Long weekend

I wrote something over the weekend! OK, so I didn't write every day. On two days, I was so busy there was no chance to do anything. However I got all of one ending complete and most of the second ending outlined. The second ending is a lot more complicated. Much more than I originally anticipated, so there are still a couple of scenes left to go. I hoping to finish that tonight.

But as I was so busy, I didn't get all the housework done, and that needs to be done at some point. I still have to load all the scenes onto the computer to. I wrote them long hand, which for outlining seems to work for me. I will have to spend a couple of hours typing them up, but in the worst case I'll simply refer to the paper copy instead.

So I'm almost ready for NaNoWriMo and I'm looking forward to it too :)

More scenes

I added five more scenes to my NaNoWriMo outline and with those scenes I have reached the point where I can go one of two ways. So tonight I'm going to start writing the first of the two endings. Hopefully I'll get a chance to put down the other ending too.

I have fifty scenes without any ending, which is the highest I've ever go to with this sort of outlining. So if I average 1000 words per scene, that's the 50000 words without finishing. Of course some will be much shorter, a few hundred at most, but others will be much longer, especially where I have grouped together several scenes in the outline.

The upshot is I shouldn't have any problems with writing the 50000 words for NaNoWriMo. There should be about 15 to 20 scenes left for the ending, perhaps up to 25. So I should be able to write getting close to 75000 words if I keep going and use all the scenes I've got written down.

I wonder what the reality will actually be...

Sick

I was ill for most of last week. I went out on the Sunday and picked up some sort of bug. I wish I could say I spent the week curled up in bed, but unfortunately I had an important meeting on the Thursday at which I had to do a presentation. I only found out about it on Monday. So while sick, I had to put together said presentation, attend the full day meeting and give my presentation.

I did all that, but nothing else except sleep. Outlining was out of the question and even thinking about NaNoWriMo was too difficult. Now there's only nine days left. Still I have enough already outlined to keep me going, but I would like to outline at least one of the endings. So tonight I have to write. No option. It just needs to be done.

Next weekend I'll be out and about again, attending an event. I hope I don't pick up another bug. That would be just my luck though. Still November doesn't start until Thursday so that gives me some time to recover. I'm also glad that it starts on a weekday. I know most people hate this, but for me, work days tend to be more structured, which means I'm far more likely to write.

I'm going to try for my 5000 words per day. Then all I need to do is write on ten out of the thirty days. Not to mention that if I don't make it to 5000 it's not all over. I know if I aim for the minimum, that's all I will do and if I fail to reach that, there is a very good chance that I will fail to complete the challenge.

Weekend washout

I didn't write a single thing from Friday through Sunday, which is dreadful. I did so promise myself to. Tonight I will write at least another 5 scene descriptions.

But on the upside, I got a good rest on Saturday, which is code for I did nothing, well almost nothing. And Sunday I did some housework in the morning, then took the afternoon to go for a drive with my husband.

All in all I was incredibly lazy this weekend. Have to try harder.

more writing

I wrote another four scenes last night, so that means I've written every night so far this week. It feels good. I'm going to try to write more on other things too, I just don't want to try too much too fast. If I do, it may get to be too much and then I will stop. I don't want to stop.

I currently have fifty scenes and no ending. I'm at the point where the story, in my head, can go two ways. I'm sure there are many more ways it could go, but these are the two that I see. I'm going to write two sets of scenes for the ending, then I have something to help me when NaNoWriMo starts no matter which one I choose at the time.

Of course I might go for a completely different ending by then, but I'll cross that bridge if I get there.

more writing

For the last two evenings I have written some more scene descriptions. I've added ten more to the list, giving me a total of forty one. Not bad.

Of course I shouldn't really call them scenes, because several are a collection of scenes, which go together. Still it should become more clear when I actually start writing them.

I'm still in two minds about the ending. I'm not sure which way I should go. I think I might write summaries for both and then use which ever is relevant. Of course if I think that's not working I can easily switch to the other.

Still if I keep this up, I will be ready for NaNoWriMo by the end of next week. Earliest ever for an outline. It's getting easier too. I guess it's all the practise.

If I do finish the outline, then I'm going to work on the short story again. I'll do another re-write. I found an older version the other day, which I prefer to the latest one. I'm going to try to write a version which combines the best of both stories.

The older version has five main characters, which is a bit much for a short story. The newer has three, but loses something in the cutting. I have to work out what and try to put that back in. That should keep me (1) writing and (2) occupied while I wait for NaNoWriMo to start.

I wrote something

OK, so it was just a few scene descriptions, but at least I did something and it felt good. I'm going to try to do the same thing again this evening.

I wrote four and a half scenes for my NaNoWriMo. The half scene was adding information and some detail to a one line scene description that I wrote earlier. So now I have thirty scene descriptions to help with NaNoWriMo.

I'm hoping to get to fifty before the start on November 1st, then if nothing else I only have to write a thousand words for each one. Not that all my 'scenes' are actually that, some are a collection of shorter scenes I use to illustrate something, such as rising tension in the community.

At the moment I don't have any details on these in mind. Some of it will depend on how the characters come across in the scenes before this point, but I do want this to be shown. Just not sure exactly how it will pan out yet.

I almost didn't do any writing last night. I had to set up wifi and update an old computer for the kids. That took most of the evening, then all I wanted to do was sleep. But I decided to write at least one scene description before sleeping. Then I ended up with four more. This makes me very happy.

Something I'm very good at.

I'm very good at doing nothing. And I mean nothing. I haven't written a word in a week. Ridiculous. So today I made a promise to myself to write something every evening this week, starting tonight. Well it is a bit difficult to start yesterday...

Sorry in a bit of weird mood. It's freezing at work and I am staying warm by making lots of mugs of tea, which I hold until they get cold, then drink. It's helping.

There seems to be a lot of setbacks and bad news at the moment. I'm waiting for something good to happen. But if I remember rightly, most of the time you need to make things happen. They don't just magically happen by themselves. Which means I need to do something rather than my nothing.

Trouble is doing nothing is so easy and it comes so naturally to me. Stop being lazy! (and work on the typing before NaNoWriMo or the whole thing will be unreadable or I'll spend my whole time correcting my typing errors.)

lack of writing

Due to some problems at work, I'm pre-occupied with work rather than anything else. It's getting a little stressful and will probably get worse before it gets better.

This means I've done practically no writing since my last post. I did add one sentence to my NaNoWriMo outline, but that was it. I'm a bit disappointed with myself. We had a power cut at home, so I could have done some writing then, but I read instead.

Which is not such a bad thing. I love to read and I haven't done so in a while. I read Snuff by Terry Prachett and I did enjoy it, but I didn't feel it was as good as some of his other books. At some points it felt a little forced, but that could just be me.

The other book I read a little of was a collection of short stories by Stephen King, some of which were written many years ago. I didn't enjoy them as much as I used to. I have only read two of the stories, but neither really grabbed me. The first was OK, but the second I just couldn't finish. It made me put the book down.

It makes me wonder if my taste in books is changing. Of course those first two stories might be the worst two in the book. I need to read more to know. I've also started to read Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. It's interesting and well written, but I'm only at page 275 so there's a long way to go.

I'm glad I read a lot, but I wish I'd written more. Being distracted isn't a good thing.