Day 7

12,241 / 50,000
(24.5%)

First word: Laurelyn

Last word: stairs

Random sentence: Both men had their suit jackets draped over one arm, their ties loosened in deliberate casualness.

From TC…Yesterday I wrote:

I broke 10K today. I’m starting to think that my problem won’t be reaching 50K, it’ll be reaching the end of the story by 50K.

This may not sound like a problem, but for me it is. Word count has never been a problem for me. Reaching THE END has. I *really* want to have some semblance of an ending at the end of the month.

Bellman replied:

(BTW, Beaver, no one said you had to finish in 50,000 words. You just have to reach 50,000. I propose a TC “NaNoFinishMo” in December-Jan for those who need it. That’ll get everyone done in time for NaNoEdMo in March…)

My response:

Oh, I know that. I’m just afraid that if I don’t get finished (and by finished I mean just get to where I think the story ends) by the end of the month, I’m afraid that what I’ll end up with is yet another 1/2 to 3/4s finished novel. December, at least the first 2/3s, will not be conducive to me continuing on with 2-3 hours a day of novel writing (that’s how long it’s been taking me to make the word count–and that’s all I’m doing, I stop once I get the daily allotment done). I mean, seriously, I have *enough* of those. What is wrong with me that I can get that far, and then I let them languish? It’s not because I’ve lost interest. I’m still very invested in all my unfinished novels. I guess if I’m honest with myself, I clearly have a mental block about finishing–on some level I’m scared to. I think if I could just finish one novel, then I could finish all the others too. Does that make any sense? So that’s why I want to actually *finish* and not just reach 50K.

A funny thing happened…

…on the way to 50K.

A minor character (Jonah’s sister, Laurelyn) suddenly walked into the room and asserted her importance. Turns out she’s not minor after all. On the contrary, she’s pivotal. Quite possibly the key to, well, everything.

Heh. Who knew?

That’s the thing about writing, you never do know, do you, until you actually set the words down. Regardless of how long you’ve talked about it and planned it, it never turns out quite how you imagined it.

Day 6

10,434 / 50,000
(20.9%)

First word: He

Last word: perky

Random sentence: She had triggered something, something, locked deep in his jumbled brain, stored away in the wrong drawer, oh, god, he almost had it.

Day 5

8,981 / 50,000
(18.0%)

First word: His

Last word: now

Random sentence: He hadn’t for a couple days, and he was looking pretty rough, his beard was almost as long as his hair, but it was something he made a mess of at the best of times, and as tired as he was, he’d just end up looking like he’d been beat up again.

Day 4

7,085 / 50,000
(14.2%)

First word: His

Last word: forth

Random sentence: A tall guy with a laptop briefcase shoved his way between them, muttering something about getting out of the fucking way.

Day 3

I promise to make these entries a little more interesting for my loyal readers, should I have any, once I get finished my week. Mon-Thurs is a blur. For now, just know I am doing this. (Yay, me.)

5,201 / 50,000
(10.4%)

First word: He

Last word: you

Random sentence: He didn’t reply to that, because well, that was the kind of empty platitude people mouthed all the time with no intention of making good on the promise.

Day 2

3,513 / 50,000
(7.0%)

First word: Assaulted

Last word: Jonah

Random sentence: But instead of throwing it away, his mom carefully gathered all the pieces, sat down at the kitchen table with toothpicks and epoxy, and glued it all back together.

Day 1

1,758 / 50,000
(3.5%)

First word: Jonah

Last word: air

Random sentence: Maybe because it kept him on the radar, somewhere between getting the Beemer serviced and which client he’d deign to offer the 4th in his weekly golf game.

Insanity

Have I mentioned how insane I am to be thinking about doing this? (At this point, it’s still thinking. The doing is yet to come.) It’s November. November, people. This is the month when I must, at the very least:

  • read, read, read for 4 courses w/ exams
  • finish outlines for aforementioned 4 courses
  • read, read, read (& take notes) for course w/ paper
  • write rough draft of aforementioned paper
  • write research proposal (& do other related stuff)
  • read, read, read subs for TC’s Dec issue
  • make selections for aforementioned issue
  • once list is final, set up December issue
  • send out acceptance / rejection letters (?maybe someone else will do this?)

Ahhh! Nevertheless, I’m still going to give it a shot. To that end, I’ve got all the subs sorted & ready to read, already, before the end of October. Yay, me. I’m going to finish w/ my non-law-review journal assignment (reviewing essays) this weekend. Have outline for paper done. Almost finished with bibliography. Will finish this weekend. Have good start on outlines, some more so than others. And on the plus side, actual *studying* for exams and writing of final draft of paper can wait till December 1. Ah, yes, the bright side. We’ll see how I feel about that in 2 days.

I think I mentioned that I scheduled NaNo writing time into my calendar as my first appointment of the day, in lieu of my usual morning activity: reading blogs / forums. See? I think it’s really possible to do this, if I just skip that little time suck. I won’t be giving up blog reading entirely, because of my paper. And of course, I’ll want to know how others are making out. But it will have to wait till later in the day.

I think that’s it. Oh, yeah. A first scene came to me one day on the bus. I was sitting way at the back and I “saw” (imagined) something (apple or something of that ilk) rolling up & down the aisle as the bus braked and accelerated. And I’m like, yeah, that’s a good image to start with. So I have something to get me started Monday morning. We’ll see where it goes from there.

Space

Have you noticed the newest spate of home improvement programs are all these “house doctor” things? You know, people who want to sell their house, but can’t, so they have some consultant-type come in and tell them what they need to do to make it sell. Then they do some stuff (paint, declutter, rearrange furniture) and it sells. Okay, clearly it works, but I don’t get it.

I mean, obviously you should fix anything broken, and clean the place up, remove fugly wallpaper or icky carpet because it’ll save the buyer the trouble. (Although why you haven’t removed it already, I have no idea.)

But inevitably, they show potential buyers walking through the house admiring the furniture arrangement or the curtains or the accessories or the color of the walls. This is what I don’t understand: when you buy a house, you don’t purchase all the previous owner’s furniture, junk, etc. along with the building. Do people not get that? Who cares what’s *in* the house? What you care about is it the bones of it: is it solid (falling apart, leaking, electrical hazards = bad) and does the space have potential? If the sellers have the worst taste in the world, so what? It’s not going be there when you move in. And it doesn’t matter what color the place is, I’d repaint anyhow, so that’s irrelevant to me.

I guess it just surprised me. If this is the standard way of looking at things, seeing only what is there in front of you, then clearly I see space much differently than most people do. I never look at rooms as they are; I always look at what they could be. Whenever I enter a new space, I immediately start rearranging, painting, constructing in my head. I know a room is well-designed when I realize I’m not changing things around in my head.

Where am I going here? Oh right. I wanted to mention this because I thought it might end up being relevant in some story or either. Just to remind me that people see physical space very differently. That not everyone has the ability to rotate things, change out colors, knock down walls all in their head. That most people can’t do that. And I don’t think it’s a lack of imagination, I think it’s something much more analytical than that, an ability to see how things could fit together. Like, erm, you know those puzzles that are like 15 or so different shapes, and you have to fit them into a square, and there are multiple ways to do it, and it seems really simple, but it’s not necessarily so? Well, I’m quite good at those things. I think it’s a similar sort of seeing. It’s not something I do on a conscious level, it just happens. Which probably explains why it’s not something I was really consciously aware of before.