Month: November 2019

Thankful yesterday wasn’t a zero word day :-)

Lynn

I sat down yesterday morning on day six of my (re)start of the 2,000 words a day plan and wrote 401 words.

I’m glad I did, because I thought I’d feel like writing later and maybe get a chance to actually write my 2,000 words yesterday.

HAHAHAHAHA!

Yesterday was also day 115 of my effort to have no more zero word days. My record of consecutive days of writing is 122, as you can see in the screenshot of the sidebar below. I’m so close to surpassing that record!

Screen shot of the sidebar on 11-29-2019

(Screen shot for posterity. I’m always trying to improve these stats. Maybe by the time you read this, the numbers will have changed in the real sidebar.) :-)

Today I’ve hunkered down in my house and will start writing as soon as I publish this blog post.

(I don’t shop, except when I do, and when I do, it’s usually last minute and in a hurry—and I’m betting you could have guessed that. I am an expert procrastinator, after all.)

I need 7,827 words to end today caught up. I am not in any way saying I will get all those words today, but I do want to cut that number down by far more than the 2,000 words today if at all possible. :D

I’m going to use 15 minute timers today.

Probably won’t track any metrics, because that’s not why I’m using timers. I don’t care how fast or slow I write. I just want to stay focused and get in more time. My math bent does mean that sometimes focusing on the math is the easiest way to keep my conscious mind busy so my subconscious can have free rein of the writing itself, so we shall see. :D

Falling falling falling…

Lynn

Should never had bragged about my two day streak of 1,000+ words. ;) Of course I broke it yesterday. I just had too much to do in the afternoon and I had too many interruptions in the morning.

I wrote 863 words on day five of my (re)started 2,000 words a day plan.

This morning, yes, Thanksgiving Morning, I’m going to try to get 1,000 before I have family things that are going to take all my time today. If I’m lucky, I’ll get to write this evening and get to 2,000.

It really would have helped if I’d had a few words in the bank into the holidays! I’ll just have to do my best not to fall too far behind in the next few days.

 

Another slip but a two day streak I’d like to keep alive despite the holidays

Lynn

I only wrote 1,007 words yesterday. My accept-no-excuses attitude obviously needs work. I had a raging headache yesterday and never really got moving on my words until it got late, and then couldn’t stick it out when I got sleepy.

On the other hand, I wrote 1,007 words and that means I have a two day streak of 1,000+ word counts and I’m going to try to hang onto it with all I’ve got despite the upcoming holidays and my packed calendar.

I’d like 2,000 today, but I’m not sure it’s going to be possible. I should have had all morning for writing, but I’ve completed four 15 minute sprints (more about that later, because yes, I gave in and I’ve started using my timers again as of the day before yesterday*). Out of those four 15 minute blocks, I haven’t gotten through one of them without having to stop the timer at least three times.

*The timers thing: I’ve decided I had to come up with a new way of thinking about the timers. They’re my inoculation against perfectionism. They keep me aware of the passage of time. They don’t interfere with flow. They enhance it.

I don’t even think about it on a conscious level when I have one running. But somehow, someway, the timer keeps me aware of what I’m doing and keeps me from falling into a circular thinking pattern that ends with me redoing the same sentence twenty times for no good reason. I’m serious. The timers aren’t about pressure, they’re about awareness. And I need them. I’m ready to accept that. I need the timers to stay aware of time and that’s just not going to change no matter how much I want it to.

Another fail but I’m not giving up

Lynn

So yesterday, day two of my no-excuses-accepted plan to write 2,000 words a day, was a fail. Stuff happened, but I can in all honesty say that I still should have gotten those words written, and that’s not me being too hard on myself. That’s me being honest. I wrote a mere 538 words of fiction.

However—

Today I’m starting early, and I’m going to get in today’s 2,000 words, and then I’m going to catch up and get ahead. I know I can do it. :D

That said, I’m not going to waste any more time on this post, and I’ll see you back here later, when I have a report to make. Accountability is probably going to be essential to this plan ever getting off the ground! :-)

No words in the bank and a few behind

Lynn

Day one did not go great for the 2,000 words a day plan. I spent most of the day reading a novel I’d been waiting on from the library.

I have mentioned that I love reading fiction, haven’t I? It’s like the obsession that will never end.

When life gets tough, I read a book. When I need a break, I read a book. When I’m sad, I read a book. When I’m excited, I read a book. I read a lot of books.

I finally gave up on keeping track this year. I’m at about six pages of titles in my 2019 reading log and I haven’t added anything in a couple of months. During those months, I had at least one period where I read 11 novels in a week.

I’m already 705 words behind my plan to write 2,000 words every day. On the other hand, I’m only 705 words behind at this point and I can make that up today.

Starting today, I’m just not going to allow myself any excuses—but first and foremost, I’m going to start getting these words done far earlier in the day every day that I can.

Sometimes I say writing is hard. But that’s not exactly true. Writing isn’t the hard part—it’s the fun part. What’s hard—and I’m talking super hard, so hard sometimes I think I want to crack open my skull with a hammer and rearrange things—is starting to write and sticking with it when it gets challenging. I mean, I love a challenge, but I have this uncontrollable desire to look away just when I get most excited. I don’t know if it’s an inability to process those feelings (a brain thing) or if it’s something else, but I have a feeling it’s a brain thing.

What that all means is that slow and steady puttering away at a story all day long is about the only way I can work steadily. It’s far more productive for me than sitting down and letting myself get into a frenzy. The frenzy causes me to start looking away until I finally just can’t deal at all. I end up jumping up and running around the house looking for something to burn off the energy I can’t process any other way.

