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!

National Novella Writing Month

 This is the first, unedited, line of my NaNoWriMo project this year titled More Canals than Giza.

 It's only tangentially related to the rest of the novel, as the story begins with workaholic Tonina Lagoria breaking out of her work groove as an illustrator in the wee hours of the morning.

 After that point, she is swept up in a story of aliens coming to Earth and running into a cute guy.

 My inspiration for this story was based entirely around my irrational worry that a pale face will pop up outside my window in the dead of night.

 Or rather, considering the somehow less terrifying thought of a dark skinned face popping up outside of that window.

 Attached to a person, not just a disembodied face. It's not like Idris Elba's visage decided to go for a post midnight walk without the rest of him.

 (In that instance I'd still scream like it was a pale face, but I'd also be charmed. He's very handsome.)

 So this entire plot was born of coming up for a legitimate (as in logically consistent and not crime based) reason for someone to be in your back garden at two o'clock in the morning.

 All I could think of was running away from some threat, and my brain supplied giant alien cats as said threat.

 Which I am so glad my brain supplied because writing this story was a lot of fun.

 I'm both seriously looking forward to January to begin revising the story, and dreading it, because I've never edited anything this long before.

 For my sins, this is the first finished draft of anything longer than a short story I've ever managed. Even though it's only about 35k long, it's still an intimidating length for a novice like myself.

 So, with the writing relatively fresh in my mind, here are things I want to address in the edit:

1. Giving currently nameless characters names.
2. Improve the romance
3. Improve the humour
4. Improve the deeper social commentary (that there is. It's not much, tbf)
5. Improve the ending
6. More descriptive detail for Tonina and other characters
7. Drive home Stephen the Newsreader losing his goddamn mind
8. More horror elements

 I'm pretty satisfied with the first draft and keeping these points in mind to improve it for the second.

 I mean, honestly, if it had been a white guy in her back garden, Tonina probably would have assumed he was a ghost and left him there to die.

 I know I would.

Post NaNo Blues

 So, another year, another NaNoWriMo has passed.

 Same old, same old, right?

 Wrong!

 This year I actually managed to pull it off!

A winner is me.

 I feel like a proud mother.

 And like any mother, not everything I did is worth a damn, but this is a risk of any creative process.

 Including making people.

 Unfortunately.

 This year I didn't do one long novel I haven't finished.

 No!

 This year I managed to create a complete story.

 More than one, actually.

 Yeah, my initial idea couldn't hold on for a full fifty thousand words, so I ended up having to supplement my word count with a few short stories.

 Three, to be exact.

 Two I have finished, and a third that still needs to be completed.

 In the spirit of sharing, I shall leave the first lines of each of these four stories below in a suitably aesthetic manner.

NaNoWriMo Extract

 So my sleep patterns been playing me right up these last ten days or so, and I just couldn't think of anything to post about. My apologies for both of these things.

 However, not what the post is about, this post is an extract from yesterday's NaNoWriMo efforts that I fancied showing off.

 It revolves around one of the newer characters in the story, Carwyn.

 (For reference he calls his sister Padi)

In the Shadow of the Stonehearted King

 He'd decided to name it Padikin.

 It was barely the height of his palm, standing in the awkward arms held straight out from the shoulder position that was depicted in the book on his desk.

 A small sculpture of a girl with pigtails and a long dress made from clay he'd taken from the arts rooms. Padikin didn't have much detail, except for little dot eyes and a smiley mouth on her face and tiny snakes of a necklace and bracelet.

 He'd made her small so she'd be easier to fire, but it made her harder to paint. She had a big black splodge on her right cheek from when he was painting her hair.

 Carwyn thought it made her cuter.

 He re-examined the pages concerning the ancient rites of golem animation. It was complicated, with many glyphs and a strange chant that the book was determined could not be sung.

 He was certain that the T'schdem had streamlined it since the book was written, as it did not need to be as complicated as it was.

