Week 1 NaNoWriMo Things Learned

821 words typed on Wed.                                                                                                                  1,968 Thurs.                                                                                                                                              1,727 Fri.                                                                                                                                                         0 Sat.          I wrote a couple of scenes in long hand but didn’t type anything.                       979 Sun.                                                                                                                                                  1,152 Mon.                                                                                                                                                   933 Tues.

7,580 Total for the week.

My goal for the week was 11,900 words.

I’m 4,320 words short.   Sure, I would have liked to hit my goal.  I didn’t, but l’ll share what I learned with you.

1.   I’m still a super star even though I fell short of my goal.  I’m not going to beat myself up over it.   I’m proud of myself for starting and getting as far as I did.  I think that’s the most words I’ve ever written in a single week.

2.  I’ve haven’t been able to write in the morning.  I write when I get home.  Originally            I wanted to write in the morning, but that hasn’t worked.   For some scary reason I           look forward to writing when I get home.  What sucks is that my work probably                  suffers because I’m thinking about my characters and writing notes.  I’ve been                    taking the first ten minutes of my lunch break and my last break to start                               writing the scene I want to continue on later on that night.  I’ve been so engrossed              in my writing on my last ten minute break that I’ve been late coming back from                  break.  Whoops!  How am I suppose to return to work when my characters are                    still talking to me??????

     3.  This morning (actually yesterday morning…don’t ask) I’m writing this post long                  hand while I’m waiting to get my oil changed (stealing bits of time).  I’m finding it              difficult to write my post and write my 1,700 words, but I keep plunging                                forward.  Even if I write some of my words in longhand and don’t get to type it, I’m            still counting that as writing. I just didn’t get to type it so it doesn’t get added in to               my typed total for the day.

      4.  I’m stuck.  I could have wrote more words last night but I don’t know what                           direction I want to go in so I have to read through my notes and figure out my                     direction.  I’ve been writing notes and partial scenes for the last year and sticking               them in a file folder so my direction is somewhere in the file.  I just (I love the                     word just. I know it probably has no meaning and it may irritate some of you, but I         always use it.  I know it’s one habit I need to kick) have to find it.

5.  I have a haircut appointment tomorrow,  a acupuncture appointment on Friday                 and I’m going shopping with my mom, sister and niece for the weekend.  Also, we               are on 10 hours mandatory overtime starting today.  F*ck!  (Sorry)   My word                       count might suck for this week, but I will do my best.

6.  I’ve decided it’s not about the word count for me.  It’s about the experience.  It’s                  about learning things about myself and my characters. It’s about pushing me out                of my comfort zone and expanding my horizons.  It’s about making time to do                      what I love.  It’s about being gentle with myself instead of being a slave driver.  If                it takes me til Dec. 15th to get to 50,000 words then it does and that’s ok.

7.   If I haven’t read or commented on your blog I’m sorry.  Time is an issue                                  right now.  I try to read and comment when I can.  I just didn’t want anyone to                    think I forgot about them.  I’ll try to get back on schedule soon.

8.  I’m not having a hard time writing my 1,700 words.  It’s more of a time issue.                        What I’m having an issue with is what to do with all of the ideas for other projects              or blog posts that interrupt me while I’m writing my word count.   As I have                          mentioned before this has always been an issue for me and I have stopped                           writing because I didn’t know how to deal with the overflow of ideas coming to                   me.  I’m trying to work through this, but it’s still hard.  What I have been doing is               jotting down notes and putting them in a file folder (I love file folders!  I don’t buy             cheap or plain.  They have to have a cute design.  I’m a little anal when it comes to               my file folders) so after NaNoWriMo is over I have a starting point.

8.  I know this post is not probably going to come out in total paragraph form                            because of the numbers.  It didn’t.  I realized today that there is a preview button                at the top of  my page.  I never knew that little guy was up there.  There’s always                something  new to learn.  Yes, my page is screwed up. Sorry about that.  Don’t                      have  time to fix it right now.  I have to shower and go to my haircut appointment.              Crap, I still need to dry my jeans.  Gotta run.

9.  One more thing…doing this NaNoWriMo is fun.  I don’t have to worry about                         spelling, punctuation, sentence structure or paragraphing.  It’s great!

Thanks for reading and enjoy your day!!