Archives: 2008 NaNo

Here's how I feel about my six NaNovels:

Year 1: Liked. Was being critiqued by a writers' group that I am no longer a part of.

Year 2: Hated. It will never see the light of day. I have not even opened the file since November 30, 2004.

Year 3: Liked. It was published on my fanfic website.

Year 4. Hated. I have not opened the file since November 29, 2006. I still like the story concept, and I am going to completely rewrite it. Some day.

Year 5: Liked. Published it on my fanfic site.

Year 6. I don't dislike it, but it will never see the light of day. It's not something I feel is worth working on to even try to get it publishable. It was a lot of fun to write, though!

So, in odd years, I come up with stuff I like. In even years, I write things that will never go anywhere. Hmmm...

I cut it close to the wire this time. I finished my NaNovel with 2 minutes and 44 seconds to spare (according to the clock at NaNoWriMo), and I didn't even scrimp on the story to finish on time, although I thought I was going to have to. It came to a natural close at about 11:40 pm, and I just wrote an epilogue to tie up a couple of loose ends.

This year, the NaNovel clocked in at 63,211 words, almost as many as my very first NaNo. Like I said, it just flowed this year. It's crap, but the words flowed. *g* I wrote on and off for 13.5 hours today, way more time than I have ever put in during the course of a single day before. I also nearly doubled the most words I have ever written in one day. I logged 10,025 words today to finish the novel!

I should head over to the forums and see which of my Wrimos have crossed the finish line (I know at least four have--whoo hoo!), but I am tired. So, instead I am going to bed and I'll check tomorrow.

I am so sad that the 2008 NaNo has closed. I got very verklempt earlier when it really sank in that this was the last day. *sigh* I can't say it enough, thanks for another wild and wonderful ride, Chris Baty!

Got my green bar today, ahead of schedule.

Now I just have to finish this sucker. I have no idea how it is going to end!!!

The joy is back! After absolutely loving the feeling of my first NaNo (I wrote 64K words in 21 days with no idea what I was going to write until the characters started yammering in my brain on 3 November), the magic was gone. I still loved NaNo for what it did for me—got me writing with no excuses—and loved that I had a completed novel at the end of it.

But it was never the same as that first NaNo.

Until now.

And I think I have Chris’ Golden Rule to thank.

I've accepted and completed the challenge. Please join me.

http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/node/3129303

The Terrible Crossover Fanfiction Idea Generator is addictive.

My favorite so far?

"Your challenge is to write crossover fanfiction combining Blue's Clues and M*A*S*H. The story should use Arbor Day as a plot device!"

Arbor Day??!?!

So, I've got two society girls in my NaNovel this year. I know NOTHING about society girls! :) Matt and I were hanging out last night, cuddling with the puppies on the couch, and the show we were watching finished. So, I started flipping through channels and found an E! True Hollywood Story episode called "Society Girls." Heh. I told Matt that we HAD to watch (totally not his cuppa!) for research for my novel. I wasn't sure I'd really learn anything in the 20 minutes of the show that was left, but it was worth a shot.

And I did actually get some insight! AND one of the society girls in my story--well, I didn't like what her dad was currently doing to keep the family fortune alive, and I didn't like what she was aspiring to be when she graduated from college. It just wasn't quite "right". Well, thanks to the show, I realized exactly what her dad was doing AND what she wanted to do, too!

Yay!

I can shut off many of my Inner Editors. My spelling/punctuation editor I have to beat to submission, but I can generally wrestle that one into its cage.

The one I cannot control--at all--is my Research Inner Editor. I. Can't. Do. It.

It's really annoying me knowing that if I had all of my characters set before November 1, I could have gotten this research out of the way in October.

Oh well. I am sure that RIE and I will learn to co-exist and work out a compromise soon.

Thank God. I was starting to get worried!

The final verdict: original fiction!

It's almost 7:30. I still haven't written a word. I keep vacillating on what I want to write. I think a lot of the problem is that I started thinking of my 2003 NaNovel a few weeks ago, and all I want to do is work on that. I also have no ideas for an original plot. I have a bunch of ideas for fanfic, but I am soooo burnt out on fanfic right now after killing myself to post before my Jixaversary and trying to get the Halloween story out at the last minute. Plus, I really want to do original. But then I think of how nice it was to have a stockpile of fanfic waiting for me so I didn't go inactive.