 He drew one glyph on the desk in chalk coloured with the blood of a ram. The book called for fresh billy blood, but he couldn't get his hands on that at such short notice. The long dried blood of a similar looking male would have to be enough.

 He placed an inverted plate on top of it and carefully wrote the chant in a circle around it.

 With a knife he wedged the plate up so he could remove it without smudging the chalk.

 A few careful curves and curls to fill in some space and the cirle was finished.

 It didn't look much like the diagram, which was designed to give a general idea and not the actual circle of magic used, that was all straight lines, glyphs and the suggestion of vines. Carwyn's was all organic looking shapes that reflected no actual living thing caught between a glyph and the carefully written chant in the alphabet of the Lords.

 He admired his handiwork and gently placed Padikin in the centre of the circle.

 "Gentle Padikin, sweet child of clay," he sang trailing his finger around the circle before spiralling through it, "to you I give the gift of life."

 Once his finger reached her feet her turned her with his free hand, causing the chalk on his finger to leave gradually fading marks on her dress. At her shoulder he stopped, pressing his finger tip against her little smiley mouth.

 "As once the gods granted it to man. I wish you a duty of nothing but joy," he crooned before blowing gently into her face, some of the trace of chalk he'd left with his finger blew away.

 Her arms fell to her sides.

 "Padikin?"

 She tilted her head at him before nodding.

 He smiled widely.

 "Welcome to the world little Padikin, and thank you, I'll be able to revive Southern soon thanks to you."

 Padikin pushed out her chest and put her little mitten hands on her hips in pride.

 Her pose of triumph didn't last long though, as she started trying to brush off the chalk the second she touched some with her hand.

 Carwyn chuckled and handed her a tiny scrap of cloth.

NaNoWriMo 2015 Roundup

 Yeah, I know this post is a fortnight late, I know I only put up one NaNo post this year, I know I've basically been letting Doug run my blog with his The Apprentice posts lately. I know, I know.

 But enough about that, let's talk NaNo.

 In the end, I managed to get twenty five thousand words done during November, which is still pretty good. It's brought my total word count up to forty seven thousand, which is almost halfway to my minimum word goal for the novel.

 Yeah, I'm a bit disappointed that I didn't manage to get the fifty thousand, but I don't seem to take the transition into winter particularly well.

 During this NaNo I had to change my plans, especially when it comes to the protagonist's relationships.

 There is only so long you can have a character be oblivious to someone else's feelings before, well, I'm sure it'll be annoying to at least some readers regardless, but before it becomes so ridiculous that it's really infuriating to everyone.

 Besides, this is a first person novel, there's only so much she can see but not notice.

 Especially when a scene like this happens:

“I’m gonna go out on a limb here and guess that it’s a personal matter that killed it?” Tracey asked, putting a hand on Pankaj’s shoulder.

Pankaj nodded.

“Yeah, man, I do not blame you. Somebody being a dick about that is gonna kill any friendship.”

“You are my brother in suffering Tracey.”

“You’re my sunbae in suffering, Pan.”

Pankaj laughed, deep and throaty.

“You know, that’s really cheered me up, Tracey. Thank you.”

“No problem, sunbae.”

Pankaj shook his head with an affectionate smile.

“I think we should talk about this later.”

“Yeah, probably a good idea,” Tracey agreed.

Tracey likes Jane, this has already been established, so you can see the problem.

Yeah, I suppose that I could cut this stuff out, but having written it, I realised that my original plan was going to be difficult to pull off, so it was best to change tack.

I don't think sticking slavishly to an original plan is a good idea, you've got to be able to change your mind when the draft organically throws up issues with that plan. Unless your plot is heavily dependent on whatever it is that's changed, don't feel like you need to get rid of it.

The other reason to change tack is that it adds more conflict.

 Wonderful, delicious conflict.

It's a writer's bread and butter and dessert all in one.

As it stands, I'm not going to be able to get the first draft done by the end of the year, which is sad, but I'm still doing quite well, I think, all things considered.

