much yesterday that today kind of stalled out. I still managed to crank out 1,110 words, which puts me over the 46,000 mark. I almost wasn't going to bother, but the more I sat on the couch and vegged out, the more disappointed I knew I would be if I didn't at least make an attempt. I then decided that the attempt had to be at least 1,000 words. So I typed--on my story, too!--until I made that count, and then tossed in the towel for today.

Tomorrow I shall make 50,000! Yay me!

The Light at the End of the Tunnel

Took the day off today to have a break and also to take DD to school and pick her up. I wrote a little over 4,000 words in 3-ish hours (wrote from 9:30-11 and from 1-2:45), and have surpassed the 45,000 mark. Yay me! Sometime this weekend, I will have reached the 50,000 word count for Nanowrimo. My story may not be finished, but I will try to get it complete by the end of the weekend, even if it takes over 50,000 words.

Renewal

Wow. No "Lost" tonight. I hardly knew what to do with myself. Instead of watching "Lost," I decided to work on my NaNo, but I seem to have come to a plateau. The initial excitement of getting started is wearing thin. I have a little over 40,000 words and there are still two weeks left to write! I think that I will get much closer to the end of my story by the weekend, since I've been writing about 4,000 words on each weekend day. Maybe I'll even gain the 50,000 mark by then. I'm not sure if my my story will be finished by 50,000. I'm not stopping with 50,000 even if my story isn't finished. I'm in chapter 9 of approximately 14 chapters (I ended up combining two planned chapters earlier in the story, and it looks like chapters 9, 10, & 11 may be combined also.)

So as I was saying, the initial motivation is waning. I sat here earlier this evening trying to get the fingers flying across the keyboard, but it was a difficult slog. I cleared out a bunch of stuff today, old emails that I had saved from years ago; old stories; old notes. Sure, maybe I shouldn't have gotten rid of those old stories, but I decided that I could (and would) write better ones. I'm a different person now than I was years ago--thankfully. I was calculating up how many journals I've written in this year, and my total page count came to 2760; that's 860 more pages than I wrote last year. I was amazed at my progress when I added up all the numbers. Not all of that is wonderful stuff by any stretch of the imagination, but each volume is like a new me. When I leaf back through them, I remember who I was then, at a certain point in time. This year has been a real turning point for me. I have been very stressed out lately, and remembering where I was in November 2005 as compared to where I am now in life, I gained a new perspective: everything is as it should be. I should stop fighting against the current of my life and go with the flow.

2007 is going to be my year of victory.

NaNo Update

I'm excited the way my story is coming together. The writing finally feels less forced; all the pushing on through to the other side (aka typing no matter what the resistance is) has really been helping. I've been able to write a little over 8,000 words this weekend, breaking up the writing. I can generally push through 2,000 words in two hours, so what I did yesterday and today was write for a couple of hours in the afternoon and then for a couple more hours in the evening. It seems to work well.

What I need to do is write some wordage during my lunch break. I could probably bust out 500 or 600 words or more in that half-hour of lunch. And I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Who would have thought last year that I'd be sitting at 34,000+ words at this position in the month? Last year, I barely broke 13,000 words, and that was generous, because some of that was just mind spew, and not on the story I was working on.

As I mentioned before, though, without my chapter breakdown, the writing would be HARD. No plot, no problem Nanowrimo may be, but this being my fifth year attempt, it has definitely been an advantage to have something to go from. I actually expect to finish this story this week (which was my main goal), and start another one. I may not get that second one completely finished, but I'll have a good start.

It's really nothing when you put your mind to it.

Productive!

Very productive day today. I made 20 artist trading cards; I'll try to scan some later. Even DD made one, with my help.

I wrote approximately 4000 words on my Nanowrimo story, bringing my total up to a little over 30,000. That means there are only 20,000 more words to go. Yay me. Tomorrow I'll try to do another 4000. What I did was write in two bouts today, from 12 to 2 and from about 7:30 to 9:30. I can write about 1600 words per hour, if I'm in a groove. I also took a nap today and washed a load of dishes in the dishwasher. DD and I played a few rounds of Go Fish.

I wish all my days could be as productive as today.

While I was working on the ATCs, I discovered that working on them fights the Crazies. Usually on the weekends, I feel like freaking out a lot of the time, or feel irritable. But today, I was creative, and ended up feeling accomplished rather than nutty. It feels good to get stuff done. And it feels even better to be over halfway finished with my Nanovel, even though I still have a long way to go. Oh, and that doesn't even count the fact that I have to majorly rework a chapter in the editing phase because my main character has to get pregnant, and she can't do that if she and her lover had protection. Hehe. And here I had been so concerned about writing that protection into the story. LOL

The 20,000 Mark

Hit it tonight, writing 3057 words. Yay me. I finally finished that atrocious chapter four, in which the main characters get it on. I realized earlier today that the reason it took me like 8,000 words for that chapter was because I was avoiding writing the "jumping into bed after one meeting, especially since male got hit by female's car" scene. But I got through it, since DD had a Brownie scout meeting. I sat down at the computer at 6:30, opened a fresh file, and just started typing--for an hour, until I had to pick her up; then for another half-hour when we got home, because she went to bed as soon as we got home since it was past her bedtime. Some stuff will probably need to be added later on to that particular chapter, but I finally FINISHED chapter four. I got a good start on chapter five as well. Oh, and I was able to multitask, watching "Lost" and typing on my story during commercial breaks--of which there were many.

