Winner, winner, turkey dinner...

Since it's the last day of November I figure this is the time for the NaNo wrap up. For those of you that missed it, I did it. Oh wait, spoiler alert...now...I did it. Hit over 50K on Monday. I let out a little Whoop! of excitement, posted a picture and then started playing desperate catch up with other things that needed done. One of those being a nice tidy little wrap up blog. So here we are...

First off, I did it. I just want to say that again because that was really the main point for me. I wanted to do this. It was important to me to actually get through it and do it. And I did. So I'm pretty pleased. There were lessons along the way and things that I need to think about now, but before I get in to the weeds with that part I wanted to say again, I did it.

Okay, lessons, first off it wasn't easy. I write at 1,000 words per hour so really 50,000 words in a month should be easy right? But I write at 1,000 words per hour if the ideas are flowing. And on some days they aren't. I had banked on being able to write a lot while Brent was in Denver. What I didn't bank on was getting sick during that time. The good news was that there was only one really bad day. Bad enough that if a friend hadn't surprised me with lunch I wouldn't have eaten a hot meal that day. But only one really bad day. I didn't get as sick as Brent did the week before so though I didn't get the stellar numbers I had been hoping for, I did get some decent numbers in that week.

So a few lessons, the dual deadlines worked for me. I had been working all along toward being finished by November 22 instead of November 30. And even though I got sick and didn't make that first deadline I had a giant cushion to make the hard deadline of the 30th. I ended up crossing the number line on the 25th. Not terrible. But to really make that first deadline I needed to have not counted on the extra time while Brent was gone so much. I should have treated it like normal time and then I might have still made the original deadline. As it was I looked at that upcoming "free" time as an excuse to slack a few days.

Writing a long story for me was hard. I like short stories, I talked about that before, but I want to mention it again. I noticed as I was writing scenes where THINGS happened to my main characters that the readers wouldn't really care because I hadn't given them any reason to care about these people. A lot of things I can get away with in a short story I just can't in a longer one. It was a good exercise in stretching for me. Why should the reader care? What did I need to add in to this story to make them care? I did a lot of back and forth writing. At more than one point I could envision the 6 year old me on the playground calling the shots in a game of make believe, "No, let's say that you did this instead!"

I also got a big glimpse in to what a lazy writer I really am. I told you that I had friends with kids and jobs doing this as well right? And keeping pace with me? My job this month? Writing. Hell, Brent offered to get me a cleaning lady for the month so I could focus just on the writing. I am hugely supported in this endeavor and extremely lazy. That I can fix. Though 50,000 words just for the sake of words probably won't happen again the schedule that I came up with will most likely stick. Breakfast, workout, writing. That's a good morning. Leaves the afternoon for the other things I need to take care of to keep this joint running and I also have the flexibility to move things around on days that I need to have the morning free for something else. But I did it this month. A busy month. And I did it.

As for the story itself? I don't know what I am going to do with it. For right now I am letting it sit. I know it will need a lot of editing. A lot of rewrites. Possibly a whole new plot line. But for now it's just sitting. It served its purpose. One continual story over 50,000 words. What it eventually evolves in to I would guess I won't know until sometime next year. I still think there is potential there. I still like the mother and daughter. I am just not sure what I need their story to be. In fact right now I have two different paths I merged in to one story (on purpose) but I'm not sure that they should be one story. Maybe they are two separate short stories.

And speaking of short stories, I think I am going back to those. I do believe that I will try out my other idea of stringing a group together to make a novel length collection. Recurring characters and situations that might dovetail, but stand alone stories. Now that I know I can just sit my butt in the chair and write daily without the world falling apart I should find it easier to get that done. That's the plan anyway.

Will I do it again? Hmm...I don't think so. I did it. I won. I got the huzzahs, seriously on the website when you win they give you a huzzah. I don't see the reason to do it again next November. I know I can do it. And I know that I can do a lot more on a daily basis than I was so for now it served its purpose and that's good enough.

