Sunday, November 30, 2008

The Last Night Of NaNo...

And all through my head...everything was going haywire. I cant wait until tomorrow when I start editing, but I have absolutely no clue how to prepare. I just came out of one insane project, and now I go into one thats just as insane for me. I had a great weekend doing nothing though. I'll just have to take it a bit at a time. If nothing else I should learn something from this venture.

Friday, November 28, 2008

Done!

I actually managed to finish it! At 2:30pm (my time, CST) I finished my novel. It's awesome. My plan now is to take the rest of the month off and start editing last year's novel on the first of December. That gives me about 5 1/2 months to edit the thing. I hope that's enough time...

But it doesn't matter right now! 'Cause I'm DONE!!!!

A Late Happy Thanksgiving!

But now I can ask everyone how theirs went.

We had family over and ate the turkey, ham, stuffing, mandarin oranges in lime jello, etc. for Thanksgiving dinner at noon. I got my morning writing done, but it's strange...if it hadn't been Thanksgiving, I think I could have finished my novel that day. Last year if it hadn't been Thanksgiving, I think I would have hit 50k on Thanksgiving day.

I don't begrudge it, I really enjoy being with my family. But now, in keeping with my semi-tradition, I have to see about finishing my novel today. I'll probably post as soon as I do it.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

If I Could Ever Write Two Scenes in a Day...

I'd be more ahead than I am now. Hopefully I'll finish up the scene I'm writing now so I can be two ahead and feel better about myself...

Family should be coming over tomorrow, and today was spent cleaning the house...now I get to settle down and watch a movie with the immediate fambly though!

And that's why this is a short post. Nothing really to report.

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Verified!

I finally got onto the laptop with my novel at 50k (I'm still afraid to plug my flashdrive into the other computer since I don't know if the virus is gone yet or not), and verified my NaNo on the website! See the spiffy badge? -pokes badge on sidebar-

Anyway, as far as finishing the novel, I had been hoping that I would get to write two scenes today, since I did a little extra yesterday, but I was lazy and instead cleaned my room a bit and took a nap before surfing the net on the computer...so yeah. I'm still on schedule though! Just not ahead.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

NaNo Day 23 and A Call For Help

I slept in today, as I always seem to do on Sundays whether I want to or not. Anyway, I'm still on track for finishing my novel, but I need some help. It involves the forbidden word of NaNo. Editing.
I've never really edited before, much less something that's the length of my NaNo. I need to have last years novel edited by mid-april. I've read up some on big picture editing, but I still don't really know what I'm doing. So if anyone reading my blog has tips or resources, I would love to see them. Thanks!

EDIT: Heh, I have a few more questions actually. How long does it take for you to go through your novel one time? And when you go through, do you edit majorly, or do you mostly do little stuff? I've looked online a bit, and I found this editing recipe, and it's kind of what I'm going by, but like I said, I still don't really know what I'm doing.

Also, I don't actually need to have this done by mid-April, I'd just like it to be done by then.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

NaNo Day 20

I totally forgot to post until just now. Sorry! Anyway, today I joined the growing group of NaNoWriMo winners. I hit 50k! Now my goal, like I said, is to finish the thing. I actually did two plot sections today, so if I need to I can take Thanksgiving day off. Or I have wiggle room for somewhere else. Anyway, good luck to everyone!

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Plan And NaNo Day 18

So yesterday I did some calculations, and figured that I had 13 days of November left, and 13 plot sections left, not counting epilogue, which should be quite short. So if I write one plot section every day, I should have a finished draft on the 30th. So then I don't have to worry about it. So I'm gonna try it. So far so good.

Monday, November 17, 2008

NaNo Day 17

I'm sorry, I kept meaning to post and meaning to post, but I never did it. And so you missed probably about 10,000 words. I'm at 40k today. That means that I only have 10k left to write...scary thought for me.

I've been wondering about how close I am to finishing my novel, since they say it's best to be done by the end of November, even if a few scenes were just sketched or shortened. I kinda hate to do that, but since I would like to be able to edit Crystal Glare without worrying too much about this one, I made up a checklist/story arc thing. I have eight sections counting the prologue, and I've totally finished three of them, and I'm probably a little less than halfway through the fourth. So I'm a little over 3/8. I guess if I broke it down further, I've done ten of twenty-four sections, which can be reduced down to 5/12. But like I said, I'm part-way through another section, so I might be closer to 6/12, which puts me halfway through.

But then, the sections probably won't be that even, and I arranged the chapters so that each of my three POVs gets one showing per chapter. I might actually start making things move a little faster, and added details and bits can be in later. I don't want to skip over scenes though, too many fun unexpected things happen for me to trust myself to just color in the lines.

Oh boy...40k though...50k is just around the corner...

Thursday, November 13, 2008

NaNoDay 13

No, I actually don't have all of my words yet. I'll get 'em though, and hopefully hit 30k too. My parents have been getting up earlier, and it makes it hard for me to concentrate for some reason. I used to have perfect silence except for my music, and my parents aren't actually that loud, but the fact that I know someone else is up just distracts me I guess...
So anyway, sorry for the short post, I'm still a little distracted. I should get over it. I've been looking at some nice ocarinas online lately, and I think I'm going to hope for one for Christmas. I've also picked up my old pendant again, but it's range isn't too big, so it makes it hard to play some of the songs. Oh well, I shalt not surely die.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

NaNo Day 12

I think I've just now realized how intricate my plot really is, or has to be. With three storylines, I have to make sure that the times add up to be equal, and all of that. I never really thought about it before.
So far today I only have about 1k. My alarm block has been doing strange things or something. Oh well. I can still get them done. Coffee helps too.
Not much has happened, but I'm excited to see that the winners this year also get a free proof copy of their books. I just hope I can get this finished and edited in time. I have on idea what its like to edit, much less be editing and writing at the same time, albeit on different books, and even less on editing two novels at once. Fun times ahead!

