Entry tags:
finished!
It may end a little…briskly, but I wrapped up my mystery plot with a final wordcount of 51,125, so I feel pretty accomplished on both accounts.
It may end a little…briskly, but I wrapped up my mystery plot with a final wordcount of 51,125, so I feel pretty accomplished on both accounts.
NaNoWriMo debrief
Owing to some poor awesome life choices, I ended up writing the last ten thousand words of my NaNoWriMo in the last two days. I wouldn't go to far as to say that I recommend this, but it was at least more sensible than the year that I wrote the last eight thousand words in the last one day. Just…don't do that.
I'm pretty satisfied with this year's effort. It's very recognizably a NaNo novel, which it should be because it is one, but at least it has a discernible plot with a beginning, middle, and end, which is also basically true of 2006, 2008, and 2012's wins, but not so much 2010 or 2011's (and the less said about 2007 and 2009's failed attempts, the better). And it was fun!
I actually like my story well enough that I'd consider tackling it over again with more research, although that version will probably end up being quite different, because research. There is plenty of stuff in the current draft that is based on actual things that I read, but it's strung together with quite a bit of handwaving, and the fact-to-handwaving ratio plummets considerably towards the end.
I'm pretty satisfied with this year's effort. It's very recognizably a NaNo novel, which it should be because it is one, but at least it has a discernible plot with a beginning, middle, and end, which is also basically true of 2006, 2008, and 2012's wins, but not so much 2010 or 2011's (and the less said about 2007 and 2009's failed attempts, the better). And it was fun!
I actually like my story well enough that I'd consider tackling it over again with more research, although that version will probably end up being quite different, because research. There is plenty of stuff in the current draft that is based on actual things that I read, but it's strung together with quite a bit of handwaving, and the fact-to-handwaving ratio plummets considerably towards the end.
talking otters and flying cows
I met Chris "NaNoWriMo" Baty at the Johnson County Library tonight! I've got a picture to prove it and everything!
( picture )
He's a really nice and entertaining guy, exactly the sort of person who could convince a bunch of people to do something crazy like writing novels in a month. I was so inspired that I have already made up yesterday's deficit and am looking to tackle today's, starting, oh, approximately now.
( picture )
He's a really nice and entertaining guy, exactly the sort of person who could convince a bunch of people to do something crazy like writing novels in a month. I was so inspired that I have already made up yesterday's deficit and am looking to tackle today's, starting, oh, approximately now.
studies in procrastination
In what is simultaneously the greatest possible boon and largest possible hindrance to my progress on NaNoWriMo this month, I figured out that I can use my alumni access to JSTOR to not only read things, but also download them as PDFs. So at present I am busy RESEARCHING ALL THE THINGS!
Of course, if I had been smart, I would have done all of this months ago and been infinitely better-prepared. But then I didn't even have an idea to write about at all until quite recently, so I've just had to go with it.
Of course, if I had been smart, I would have done all of this months ago and been infinitely better-prepared. But then I didn't even have an idea to write about at all until quite recently, so I've just had to go with it.
Entry tags:
boo!
I decided to dress as Girl Loki for Halloween. This is less of a costume and more of an outfit, as I just took the Kid Loki t-shirt which I already own and paired it with black tights, a short black skirt, and a long black hoodie sweater with gray embroidery which I also already own instead of crafting a thoughtful and detailed genderswapped Kid Loki costume from scratch, which is something I would not be capable of doing at all, much less on short notice. It was something to wear while I doled out candy in dribs and drabs in our relatively quiet neighborhood.
I also inflicted the pink princess costume on the dog, who hates it, but the kids love it. She figured out pretty quickly that she can get the hat off by herself, so that doesn't last long, which is unfortunate, because it is really the cutest part.
( cut for graphic depictions of animal cruelty and some dangerously sad puppy eyes )
I have an idea for NaNoWriMo that I like, at least for the moment, but we'll see if that liking survives its first encounter with a blank page. I also have several half-finished![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
kink_bingo fills that don't quite make a line yet and clearly aren't going to be posted pre-amnesty anyway, since that would be a matter of hours from now, and, uh, no.
I also inflicted the pink princess costume on the dog, who hates it, but the kids love it. She figured out pretty quickly that she can get the hat off by herself, so that doesn't last long, which is unfortunate, because it is really the cutest part.
( cut for graphic depictions of animal cruelty and some dangerously sad puppy eyes )
I have an idea for NaNoWriMo that I like, at least for the moment, but we'll see if that liking survives its first encounter with a blank page. I also have several half-finished
kink_bingo fills that don't quite make a line yet and clearly aren't going to be posted pre-amnesty anyway, since that would be a matter of hours from now, and, uh, no.
