Word count begins November 1st. 1667 words a day will get me to the 50k goal. I figure if I put my progress up here you can shame me into keeping up with the goal. It’s going to be tough but I made a promise to at least try…
11.1.8 – 1:40am
832 words since midnight. Exhausted from work/driving. Wanted to get started at midnight. Will continue in the morning. They say the links to the word count graphics will go live tomorrow night. Trust me, I know 832 is not a lot, but I got started and they count.
11.1.8 – 11:20pm
1949 words total today. Above the average but there’s still a long way to go. Considering we still had a house full of girls this morning and we had to go out tonight to buy some books for Becca, I consider today a successful start.
BTW, the NaNoWriMo website is choking to death with the amount of traffic they are getting so the widgets that show you my word count may lag behind from time to time.
11.2.8 – 10:30pm
Up to 4853 words. Ahead of schedule. A good start. Let’s see how long I keep this up now that I’m going back to work tomorrow morning…
11.4.8 – 1:00pm
For those of you keeping score on my NaNoWriMo word count: I drove all day and worked all night last night. I typed out a paltry 362 words when I got back to the hotel and promptly crashed into bed. Not enough to cover the daily goal but enough to keep me above my day three total goal. So I haven’t fallen behind yet. And rather than keep typing here, I think I’ll get back on it. I will skip lunch and make up the word count!
11.6.08 – 11:55pm
Well I made it over the 10k line. That normally takes me about a month. This contest is really making me redefine HOW I write. I am not allowing myself to do ANY editing while I am writing. So far I really like it. I hope this is a sign of things to come.
The pace is a little demanding. I have things to do. Work, life, etc. Finding the time to write out 1500+ words a day is a bit difficult but that’s what this is all about. So far I’m staying on schedule…
11-8-08 – 2:20am
Well I made it through one week and haven’t fallen off track yet. I’m hitting the dangerous part now. They say the hardest part of the story is the middle. The beginning is exciting because you’re world-building and setting up the premise. The end is exciting because you’re bringing it all to a close and wrapping it all up. The middle can be boring to write and if it’s boring while you wrote it, it’ll be boring to anyone who has to read it. The beginning is almost over and I’m just about ready to venture in to the middle. Don’t analyze my word count with where I say I am in the story, there is plenty of editing that needs to take place back there. But for the most part, the beginning is over and it is time to start the hook. The end probably won’t be written up very much in this project because 50k words is not a novel length work. So I’m expecting to be dead center in the middle of the work when we finish here.
I do have to admit that I am normally guilty of skipping around and writing the end when I get bored. It keeps me excited and by the time I write all of that up, the middle is even MORE boring because I have nothing to look forward to. So in the interest of getting this done, I’m writing semi-linear. Some things will have to be edited in for time-line reasons but I’m trying all kinds of new things with this system. I haven’t gotten bored yet. We’ll see, we’ll see.
Sunday, 11-9-8 – 10:30pm – Gearing up to fly to Chicago
Well this weekend was a bust for writing. I made today’s goal but I’m still behind for not writing a damn thing yesterday. I was exhausted from the concert and spending all day in the sun. I crashed when I got home. Today was busy but I found time to blow through 1700 words just because I knew that if I fell TWO days behind, I might never get caught up.
I’m a little depressed because I’m leaving my family and friends behind for six weeks (except a quick Thanksgiving trip) and I just feel tired and worthless. I mention this here because it could mean one of two things. Either I have plenty of time to write, or I sink further into madness and I stop all together.
Just so you know.
You know, if you sink really deep into madness, then you become a great writer (think Poe or Lovecraft, just off the top of my head) so it’s a win-win! {smile}
Tuesday, 11.11.08 – 10:40pm CST
Thanks for the smile man, it made me nut up and type away. I’m still on the wagon. I’m not sure how good the crap I just typed out is but I forced myself to make up for yesterday’s nil input. I’m just under 1000 words off pace and that’s not bad considering I’ve had a couple days of zero.
I find myself sabotaging my efforts. I’ve been sitting here in the hotel with nothing to do and trying to find ways NOT to write. I haven’t turned on the television but I sat here and stared at the carpet for over two hours thinking about how many people have walked on it and how maybe I shouldn’t walk around in bare feet. Two hours. No shit. There’s something in me that just wants to fail…
I agree with Wade, incorporate the dirty carpet!