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Non-posting and Days Off: NaNo Day 11

Sorry, I forgot to post there for a while. I got my words on Saturday, and then stayed up insanely late, especially for me during NaNo...11:30 is no time to be up when you're not writing...

Because of that, I ended up taking Sunday off. I couldn't seem to get up early enough Sunday morning to get anything done before church, and after church we had some friends coming with us right away, and I had no chance to write. So I didn't. I had plenty of extra to cover it.

Yesterday brought major slowness on my writing, and I didn't get them done until evening. I think I was kinda still tired from Saturday, since even though I didn't get up at 5:30 on Sunday, I was still up too early. I got 'em done though, and today was much better (seeing as I'm actually already done).

Actually, today I hit a major milestone: 25k! Yay! I'm so excited. I've now written more words than I have left. It's a downhill slide! Hopefully.

Saturday, November 8, 2008

NaNo day 8

Accompanied by a picture of various things on my desk! The background is my neo, in the lower left corner is a frappuccino that I'm now filling with lucky stars, and in the upper right corner you can see my full jar of stars along with my not-so-full jar of mini-stars.
Oh, and I hit 20k a bit ago. Almost 1k in for today.
And my computer has a virus that its having a hard time getting rid of. My novel's backed up. Is YOURS?

Friday, November 7, 2008

Whoops! NaNo Day 7

Sorry, I kept meaning to post yesterday, but I didn't. Anyway, so I made my words, hit about 17k. Today hopefully I can get to 20k.

My only problem is I slept late...so I really don't have as much time. Oh well, we'll try it anyway^^

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Nano day 5

I think I might have figured out the speech recognition. It was all because of one little option. All I had to do was turn on dictation everywhere. It still takes a long time, since it asks me about every phrase. I still don't know if I'm going to use it or not. It is fun though.

I got my words a lot earlier today. It didn't take me all morning. So I guess I have about 12 or 13k.

OK, this is taking forever, so I'm going to end this post. Ta for now!

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

NaNo Day 4

I’m having all sorts of fun today. Even though I haven’t got my words, I’ve been playing with the Microsoft speech recognition program. It’s taking a while to get used to, but it’s kind of fun.

Although, I really should get back to work. I only have 1362 words so far today. I’m enjoying my story though, and I just have to get a few more. The speech recognition is a little irritating at times, since for some reason it won’t let me dictate on the Blogger poster. I don’t know what’s up. It just doesn’t want to dictate on a text field like It should do it though, I’ll just have to figure out how.

The good news is I hit 10k today. And so I got to open my butterflyball. And you know what that means: I got my raspberry filled chocolate. I really wish that the chocolate would’ve fit in the little balls though… Oh well, what’s done is done.

So I guess this is my first post with speech recognition. It’s kinda fun to use, but I don’t know if I will not. I guess it’s not bad, but it still taking some work.

Well, I’m off to finish up my words! Maybe I’ll have another post later, we’ll just have to see.

Monday, November 3, 2008

NaNo Day 3

So far I've managed to post every day...yay!

It took me forever to write my words this morning...It was 9am before I hit 2k. I was just so sleepy.

I've only written about 2k so far...but I'm hoping to tap out a few more words this evening to boost it a bit further. I managed to get school done today with my writing, which is a good sign. I didn't even miss out on my exercise, so that's a bonus. At least, I guess it is.

Tomorrow...I actually don't really have anything tomorrow either, besides school of course. My busyness will start on Wednesday, with piano lessons. Oh well, take it as it comes.

Sunday, November 2, 2008

NaNo Day 2

It's still early, but I doubt I'll really be able to post later. I totally forgot that today Daylight Savings Time ends, and so I was up at 4:00 instead of 5 like I thought. I got my words, but then at 6:45 I thought it was 7:45 and everyone in the house was still sleeping. And then I remember: Duh! It's the end of daylight savings!

So yeah. I got my 2k written, so I expanded by a few hundred words the lead I got yesterday, but I don't think I'll really get any more writing done today. I'll have to head off to church soon, and then we have a catfish fry to go to (which will be fun), and then after that we have a play and choir recital that I'm singing in (which probably won't be so fun). So I probably won't be back until it's quite late and I'm quite tired. Oh well, that's why I get up early in the first place.

I've seen so many blogs of people who are doing well with their wordcounts. I wonder if it helps that you do have a blog to post successes on. It's just great to see that people are working hard.

Well, I'm off to send NaNoMails to the WriMos I'm mentoring, and then I'm off to church!

Saturday, November 1, 2008

NaNo Day 1

So far...it's awesome. Even though I've been writing every morning (except for October of course), I've forgotten how totally awesome NaNoWriMo is. My roommate was awesome and let me set my loud alarm, and so I set my phone to five minutes earlier, hoping it might wake me up. I guess it actually did, a little bit. I remember I was rolling over, but I wasn't thinking; I guess I was still half asleep after all. My alarm went off and I turned it off during the first ring. I heard her roll over, but I guess she didn't really wake up, or else she didn't remember in the morning. I got up and wrote my words, read some of No Plot? No Problem!, and then got started on my day a little more.

After the guests left, I settled down to type again. It was incredible. I've written 5,000 words in less than twelve hours. I dunno. I've never written that much in a day before. Anyway, I've only just now introduced my three viewpoints, and so I think my story will last 50k.

I'm tired now though...I didn't get to sleep until 11 last night...and getting up at 5...urg...