Entry tags:
Ooof.
So, I won at NaNoWriMo this year! Here is my word meter:
50196 / 50000 words. 100% done!
That doesn't give you a very good insight into the last few days, however. Instead, check out this graph:
Why yes, I did write the last 20,000 words in the final three days of November, roughly according to my last-ditch schedule, which called for 10,000 words on Sunday, 5,000 words on Monday and 5,000 more words on Tuesday. That was ... not even as fun as it sounds. In retrospect, the craziest part was that I was actually awake and chipper enough on Tuesday to make the final push that evening, whereas today/Wednesday I was so braindead that it's a minor miracle that I managed to sleepwalk through work, much less do anything else.
The last two times I won NaNo, I offered copies around to anyone who wanted to read them (or, alternatively, not read them), but while this year's effort does, in fact, contain in excess of 50,000 words, it does not actually have an ending. It barely even has a beginning of an ending, and that is on the last (written) page. When I say 'beginning of an ending', I mean that this is the first time in which the premise that I started from at the beginning of the book (post-apocalyptic Baptist missionaries from China who are re-converting the North American continent with the aid of water-borne mind-altering parasites) is even explicitly touched upon. So the text as it stands is kind of boring (since whenever I didn't know what was supposed to happen next I just overwrote the part I had in mind, for wordcount purposes) and pointless.
Still, I'm batting .500 at NaNo! I decided to put in the effort to win this year, even though it involved a terminal effort of crippling optimism, because hey, I already have plenty of things to fail at. Good times.
That doesn't give you a very good insight into the last few days, however. Instead, check out this graph:
Why yes, I did write the last 20,000 words in the final three days of November, roughly according to my last-ditch schedule, which called for 10,000 words on Sunday, 5,000 words on Monday and 5,000 more words on Tuesday. That was ... not even as fun as it sounds. In retrospect, the craziest part was that I was actually awake and chipper enough on Tuesday to make the final push that evening, whereas today/Wednesday I was so braindead that it's a minor miracle that I managed to sleepwalk through work, much less do anything else.
The last two times I won NaNo, I offered copies around to anyone who wanted to read them (or, alternatively, not read them), but while this year's effort does, in fact, contain in excess of 50,000 words, it does not actually have an ending. It barely even has a beginning of an ending, and that is on the last (written) page. When I say 'beginning of an ending', I mean that this is the first time in which the premise that I started from at the beginning of the book (post-apocalyptic Baptist missionaries from China who are re-converting the North American continent with the aid of water-borne mind-altering parasites) is even explicitly touched upon. So the text as it stands is kind of boring (since whenever I didn't know what was supposed to happen next I just overwrote the part I had in mind, for wordcount purposes) and pointless.
Still, I'm batting .500 at NaNo! I decided to put in the effort to win this year, even though it involved a terminal effort of crippling optimism, because hey, I already have plenty of things to fail at. Good times.
Entry tags:
Ooof.
So, I won at NaNoWriMo this year! Here is my word meter:
50196 / 50000 words. 100% done!
That doesn't give you a very good insight into the last few days, however. Instead, check out this graph:
Why yes, I did write the last 20,000 words in the final three days of November, roughly according to my last-ditch schedule, which called for 10,000 words on Sunday, 5,000 words on Monday and 5,000 more words on Tuesday. That was ... not even as fun as it sounds. In retrospect, the craziest part was that I was actually awake and chipper enough on Tuesday to make the final push that evening, whereas today/Wednesday I was so braindead that it's a minor miracle that I managed to sleepwalk through work, much less do anything else.
The last two times I won NaNo, I offered copies around to anyone who wanted to read them (or, alternatively, not read them), but while this year's effort does, in fact, contain in excess of 50,000 words, it does not actually have an ending. It barely even has a beginning of an ending, and that is on the last (written) page. When I say 'beginning of an ending', I mean that this is the first time in which the premise that I started from at the beginning of the book (post-apocalyptic Baptist missionaries from China who are re-converting the North American continent with the aid of water-borne mind-altering parasites) is even explicitly touched upon. So the text as it stands is kind of boring (since whenever I didn't know what was supposed to happen next I just overwrote the part I had in mind, for wordcount purposes) and pointless.
Still, I'm batting .500 at NaNo! I decided to put in the effort to win this year, even though it involved a terminal effort of crippling optimism, because hey, I already have plenty of things to fail at. Good times.
