NaNo Addiction

So despite going on all year about how I definitely was not going to ML again this year and how I quite possibly wasn't going to do NaNo at all, I'm totally doing both (at least as long as no one tried to usurp my ML-ing power before I had a chance to respond; I wasn't able to do so by the you-are-guaranteed-your-spot response date).

I hope this isn't a huge mistake. I'm totally feeling better about NaNo in general this year than I was last year though, so I hope it'll be all right.

Have a big job interview later this month which, if successful, will mean that I'll need to be preparing for a huge move and huge changes, which might make November a bit crazier than usual, but I'll worry about that if it actually happens.

Am thinking about having another go at the first thing I attempted last November. After three days of writing it I decided it was unbelievably terrible and started over with something else (which was really unbelievably terrible). But I just came across the small bit I wrote of it, and it was totally interesting! What was I thinking?! I don't quite remember where I was going with it, so it'll need some thought, but the characters are pretty fantabulous which is the most important thing for me when I'm writing. The plot can generally figure itself out.

So, yeah. Apparently even more addicted to NaNo than I suspected. I tried to give it up, really! But the excitement of it being less than two months away was just too much for me.

Super excited that it starts on a Saturday this year. Yay for a big weekend chunk of writing to start off the festivities!

some months later

So I did finish. And finish early. Apparently I just didn't want to talk about it.

Probably because it was the worst thing I ever wrote. And I know that sometimes I say that (especially about NaNo), but when I go back a while later and reread it, things don't seem quite so bad. But not this time! I really never intended to look at the novel again, but a couple weeks ago I read the whole thing while I was battling insomnia. It managed to be even worse than I remembered.

I think that a lot of my problem was that the past couple years of ML-ing had been so fantastic, but last year ended up being really frustrating in that regard, and it was hard to get inspired to write a good novel while I was spending so much time worrying about running things and trying to get people to, you know, show up.

I don't know if I'm going to do NaNo this year. It might be time for a break. Or, if I do, it might be a good idea to step down from the ML-ing for now. It's been fun - even with the frustration last year, it was fun - but it's a lot of stress that maybe I just can't deal with right now.

I think I might try to do a bunch o' writing in September though. No word count goal, no real pressure, just making myself sit down and write as much as I can. And hopefully have it not be insanely sucky. Stay tuned.

vive la misère!

Just a bit over 35k! This is my favorite number to reach (apart from the obvious 50k, of course). It feels so much better than 25k; in a truly glass-half-empty way, that milestone tends to make me think, "Ugh, I still have to write the same amount I just wrote? That's too much!" But just 10,000 more words, and it feels like an accomplishment. It feels really close to the end.

If I write 3,000 words a day from now on (which is approximately what I've been doing all week, although I did have one day with 4,000), I think I should finish on Tuesday which should be the earliest I've ever finished. Which would be awesomeness. I would not be adverse to finishing sooner, of course, but we'll just see what happens.

Last night at our meeting we were talking about how being depressed and miserable seems to make it easier to write, and I think that really says a lot about why my second week was so much more productive than my first. Week one was a pretty good week for the most part; week two was misery itself thanks to illness and a panic attack about life stuff and then an utterly crappy work week. Word count at the end of week one: about 8,500. Word count at the end of week two: about 32,000.

halfway there

Characters wangsting about their attraction to other characters makes for good word count.

Got to a little over 25k easy as anything. Writing gets worse and worse, my spirits get better and better.

Huzzah, terrible writing! Huzzah, word count!

crazy writing frenzy

This was a bad week for writing, by which I mean, I didn't do any. I was more than a day ahead on Monday, which turned out to be a crappy day, so I felt all right not getting any words in that day. Alas, then the week got crappier and I got sick, and before I knew it, it was Saturday afternoon and I only had 8500 something words.

As of now, Sunday evening, I have just a little over 22k.

My brain is so close to falling out.

I think this is how I have to do NaNo now. The first couple years it was a challenge enough to get through the month and get my word count. But I know I can do that now. I've done it five times before during November and once again last July. But without a challenge, I'm super unmotivated to finish. But writing a ton of words in one (or two) days? Still a challenge. Still exciting.

Anyway, I should get to the halfway point tomorrow with no problem. I'm more excited to get to 35k though. That always feels so very close to the finish line.

And I really want to be at the finish line really early this year.

My novel continues to get dumber and dumber. I've always gone on in previous years about how the novel o' the year is terrible and no one ever needs to see it, but there are always at least a couple people who end up reading parts (or all) of it. This year's? Seriously never going to be shown to anyone. I haven't even managed to write anything apart from the first three paragraphs of the first chapter that I'm willing to put up as an excerpt on my profile. Last year I was throwing whole chapters up there. This year it's all just too truly terrible. At least I'm having fun with it though. The first week was really hard, what with the starting over and all, and the second week obviously got off to a bad start. But things are looking up.

pirates

Day four of NaNo and I've started over and am almost a day ahead of where I need to be to be on track and I don't hate writing or my novel or the world.

So, a good decision to start over. This year, at least.

Anyway, I'm writing about pirates now. Possibly gay pirates? I'm not sure yet. Also, there's a samurai. It's lame and ridiculous and, therefore, kind of fun.

New title: Captain O'Bollocks Strikes Again!

scratch that, start again?

So, day two of NaNo and I hate my novel and want to start over.

Seriously, it's terrible, and not in an awful-but-still-fun-to-write way. Terrible in an I-want-to-kill-myself-for-producing-this-tripe-oh-it's-painful-to-think-of-writing-more-of-this way.

I seem to remember feeling the same way last year, but I stuck with it and the novel turned out cracktastic and was mostly pretty fun to write. So maybe I should just stick with it again this year and hope for the best?

I really, really hate it though.

I really, really want to quit start over.