BROKE 30,000!!!!

Just received the week 3 note from NaNoWriMo founder Chris Baty. Apparently there are predictable phases that each writer goes through each of the 4 weeks. During week #2 which just passed, there is the strong desire to scrap the whole idea that you have been working with and start over with a new and BETTER idea. This, apparently, is a really poor idea. I did have little inklings of doubting thoughtlings. I know that my whole story is kind of improbable and has lots of problemos, but I still have more ideas for it and I have a stronger desire to keep going than to start over. Starting over at this point would definitely give me the shivers. And I would never finish. Why am I even writing this now? I think it is because I am in such a good place with the writing and maybe I can hardly believe that it is still fun and dare I say easy? And I can see that this is not a given. 115,000 people all over the world are doing this. That is amazing too.

Week 3 is about gaining momentum to head for the finish line. That sounds good.

Reading also the week 3 chapter from Baty’s book “No Plot? No Problem!” He says that by this time the people in your life will be very tired of you spending time fixated on your writing and your novel. What does it say about the people in my life that no one even seems to notice what I am doing? Well, not no one, but almost. Every time I bring it up, it’s like, oh yeah right. Just reinforces my idea that my local support system sucks eggs. Besides my sweetie, the only one who consistently asks how my novel is coming along is my 86 year old mother who is having cognition issues and can not remember much of anything! And of course, because of my whole history with her, the fact that she is asking becomes more like nudging anyway. And I feel sorry that I ever mentioned it to her. Who knew that the only current events she would remember were that Obama was elected and I am writing a novel?

Oh no. Look at these paragraphs I have been writing. STOP IT. Get to the writing that counts. NOW.

Have to check my lotto numbers first….Interesting. How could I have picked all the wrong numbers again? Since I buy lotto tickets so infrequently, you would think that the Goddess of Lotto Luck would smile down on me when I do. Nope. Not a single number matched. She must have been busy baking pumpkin pies to freeze ahead of time for Thanksgiving. What am I writing??? GET TO WORK!

I am enjoying the NaNoWriMo message board. People moaning about word counts, but also some really nifty ideas about websites and ways to boost your count. Like a link to a joke website that lists jokes in various categories. The suggestion is to choose a joke and have a character tell it—but in a very long, drawn out version. And then there is the application that some deranged person made that threatens you if you don’t keep writing. It’s called “Write or Die.” I would say that this is possibly the polar opposite of all that Jen stands for. Either horrible noises occur or your writing actually starts to disappear if you stop writing for more than a few seconds or minutes. (You can set it to “gentle” which just reminds you to keep writing, but that isn’t so exciting.) Check it out.

http://lab.drwicked.com/writeordie.html

And I continue not to write the novel. Gotta get going! No, need a cup of tea first. Then I will light my candle and really begin.

OK. Much later than I would have liked: broke 30,000 words!
Wrote 1673 words
New total: 30,234

My task in going forward: Maybe write the ending scenes next, since I know what is going to happen, and then continue with the fill-in scenes? The reason I am thinking of doing it that way is two-fold. First of all, that would let me write those final scenes and see how much they entail. And second, I might then have a better sense of what needs to be there earlier to have those scenes make sense. The scene I wrote today, which was supposed to be a scene giving some background on a possible suspect, seems largely superfluous. But if I am not 100% sure what I am leading up to then I do not know if spending 1667 on this character was too much or not. I am thinking that the ending would be about 10,000 words. So I need to make sure that the middle 11,000 or so words logically lead up to that. But writing the ending before I get there feels a bit scary. Either like I won’t want to go back once I have written it, or maybe that I will try to write it and it won’t make sense. Hmmm. Don’t quite know what is going on with me. I am certainly doing a lot of journal type writing today though.