And, what a good writer knows is that the best coupling was/is word processor AND drugs!!
Also, you had stated earlier that you were writing without self editing, my friend, what do you think editors are for, to make sense of your ramblings. Too much “self” editing can do great damage to great works. Bang away at those keys, release the muse, edit grammer not content.
Sunday, 11.16.8 – 10:15pm
I made it to the half way point. I had to spend a lot of time at the keyboard this weekend playing catch-up but I made it past the half way point and I am back on track! The next small goal is 30k by bedtime on Wednesday. It feels good to be back on target.
Wednesday: 11.19.8 – 8pm CST.
Just broke the 30k count. Not sure it’s actually valid because I’ve got a few dozen note lines in there about changes and direction… Oh well, I’m counting it as 30k (barely).
I’m back on the 24/7 day/night work schedule again starting today and it’ll be hard to keep up with the words.
On the bright side, 30k is a hell of a milestone and it’s all downhill from here. I honestly didn’t think I’d get this far this fast. 50k here I come…
Strange place to hit a wall, all of the really hard work is done. It was supposed to be fun from here on out. It’s not so much a wall as a “creativity union strike”.
I’m not supposed to correct mistakes yet but I’m not getting anything down enough to be considered as a mistake.
I write a line and I can’t go any farther than that line.
“Alex sat up and looked around.”
The voices chime in:
Why would he look around? He knows what the room looks like.
Why can’t he ‘slowly’ sit up or ‘frantically’ look around? Look around frantically? Maybe you should describe the bed.
You know, I’m not so fond of the name. Maybe his name is Mike instead of Alex.
I can’t shut out the voices. They’re all coming in at once and I don’t have time to sort through all this…
11.23.8 – 1:36am CST
Major changes in the story are already being edited. It’s not really slowing me down so much as I’m going back and writing in new subplots where they belong rather than putting a note telling me to move this page back before this or that…
Probably a bad idea but it’s making sense so far.
The action has kicked in and I’m not struggling to make the exposition interesting any more. Things are finally happening!
Is stuff blowing up and are people dying? Are Victorian era socialites having tea? Are medieval wizards and warriors battling to the death? Will little Billy ever find his puppy?
You’ll probably never know…
I’m on schedule to complete on time. My Chicago connection never contacted me back so I plan to spend a lot of tomorrow writing and get ahead of schedule. I know I’ll get absolutely nothing written on Tuesday as I fly home and spend the evening with Teresa and Becca. So with just over a week to go, every word counts.
11.23.8 – 11:47p CST
Wrote all day long today. Got caught up and actually two days ahead of schedule. I’ll have time to write a bit tomorrow and then I’ll finish up later on during the Thanksgiving break.
There is no longer any doubt that I’ll make it. Hell, I could go back to writing on pencil/paper and finish this thing. I’ve all but conquered the challenge. All I have to do now is drag my tired ass in past the finish line.
But the writing doesn’t stop there. I’ve got a lot more to tell in this story. It will probably go into 65k before it is done and then it can get fleshed out and filled in at the weak spots. I won’t work on the grueling schedule I’ve been under for NaNo but I will maintain a sense of a deadline. I think it helps.
I will surrender a copy of the manuscript to Teresa on December 1st to fulfill my promise but I’ll ask her to wait to read it until I finish it.
11.25.8 – 11:04pm EST
Cleared 45k! Still well ahead of schedule. Even got 600 words written today and I had counted today as a nil input day because of travel and such.
The next goal is to finish this thing ahead of schedule. I’ve got until midnight on Sunday. I want to get past 50k by Saturday just to stay on top!
I’m at 47590 and I just can’t keep my eyes open much longer. If I HAD to I could punch through and make it the last couple of thousand words but it’s after midnight and any wordcount I put up now will count as Friday anyway. I’ve come too far just to throw in a bunch of sleepy nonsense to inflate my wordcount that I’ll have to edit out later.
I’ll get some sleep and tomorrow I’ll make the final push. If I pounded out 2600 words on a busy day like Thanksgiving, I can certainly get 2410+ on the day after. So it looks like I’ll wrap this contest up tomorrow but the story is long from over. 50k is only novella length and this story deserves full length form.
I’m still far from complete in the action and what I thought was the ending might serve better as only the beginning of the end. What I’m saying is, this puppy’s got a lot more writing to do even after Nano wraps up.
Don’t count your chickens and all of that but I’ll probably post something up here tomorrow if/when I make it past the finish line.