Oh well, I should get some writing done.

NaNoWriMo Chronicles - Week One

 I'm already behind.

 By about a full day's word count.

 With that out of the way, let's cover what I'm writing this year (largely to avoid this becoming the 'Murphy talks about The Apprentice funtime blog', at least any more than it already has, that is).

 Of course, my focus this year is Herd, because I will finish that novel if it kills me.

 I'm about ten thousand words into the NaNoWriMo attempt, but I do have over thirty thousand with what I already wrote, which is about a third of the way through my word goal for the project. So NaNoWriMo has already been a massive help.

 If I can manage to get fifty thousand by the end of the month, then I'll have knocked off about three quarters of the project, which would be exceedingly useful.

 If I can't, well, I'll have still knocked out a good chunk of the novel.

 Of the chunk I've done so far this month, here's an excerpt.

The next gallery was more things about the founding of, and early history of, Park City, the one after was the portrait gallery dedicated to Jason Park.

The picture Syed’s group had shown us had a large oil copy prominently displayed in the exhibition. The artist had taken a slightly more impressionistic approach (according to the information card), but it was still a good likeness. I liked the slightly dreamy approach.

But as nice as that painting was, it wasn’t the real reason why we were there.

There were a lot of paintings and photos of him as a young man.

He was gorgeous.

Boyish good looks, fluffy black hair and a smile that could melt anyone’s heart.

My favourite portrait was of him in a traditional formal hanbok (Maxwell explained) looking to his side out of a window.

“I look good in a hanbok too, you know,” Maxwell pouted.

“You’re not wearing one right now,” I pointed out, not looking away from the painting.

“You’re tough to please,” he teased back.

“I don’t ask much, just found a city and constantly wear a hanbok.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he smiled.

We emerged from the museum after an additional half an hour talking discussing Jason Park’s impact on history and stunning good looks.

The NaNoWriMo train wreck

 Wow, I did really badly this year. I don't think I even hit three thousand words this year.

 Including the Batman fanfiction, it's still under five thousand.

 I'm not having a great time in general right now, and my writing is suffering as a consequence.

 I'm not going to let this defeat me, though, so I'll continue working on Herd over the next few months.

 I'm also going to work on editing some of my old short stories in order to make them suitable for publication. I'm planning to search for a literary agent once I have two stories cleaned up and ready to be published.

 I might as well, having perfectly good short stories just lying around is just a waste.

 As for the new schedule for the Final Fantasy VIII posts, I'm going to keep it as is for the moment. I may return to the old schedule after I've had a chance to build up some posts, something I haven't had the opportunity to work on lately since Steam has been playing up for the past week or so. It's finally stopped messing me around, so I can start playing again.

 By the way, tomorrow's post will be the long awaited rework post with the redesigns of Rinoa and Seifer's outfits since my printer is finally working again too.

 So there's that to look forward to.

Park City Lives Up To It's Name, But Mostly By Accident (NaNoWriMo 2014 - Two)

 Ah, this year is not going particularly well in terms of the old word count, I'm not going to lie to you.

 I'm going to keep it up and try to get to at least 25,000 words, if not more. In order to help accomplish this goal, I'm going to dedicate Fridays and Sundays to writing Herd.

 Speaking of, I have a little extract for you.

Enjoy.

Herd (Current NaNoWriMo Word Count:2380)

 Our journey ended when the coach entered a gated off street that had police guarding each end.
 
 There were a few in a fancier version of the same uniform standing in formation around the entrance to a particularly large and incredibly ornate building in the middle of the street.
 
 It was unlike most of the buildings I’d seen in the city so far, it bore no resemblance to Chinese architecture at all. In fact, it looked like a building from the Victorian period. The first one.
 
 It reminded me of home.

  A smiling man in some kind of traditional South East Asian dress and a heavy mayoral chain was standing on the steps leading into the building and smiling at us broadly.
 
