Day 6: Nanowrimo (and NaBloPoMo)

NaNoWriMo

Today's goal / alternative "finish early" goal: 10,000 / 10,714
My total words written: 10, 847 words total.

Impressions: Yahoo! I made it past the 10K mark. I am over 1/5 done! Yahoo! I am so tired today that I wasn't sure I even had the energy to write. When I looked to see how much I needed to write to stay on track, I realized it wasn't that much. I decided to just go for it. I am glad I did as I got some pretty cool concepts on paper, er, I mean into the computer.

Because I have a day job, a cool man and 3 small kids, the only time I can work on this is when the kids are all asleep at night. The problem with that that I am always leaving the writing until late at night. I remember reading an interview with Charles de Lint and he was talking about writing and said he had a page goal every day and couldn't go to sleep until he finished it. He talked about if he wrote in the morning, he would be done! I'd like to do that but so far it hasn't happened yet.

Last night on the website I saw that Chris Baty had done a writing exercize which looked cool. Here is what he wrote: "Borrowing a question from one of Tavia's Young Writers Program exercises. Namely: What do each of my characters want more than anything else in the world?" I thought about this question during the day and couldn't come up with a single thing my main character wanted. I realized I didn't know her very well!

Likelihood of finishing NaNoWriMo: 100% because I am still on track.
Likelihood of finishing NaBloPoMo: and going...

Is anyone out there reading this??? Please let me know. I have never blogged this much in my life and I feel like I am blogging into a black hole!

Day 5: Nanowrimo (and NaBloPoMo)

Nanowrimo

Daily goal / alternative "finish early" goal: 1,667 / 1,786 words
Today's goal / alternate "finish early" goal: 8,333 / 8,929 words total

My total words written: 9,812 words total (I so wanted to get to 10K tonight but I am just too dang tired.)

Impressions: What a difficult writing day! I was on fire yesterday. Today, not so much. I didn't like where the story headed today. I am hoping that I will be able to pull it out of it's current direction tomorrow.
You may have noticed that I have an "alternative "finish early" goal". This is how many words I have to write if I want to finish in 28 days instead of 30. I figure it is a little bit of insurance against a day when I might want to skip writing.
I also have a spreadsheet that I have created to chart my progress. What can I say? I have an engineering degree!

Likelihood of finishing NaNoWriMo: 100% only because I am still on track but honestly

I am too tired to think about it right now.
Likelihood of finishing NaBloPoMo: Still going...

Super Goal: Same as yesterday...help our whole family get healthy.

Day 4: Nanowrimo (and NaBloPoMo)

Nanowrimo


Daily goal / alternate "finish early" goal: 1,667 / 1,786 words


Today's goal / alternate "finish early" goal: 6,666 / 7,143 words total


My total words written: 7,753 words total (What do you think of the color coding?)


Impressions: I like this story. It isn't particularly a new story...but what story is? I think I have figured out a plot although I am not sure how the prologue I wrote fits in to the current storyline. Either I am going to have to come up with a link or I am going to have to write it off (pun intended) as a warm up exercise.

I am having serious issues which I am not addressing right now. They are in the areas of consistency of voice and dialogue. I am not a regular writer so to some extent, I don't know how to a) choose a voice and b) do non sucky dialogue. Will writing a lot help? Or do I need to focus on learning how to do these things? Since I have no time to learn (only time to write and blog) I will have to hope it is the former and not the latter. I will leave these problems until NaNoEdMo (or perhaps sooner) unless anyone has any great ideas they want to share.

Is there anything anyone out there would like to know about this experience? Just post a comment and I will reply to your post.

Likelihood of finishing Nanowrimo: 100%.


Likelihood of finishing NaBloPomo: I am still going strong (can you say that if you are just on day 4 of 30 days?).


Super Goal: Help our whole family get healthy!!!

Day 3: Nanowrimo (and NaBloPoMo)

Nanowrimo

Daily Goal: 1,667 words

Today's goal: 5,000 words total

My total words written: 5,651 words total

Impressions: Carving out time to write on a weekend when I knew I was going out was difficult. I managed to get 1,400 words written before we went out. I was definitely getting stuck with my plot today. There was a big show down in my story and I am stuck on the explanation. Is it all because of greed? Is it because someone wants to save the world? (Save the world, save the cheerleader). I have to make some decisions in the next few paragraphs as to where this book is going. How trippy is that?

Likelihood of finishing Nanowrimo: 100%. Still going strong and I am interested in my words. I think that is a good sign.

Likelihood of finishing NaBloPomo: I figure it is either 0% or 100%. If I miss just one day, I automatically go to 0%. I had a scare tonight because I thought I would be out too late to make a post. (No J&D - that is not why we left earlier than you - we really were tired!) I think I have to plan better.

Super Goal: No super goals to report today.

Day 2: Nanowrimo

Nanowrimo

Daily Goal: 1,667 words

Today's goal: 3,333 words total

My total words written: 3,923 words total

Impressions: W and I are both on target today. I wrote a little this afternoon and finished up this evening. I am hoping that I won't experience "Nanowrimo insomnia" again today. I realize that I have a lot of energy and feel very creative. I am loving it. I'd like to get the small Nanowrimo logo for these posts but I haven't found the time yet. Imagine that!

Likelihood of finishing: 100%. I am on target and still optimistic. I am sure there will be a dark night(s) of the soul but that won't be for a few weeks.

Super Goal: I have surpassed my super goal of 3,571 words today. I want to bank enough words so that I can take a day off here or there.

Super secret admission: I am a glutton for punishment. I joined NaBloPoMo today. Hey - I was going to do it anyway to track my progress!

Nanowrimo Insomnia

I forgot about one danger of writing just before bed; nanowrimo induced insomnia. Instead of falling into an effortless sleep, I am thinking about how my story is unfolding. Thinking things like this, "taser / sword combo" and "observers can "chat" mind to mind offline". I may have to write earlier in the day to give my brain a chance to calm down.

Day 1: Nanowrimo

Nanowrimo

Goal: 1,667 words (per day)

Progress: 1,774 words.

Impressions: As usual, my writing has taken off in a direction I wasn't expecting. I said I was going to write a cyberpunk novel but now I don't know what it is...cyberpunk? Sci-fi? Fantasy? A combination of all three with spirituality mixed in? I have to remind myself to write a book that I want to read, to write about characters I want to know. It is hard to rein in the writing beast sometimes. I also have to remind myself to just write, write, write! Editing comes later. W wrote over 2,000 words today! Yahoo! Go W!

Likelihood of finishing: 100%. OK, just kidding! Who can say on the first day? I met my goal today which puts me in an optimistic mood. We shall see how the coming days go...I remember Thanksgiving being a pain to work around when I did Nanowrimo the first time and had only one kid. Now I have 3. Gulp.

Super Goal: Bank enough words that I don't need to write on Thanksgiving or the day after Thanksgiving (so I can shop - JUST KIDDING). This would move my goal to 1,785 words per day.

Just wait - soon I will break out the graphing tools. Yeah!

Are you doing Nanowrimo this year? How are you doing?

Super secret admission: I just decided to do this yesterday. What was I thinking???