And the last thing, thank you all so much. The encouragement I got from all of you when I posted my daily word counts meant so much to me! I really felt like I would be letting you all down if I didn't finish so thank you for standing behind me and pushing my lazy ass over the finish line, even if you didn't realize that's what you were doing!

Now on to December! Now I only have to catch up on Christmas shopping, cards, the letter, decorating, blogging, editing, starting the short story series....

The Dread Writer Roberts...

So if all goes as planned and I meet my daily quota at the end of the day tomorrow I will be 1/3 of the way through the NaNo challenge. Which is right on track for me since I want to be mostly done if not all the way done by the time C comes home for Thanksgiving.

Because I am writing every day instead of waiting for a story to come to me and reworking it over and over in my head before committing it to the screen I'm having to write in a way that is different for me. Less thinking and mulling more writing. I'm also not reading, rewriting or revising. It's all just dumping out on the page. So I have no idea at this point if when I go back and read it all at the end it will work together in to a cohesive story. It should be interesting.

I'm also having to think on the fly. As I start my yoga in the morning I feel like I've stepped out of Princess Bride and the story is the farm boy. Well that was a good story but as I have nothing left to write I'll most likely kill it this morning. Then I do my yoga, then my cardio and while that is happening part of my brain is thinking well, what next? Should I talk about Aric some more? So I go back to Deidre? Do I write the scene where Cal dies or do I leave it as it stands? And by the time I finish the cool down and stretch out again I have an idea. Shower, dressed and back to writing. As you wish....

I have to say the greatest challenge (aside from doing it every day) has been in trying to do something different. When I write a short story, my comfort zone, I am giving you a window in to a life. Just the briefest glimpse of these people. One situation. One snapshot in time. They all have back stories, but they are in my head, I know them but you don't need to. You get pieces of them. The story I wrote recently about the couple in the coffee shop? You could piece together their back story with what I gave you, but there is a whole world there I left unsaid. And that's what I like about short story writing. You get to fill in the missing pieces and make the characters what you need them to be.

Now? I'm writing a long story. You need the background. You need to know who these people are and why they are doing what they are doing. Things that were vague ideas in my head when I wrote the first short story about them now have to be fleshed out. And that's tough. Because some of what I could leave up to you to figure out is now on me. And I don't know! I mean really, one of the ideas I had that is fairly central to the story I am having a hard time figuring out how to make work. Right now it's kind of water colored vague and I might just leave it like that. YOU figure it out.

But the good news is I am doing it. Every day. Workout, write. Small bites.

Update!

Okay, so today is the first day of the first full week of NaNo. Last week was the trial run for the schedule and it seems like it's a good fit. Though it was slightly harder to get motivated this morning than last Monday. And when I sat down in front of the computer to write the words were not so much fluently articulated. (or something like that)

Anyway...I powered through and did just over 3000 words for the day. I want to do around 11,000 more words by the end of the week so 2200 to 2700 words a day depending on if I am planning on writing on Saturday. Who knew there would be so much math involved?

I've already given up on writing linearly. I have certain scenes in my head and those are what I am writing. After I get those out then I will go back and write bridge chapters and filler to put them together. My biggest worry still is if I have 50,000 words to put to this story.  If I get to 30,000 and tap out I guess they can all take a wacky road trip someplace!

And as I am super competitive I am having to tell myself that my small bites of words are just fine. Even if Mel wrote over 10,000 words in two days. And she has a baby at home. How in the hell is she doing that? And Jen writing as much as I am on a daily basis but you know after her full day at work and brutal San Francisco commute home. But it's fine. Really. And Dana cranking out 1000 words while her daughter plays softball? No big deal. I mean I can do 1000 words too. As long as I'm home alone and don't have any distractions and...

Okay, yeah, so I have friends doing this who have jobs and little ones and other things and they are cranking out the numbers. It's motivating to say the least. I mean what in the world could my excuse be for not finishing? I broke a nail? The cat wanted attention? Both things that happened today, by the way, so I'm pretty sure I'm a hero for getting my word count in. Or something.