 Like Doctor Bazan, it was hard to pin him down to just one ethnic group, at least, to any I was familiar with. He was rather a bit paler than her, with a broader nose and much curlier black hair, dotted with grey, that was pulled back into a plait.
 
 We were invited to leave the coach and we spilled out onto the street, the police were stationed near the fences at the ends of the street, trying to block off too much gawking from the people crowded on the other side. Although there were some photographers in the street taking photos at a respectful distance. They were smartly dressed, in suits and clothes much like the mayors.
 
 Peter and Calanthia tracked us down in the small crowd as we huddled together nervously, as the mayor cleared his throat and began his speech.
 
 “Gentlefolk of Vault Mingo, as Mayor of Park City is it my pleasure and honour to welcome you to our fair city on behalf of our founder Jason Park.”
 
 Oh. Well I felt daft.

Rebel Rebel (NaNoWriMo 2014 - One)

 I'm a rebel this year, although I'm pretty sure I've been a rebel every year I've done NaNoWriMo, so make of that what you will.

 Basically, it just means that I'm working on a previously started project.

 No, you don't get any prizes for guessing that it's Herd.

 I've managed to get 1,066 words done today, which is about six hundred shy of the official target, but I've been running on empty all day, so I'm still pretty pleased.

 I'm hoping that I can catch up in the next few days.

 I'll try and get a short excerpt up either on Monday or Wednesday.

 In the meantime, don't forget that there's a bonus spoopy drabble going up tomorrow.

Camp NaNoWriMo Update - Part Three (Kinda)

 Still ill, still barely wrote anything.

 -sigh-

 Since I've really got no news on this front, have an extract of what I did manage to write.

 As ever, comments would be appreciated. I can use all the encouragement I can get.

Herd

This entrance was a large and breezy garage, like a bus terminal.

Which was an apt comparison, there were buses parked there. Single decker and wider than the type usually seen, or that used to be seen, in cities and towns. They also looked like they’d had some kind of shielding attached to them and there was a railing around the top, like people were intended to stay up there.

The other members of Vault Mingo were starting to mill around outside the bus, looking nervous and scared.

Probably because of the three people in bulletproof vests with guns strapped to their backs and what looked like gas masks slung around their necks.

They looked cheery enough, though, all bright smiles and chatting to some of the other city folk who carried clipboards.

“Why are there people with guns?” Peter asked Dr Jones quietly.

“It’s for your protection, there’s been a few problems outside of the city walls lately.”

“Problems with who, exactly?” Peter demanded.

“Some bandits, there’s a community of them nearby. City hall is currently in discussion on what to do about them.”

He seemed very calm about the whole situation.

“They’re pretty easy to deal with, just keep them out. We’re generally concerned that they present a danger to themselves.”

Camp NaNoWriMo Update - Part Two

-Gross sobbing noises-

I have had no impetus to write this past week.

The depression and feelings of self loathing have not been helpful. I really should jump around more in order to keep the enthusiasm going.

So, since I have nothing new to show you guys, I'm going to show you an extract from what I wrote before Camp started.

Oh, just before that, though. I know I promised on my tumblr that I would be following up my FFXV post with another a month later, and it's been a month now. So you can expect a bonus post about that tomorrow.

It will be such fun.

But anyway, have an extract!

Herd

Where’s Peter?

I tried saying that too, but my throat was so dry and disused that I couldn’t even give you a vaguely correct transliteration.

“What’s she saying?” someone asked. Someone with a strangely androgynous voice, I couldn’t decide whether I thought they were a man with a feminine voice or a woman with a manly voice. Either way, or neither, they sounded quite nice and soothing.

Which was probably why they elected to be the one to tell me things would be fine.

“My money would be on ‘where’s Peter?’.” This was definitely a man, or possibly a bear who had learned to talk.

I tried to sit up and someone put their hands on my shoulders to hold me down.

“That might not be such a good idea,” the androgynous one said kindly, “we’ve had the odd problem with nausea.”

