Tag: Word count milestones

A new record—50,000 words, two months in a row

I did it! The goal I set out to meet this month has been met. But not only did I cross the 50,000 word mark for May after having written 50,000 words in April, I also finished a short story last night doing it. :)

Now, there are three writing days left in this month, and I’m not sure I’ll reach the 2,000 words per day average I had hoped to reach this month, but I can still make this my best month to date.

My current record high word count for a month (fiction only, remember!) is 57,249 from back in April 2016. As of last night, I’m sitting at 50,262 words for May. I need 6,988 words to beat that. A solid 7,000 would be better than a one word bump. :) So I need to write more than 2,333 each day of these last three days to do it.

I’m going to try.

Would you believe I’ve written almost 5000 words today?

Believe it, because it’s true. I’ve written almost 5000 words today, on the first day that I’ve taken a break from my 6000-words-in-a-day challenge since I started it twelve days ago.

Oh, the irony.

ETA: Scratch that. I have written 5000 words today. 5,100 to be exact.

ETA2: And I came in at 5,816 words for the day which is a new record for me. I also created a personal record for time spent writing: 10 hours and 33 minutes.

Good month, bad day

I’ve reached one new record this month: April 2016 has now become the month in which I’ve written the most words since I started tracking. Fiction words, of course, because if I counted these blogs posts and other stuff, who knows what it’d be? Just know that when I talk about records, I’m always talking about fiction I plan to publish.

I’ve written 55,810 words this month. Then there’s today.

It’s unlikely I’ll reach my 3,933 word count goal for today, but I have written a few more words that I’ll add to that number, and I might write a few more on top of that. We’ll see. More below on that topic.

I feel like I’ve slowed down these last few days, but I think it’s because I’ve been so tired from lack of adequate sleep. I want to write more, but I just don’t have a lot of energy for it.

I’ve already made a pact with myself to get into bed early tonight. I really have to stop staying up late for stupid reasons!

Unfortunately, that resolution doesn’t help the fact that I’m dog tired today, and it’s 3:52 and all I’ve written so far is 302 words. I didn’t use the timer for those words either, so I have no notion what my writing speed is—I think it’s slow. Like, really slow.

The big problem seems to be my natural affinity for morning light. It’s getting light outside very early in the mornings here, a little before 5:30 am. I’m just not getting to bed in time to get a good night’s sleep considering how difficult it is for me to sleep after daylight comes. I’ve been waking up around 5–5:30 am and not getting back to sleep. That’d be fine if I was going to sleep before 11:30–12:00, but I’m not. I don’t believe I’ve gone to sleep before 11:30 once this past week, and it’s been much closer to midnight many of those nights.

I need more sleep.

If I don’t make myself get it, I’m going to stall out again on the writing. I can tell. Today proves it. I feel the desire to write, but I can’t even keep my eyes focused on the screen as I’m trying to write. (I sometimes get headaches if I don’t get enough sleep and today is one of those times. My eyes don’t focus well when I have a headache and I don’t work through headaches well.)

Anyway, all that to say today kind of sucks for writing.

But—I want to keep trying. I’m about to start an actual session on one of my books. Maybe knowing the timer is going will help.

I could be reading the book I finished yesterday, searching for mistakes, but yeah… I’m sure that’d go great with this headache. I’ll save that for tomorrow.

By the way, lack of sleep really can feel like inebriation. I have that same floaty head feeling and it’s dogged me all day. And there’s one reason why I don’t drink alcohol very often. I hate that feeling.

Breaking my one-day word count record—attempt #3

Success!

I’m writing this in Evernote today so I can have the accountability without the WIFI. ;) I need accountability.

FYI: This turned out to be one long log! TMI warning!

8:02 am—

Starting with a 50 minute timed session of writing. Playlist is playing. Book doc is open. And yes, I’m still working in Word 2016 although I had to zoom in to 110% so the font issues don’t annoy me so much. I’m not that unhappy with the zoomed text. I still like Word 2007 better! :D

8:59 am update—

I wrote 497 words in 50 minutes. That’s a pace of 596 WPH. So still a little slow but better than yesterday for sure! Going for a quick break and then I’ll get back to it.