That doesn't give you a very good insight into the last few days, however. Instead, check out this graph:
Why yes, I did write the last 20,000 words in the final three days of November, roughly according to my last-ditch schedule, which called for 10,000 words on Sunday, 5,000 words on Monday and 5,000 more words on Tuesday. That was ... not even as fun as it sounds. In retrospect, the craziest part was that I was actually awake and chipper enough on Tuesday to make the final push that evening, whereas today/Wednesday I was so braindead that it's a minor miracle that I managed to sleepwalk through work, much less do anything else.
The last two times I won NaNo, I offered copies around to anyone who wanted to read them (or, alternatively, not read them), but while this year's effort does, in fact, contain in excess of 50,000 words, it does not actually have an ending. It barely even has a beginning of an ending, and that is on the last (written) page. When I say 'beginning of an ending', I mean that this is the first time in which the premise that I started from at the beginning of the book (post-apocalyptic Baptist missionaries from China who are re-converting the North American continent with the aid of water-borne mind-altering parasites) is even explicitly touched upon. So the text as it stands is kind of boring (since whenever I didn't know what was supposed to happen next I just overwrote the part I had in mind, for wordcount purposes) and pointless.
Still, I'm batting .500 at NaNo! I decided to put in the effort to win this year, even though it involved a terminal effort of crippling optimism, because hey, I already have plenty of things to fail at. Good times.
communicating with other humans in the form of text on computers
Just dropping back in from a period of extended gafiation to reassure my ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
yuletide writer that I aten't dead and I will babble a little more about my requests in the next couple of days if you're interested in that kind of thing!
Socrates/Alcibiades is a repeat request; The Children's Book and Goth Detectives RPF are shiny and new!
Oh, and as is traditional, an update on my NaNoWriMo procrastination
30037 / 50000 words. 60% done!
yuletide writer that I aten't dead and I will babble a little more about my requests in the next couple of days if you're interested in that kind of thing!Socrates/Alcibiades is a repeat request; The Children's Book and Goth Detectives RPF are shiny and new!
Oh, and as is traditional, an update on my NaNoWriMo procrastination
communicating with other humans in the form of text on computers
Just dropping back in from a period of extended gafiation to reassure my yuletide writer that I aten't dead and I will babble a little more about my requests in the next couple of days if you're interested in that kind of thing!
Socrates/Alcibiades is a repeat request; The Children's Book and Goth Detectives RPF are shiny and new!
Oh, and as is traditional, an update on my NaNoWriMo procrastination
30037 / 50000 words. 60% done!
yuletide writer that I aten't dead and I will babble a little more about my requests in the next couple of days if you're interested in that kind of thing!Socrates/Alcibiades is a repeat request; The Children's Book and Goth Detectives RPF are shiny and new!
Oh, and as is traditional, an update on my NaNoWriMo procrastination
Entry tags:
NaNoFailMo
It turns out that you can either have an Epic NaNoWriMo Catchupathon or a Four-Day Weekend Family Holiday Roadtrip and Hug-In, but not both. And by 'you', of course, I mean 'me'. In my defense, I wasn't aware that I was planning on a Family Holiday Roadtrip and Hug-In until sometime last week, so I wasn't really factoring this into my NaNo optimism.
I wasn't terribly upset, to be honest with you. Me and NaNoWriMo 2009, we had some good times, but it was time for both of us to move on. By which I mean that I'm going to move on and my 25,000 word masterpiece is mostly going to stay put. Possibly when I am bored, I will reread it and copypaste any bits of it that are still funny.
I wasn't terribly upset, to be honest with you. Me and NaNoWriMo 2009, we had some good times, but it was time for both of us to move on. By which I mean that I'm going to move on and my 25,000 word masterpiece is mostly going to stay put. Possibly when I am bored, I will reread it and copypaste any bits of it that are still funny.
Entry tags:
NaNoFailMo
It turns out that you can either have an Epic NaNoWriMo Catchupathon or a Four-Day Weekend Family Holiday Roadtrip and Hug-In, but not both. And by 'you', of course, I mean 'me'. In my defense, I wasn't aware that I was planning on a Family Holiday Roadtrip and Hug-In until sometime last week, so I wasn't really factoring this into my NaNo optimism.
I wasn't terribly upset, to be honest with you. Me and NaNoWriMo 2009, we had some good times, but it was time for both of us to move on. By which I mean that I'm going to move on and my 25,000 word masterpiece is mostly going to stay put. Possibly when I am bored, I will reread it and copypaste any bits of it that are still funny.