Now that they mentioned it, I did feel a little ill.

I made a face.

“Have I just made you feel nauseous?”

I nodded carefully.

“Here.”

Mr Bear handed me a bottle like object.

It was cold.

“It’s got water in it, have a drink and you should feel a little better.”

I sipped it as instructed and the feeling of cold water in my mouth helped me wake up.

I moved suddenly with surprising force, sitting up and spitting out the water. I scrambled out of the cryo pod and tried to run.

“Wait! Stop!” AndrogynyPerson called as I staggered at top speed away from the pod, blinking against the painfully bright light as I opened my eyes for the first time.

There were people all over the place, people of all shapes, sizes and colours, but all with the same unifying trait.

They all had long hair and that marked them out as other.

I realised that the exit was actually further away on this side than in the other direction, and that meant more chances to be caught.

Shit.

I decided to try my chances in the other direction, skidding to a stop and preparing to run back the other way and dodge AndrogynyPerson and Mr Bear.

No one beats me at British Bulldog.

Camp NaNoWriMo Update - Part One

 It's not going super great.

 I've been ill, as you all know from the lack of proper posts for the last few days.

 However, I have got some done, and what I've got, I'm happy with.

 So have an extract of what I've written.

Herd

Peter was waiting outside, gathering stares from the Park City people. He did cut an imposing figure, tall, dark and handsome with his hair cropped close to his skull.

Compared to them, he was an almost defiantly masculine individual.

Some of them whispered about us once we joined him.

"She clear then?"

"She's clear. The picture of good health, as predicted."

"Told you, she's a tough girl."

Dr Jones laughed, "I never doubted that for a moment, Mr Howe."

He gave me an affectionate pat on the shoulder as he said it.

I couldn't help but smile.

"So, follow me and I'll take you to Miss Wilson and Master Stoppard."

He walked ahead and Peter and I shared a mildly amused look as we followed him.

The foyer started to have more and more members of the vault in it, we nodded in greeting to people as we passed.

Dr Jones stopped to talk to one of the people in white coats, this one had a blunt cut fringe and streaks of pink in her hair. She told him where to find Wilson and Kyle and he took us to a cubicle.

"Miss Wilson is in here, I'll go and fetch Master Stoppard for you."

True to his word, just after Dr Jones left, Wilson emerged from the cubicle.

She was wearing her standard tracksuit bottoms and pastel pink top with a big bow on her shoulder, but she still managed to look radiant.

I got a little anxious about my own appearance. My hair wasn't cropped close to my head like hers was, so it was probably a tangled mess.

I tried to subtly run my hand through it as she practically rugby tackled Peter into a hug.

"Peter! Jane!" She squealed, "you're okay!" She pulled away from Peter and turned to me, "girl, you look fine," she scolded as she dragged me into a hug. "We can do something about those shorts later."

I smiled and hugged her back.

"What happened to you two?" She asked as we separated, "some of these guys were saying there was a fight?"

“Jane punched one of the doctors in the face when she woke up,” Peter explained.

“How hard?” she asked.

“He looks like he’ll get a black eye.”

Wilson gave me a friendly punch in the arm, “‘atta girl.”

If you want to be an absolute darling and help me out, you could leave a comment telling me what you think of the characters and setting in the extract.

Also, regular posts will recommence on Tuesday as planned. I'm finishing up one tonight so it's ready to go.
So make sure to check back for that.

Last Day Before Camp

 Oh, I'll spend the next few days getting ahead on my FF8 posts, she says. I'll hash out the plot to Herd, she says. I'll be a productive member of society, she says.

 Bah.

 Here I am, the day before Camp NaNoWriMo with my only outline the one I made before I came up with some of the more important elements and twists, eating a chia seed pudding that has lasted for over an hour and still has no end in sight, and kind of procrastinating from doing all the stuff I need to.

 I got up at eight this morning, eight and the only productive things I've done are food related and taking selfies.