Okay, here’s an example of breaks and what happens. I got up at exactly 9 am, peed, went to the kitchen, made coffee, peed, refilled the soap dispenser in the bathroom, moved my computer from the desk to the living room, peed, poured the coffee into a cup, and got comfortable on the couch. It was then exactly 9:15.

It’s now 9:18. This comes to 18 minutes break for 50 minutes writing. We’ll see how the rest of the day goes.

I have a hard deadline this afternoon of 4 pm because of an obligation I have, so today needs to go well if I want to break that word count record. :)

10:13 am update—

I’m now up to 1,051. That’s another 554 words in another 50 minute session, bringing my pace up to 631 WPH. My spreadsheet tells me I’ve completed 1.6667 hours of writing and need another 6.592 hours to reach my goal at that pace. :o

I can do it. The story is going well now, and I’m thrilled to be able to say that.

Now, off to take a quick break before I start again. I might go with a 60 minute session next. Let’s see how long this break runs.

Alright. I’m back and it’s 10:26, so that’s .  .  . 13 minutes. Wow. I did nothing but pee and heat my coffee in the microwave for 25 seconds, text my kid a message about when he needed to be home, and text my sister about my word count. Short texts too. I didn’t even wait for a response before I put my phone back into airplane mode.

If I can stay writing for the entire session and not need to stop for peeing, longer sessions would seem to be the best way for me to cut the breaks back. My goal is 25%, so for every 18 minute break I have I should be writing 18/.25=72x.75=54 minutes. Of course, the 13 minute break goes just fine with a 45-50 minute writing session.

But longer sessions might only be a good idea if I can do them without needing to stop in the middle of them. That’s where I’ll run into problems.

It’s now 10:39 am. Time to get back to writing. I’m not going to count the extra 13 minutes against myself since I’m trying to figure out something here. :)

11:34 am update—

Can’t wait to stop at 60 minutes! I’m dying here. :D Pee break necessary!

Okay, whew. Peed, knocked down a spider web on my front porch, which I stepped out on to get a breath of fresh air and a moment of sunshine, then made a fresh cup of mint tea, peed again, and I’m back. It’s 11:45. So, an 11 minute break for a 54 minute writing session. That’s acceptable.

I got another 692 words to put me at 1,743 and my pace is now 679 WPH, which is an acceptable average. :D

Now, back to writing. ;) I’m going to try 60 minutes again. If this one doesn’t work out, I’m going back to 50 minutes and will just have to focus on keeping breaks as short as possible.

12:52 pm update—

I made it 60 minutes, but I can say confidently that I wouldn’t have made it more than 5 minutes more. I wrote 686 words this time, putting me at 2,429 words. My pace is now 681 WPH.

I need a lunch break now, and I’m going to really hope my break doesn’t slow me down once I come back to writing. I usually break for lunch at 12, but I forgot about that when I started this last session and when my phone alarm went off to remind me, I decided I could wait. I wasn’t that hungry at the time, although I definitely am now! :)

Be back soon. When I return I think I’ll go back to 50 min. Just less chance all around of needing to stop early for a break.

2:04 pm update—

Okay, I have no idea how lunch went long. The clock doesn’t lie though and it’s obviously been just over an hour since I stopped.  Tomorrow I think I’ll set a timer for 45 minutes and see if I can shorten that.

I feel good that I’m restarting at almost the halfway point to breaking my word count record. I have 2,779 words to go to break it, but I’d like to break my record by at least 100 words.

So far, my spreadsheet shows I’ve written for 3.56 hours today and that I need to write for another 4.08 to finish. I can do that. Although not by 4 pm, unless I suddenly double my WPH. Possible but not probable. I do believe I’ll have another 2 hours tonight to write also, although without WIFI I can’t exactly check my calendar. :D

Anyway, time to get to it. I only have enough time for 2 more 50 minute sessions if I start right now!

3:10 pm update—

Not tired yet. The story is going GREAT. :) I hate that I have to stop in less than an hour! I have this horrible fear I won’t recapture the magic when I get back.

Anyway, I wrote 664 words in 50 minutes, putting me at 3,093 for the day. My pace is currently 703 WPH. My spreadsheet says I’ll need to write for another 3 hours to reach my goal of breaking my word count record. :)

I think I have time for one more 50 minute session.

