AAARRRRGGGH!

Well, looking at the last week of November, I got the bright idea yesterday morning, that if I just average a little over 6000 words a day for the week, I could actually come out on top with 50,000! I came in just under 6000 yesterday, so now I need to average 6500 for the next four days. I've done over 3000 today and I'm TIRED. My hands are tired, by eyes are tired, my brain is tired. I really don't have time even for this short of a post, but I just needed to complain a little.

I can't forget to mention...

... on this particular day: I am thankful for Doug, and our 17 year journey which began on this date in 1990.

I always think of Doug when I read in Proverbs 20, "A faithful man who can find?" and I'm very grateful to God for finding him for me!

Thankful

Well, we got through another Thanksgiving! Actually, I really enjoy hosting our family dinner, but since cooking and domestic activities are not one of my strong points, I always approach the date with some degree of trepidation. Added to the sheer amount of work involved, and I'm always glad it's over.

We did not have a dinnertime discussion of what we're thankful for this year. If we had, after acknowledging the primacy of gratitude for the Lord and my family, I'd have said that I'm most thankful for freedom.

Perhaps that's because of the current story I'm writing, which envisions America in the future as a very statist nation with little respect for privacy or freedom. It definitely causes me to think about things.

Nano is not gonna happen this year!

O.k., I'm making dinner tomorrow for 12-15, which, taking into account the shopping, cleaning, and cooking, means I'm losing about 4 days. Last weekend we spend three days at Niagara Falls, and the weekend before that I was sick for a couple of days...

All of which means, I'm just under 18K words, and probably won't get much above 20. I guess 50,000 words in a month is not in the cards for me until I no longer have kids at home and/or I no longer host the family's Thanksgiving Dinner.

I'm still glad I'm doing it. First, it has the potential to be a great resource in terms of asking questions on the forums. I haven't done it yet, nor spent much time reading there, since I didn't discover them until November had already started and time was precious. I noticed that a lot of folks post in October, so that might be a good opportunity to get some information.

The biggest benefit, though, is getting my Jairus story out of my head and onto paper. I don't know if I'll ever do much with it. At the moment, it's short-story length, and I'm inclined to leave it that way. Like most Nano writing, it's pretty awful, but I want to use my editing time on Onesimus. I also am quite enjoying the new and totally different story I had to begin when Jairus petered out. It's unlike anything I've done before, and does have potential to be a book-length story, although perhaps not one I'm capable of writing.

Oh, well... lots of housecleaning yet to do. I've done four things on a list of about 50 for today, and I'm already tired, so this was just a break. I'll get out the whip and try to spur myself on, now.

Yesterday's Election

Okay, here's the scenario: You're standing at a voting booth, reading the ballot. Three tax issues are on it: One is a school tax. I don't remember exactly what it said, but it was pretty straightforward. It also failed. They just raises our school taxes a year or two ago.

BUT, the other two both had at the top, "Tax replacement and decrease." Doesn't that make it sound like the tax will go down? But, no.... in both cases it goes up. One of them approximately doubled the tax. Surprise, surprise... they both passed.

Argghh! No wonder Ohio is one of the most heavily taxes states in the country.

Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad

I was so pleased when my 12 year old daughter decided to do her own NaNoWriMo. I'd never have thought of doing something like that at such a young age! And she was doing it well. Three days into it, she had over 5000 words written, which put her a little ahead of the pace. She's been ahead of me a lot of the time.

The first night, we backed both of our stories onto a flash drive... but neglected this minor detail the next two days. (Can you guess where this lovely story is going?)

Morning #4: her laptop is completely dead.

There's a little history here. First, you should know that she used three years of paper route savings to buy this laptop over the summer. Second, you should know that this is the fourth time it has died like this. They keep replacing the hard drive (taking weeks in the process), but clearly something else is causing this.

So, I'm MAD at myself for not backing her story up every day, and I'm MAD that this keeps happening, and I'm MAD that something she sacrificed so much to buy turned out to be such a lemon, and I'm MAD that her story is lost, and I'm MAD that even if it's recovered, it will miss the November NaNo window. I'm also really hoping that her wonderful talent and interest in writing isn't discouraged by this setback.

sniff.

And They're Off!

It's five o'clock in the afternoon on November 1st, and I've been writing off and on all day. I got almost 900 words done during my son's karate lesson this morning. I skipped lifting weights, shortened my walk, and didn't do either the Grammar or Spanish study I normally would. (I've also ignored some pending housework, but I'll keep ignoring that, thanks!)

So, my current grand total is.... (drum roll, suspense, etc.) 2106 words written! It's fun, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to keep this pace up for a month.

I'm enjoying my story, though I'm having the same problem I've had with the Onesimus stories. I have an overall direction for the work, and several 'stops' on the journey in my mind, but I sometimes struggle with connecting the dots. I wonder if that's normal for writers?

Okay, I'm truly sick of typing, so I'm done now.