 Well, I tell somewhat of a lie. I did oversee the end of us getting our bathroom finished (I'll post some photos on Wednesday).

 But apart from that handful of things, I couldn't name you any of the things I've done today.

 Why am I so useless?!

 Maybe it's because I'm not very good at writing story outlines.

 You'd think I'd be pretty decent at it since I have a rough plot outline for a video game that's over fourteen thousand words (and still not finished). But I'm really not.

 I'm not really a 'by the seat of my pants' kind of writer. I do have plans, elaborate ones even, but they all live in my head.

 As you can imagine, it's not a very efficient system. My memory is kind of patchy, sometimes nigh on flawless, but more often just kind of absent.

 (I finished the pudding, by the way, it took an hour and forty five minutes to eat. It's ridiculously filling. It might be a good snack to stretch out over a full day. The recipe is in this video.)

 I may try the bullet point approach. Write down all the things I think the story needs in order of when I think they need to happen. Kind of like a check list, but not as restrictive. It'll also let me hop around a little more. Usually I like to write in order, but sometimes I get super excited for certain scenes (usually character introductions) and want to write them as soon as possible.

 I'm also going to write my outline (and the Camp NaNoWriMo run itself) in Google Docs. It's more convenient this way because I can use Google Docs on my phone and write no matter where I am, which is handy because it means that I don't have to get my laptop out on the train if I want to write on the way to Derbyshire.

 I'll let you guys know how this plan goes when I show you the bathroom pictures on Wednesday. Right now I better get to outlining and getting a head start on tomorrow's FF8 post.

 Ciao for now!

Reecey plans for Camp NaNoWriMo

 It's time to consider writing like a fiend again.

 Now, I have done the regular NaNoWriMo for the last two years, but this would be my first time doing Camp NaNoWriMo.

 As you well know, NaNoWriMo is where writers attempt to write fifty thousand words in November.

 Camp NaNoWriMo is a little different, it takes place in April and July and you can pick any target from ten thousand to a million words.

 It also doesn't have the caveat that plain NaNoWriMo does, that being that your project has to be new. You can pretty much do what you want, as long as your project can be measured by word count (RIP ScriptFrenzy).

 My project for this Camp NaNoWriMo is going to be Herd (big surprise).

 It currently stands at around five thousand four hundred words and the goal I'm going for is thirty thousand more by the end of June. I haven't gone for the straight fifty, as the FF8 posts have been taking up a lot of my time. I may have difficulty doing a thousand words a day, but it's a worthy goal.

 The over all plan for Herd is for it to stand at around one hundred thousand words or so. Although I'm not sure how long the first draft will end up or how long the book will end up being. I'm fine with it being shorter or longer than this initial goal, but I do have upper and lower limits. No longer then one hundred and twenty thousand and no shorter than eighty thousand.

 The next five days will be occupied with trying to build up a little bit of a store of FF8 posts and bashing out the outline a little more.

 I'll dedicate my Saturday posts to talking about my process and my struggles during this endeavour.

 So wish me luck, and be prepared to poke me into writing occasionally.

 (By the way, I'm going to post the last part of Day Thirteen tomorrow, but the first part of Day Fourteen on Saturday. I've got a Let's Rework post planned, and I like to have them up between 'days' of game play for the sake of making them easier to spot in the masterpost. So don't be worried when there's no Let's Play post on Friday, it will be coming.)

Day eleven, a quickie update and a love affair with Pokemon

 Damnit, I meant twelfth.

 The black dog has reared its head again.

 No, not Faiz. If it was her, obviously I would have said she ;-)

 By the black dog I mean depression and that I'm a little pretentious for referencing Churchill.

 My word count has plummeted, and right now I am five thousand words behind the projected target for today, and it's just going to get worse tomorrow.

 I feel like the most I can write in any given day is 2,000 words, and that's not terribly consistent.

 -sigh-

 Right now I'm just playing Pokemon and trying to cheer myself up.

