huh

So, November, NaNoWriMo, and Kelsi and Joran have all come and gone. Have I mentioned that it had to have been a man who came up with the brilliant idea to put NaNoWriMo in the same month as my birthday, Thanksgiving and Black Friday? Seriously! Who's bright idea was that? Had to have been a man. (I say that even though my husband is the one who does all the Thanksgiving cooking, so it's not like I can claim days of slaving over the stove in preparation. However, there is no way on God's green earth that he is stepping foot in a store on Black Friday, so all the Christmas shopping is left to me, shopping and writing are not compatible.) I know. Excuses, excuses.

Anyway, K&J are out of the dungeon, they have a new start, and they are now kind of cooling their heels waiting for me to get done with the dragons before I go back to them again. We shall not discuss word count, but I can assure one and all that I was never in any danger of hitting the 50,000 word mark. That is what next year is for. Which means that in the next eleven months I have to come up with a really good story idea. I mean, I couldn't even write the book when I'd already written it once and knew it inside and out. Or maybe that's my problem. The last two years I've tried to rewrite something I'd already at least started on once. Maybe what I need to do is wake up November 1st and start writing. I guess we'll find out in eleven months. At least I had a good time getting together with my writing buddies. Who says writing isn't a social activity? (Though not one to be carried out while shopping.)

Nanowrimo

Nanowrimo starts in just over an hour. Am I ready? No! Am I doing it anyway? Yes! Kelsi and Joran are being freed from the dungeon. They are seeing the light of day after six long years. Fresh start, blank page (screen). Better, stronger, faster. The bionic first-book-I-ever-wrote.

NaNoWriMo

November is National Novel Writing Month. It is also the month of my birthday, two siblings' birthdays, Thanksgiving, and the month before Christmas. Which is why I signed up to write a novel this month. What's that? you say. You're crazy, you say. You haven't written on your blog in months, you say (and I've heard something about it being write-on-your-blog-every-day month too). Why yes, I am a little insane, thanks for noticing. In fact, I'm insane enough to be working on polishing my first dragon book while committing to write the second. Yup. Insane. My patheticness knows no bounds. I'm supposed to keep track of my word count for NaNoWriMo and I can't even figure out how how to do that. (I am certain that these are things I should not be confessing, in case some interested agent/editor someday looks me up and finds out how utterly incompetent I really am. However, in my defense, they say that it is writing ability that will get me published, not my ability to to do a word count. Besides, I'm confident that by then end of this month, I will know how to find a word count.)

So, I spent an hour or so this afternoon writing. I know, an hour a day does not a novel make, at least not in one month. However, I spent most of the morning reading On Writing, by Stephen King, since I have been told on countless blogs that I should read that to improve my writing. And since I am focusing on my writing this month, this seemed like a good time to read his book. Except that reading does get in the way of writing. It's an issue I will have to work on throughout the month, I guess. In any case, I realized that my 'writing' muscles are woefully under developed. The idea of this month, and the reason I decided to do this instead of working on next month's Christmas presents, is to turn off the editor and just write. Create. That sounds like bliss. I just have a hard time doing it. I have barely one page written so far today (though single spaced, since I never fiddle with lines and page numbering and what-not until later) and I found myself going back and changing this word or that instead of moving forward. I have a lot to learn and I look forward to learning it.

Now, if they could have made NaNoWriMo in March when I don't have birthdays and holidays to contend with, this would be perfect.