Friday 7 December 2018

20k/5 Days: An Experiment

 The structure of NaNoWriMo was something I really got into this year. I had tough points, but no matter the blow to my mood, or my word count, I managed to pull it back and get a win.

 Part of that, I think, was the method I developed (with great help from Sue, one of my region's Municipal Liaisons) of treating blocks of time as word wars, or, in my case, sprints.

 I learned that I can do five hundred words in half an hour pretty consistently, and with that strategy in use, I managed to do three thousand a day on my best solo days (Write In days were usually better because of writing in more than one place and in a social setting).

 With NaNo over, and a supplementary short story and my project from last year still unfinished, I felt a little bereft with no challenge.

 I was as Alexander, I wept for there were no more worlds to conquer.

 So I made my own.

 As it is my wish to be a professional writer, a daily minimum word count for non-NaNo times is something that I need to develop.

 With a successful NaNo behind me, I decided to think big, and so, I committed to spending the next five days, starting Monday, on writing twenty thousand words.

 Wish me luck, and do not weep for me if it all goes tits up.

 Monday

 Day's Word Count: 4063

 Log

 Phew, today was a hard start.

 I felt pretty good at the beginning, got an early start and had my first thousand words done by quarter past nine. (I woke up at five, these things happen.)

 I ended up taking a long break after, about forty five minutes, and I feel like this may have been a mistake. I felt like I was flagging pretty early on during my third block for the day.

 Block four forty five minutes later wasn't too bad, though.

 Blocks five and six came in rapid succession after lunch, that flagging feeling disappearing pretty fast.

 With the end of block six came the end of the last short story I wrote to fill up my NaNoWriMo 50k. So long Lesbian Witch Romance (working title, I promise.)

 Now, strictly speaking, I had a thousand words left for the day. It's the 500/30 method I mentioned above, after all.

 However, I spent the better part of two hours feeling way too intimidated to get back into the novel that had been my white whale since the end of last November.

 (Out of about sixty eight thousand words, forty six thousand were written in NaNo17. Twenty two thousand over eleven months is pretty dire, I think.)

 So my seventh block was just 250/20 to try and ease myself back into it, which worked pretty well, ended up with three hundred and forty, not too shabby.

 Unfortunately, though, the last block was back to 500/30 and I under performed by about two hundred words.

 No matter, though, I made up the shortfall to the total 4k for the day shortly after.

 Not the most brilliant start, but a start it is. Hopefully I can continue to build momentum on TWoA tomorrow.


 Tuesday


 Day's Word Count: 4042

 Running Total: 8105

 Log

 Why am I doing this to myself?

 Well, the good news is that I managed to get the first four blocks done with little trouble, under performed a little on block four, but not by enough to really put a dent into my progress.

 Block five is when I really started feeling the burn. I under performed slightly again, but it felt like a struggle in a way the previous four hadn't.

 Block six was an out and out failure, I put it off for hours and got less than half what I wanted to.

 Seven only came, with less of that burned out fog mind, after a half hour on my exercise bike. The blood being pumped a little harder helped clear the malaise.

 Since Six was a wash, I had six hundred words left over, and by this point it was five thirty, so I filled up the rest of those by starting something silly and indulgent.

 Finally finished that at about twenty past nine. I am a mess and want to go to bed.


 Wednesday


 Day's Word Count: 0

 Running Total: 8105

 Log

 I woke up today feeling exhausted and dreading getting up. I stayed in bed past the time I'd already written five hundred words avoiding the day.

 Now it's twenty five past one and I have failed to write a single word. If I manage to write anything, I will note it in an addendum, but my hopes are not high.


 Thursday


 Day's Word Count: 538

 Running Total: 8643

 Log

 So I ended up sleeping in until ten. Apparently I was that tired.

 I wrote one block after brunch, but didn't really feel the need to push myself to write more. Instead I actually did some housework.

 After such severe burn out, I'm satisfied with that count for the day. I will, however, try to get more done tomorrow.


 Friday


 Day's Word Count: 1623

 Running Total: 10266

 Log

 Well, I woke up on time and got three blocks done in the morning (although a bit later than Monday and Tuesday to start and took a long break).

Fifteen hundred was really what I wanted to do as a minimum today, and might have managed more if my Mum hadn't given me the change jar. So any possibility of writing died in the face of counting out well over a thousand coins.

 (It was a worthwhile exercise.)


 Conclusion


 Twenty thousand in five days was just far too ambitious.

 Just way too much to do.

 While I had achieved numbers higher than four thousand in a single day during NaNoWriMo, they tended to be spread out and at least partly done in a social setting.

 I think about a thousand a day is a good minimum for me personally (at least during a 'work day') and three thousand is a number that is definitely achievable on a day to day basis.

 Doing original writing in the morning and dedicating the afternoon to editing writing blog posts, or artistic pursuits may be the optimal method of organising my weekdays.

 Currently I'm not actively editing anything, so that will need to be tested in the New Year.

 Until the end of December, I'm going to take it easy.

 Despite NaNoWriMo being successful, I had a pretty rough time of it last month.

 Some personal issues, the DWP screwing me over, and the change of seasons laying me low as per annual tradition. all made my NaNo success a surprise to me.

 The New Year is something I'm particularly looking forward to because I'm going to be trying a new method to help organise my life and improve my productiveness (hopefully enough to get out of the hell hole that is the jurisdiction of the DWP).

 I plan to cover that at a later point in the month.

 As for now, have a nice weekend, everyone!

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