 I feel as though my stress is ninjaing its way into ruining my life again, as it's easy to miss until I feel absolutely awful and am contemplating something particularly stupid.

 It's my birthday on the 14th and I don't feel like I want a birthday, like I don't deserve it.

 Anyway, some cheerful news.

 I've drawn in adult Joker on my fan art and I am planning an extra special Game of Thrones fanart. It's going to be amazing.

 I'm also really loving Pokemon Black 2. I think it's rapidly over taking Soul Silver as my favourite Pokemon game. For the last eleven years I have maintained that Gold and Silver (and then HG and SS as improved versions) were the best Pokemon games, but now I think they have at the very least an equal, if they haven't been surpassed.

 I found White something of a bore, but Black 2 took most, if not all of my issues and fixed them. Apart from triple battles, I still hate those; although they have less diverse triple battle teams so it's more manageable and I do absolutely love rotation battles.

 I also found something pretty funny that I want to share with you. I'll get to showing it to you all tomorrow, for now, Genny, Tarka, Thorny, Misty, Nosey and Steve are calling me and Liza's keen to get back in the action (Misty's in training so she'll evolve).

 Also, I need to work on getting Flopsy to stop hating me. Seriously, she actively hates my guts. I have no idea why, as I haven't done anything to her at all since catching her, and other Pokemon I've stored right after catching don't actively hate me.

 Ugh, it's all gotten so wonderfully complicated.

 NaNoWriMo word count: 15,282

 Novel count: 20,943

Day seven, and I love to suffer

 So, I'm staying up to watch the presidential election results.

 Fun fact, the last time I prayed was in the year 2000 because I really didn't want Bush to win. I'm not saying I'm psychic, it's more that I was grew up in the Clinton administration and had a somewhat starstruck view of Al Gore.

 Anyway, you didn't come here for my life story. Well, you probably are interested if you came here through Twitter, but Tumblr or Google+, I know you're here for the word count.

 So, after an abysmal day yesterday, I've managed to keep up to par.

 Yes, after days of being ahead due to writing at least the minimum everyday and having that lead I managed to get in the first two days, I crashed.

 Yesterday was not a good day, so I only managed four hundred words.

 However! Today I managed 1700 words, so I'm back on form, people.

 That means I'm up to 10,490.

 It also means that I'm growing frustrated with NaNoWriMo.org because I instinctively put a comma into any number over a thousand and it doesn't like me doing that.

 Curses.

 In other news, I also did some work on a piece of Batman fan art yesterday, here's a poorly photographed preview photo:

It's a babby Joker!

It's a not-to-be used character design for Arkham High. People may call me a fool, but Arkham High does not involve a teenage Joker.

 It did in a previous incarnation, a picture of which inspired me to start this picture, but I decided to take him and a bunch of other characters out, mostly because it was becoming a bit too 'much'. Also, that original incarnation/draft was awful.

 I did, however, include some new characters, all of whom are going to be a lot of fun. Especially the Principal, I love this guy, he's amazing.

 Anyway, as a final note, at this moment in the election, Romney is ahead 163-157. I'm very depressed.

 NaNoWriMo word count: 10,490

 Overall Silver Crosses word count: 17,016

Day three and progress on NaNoWriMo

 So far, so good.

 After my horrible dip, I couldn't get the first chapter finished in time for the first.

 But, I did get it finished on the first day of NaNoWriMo!

 And now I'm about half to two thirds of the way through chapter two and getting a good start on NaNoWriMo in case I have another dip during the month. Which is entirely likely, because guess who has to deal with Atos?

 Yes, I have to deal with Atos. I'm just going to have to hope that they won't conflate writing for fun, which I can't always do, with being able to cope with being made to search for work in an increasingly depressing economy. Before I was put on ESA, applying for a job and not even getting a rejection email did not help improve my mood.

 Anyway, in other news, my doctor says he's going to push for me to get counselling, which is a huge help. The sooner I get into counselling, the sooner I can start to gain the confidence to get on with my life and not be overwhelmed by my family situation.