That episode of "Lost" tonight was a doozy. I was so dying inside when Sawyer and Kate were, ahem, doing the nasty, and then later, when she was begging him to fight, but he was just going to let the guy execute him--to save her. The two actors have great chemistry together. Unfortunately, we will have to wait until February 7, when new episodes are supposed to premiere, something like 16 new episodes without interruption or reruns, at least according to the previews. It sucks that it will take that long to come back on the air, but I hope it will be worth it.

NaNo Update

Way to go, me! I am up to 17,425, well surpassing last year's grand total of somewhere around 13,000. Here is a short excerpt of Chapter 4, which is turning out to be REALLY long.

Celia laughed.

"You are so pretty when you laugh," he said, looking at her intensely.

"Now you are hitting on me," she replied. "I think I'd better just sit over here."

"Oh, come on. You know you want to." He grinned mischievously.

"Who's to say that I'm not the serial killer?" She smiled back.

"Really. You could ravish me, then ravage me, and no one would believe that I got killed by such a beautiful woman."

"Oh, man, the shit's getting deep in here now," Celia said. But she got up from the chair and sat down on the bed, leaving plenty of room between them. Owen flopped back on the pillows, and she did the same. The tv's sound was low, and after a few minutes, Celia felt like nodding off. She rolled over on her side, facing Owen.

"I think we both know what we're doing here," she whispered.

"Oh?" he said, smirking a bit.

"Yes. I mean, in spite of the accident."

"Oh, in spite of the accident…" He reached for her hand, and she let him take it. He began to rub his thumb along the pad of her hand, and she felt shivers go up and down her spine.

"I shouldn't have come in your room," she said, moving closer to him, to feel his warmth. The air conditioner had finally cooled down the room, and now she was cold.

"Maybe you shouldn't have," he said, looking into her eyes. She could not take her gaze away from his. He moved closer to her, and now they were inches apart. She looked down at his lips. She could see his tongue every time he spoke, and she wondered what it would feel like to kiss him.

"Can I kiss you?" he asked. She nodded, and he took her in his arms, embracing her.

Celia had never been kissed like that before. Owen easily leaned in toward her, parting her lips with his tongue, and then she knew what he tasted like. She could taste a bit of coffee and cherry pie on his breath, but she didn't care. She kissed him back like it was the end of the world.

Finally, breathless, she broke the kiss. Below, she could feel what the kiss had done to him.

"Um," she sighed, looking at him once more. She reached up and caressed his face, feeling a day's worth of beard stubble under her fingertips.

"Um is right…" he said. "It's been a long time since I felt that."

"That? That what?"

"That kind of response." He grinned.

"Oh? Surely a hot motorcycle stud like you gets plenty of free sex whenever and wherever you want it."

He shrugged. "Not usually. I'm pretty picky."

"And tonight?"

"Am I going to get free sex?"

"Hehe. Nothing is ever free."

"Ain't that the truth." He paused.

So what do you think? :) (You can also read part of the first chapter here.)

Sitting at the Blank Screen Is Terrifying

I have been waiting all day to be able to sit down at the keyboard, but now that I'm here, my mind has gone blank. Isn't that how it always goes?

I managed to write my first chapter last night on my NaNo work-in-progress. Yes, even through "Bones" and "Lost," I wrote 3335 words. Not bad for a first day's work. It took approximately three hours of almost constant typing. Creating is hard work. I took one break for about ten or fifteen minutes around 9 p.m. I'm lucky that DD goes to bed early.

DD has always been a pretty easy sleeper. She will tell me when she's tired, and practically beg to go to bed, like she did tonight. (Her usual bedtime is 7 p.m. or 7:30 p.m., sometimes earlier.) But, she was up early today, around 6 a.m., and I'm sure that going to school all day is tiring for her. Her perpetual cold isn't helping matters, either. She may have another loose tooth, so she hasn't been eating very well. Sigh. Poor kid.

Thank the gods it's Friday tomorrow! Another new episode of "BSG," and the weekend is completely free... the only thing I have to do is attend a baby shower for a cousin on Saturday afternoon... oh, and write my word count, of course.

I probably could have written faster last night if I hadn't been watching two of my must-see shows. I was multitasking, with eyes on the tv and writing with the hands. It's like turning off your monitor, except the monkey mind is kept entertained by what's going happening on the tv screen. Quite effective really, but I think it did slow me down a bit. Tonight I'm trying something different: listening to instrumental music. We'll see how that goes.