All right I just wanted to let you all know how it was going. Thanks again for the encouragement!

Words, language, tone, I would agree with you but you are an ass...

Okay, so the title to this blog is more of a list, but that's what you are in for right now.

I always pay attention to words, word choice, meaning, all of that good stuff. It's not a shock to you that I do this, it is part of who I am. And it also is the source of much frustration at times because I'm not sure why no one else is paying attention. For instance the word entitlement. Did you shudder? It's gotten a pretty bad rep from people on the conservative side of our (meaning the USA) political spectrum. Oh those entitlements! How dare people feel they are entitled to that! But did you know what an entitlement is? I'll give you a hint, its synonym is right. You have a right. It's your right. How would you feel if the Second Amendment fell under the Bill of Entitlements, would it change your thought process about it? A right is something you are legally or morally entitled to. Entitlements and Rights. Same thing, thought of completely differently. Just because of the tone people have used when saying one over the other.

Rights! This is my Right! And the angels sing and the inspirational music plays! I am entitled to this! This is my entitlement! And the wa waa sound is made and the crying baby is heard in the background. But they are the same thing. It's just how you've been conditioned to hear them.

And what happens if you are in a discussion with someone who doesn't hear things the way you do? I was listening to a story about coal transportation this week. Basically one group wants to be the port to ship coal to China for their use and one group opposes it. Job creation versus environmental protection is how it's being framed. If the port is set up for transportation then people will need to work there, but the concern is if the trains are running coal through the town and in to the port the resulting coal dust is going to be an issue. It's more complex than that but I'm not here to debate this point, I want to get to an argument I heard and the absolute confusion of the two people arguing. On one side was a woman who stated it was an issue with people being able to do what they want with their own land. On the other side was a man who said it wasn't her land to decide what to do with. Even though the tracks ran through part of land she owned.

So I thought, now that's a group that would never see eye to eye. Those that believe you can own the land and those that believe you cannot. Why do you own land? Because someone sold it to you. But how did they have the right to sell it to you? Because someone else sold it to them. And how did they have that right? And eventually you get back to to beginning of someone deciding that since they were there first it was theirs. Or the government saying you get this piece of land, now it's yours. But if you really believe that the land was here first and cannot be owned by someone, and really how ridiculous to think you can own the land you are sitting on, do you own the air you breath? The rain that falls on your head? The sunbeams? The wind? Land rights versus the sense of entitlement that because you were there first it's yours. (see what I did there with rights and entitlements) And I have to admit I would be in the I own it camp. Though I can see how silly it is for me to think that I do, when I die any land I own might be passed along to future generations but they will just be borrowing it as well.

So we have words and the fact that they mean things but we don't pay attention to what they really mean. We have concepts that mean one thing to you and another to me like ownership.

Oh and here is another one! What if you are talking to someone and they say something that they think is really negative but you think it's great? I had one of these the other day. A friend shared a status from someone else "What one generation tolerates the next accepts." What do you think of that? Is it positive or negative? It struck me as a good thing. My generation started down the path of tolerating gay people. C's generation accepts that sexual orientation has nothing to do with what sort of person you are. Toleration to acceptance in one generation. Woo hoo! This is excellent! But they looked at it as a negative. If you tolerate bad language in your generation then bad language is the accepted language in the next. And that sort of thing. Hmmm...okay. I can see that. But I viewed it as a positive progression instead of a negative one.

Oh! And there's another one, progressive. I had someone spit that at me like it was an insult. You are a progressive! Well thank you! I really do try. Much better than being regressive and preferable to being stuck. I also don't think it's insulting when people call me out on changing my mind on an issue. I have changed my mind on a lot of issues. When you know more your opinion should change. It can be more evidence that you were right in the first place so you feel on solid ground, or you might find out that you were wrong. It's the people who are resolute and never change that I worry about. What are they doing with all of the new information coming their way on a daily basis? It doesn't make you a hypocrite to change your mind. Being a hypocrite is saying one thing and doing another.