Argh! I hate writer's block! If I've been struck by it this early, I'm dead in the water.

...I've decided to do original fiction. That could change, though--despite the fact that it is November 3, and I should have decided already. Had an insanely busy weekend and decided to start writing in earnest today. We'll see what I come up with!

I also just calculated how much I wrote in the last couple of weeks between all of the meeting summaries and the Halloween story. Between October 20 and October 31, I wrote 34,638 words. And two of those days I didn't write anything. So, I basically did 70% of NaNo (wordwise) in one-third of the time. I'm not totally burnt out on writing or anything!

I also got a call at 5:30 pm on Friday asking me to write a summary this week because the person supposed to do it couldn't, and the person who promised to do it for this other person decided at the last minute that she couldn't either. So, I thought I only had one summary to write this week, and now I've got two. I'm sick to death of summaries!

After printing a bunch of stuff weekend for NaNo, I got the warning on Friday that my ink cartridge was going kaput. The last time I had to replace my ink cartridge was a couple of months ago while doing all of the JixDisney stuff. And the time before that was last November during NaNo. The only time I even use my printer is for NaNo (or recently JixDisney). Seriously, I telecommute 500 miles away to the East Coast and my printer literally has dust on it. Oh, and after my last printer broke from dis-use, I threw it in the garbage, and the only reason I have a printer now is because my FIL decided, after I had happily lived an entire year without one (that was before NaNo), that I HAD to have one. It's working out well now, admittedly.

ANYWAY, after getting the warning on Friday, the cartridge was completely useless by Sunday morning. So, I spent the $30 (and the hour round trip into town and back) and replaced it. And guess what? I just got the warning AGAIN right now. Argh!!! I can't afford to replace my $30 ink cartridge every three days!!!!

I knew what I wanted to write! Or, rather, that I didn't want to write two things. Maybe I could go for the gusto and write both? 50K of fanfic and 50K of original fic?

Naaaahhhh...

Running NaNoWriMo takes a lot of time and resources, and those people work hard. I always knew they did, but getting a glimpse of some behind-the-scenes stuff as an ML and a forum moderator has opened my eyes even more. I've donated every year that I've done NaNo, because I really believe in it. They give me so much that I want to give back. If every Wrimo donated just $10, then the fundraising goals would almost be met that way alone. It's understandable that not everybody can afford to donate, though.

I was perusing the ML forum on the site today, and I laughed when I realized that every poster has a halo (a sign you donated) next to their name. You never see that in the regular forum. And that's what got me thinking about all of this--seeing all of those halos lined up next to each other.

I started perusing the site, looking at the various things they've got going on, when I came across the "Donating When Broke" page.

At the bottom was a description of GoodSearch (quoted directly from the NaNoWriMo page):

This Yahoo-powered search engine donates a penny to the charity of your choice for every search you do. Before you start searching just put "The Office of Letters and Light" in the "Who do you Goodsearch for?" box. That will lock in NaNoWriMo's parent nonprofit as the recipient of all your searches from that point forward.

Cool thing: We've earned almost $2,000 in Goodsearch funds since we started this in 2007! If every NaNoWriMo participant switched to Goodsearch for November, we could pay for most of our expenses through Goodsearch funds alone.

I am so switching for November, and I hope that everyone who reads this blog will, too. All of the things we Wrimos use--the forums, the author profiles, the buddy lists, the word count widgets, etc. etc. etc.--all cost money, and I love the idea of giving back and help defraying the cost of the resources I use.

Is it time for '08 already? Eeeeek! Since my last post, I've actually typed a bunch of NaNo blog posts in Word (during times I was traveling and had no Internet access) to eventually post when I did have 'Net access, but they're all still sitting on my hard drive--where I guess they'll stay, because I don't feel like posting them now. *g*

I've blown the dust off of the actual blog, though, and now this space is ready for celebrating 10 years of NaNo.

Now...to just think of a plot...or even a fetching main character I can work with...or ANY character I can work with! :)