4:08 pm update—

I’ve run out of time! I’ve had to stop at 40 minutes at 3,699 words. My WPH shot up with this last session, so I’m very happy with my progress! My pace is 730 WPH now, and the spreadsheet says I need to write for 2.06 more hours.

We’ll see if I get time to do that tonight and beat this record of mine!

8:02 pm update—

Got home at 7, but the one thing I forgot when I said I could probably get 2 more hours of writing time tonight was dinner time. Because of that I’m getting started later than I wanted to. I try to quit at 9 every night, but it’s a Friday so I might just stay up and get this record broken. I think I can do it.

I’ll see how this first session goes and decide then. If my WPH is tracking near what I got earlier today, then I’m willing to stick it out and go to bed later. If it’s too low, I’ll push for my 4,521 words and quit there, because I plan to write a lot of words again tomorrow and I won’t be up for that if I stay up really late tonight. That kind of thing tends to have a snowball effect on my productivity.

Since my intent is to train myself to write 4,521 on every work day I can, I need to be able to do it while sticking to my normal evening routine. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life staying up too late trying to hit that word count. :)

Also, my fingernails grew today. Or maybe I’m more dehydrated now after 3 hours in the car and the pads of my fingers have shrunk away from my nails. Who knows. This morning, they weren’t a problem, but right now, they’re driving me crazy. Time for clipping. Then I’ll get started on that first 50 minute session.

Alrighty! Got that taken care of. Time to get started.

9:19 pm update—

I’m getting tired. It didn’t slow me down much though, although I do feel like I’m making more typos than I was and having to correct myself. I wrote for 50 minutes, 667 words, and my pace now averages 740 WPH. So although I wasn’t as fast as I was in the session before this one (at 909 WPH), I was still faster than in any of the rest, coming in at 800 WPH exactly.

I do think I’ll continue. Tonight might just be the night. :D

My spreadsheet says it’ll take me another 1.137 hours to finish. That’s 69 minutes. So . . . I’m going to set my timer for 60 minutes and try really, really hard to write at least 942 WPH! That would put me 100 words above my record and I wouldn’t have to go into another session. ;)

Anyway, need a quick break first because my legs are going numb and I’m very thristy.

Back from break and it’s now 9:40 pm. Somehow my break has taken me 21 minutes! I can’t explain it, because I didn’t do anything during my break except pee, guzzle a cup of water, make a fresh cup of herbal mint tea, and shake out my legs while I waited the 2 minutes it takes to boil the water.

Honestly, I think I’m just tired and I’ve slowed down. I mean, I’m seriously tired. I’ve started yawning a lot, because 6 am comes early and that’s what time I get up every day. I’ve had a couple of days this week where I just didn’t get enough sleep and although I got more the last two nights, I’m not caught up by any means. I’ll get to sleep in tomorrow morning, so maybe I’ll catch up finally. ;)

Honest to goodness, I just want to go to bed! Fighting that feeling and getting back to my book . . . right . . . now.

10:56 pm update—

How’s this for irony: I finished my 60 minute session and I’m sitting at 5,108 words. Exactly 100 words fewer than my record.

I’m not going to bother with a break because if I take one right now, I might not come back. I’m so tired I think I could fall asleep right here. I’m setting a 15 minute timer and hoping I can knock out 200 words so I can call this thing! :D

11:21 pm update—

It’s done! I have written 5,221 words today. I didn’t end up with an extra 100 words but it’s close enough! I’ve now set a new one-day word count record for myself, and boy am I tired.

Too bad all these words weren’t fiction. This is one long log!

I’m not even going to read through this to see if I went too far over the TMI line. Just too tired! :)

I’ll be back tomorrow to try for my daily goal of 4,521 words.

Now goodnight!

Here are today’s numbers, all laid out for you. Or me, in case I want to see them again (I don’t archive daily detail like this anywhere; I only track a daily total).

Minutes Words Session WPH
50 497 497 596
50 1,051 554 665
54 1,743 692 769
60 2,429 686 686
50 3,093 664 797
40 3,699 606 909
50 4,366 667 800
60 5,108 742 742
15 5,221 113 452
429 Total minutes -0.017803 Hours to finish
5,221 Total words
730 Total WPH 7.15 Hours completed