And what about tone? Or even accents? How does that add or subtract from your understanding of people? Brent and I were watching an episode of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives the other night and they were in Albuquerque. The woman who owned the restaurant had a solid Albuquerque accent. Her sentences ended in a lilt, it's not a lilt like a Southern thing, but we almost sing the ends of sentences back home. It's not something I really noticed until I had been gone for awhile. And vowels are different. I turns into E. Instead of a Philly sandwich she made a Pheely. She did say sandwich instead of sangwich though...

Anyway...

I don't have much of an accent. I didn't even when we lived there. My parents are Midwestern, my siblings were older when they moved so their accents are more in line with my parents (warsh instead of wash). But when I was hanging out with my friends there were phrases that were just said with a certain intonation that is pure New Mexico. Eeeeee, orale, umbers...And phrases..I know, right? That's directly descendant of It's all bad, no? Those are the changes I've made over the years. I've dropped the all qualifier. I've changed no to right. Sometimes if I'm trying really hard you can hear the difference between pin and pen when I say them. But if I am home for any length of time my bags all become begs, my rights become nos and my Rs start to roll...

Okay, on to the last part of my random blog.

Voice. You've got your words and your tone and your meaning and your accents. What about voice? I mean this for writing specifically. When I write something I write in my voice. People that know me can actually hear me when they read. They know exactly how I sound and I write like I talk. My non-fiction voice is strongly my own voice.

I had three voice issues this week. One was in a fiction book. The author writes in first person. Which seems like it would be easy and it can be, except if you are switching between characters. This was the last book in a series and for the first two she wrote from one character's point of view. For the last she switched between two. She had a reason for it, I won't get in to that this isn't a book review, but it really bothered me. The reason was she hadn't given the second character a strong enough voice. He was the same as the other. So I would be reading along in a chapter and forget whose head I was in. They were too similar. If you are writing in first person your voice has to be strong. I can never forget who you are.

The second was a non-fiction group of essays. It was a closet book. These are books I have collected over the years that I am "getting" to. Finally this year I decided if they aren't read by January they are out of here, so I've made due diligence in clearing them out. Well anyway I'm reading this book and I don't like the author. He's spoiled. What is supposed to be amusing, I know it is, is coming across as pretentious. And I'm starting to wonder why in the heck I have this book of musings from someone I obviously don't like. Then as I was staring at the cover the author's name finally worked its way through my files and made the connection. David Rakoff.  David Rakoff. I love him. He was on This American Life. Very amusing, dry, funny. Okay, well now I have his voice in my head maybe I will like these essays more. I was obviously reading them with the wrong tone. But no, I could never capture the bemused, dry, witty, cadence he had in these writings. They still came across as pretentious and spoiled. I felt a little like I was betraying his memory, but his voice was just not there for me.

And then sometimes someone's voice is so strong you can't get past it to get to their message. There is a blogger/radio personality out there that drives me crazy because of this. I've read a lot of his posts because he appeals strongly to a demographic that is well represented on my friend list. And I try to make sure I am reading things people post, at least until I understand what I am going to see. If I know it's going to be something I won't be able to tolerate due to experience I skip it (Bill Maher and Ann Coulter for instance) and this guy is quickly falling in to this camp.  Because see, even when I agree with his main point I cannot bear his blog. His voice is that strong. And his voice is condescending asshole. He's pretty sure he has the world figured out (though he does the whole false modesty shit A LOT) and takes some pretty strong stances on things that are not as black and white as he would like them to be. He dismisses personal anecdotes from other people while holding his own experiences as infallible. It's hard to take.

Oh he's just snarky people say! Well, snark is tough. Trust me, I have experience here. (And all the readers go no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no...) The problem with snark is that if you present it as fact you come across as an ass. If you decide that you are right and any one who disagrees with you is obviously a brain dead sheep you are an ass. If you are completely unwilling to accept that the world is a complex place and there are very difficult things out there that people are dealing with because you are fine and you made it okay then you are an inconsiderate ass.