New focus on a daily quota

Lynn

It’s getting late in November now and this year is almost over. I’ve taken a look at the year, and although I’m very happy to report that my writing slowdown of 2017 and 2018 is behind me now, I haven’t reached my goal to have my best year ever. ;D

By a lot, to be frank.

But it’s still possible!

My best year’s word count is 268,191 from 2013. To beat that, I need to write 51,800 more words this year.

Technically, my best year-end average daily word count is 798 words from 2012, but that was the year I started tracking (and started writing to sell), and I only wrote for half the year. If I want to beat 798 words per day, I need to write 74,879 more words this year.

Counting today, I’ve got 39 days to do it.

That’s 1,323 words a day—or 1,915 words a day. Since both of those fall below the magic 2,000 words a day I’ve been aiming to hit for what feels like forever, I’ll take the high end, thanks. :D

So here goes. Starting today, I’m going to get myself to a 2,000 words a day average and then I’m going to keep it. Whatever it takes.

I wanted to do it this year, but I didn’t, so I’m going to start it now, and I’m going to do it!

With all those holidays coming up, I think I’d better get a few words in the bank, too. :D

Maybe by next year, it’ll be such an ingrained habit, I’ll be able to keep it going all year.

October 2019 progress

Lynn

I forgot to post my October progress post. :) That shouldn’t be a surprise. I also forgot I was going to post about NANO. That update is out of the way and now I’m going to do the October progress post. :D

October words: 19,168.

That’s far under where I wanted to be for the month, but it did continue a streak of months in the five digit word counts.

There’s not a lot else to say. I continued writing on whatever interested me, and that has been a nice change of pace. I also have stayed away from timers and schedules and I’m not feeling the pressure to go back to using them.

On the other hand, I’ve now finished two stories that I haven’t yet published and I don’t like that. I much prefer finishing one at a time, getting it published, and then getting back to writing. That’s been a side-effect of writing on more than one thing at a time. I now have a lot of stuff that if I continue with that, will end up finished in lumps. Not really a fan of that, now that it’s actually happened to me.

So that’s something I won’t be doing in the future. I’m about to drop the multiple stories thing again, but only sort of, and with a purpose.

Here’s what I mean by that. I like moving between stories, but I also need to maintain a high interest in each story and finish it as quickly as possible. So… on days when I just cannot seem to get moving, I plan to allow myself to change stories. But as a general rule, I think I’m going to have to try to keep myself working on one book, no matter what, and finish it as quickly as I can so that my interest doesn’t wane and I don’t lose a lot of time to trying to get back into the story after an extended break.

I really don’t think those extended breaks do anything good for me. I lose a lot of love for my stories when I take them, and getting restarted is a bear. Seriously, it’s the worst.

I’m now at day 99 of my writing every day streak. I can’t count today because I actually haven’t written anything yet. But as soon as I do, it’ll be 100 days long. The number to beat is 122 (in the sidebar over there somewhere if you want to see it).

The changes to my sleep habits have also been helpful, maybe. I actually can’t say. I do know I’m doing better than I did during my massive downturn, so there’s that. I don’t really know how I can quantify this in the long-term, except to continue to adhere to better sleep habits and see where things stand many months from now. If I can make it through the holidays writing, that’ll be a win. It’ll be a tough proposition once the school breaks start, so I’ll have to stay vigilant about the earlier bed times! :D

So that’s where things are.

November has been (so far) about trying to do what needs to be done to get those finished stories out, and move on. And pick my next focus and really hone in on it and plan to get it done ASAP. And stop all this dilly dallying around. It feels less like fun than you’d think. It feels more like puttering, and there’s no sense of accomplishment at all. My ability to self-motivate depends on how I feel about what I’ve done.

And finally, I’ve set a challenge for myself to make November my first 60,000 words month. I’m behind at the moment (of course), but I’m still hopeful that I’ll be able to do it.

:D

I forgot I was going to post about NANO

Lynn

I forgot I was going to post about NANO this year. It doesn’t really matter now, because I’ve pretty much bailed on the NANO website. I never log my writing (except for the last day) on the day I write my words, and the new site only just now started even showing the tally of daily word counts (I think it’s sessions really, not even by day). I can’t edit my word counts by day and so it has me with all kinds of weird lumps on the progress graph.

Here’s a comparison shot of what we had to work with on the old site and what we have now.

Screen shot of old nanowrimo stats Screen shot from new nanowrimo stats page

As for the other changes, the NaNoWriMo stats page is a cluttered mess. I don’t like it and I’m not feeling the love for NANO this year, for sure.

Overall, in almost all ways, I do not like the new site, to the point that I finally realized I just don’t want to go back to it. I can do better charts and graphs on my own spreadsheet anyway.

So this is my last NANO post of 2019. I’ve decided I’m not going to participate this year after all.

On that note, I’ve adjusted my November goal to writing 60,000 words of fiction this month.

I’ve never had a 60k month. Probably ever, even before I started tracking in 2012. I know my NANO win in 2011 was just a 53k month and that was the best month I think I’d ever had up to that point with writing fiction.

Kicking off NANO 2019

Lynn

Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month and I’m getting a little bit of a late start on my first day’s words. I’m not going to make a bunch of excuses for that—I’ll just say I’m here and I’m going to try to get them done. I need 1,667 if I don’t want to end day one already behind.

I don’t. :D

I’m doing the rebel thing this year. My project is all my current novels in progress. I have six going at the moment. :D I want to make this a 50k word month and I want to finish at least one of those novels. Those are my NANO 2019 goals.

I’m currently trying to finish some short fiction I started a while back but the novels are the only thing I’m counting words for so that’s going to be an extra bit of a challenge.

Good luck to anyone reading who is also participating in NANO this year. :D

And good luck self. Because why not? ;-)

Once I have numbers for today, I’ll link up a Day 1 of NANO 2019 post.