Well, That Was Quick

So... yesterday I finished Crystal Glare. Highest daily wordcount was yesterday, nearly 3,000 words. 21 days of writing, for a total of about... 44-45k, I think. I'll let you know when I get it all uploaded into the computer.

It's vaguely worrying that all of a sudden my stories are so short. Crystal Frontier was written in '09, and came out close to 100k. I edited it down to about 60-70k. I don't mind. That's a good length. NaNo '08 ended up at about 60k, which was good, for as little of a plot I had. But things have kinda gone downhill since then. NaNo '09 was pretty long, I think, Crystal Glare Draft 2. But I haven't enjoyed a whole lot of my stories since. I've stressed over them one way or another, which is a problem. I enjoyed Enori. Whatever summer that was. Late summer '09? I don't remember now. I'll check. Ah. Summer 2010. More recent than I thought. Last summer doesn't feel all that long ago. Anyway, I enjoyed Enori. It wasn't based in Yavn, though. So I think maybe I should take a step back from Yavn, for a while. I've got exploration plots in Shorion and... does that other country have a name yet? Oh well. I think Yavn is getting a little old. I tracked its origin, as well as Shorion's, roughly, but I don't know hardly anything about Shorion. It might breathe new life into both of them as far as relations between the two. I mean, eventually either one or the other is destroyed or they come to some sort of peace.

Anyway, it's nearly May. May holds graduations and a LARP -- Live Action Role Play. Should I write in May? It probably wouldn't start until the latter half. If I wait until June, that's got my senior recital. Now, the question there is whether having a project will help distract me from the stress or just stress me out more. I'll take a few days and think on that.

I also have that language I'm creating, Ganyi, that needs some work. There's a lot more vocabulary to work on, and maybe an alphabet to polish up shiny a bit more. I wanted to get a short story or somethin' written up in Ganyi before NaNoWriMo this year. And then there's Italian, and a little more science yet, and literature... I might just see if I can take a break. I have various other things to do while I wait.

All right then!

I Killed a Man Today...

I really should plan that sort of thing out better. I ended up kinda prophesying that my hard-hearted Arantos would die. That was Saturday, I think, that I wrote that in. So today I had to kill him off. I don't know that he was a sympathetic character to the reader, but his cousin Parika is, I think, and she's going to be all sad about it. I guess I never get to have his heart melt... one way or another it was going to be kind of sad, since if he realized what he'd done he would probably be nearly suicidal anyway. I don't mind killing him. I just mind that I forgot to plan it in while I was plotting, again. Oh well. I may edit it a few more redeeming features if I get to the point of editing. A line or two here, a flashback there, not too hard.

What's really handy is that Parika now is a source of thousands of words, because of her mourning. Very sad, but I get my word count pretty easily today. If I could just keep from being distracted by things like blog posts and piano sheet music.

I have a lot of cleaning I need to help with today, and then a piano lesson this afternoon, and then I'm gone all evening. Grar. I still need a job. The YMCA needs front desk people, I could do that, probably. I should go in and fill out an application. Bleh.

College O.o

It's vaguely exciting, I guess, going to college. I came up with my brother to take an assessment test and see a counselor and such-like, and now I'm waiting around, and therefore blogging!

The assessment test went fine, I got placed even higher than I was aiming for, so that's nice. But then why didn't I get the right score on the ACT? I don't know... less stress, I guess, or something. Anyway, I can take College Algebra, and English with honors, if I like. I dunno. Thursday is an enrollment party, to try and arrange schedules and whatnot.

I've found that I'm not only more motivated to get up early and write when I have things to do, but I write faster when I feel like I might have less time. Maybe I should schedule all of my days like that. But that's high stress, unless of course half of my day gets cancelled, like it did today. I can't exactly arrange that, though.

So yeah, productive day! Not quite over yet, but I'm gonna see about doing a little Italian and playing some Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past.

Summer Jobs and College

Today apparently is a day to be grown-up, or something. I hate growing up. It stinks. Ah well, così è la vita, I suppose. Oh yeah, Italian's been going pretty well, too. I feel like I'm learning at least a little. Anyway, I got my acceptance email from the Community College today, which means figuring out when I'm going to go in and take the COMPASS math test. The whole test thing frustrates me, since I thought my ACT score was high enough that I could go straight to college algebra, but it appears that I'm still a point short for JCCC to let me straight into the class without an assessment test. What's annoying is that I'm that same point short from going straight to Calculus, if I were to attend KU. What's up with that? Whatever. I'll go in Monday or Tuesday, before enrollment, and take their stupid test. I'd like to get that done before next Thursday, when enrollment opens.

I also called around a little bit today for some summer jobs, the library, pharmacy, maybe a local restaurant/catering place. I'll call them in a bit. I guess. Meh. I don't even really want a summer job, but the powers that be decree that I shalt have one. Blech.

My words wrote themselves early today, my motivation being that I needed to look for a job. Good thing, too, or else they might not get written at all. It's one yucky day outside. Rainy, cloudy, coldish. I thought we were about done with this. Oh well. The story progress, with bickering characters that are really fun to write. I need to remember that.

Productive Day Is Productive!

I barely managed to haul myself out of bed and write my 2,000 words, working a few more characters through their quest. Now really interesting stuff can happen! I wonder if it's still too linear. Oh well, I'll deal with that later. I found out I don't have a piano lesson after all today, so that frees up my whole day, without even writing that need be done. I'm determined to keep it up today, just for the fun of it, so I need to look up when and where I can take a test at the Community College, fill out a scholarship application, and... practice piano, I guess. Also science and many much Italian studies. I think there was something else... I dunno. I did get through Invention #13 from memory without huge major mess-ups. Some some minorish ones. And it needs to be faster. FASTER FASTER!

I'm a little hyper. I'ma go do something productive now. Or maybe watch Full Metal Alchemist. There's always that.

Projects!

Oh, and I have someone who actually read by blog! Huzzah! I started Crystal Glare on Monday, getting back into the groove. I get to write my story of reclaiming a country from invasion. All sorts of handy dandy fantasy stuffs.

I got up early to write the first few days, but for some reason my alarm didn't go off today, I have no clue why. I even checked last night that it was on, but the dang thing didn't wake me up or somethin'. Oh well, it's a nice day, so I'll probably head out to the woods this afternoon and write in my treehouse. That makes everything better.

I think I have senioritis, I'm so lazy about school lately. I think I'll actually take this science test, just for the practice. Electric potential and all sorts of fancy stuff this module.