A few weeks ago a friend of mine posted a blog of his where he mentions in the blog he doesn't understand why strangers who read his work think he would be an ass in real life (paraphrasing). Umm, dude, read your blogs.

So this brings us to this week. He posted about something that if I had been given an outline of I would say, Yes! I agree with this person! But then I read the blog and could feel my jaw tightening. I had to tell another friend that I am glad that he is getting a message out there (basically we shouldn't look to medicate our kids for being kids, and being a little different than the crowd is a good thing) but I just wish it wasn't done in his way. Because I found myself tearing apart his argument by the end of the blog. And I agree with him! But the way he presented it? Too strong of a voice.

And how often does that happen in real life? I had a job once where I swore I needed to add interpreter to my job description. Because I would sit in our conference room while our owner would say one thing, another member of our staff would say the SAME thing just in a different way and they would argue over who was right. They couldn't hear each other over their tone, or voice, or preset thoughts. So I would have to say, well, I think that...blah, blah, blah is a great idea. And they would both recognize that blah, blah, blah was their own brilliant idea that I was backing and everyone would leave happy.  Well except for me who was left in the conference room pounding my head against the table...

And that brings us to the end of my list of random thoughts about communication that have been bouncing in my head all week. It's kind of amazing that we understand each other at all isn't it?

T minus two and counting...

Quick NaNo update time!

Yesterday I spent a good chunk of time trying to figure out a new software system for writing. It sounds really great and I am sure it is, I just couldn't really figure out how to effectively use it. I think part of it was the tutorial was a bit overwhelming. A lot of information thrown at once. I will go back in tomorrow and see if I can make it work, and if I can't then I will just use Word like I had planned. But the main thing was while I was messing around with that I settled in on Practical Magic as the book I am going to write.

The other piece I decided on was to take the little short blog stories I have already written and expand them as the start of the book. The first one or maybe two will be the introduction chapter, then chapter one will start with Deeds at school. The first part of the book will lead back up to that first glimpse you get of her and Aska. I've already decided to make some changes and am treating those first stories as outlines.

The schedule thing seems to be a good plan. Though I didn't follow it today. Skipped the workout and messed around this morning, well if you can count the annual drape and scrape as messing around, but anyway I flipped the schedule, errands in the morning, writing in the afternoon a day off from working out. I don't plan on a lot of those in November, the days I have appointments are the end of the month and I am hoping to have reached goal by then so the schedule will be tweaked at that point anyway.

Workouts are good. Sitting still for a few hours at the computer is easier to do after a workout. I'm not so twitchy. Though I am at that tipping point of "why did I let myself get so out of shape? I will NEVER let this happen again!" and "holy shit I am so out of shape, everything hurts! I should NEVER workout again!" I'm pretty sure I'll tip the right way, but if I don't you have my blessing to push me.

Back to the schedule thing, writing in the morning is good as well. I've noticed as I sit here writing this blog and thinking about the other blog that I want to write I am MUCH more distracted than I have been. I think I just need to get the focus oriented things out of the way early in the day.

And that's that for the update portion of our day.  Tomorrow should be a straight up ranty/rambling/randomy blog. I have a lot of different ideas that sort of tie together in a theme so expect that. Then....dum dum dum....NaNo starts...  Eek!

Preparation!

And here we go. Day one of setting up new habits and schedules and such. NaNo starts on Friday but as I mentioned earlier starting something on a Friday just seems like a bad idea. Especially since I am not sure yet how much I will actually be writing on the weekends. So today was the start of setting up new schedules.

And me being me I decided since I was setting up a new schedule anyway and I need to get back in to a consistent work out routine again I wove the two together. So as of right now my mornings are breakfast, Brent to work, workout, shower, writing. When lunch time rolls around I will break for lunch and if I have put at least a few thousand words down I will move on to the rest of the day, chores and then reading or watching something on TiVo. If I haven't then after lunch I come back in and write more. Exercise, discipline then affection. Yep, I'm treating my new schedule the way Caesar Milan trains a dog. Because it amuses me. Well that and I'm not likely to push off reading but I will push off a workout. Do the harder stuff first so you have the treat waiting for you at the end.