I'm still trying to figure out that episode of "Lost" anyway. As with the other episodes this season, I didn't think it was very interesting. Sure, we learned a few new things, but not much. And they killed off another character--in a particularly strange yet gruesome and gory way--one who didn't "repent" for his supposed sins. Same as with the character of Ana Lucia, from last season. *shrugs* All I can say is that it had better pick up, or I'll find something better to do on Wednesdays at 8 p.m.

I was looking at my list of 43things (over there in the sidebar) and realized that at the end of the month, I should be able to cross off several things on the list. That will be an accomplishment in itself, considering that I've had most of those things on the list for a long time, but haven't been working toward any of them. I'll feel great when I can mark some of them as done. :)

NaNo Will/Will Not for 2006

I will...write every day, at least 1,667 words per day, even if I'm depressed, premenstrual, hating the world, feeling suicidal, ready to jump out the window, or prefer to sleep 24/7. The Well of Self-Pity will NOT suck me dry this year.

I will not...spend too much time dwelling in self-pity instead of writing, doing dishes, doing the laundry, or sleeping instead of writing.

I will...like my story and characters enough to carry me through 30 days of writing frenzy.

I will not... stop after 5,000 words, feeling that it's too much to keep working on.

I will...avoid the "I hate myself and want to die" Nano forum like the plague.

I will not...spend too much time surfing the Nanowrimo forums instead of writing.

I will...remember how Jane Austen wrote in the sitting room among her family members, and despite constant interruptions.

I will not...yell at my family because I am trying to concentrate on the latest wrinkle in my story.

I will...believe in myself.

I will not...think I am the next Charlotte Brontë.

I will...love myself and my writing, no matter how bad the writing seems.

I will not...worry so much about stupid things that don't matter.

(repost from October 21, 2005)

NaBloPoMo

NaBloPoMo, for those who aren't up for the challenge of Nanowrimo or are too busy with other things.

In My NaNo Survival Kit

(Yes, you will be hearing a lot about NaNo on this blog in the next couple of months, so I apologize in advance.)

Inspired by this post on the NaNo Forums, here is what I deem as must-have items during November:

• my NaNo outline (currently residing on a floppy disk; other notes are in a steno pad)
• a floppy disk or my USB drive to make frequent backups
• motivation to do my daily word count BEFORE reading the forums
• my PC (duh!). Some people choose to handwrite their entire NaNo. I think they're nuts. I might make notes or jot down scenes if I have no access to a computer, but the hard work will be done on my PC.
• supportive buddies from the NaNo site (and words of encouragement from my loyal blog readers, of course!)
• generic acetominophen, for when my arms and hands ache from typing and my body aches from sitting in an old, once-ergonomically correct computer chair
• U2 CDs to listen to while I write
• 9 hours of Sunday football (I can get a lot done while hubby watches and I sit there with my laptop, and we're still spending time together!)
• a blanket, for when I get cold because I haven't moved from in front of the computer for an hour or more
• my dial-up connection, so that I can logon to the internet and the phone will therefore be busy and won't ring to distract me
• plenty of water to drink when I'm thirsty, and working at the computer makes me very thirsty
• my copies of "Writing Down the Bones" and "Bird by Bird" to remind me to not take my first draft so seriously

None of these things are vital (other than the computer and water, maybe), but these things will help me get the damn thing written. And if I don't, you readers can bug me about it—daily. LOL

NaNovel Planning

Title: Sayonara Sweetheart

Genre: modern, contemporary (ok, if you really have to label it: "literary fiction")

Characters:

• Celia March
• Rica March XXXX (Celia's sister
• Josie XXX (Rica's daughter)
• Owen Ellis (potential love interest for Celia)
• XXXX XXXXXX (Josie's boyfriend)
• assorted other friends of Josie's

Premise: Family means no one gets left behind. OR No one is perfect, not even the "good girl."


NaNo To-Do List:

1. Decide how many chapters (done, 15)
2. Decide on word count needed to make chapters (done, 1667 per day; 1 chapter done every other day)
3. Plan plot. (done, roughly)
4. Research "scenes." (done)
5. Do more character development (working on it)
6. 10-15 page character bio (?)
7. What does each character carry around with them?
8. first sentence
9. final sentence (done)

So This NaNo Thing...

In 2004, I managed to make it to 50,000 words, the goal of National Novel Writing Month. Last year, I was all set to go, but got mired in confusion about 13,000 words into my story, and just gave up. (Don't even ask me about 2002 & 2003!)

This year, I have pledged to not only make it to the 50,000 words, but to actually FINISH the story. So I've been planning.

Sure, I know the tagline for NaNo is "No Plot? No Problem!" but because I've had no plan of where my story is going, I mostly just rambled on. When I made the word count goal in 2004, my story was only probably about half-finished. I haven't touched it since. :)

A great place to read some helpful articles on planning out a novel is Holly Lisle's website. She's a professionally published author, and her articles get down to the nuts and bolts of how to get a draft written. I have many "how to write a novel" books, but she breaks it down into easy, readable steps. After reading some of the articles on her site and then going back to the books, some of the stuff in the books makes more sense.

Join up with NaNo. I promise it can be fun.