“The sun is the same in a relative way but you’re older. Shorter of breath and one day closer to the end of NaNoWriMo.”
For some reason the NNWM site counted my entry as Saturday but you can trust me, I crossed 50k before midnight Friday.
50541 at the end of today’s push and still lots more to write.
But we did it! Thank you for your comments. It really helped knowing that people were watching. There were several points at which I was ready to call it off and say, “maybe next year” but I couldn’t do that because you were watching.
So still lots more to write, a ton of edits and redrafts. I’ll post my final NNWM word count here on Sunday.
11.30.8 – 5:40p EST
52012 total word count for the month of November.
I’m packing up for Chicago again and spending my last few hours with Teresa and Becca so unless they decide they don’t want me around I imagine this is the last I’ll write on the story tonight.
I’ll keep imposing arbitrary deadlines on myself because they seemed to work for me. Completed with first draft by New Years? We’ll see.
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Word count begins November 1st. 1667 words a day will get me to the 50k goal. I figure if I put my progress up here you can shame me into keeping up with the goal. It’s going to be tough but I made a promise to at least try…
October 24th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
so? there arent’ any new ones…. Surely you could have knocked out 10 or 15 syllables, right?
October 24th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
Hey Morgan. Wade pointed me to your post here…
You are right. There was something wonderful about Autumn Meet. I experienced a lot of the same things.
Thank you for all you do. Looking forward to seeing you again in the Spring. You’ll have your drum reheaded by then.
wish I’d known… I wonder if you might have done better with my drum… dunno. I never dragged it out – I like to dance better.
Keep shining, keep being you.
Caiti/Kathleen – whatever.
November 1st, 2008 at 1:42 am
11.1.8 – 1:40am
832 words since midnight. Exhausted from work/driving. Wanted to get started at midnight. Will continue in the morning. They say the links to the word count graphics will go live tomorrow night. Trust me, I know 832 is not a lot, but I got started and they count.
November 1st, 2008 at 11:21 pm
11.1.8 – 11:20pm
1949 words total today. Above the average but there’s still a long way to go. Considering we still had a house full of girls this morning and we had to go out tonight to buy some books for Becca, I consider today a successful start.
BTW, the NaNoWriMo website is choking to death with the amount of traffic they are getting so the widgets that show you my word count may lag behind from time to time.
November 3rd, 2008 at 12:47 am
11.2.8 – 10:30pm
Up to 4853 words. Ahead of schedule. A good start. Let’s see how long I keep this up now that I’m going back to work tomorrow morning…
November 4th, 2008 at 1:58 pm
11.4.8 – 1:00pm
For those of you keeping score on my NaNoWriMo word count: I drove all day and worked all night last night. I typed out a paltry 362 words when I got back to the hotel and promptly crashed into bed. Not enough to cover the daily goal but enough to keep me above my day three total goal. So I haven’t fallen behind yet. And rather than keep typing here, I think I’ll get back on it. I will skip lunch and make up the word count!
November 6th, 2008 at 11:13 am
I hope that you work on NaNoWriMo is better than your work here:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0604555/
November 7th, 2008 at 1:12 am
11.6.08 – 11:55pm
Well I made it over the 10k line. That normally takes me about a month. This contest is really making me redefine HOW I write. I am not allowing myself to do ANY editing while I am writing. So far I really like it. I hope this is a sign of things to come.
The pace is a little demanding. I have things to do. Work, life, etc. Finding the time to write out 1500+ words a day is a bit difficult but that’s what this is all about. So far I’m staying on schedule…
November 8th, 2008 at 3:35 am
11-8-08 – 2:20am
Well I made it through one week and haven’t fallen off track yet. I’m hitting the dangerous part now. They say the hardest part of the story is the middle. The beginning is exciting because you’re world-building and setting up the premise. The end is exciting because you’re bringing it all to a close and wrapping it all up. The middle can be boring to write and if it’s boring while you wrote it, it’ll be boring to anyone who has to read it. The beginning is almost over and I’m just about ready to venture in to the middle. Don’t analyze my word count with where I say I am in the story, there is plenty of editing that needs to take place back there. But for the most part, the beginning is over and it is time to start the hook. The end probably won’t be written up very much in this project because 50k words is not a novel length work. So I’m expecting to be dead center in the middle of the work when we finish here.
