Work has been driving me barmy lately. Between the nightmare of dealing with Windows platforms integrating with Linux NFS WatchFolders and other platforms integrating with those Windows platforms I could just about lose my mind.
I spend at a minimum 6 of my 8 hour workday up to my eyeballs in configurations, log files, xml traces, and metadata, then I spend at least 3 hours a day commuting to and from my job. It's a wonder I have any time to write at all.
The key is, I make time. In the evening, after my kids are in bed, and my wife is gently tucked into her Pandaren in World of Warcraft, or Facebook, or Pinterest, I shut down my browser, put on my headphones and write.
I started behind the 8-ball on NaNoWriMo but I'm slowly and steadily catching up. I even took a night off for Skyfall (go see it) and I'm still gaining ground.
Tonight I hit ~70K words on my draft. I started November at 50,000 words even on the draft. I went so far as to change a few wordings here and there to make it even out so I could do NaNo and keep on track with minimal math. I'm supposed to be at 73,333, putting me 3,333 behind, which is far better than the ~7K hole I've been climbing out of.
So anyone out there who's having trouble catching up on their NaNo. Sit your butt in the chair and shut down your browser. Disconnect your internet (turn off wi-fi or unplug it) if you must. If I can do it with only 2 hours a day, then you should be able to.
- Grimm
P.S. Natalie Bahm and her agent Sara Megibow are running a promotional contest on her book The Secret Underground with all the profits going to help a sick baby boy named Jayden. The contest is simple, comment on the contest blog post for a chance to win a 50 page critique by Sara Megibow (agent extraordinaire) on a finished or unfinished manuscript (yours or your friend's).
While you're at it, buy the book, the cause is most definitely worth it and from what I gather it's a damned good book (I haven't received my copy yet).
Ok, 2 lessons learned.
ReplyDelete1. Always hit Preview before posting a blog update.
2. Be very very careful when copying text and links from other blogs that you don't bring their formatting with them.
I just spent a good 20 minutes extra cleaning up white backgrounds and funny coloured text that didn't show up in the editor but definitely showed up in the blog entry.
Now I feel really guilty about my word count! But at least I've been away from writing for good reason! Part of NaNoFiMo is to finish novels, and I've been doing critiques for the last little bit, which is helping folks get their novels polished and ready to query.
ReplyDeleteAll that great reading has been a good kick in the pants, though. I'm so far behind a NaNo goal that there's no way I'll actually finish now. But I've done all the other edity stuff, so it all balances out in the end.
You're doing great work helping other writers, that's every bit as valuable if not more than meeting a NaNo word count.
DeleteFor me this year NaNo is about that last sprint to finish the draft. After I knocked the last half off, and heavily revising the first half I needed the kick in the pants from NaNo to get it finished by my self imposed deadline.
My goal is to have it critique ready (if not submission ready) by March 1st 2013.