I wasn't terribly upset, to be honest with you. Me and NaNoWriMo 2009, we had some good times, but it was time for both of us to move on. By which I mean that I'm going to move on and my 25,000 word masterpiece is mostly going to stay put. Possibly when I am bored, I will reread it and copypaste any bits of it that are still funny.
Entry tags:
NaNoOhNoWoe
I have written a whole bunch this weekend! At the moment, my novel has gotten so boring that it is actually putting me to sleep, but I am still guardedly optimistic about finishing it by the 30th if I keep super-busy and come up with some more exciting trouble for my characters to get into. Sorry, guys, you thought it was bad enough that you burned down your own (shared) house with fireworks, you're hiding from your thesis advisor, and your parents think that you're enrolled in law school, but your lives are just going to have to get weirder,
22728 / 50000 words. 45% done!
And now, as I said, sleep. It's early enough that I could actually consider waking up early tomorrow morning and doing some writing like those weird morning people do.
And now, as I said, sleep. It's early enough that I could actually consider waking up early tomorrow morning and doing some writing like those weird morning people do.
Entry tags:
NaNoOhNoWoe
I have written a whole bunch this weekend! At the moment, my novel has gotten so boring that it is actually putting me to sleep, but I am still guardedly optimistic about finishing it by the 30th if I keep super-busy and come up with some more exciting trouble for my characters to get into. Sorry, guys, you thought it was bad enough that you burned down your own (shared) house with fireworks, you're hiding from your thesis advisor, and your parents think that you're enrolled in law school, but your lives are just going to have to get weirder,
22728 / 50000 words. 45% done!
And now, as I said, sleep. It's early enough that I could actually consider waking up early tomorrow morning and doing some writing like those weird morning people do.
And now, as I said, sleep. It's early enough that I could actually consider waking up early tomorrow morning and doing some writing like those weird morning people do.
Entry tags:
block, writer's
I think I've figured out what I'm going to write for NaNoWriMo this year, which is good, because November is presently hurtling towards us at a terrifying speed.
I've vaguely considered what I want to nominate/request foryuletide.
I still have three kinks to write to finish my line in kink_bingo. Maybe they'll get written while I'm procrastinating on the big two.
I've vaguely considered what I want to nominate/request for
yuletide.I still have three kinks to write to finish my line in kink_bingo. Maybe they'll get written while I'm procrastinating on the big two.
Entry tags:
block, writer's
I think I've figured out what I'm going to write for NaNoWriMo this year, which is good, because November is presently hurtling towards us at a terrifying speed.
I've vaguely considered what I want to nominate/request foryuletide.
I still have three kinks to write to finish my line in kink_bingo. Maybe they'll get written while I'm procrastinating on the big two.
I've vaguely considered what I want to nominate/request for
yuletide.I still have three kinks to write to finish my line in kink_bingo. Maybe they'll get written while I'm procrastinating on the big two.
NaNoWriMo 2008: Signal and Noise (but mostly just noise)
Having rashly promised people that I would email them a copy of my postapocalyptic monastery novel if I actually finished it, I find myself actually having to deliver!
Don't worry, you needn't feel obligated to enjoy it, or actually read it, or anything. That said, I had a lot of fun writing it, in highly twisted and masochistic sort of way. (Especially yesterday, fourteen thousand words, oh my god).
[Poll #1307620]
Don't worry, you needn't feel obligated to enjoy it, or actually read it, or anything. That said, I had a lot of fun writing it, in highly twisted and masochistic sort of way. (Especially yesterday, fourteen thousand words, oh my god).
[Poll #1307620]
NaNoWriMo 2008: Signal and Noise (but mostly just noise)
Having rashly promised people that I would email them a copy of my postapocalyptic monastery novel if I actually finished it, I find myself actually having to deliver!
Don't worry, you needn't feel obligated to enjoy it, or actually read it, or anything. That said, I had a lot of fun writing it, in highly twisted and masochistic sort of way. (Especially yesterday, fourteen thousand words, oh my god).
[Poll #1307620]
Don't worry, you needn't feel obligated to enjoy it, or actually read it, or anything. That said, I had a lot of fun writing it, in highly twisted and masochistic sort of way. (Especially yesterday, fourteen thousand words, oh my god).
[Poll #1307620]
Entry tags:
oh thank goodness
|
Now I must go to sleep lest my head explode.
ETA: I will put up a poll for anyone who wants a copy tomorrow. When my head is less explode-y.
Entry tags:
oh thank goodness
|
Now I must go to sleep lest my head explode.
ETA: I will put up a poll for anyone who wants a copy tomorrow. When my head is less explode-y.