I do have to admit that I am normally guilty of skipping around and writing the end when I get bored. It keeps me excited and by the time I write all of that up, the middle is even MORE boring because I have nothing to look forward to. So in the interest of getting this done, I’m writing semi-linear. Some things will have to be edited in for time-line reasons but I’m trying all kinds of new things with this system. I haven’t gotten bored yet. We’ll see, we’ll see.
November 9th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
Sunday, 11-9-8 – 10:30pm – Gearing up to fly to Chicago
Well this weekend was a bust for writing. I made today’s goal but I’m still behind for not writing a damn thing yesterday. I was exhausted from the concert and spending all day in the sun. I crashed when I got home. Today was busy but I found time to blow through 1700 words just because I knew that if I fell TWO days behind, I might never get caught up.
I’m a little depressed because I’m leaving my family and friends behind for six weeks (except a quick Thanksgiving trip) and I just feel tired and worthless. I mention this here because it could mean one of two things. Either I have plenty of time to write, or I sink further into madness and I stop all together.
Just so you know.
November 11th, 2008 at 9:54 am
You know, if you sink really deep into madness, then you become a great writer (think Poe or Lovecraft, just off the top of my head) so it’s a win-win! {smile}
November 12th, 2008 at 12:47 am
Tuesday, 11.11.08 – 10:40pm CST
Thanks for the smile man, it made me nut up and type away. I’m still on the wagon. I’m not sure how good the crap I just typed out is but I forced myself to make up for yesterday’s nil input. I’m just under 1000 words off pace and that’s not bad considering I’ve had a couple days of zero.
I find myself sabotaging my efforts. I’ve been sitting here in the hotel with nothing to do and trying to find ways NOT to write. I haven’t turned on the television but I sat here and stared at the carpet for over two hours thinking about how many people have walked on it and how maybe I shouldn’t walk around in bare feet. Two hours. No shit. There’s something in me that just wants to fail…
November 12th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Nah, your id is telling you that you need to incorporate a dirty carpet into the story.
(“Id” – yup, you can tell I’ve been watching 50′s SciFi again, using archaic Psych terms…)
November 13th, 2008 at 11:58 am
I saw a quote this morning that I thought I’d share:
”
The last time somebody said, ‘I find I can write much better with a word processor.’, I replied, ‘They used to say the same thing about drugs.’”
November 14th, 2008 at 1:32 am
When you finally stop typing,
When the muse has taken a break,
when you finally come up for air…
And the cigar has burned itself out,
The coffee has gone cold and
You hadn’t noticed that the sun has gone down…
That’s when writing is good.
November 15th, 2008 at 9:10 am
I agree with Wade, incorporate the dirty carpet!
And, what a good writer knows is that the best coupling was/is word processor AND drugs!!
Also, you had stated earlier that you were writing without self editing, my friend, what do you think editors are for, to make sense of your ramblings. Too much “self” editing can do great damage to great works. Bang away at those keys, release the muse, edit grammer not content.
Love ya
November 16th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
Sunday, 11.16.8 – 10:15pm
I made it to the half way point. I had to spend a lot of time at the keyboard this weekend playing catch-up but I made it past the half way point and I am back on track! The next small goal is 30k by bedtime on Wednesday. It feels good to be back on target.
November 17th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
heh – So quit trying to catch my band, and write more words!!!!!
November 19th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Wednesday: 11.19.8 – 8pm CST.
Just broke the 30k count. Not sure it’s actually valid because I’ve got a few dozen note lines in there about changes and direction… Oh well, I’m counting it as 30k (barely).
I’m back on the 24/7 day/night work schedule again starting today and it’ll be hard to keep up with the words.
On the bright side, 30k is a hell of a milestone and it’s all downhill from here. I honestly didn’t think I’d get this far this fast. 50k here I come…
November 20th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Strange place to hit a wall, all of the really hard work is done. It was supposed to be fun from here on out. It’s not so much a wall as a “creativity union strike”.
I’m not supposed to correct mistakes yet but I’m not getting anything down enough to be considered as a mistake.
I write a line and I can’t go any farther than that line.
“Alex sat up and looked around.”
The voices chime in:
Why would he look around? He knows what the room looks like.
Why can’t he ‘slowly’ sit up or ‘frantically’ look around? Look around frantically? Maybe you should describe the bed.
You know, I’m not so fond of the name. Maybe his name is Mike instead of Alex.