The number count part will start on Friday, the first few days this week are still prep work. For instance this morning I re-read the Practical Magic story to see if I could really turn that in to a book. I have 3,000 words invested in it already do I have 50,000+ more? Also I started that story as a lark. Something to post only on the blog and only as the ideas came to me. If I use it for NaNo I will be taking it off the blog and putting it in to a book. Or at least trying to. But on the other hand if it works out that I write it and still don't think it's something to send to a publisher I will have weeks of things to post in the bank. I'm not completely settled on the idea of writing that story for NaNo but I'm leaning enough that I've added Aska to my spell-check.

The biggest habit to make (break?) will be not being online when I am writing. That's the discipline part. No Facebook or email running in the background. No quick dashes off to ew.com to read about something. Actually sitting down and focusing on my writing. So far I've made it 45 minutes without checking my notifications. Go me!

Right now I'm also deciding if I just give up on my inconsistent blog posting for November, knowing that you all understand I'm here, writing, I'm just not posting, or if I try to make sure that I fit in some time for some writing that doesn't count towards words and goals and is just head clearing or fun. Most likely I'll post here keeping everyone up to date on how it's going. I have a feeling I will need the head clearing. And the venting.

All in all I think that November will be good for me. Getting back in to a schedule will be fun, at least for awhile, and if I can get that workout ingrained again I will be a much happier camper. I'm always really happy when a workout is done.

Okay, off to take notes on PM and see if I can get a few more ideas for a few thousand more words!

Aska and Deeds and Cal await!

So who thought this was a good idea anyway?

Okay, well, Friday is November 1st. That means NaNoWriMo is upon us. Or me. Or us. Or whatever. Words. Bah!

Yes, that's about where my brain is right now. The reality of what I am doing is sinking in. Schedules. Deadlines. Discipline. I'll take Things Denise Doesn't Like for $100, Alex.

So anyway as my brain is giving me 1000 reasons why I should bow out now I'm fighting back with the one main reason to keep doing it. To show that I can. Which, as most of you know, is usually my reason for doing anything challenging. I've got this.

Because Friday is a stupid day to start something (reason #478) I'm actually going to sort of start on Monday. Not writing the novel part, that would be cheating, but writing for a set amount of hours. So there will be a few blogs up next week. Probably nonfiction but maybe a little fiction might leak out. Only if I can't possibly turn it in to part of the story I will be writing for NaNo, but it might happen. That has been one of the main realizations I've had heading in to this challenge, my entire schedule needs to shift. To get the writing done as well as the other things I want to do I have to go back to managing my time. And for someone who hasn't worn a watch since C left for college that's saying a lot.

Here's the real kicker though, I'm still not sure what I'm going to write about in November. I had settled on an idea, the sort of short stories I do most of the time just all tied together with recurring characters. Those of you that have read this blog for awhile know I've had these people in my head for awhile and thought about doing this so this would be a good time. And to be honest I felt that would probably be the easiest. Those stories come to me fairly regularly. I could just fluff them up a bit and be on my way. So after spending a few weeks making notes and plans to do just that I thought... wait! maybe I want to go ahead and go back to that science fiction fantasy story I started on here ages ago and then just left to wait.

Blame Susan for putting that idea in my head.

But the sci/fi/fantasy story actually does have the makings of a real structured novel. Not just a thread of short stories tied together. So maybe I should go ahead and do that instead. But what if I don't get any more inspiration on that front? I know the story I want to tell there I just have never really been able to figure out how to get there. Maybe this is the kick I need to get that world out there?

Words. Bah.

So for the next few days that will be my challenge. Figuring out what I want to do for the real challenge. And calming down the gremlins in my brain. Wish me luck!