 Current Word Count: 4,671

One day to go, a day in the life of a depressive

 As you well know, I didn't write a post yesterday. That is because nothing got done. At all.

 After writing the post the day before yesterday, my depression got triggered, and regardless of the fact that the trigger is no longer a concern, I'm still feeling the effects.

 In the hours after the trigger happened, I was so distressed that I couldn't sleep, and only watching videos of cats, rabbits and octopuses combined with 'Icanhascheezeburger' was I able to sleep.

 Yesterday, I suffered fatigue and the muscles in my back kept seizing up as well as feeling like I was going to cry all day. This is not mentioning the feelings of self harm.

 Today was better, but I'm still feeling down, a bit cry-ey and my back muscles are still playing up.

 So not much done in the way of writing and planning.

 Right now, my priorities are down to finishing this chapter and getting twiglets on that 2 for 1 deal at Tescos, because I love twiglets and yeast extract has a bunch of b vitamins in, which I think are meant to help with mood. Also, it has folic acid, which is supposed to help fend off anaemia. It's apparently really good during pregnancy, so that's good, if completely inapplicable in this situation.

 Success on NaNoWriMo seems unlikely at this point, but I'm still going to attempt it. Because even if I fail, I'll have done something.

Third day to go, and lack of progress

 How are my key areas going? Not great.

 A. Still haven't finished the first chapter yet, but on the plus side, Carl has finally shown up. So that's something. It's currently up to 6,326 and I haven't worked on it yet today, so it should be finished tomorrow or the day after.

 B. More plot has been written up! Also, the third main character has shown up, and is getting a few scenes with Mel by himself.

 C. Completed!

 E. Have tidied kitchen table as much as I can. Everything on it is important stuff my parents need to deal with.

 Progress on my room is yet to be made.

 F. Still need to get around to this.

 G. Made the decision for Mel and Zach to investigate second incident during the day, so no Carl unfortunately.


 I ran out of twiglets today, and am upset, as I love twiglets and need something to munch on.

 On the other hand, though, in good news, I'm getting a haircut tomorrow, so I'll make sure to show you my snazzy new do when I get it.

 Back to plotting and writing for me!

The fourth day to go and a change of plan

So, how am I doing on my seven key areas? Well...

 A. I'm still working on the end of this first chapter, but it's getting very close to being done. It's currently up to 5,742, so it looks like my prediction will be accurate.

 B. Currently up to seven index cards with plot lined out on them. This doesn't include the post-it notes annotating important factors that need to be taken into consideration. It also doesn't include the work already done on chapter two, which adds up to five index cards.

 C. I have gotten the new index cards and super special awesome NaNoWriMo specific pen! Unfortunately, the index cards are not the same size as the ones I already had, so I copied my notes out onto the new ones. I know that sounds unnecessary, but it would have ruined everything if my cards didn't match. I'm just that way about things like this, I need them a certain way.

 I've also abandoned the wall of plot and opted for the book of plot. Which has the advantage of portability. I'm sticking the cards in with masking tape, so they can still be moved around.

It's genius. Genius I tell you!

 D. Still need to codify character traits. Will be dedicating part of tomorrow afternoon to it.

 E. Slowly working on tidying kitchen table and will dedicate part of tomorrow to tidying my room.

 F. Have not yet looked into how to write effective action/fight scenes. Will make sure to do so some time in the next few days.

 G. I have started to make some decisions, such as Josh's attitude towards business people and how Mel and Carl obtain an important phone number.

 I've also decided my snack for NaNoWriMo. Thank the over commercialisation of Christmas, because mini twiglets are on offer! I love me some twiglets.

 I also love Neuro Bliss, so it's likely to turn out to be one of my beverages of NaNoWriMo.

This particular drum won't be for NaNoWriMo, because it won't last until the first.

 There's more snackage to be planned, and my NaNo playlists need to be created, but I think I'm making good headway on that.

 Huzzah!