I can’t shut out the voices. They’re all coming in at once and I don’t have time to sort through all this…
November 21st, 2008 at 9:34 am
Less than 10 days to go, better get a move on!
November 23rd, 2008 at 3:46 am
11.23.8 – 1:36am CST
Major changes in the story are already being edited. It’s not really slowing me down so much as I’m going back and writing in new subplots where they belong rather than putting a note telling me to move this page back before this or that…
Probably a bad idea but it’s making sense so far.
The action has kicked in and I’m not struggling to make the exposition interesting any more. Things are finally happening!
Is stuff blowing up and are people dying? Are Victorian era socialites having tea? Are medieval wizards and warriors battling to the death? Will little Billy ever find his puppy?
You’ll probably never know…
I’m on schedule to complete on time. My Chicago connection never contacted me back so I plan to spend a lot of tomorrow writing and get ahead of schedule. I know I’ll get absolutely nothing written on Tuesday as I fly home and spend the evening with Teresa and Becca. So with just over a week to go, every word counts.
November 24th, 2008 at 1:54 am
11.23.8 – 11:47p CST
Wrote all day long today. Got caught up and actually two days ahead of schedule. I’ll have time to write a bit tomorrow and then I’ll finish up later on during the Thanksgiving break.
There is no longer any doubt that I’ll make it. Hell, I could go back to writing on pencil/paper and finish this thing. I’ve all but conquered the challenge. All I have to do now is drag my tired ass in past the finish line.
But the writing doesn’t stop there. I’ve got a lot more to tell in this story. It will probably go into 65k before it is done and then it can get fleshed out and filled in at the weak spots. I won’t work on the grueling schedule I’ve been under for NaNo but I will maintain a sense of a deadline. I think it helps.
I will surrender a copy of the manuscript to Teresa on December 1st to fulfill my promise but I’ll ask her to wait to read it until I finish it.
November 24th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Don’t……let……..your…….guard……..down
November 26th, 2008 at 12:08 am
11.25.8 – 11:04pm EST
Cleared 45k! Still well ahead of schedule. Even got 600 words written today and I had counted today as a nil input day because of travel and such.
The next goal is to finish this thing ahead of schedule. I’ve got until midnight on Sunday. I want to get past 50k by Saturday just to stay on top!
November 28th, 2008 at 2:26 am
11.28.8 – 1:15am EST
I’m at 47590 and I just can’t keep my eyes open much longer. If I HAD to I could punch through and make it the last couple of thousand words but it’s after midnight and any wordcount I put up now will count as Friday anyway. I’ve come too far just to throw in a bunch of sleepy nonsense to inflate my wordcount that I’ll have to edit out later.
I’ll get some sleep and tomorrow I’ll make the final push. If I pounded out 2600 words on a busy day like Thanksgiving, I can certainly get 2410+ on the day after. So it looks like I’ll wrap this contest up tomorrow but the story is long from over. 50k is only novella length and this story deserves full length form.
I’m still far from complete in the action and what I thought was the ending might serve better as only the beginning of the end. What I’m saying is, this puppy’s got a lot more writing to do even after Nano wraps up.
Don’t count your chickens and all of that but I’ll probably post something up here tomorrow if/when I make it past the finish line.
“The sun is the same in a relative way but you’re older. Shorter of breath and one day closer to the end of NaNoWriMo.”
November 28th, 2008 at 8:16 am
How appropriate for a writing excercise…..
Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
November 29th, 2008 at 12:09 am
11.28.8 – 11:50p EST
For some reason the NNWM site counted my entry as Saturday but you can trust me, I crossed 50k before midnight Friday.
50541 at the end of today’s push and still lots more to write.
But we did it! Thank you for your comments. It really helped knowing that people were watching. There were several points at which I was ready to call it off and say, “maybe next year” but I couldn’t do that because you were watching.
So still lots more to write, a ton of edits and redrafts. I’ll post my final NNWM word count here on Sunday.
Thanks again!
November 30th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
11.30.8 – 5:40p EST
52012 total word count for the month of November.
I’m packing up for Chicago again and spending my last few hours with Teresa and Becca so unless they decide they don’t want me around I imagine this is the last I’ll write on the story tonight.
I’ll keep imposing arbitrary deadlines on myself because they seemed to work for me. Completed with first draft by New Years? We’ll see.
April 25th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
and it’s five months later – time to open the doors, Man……