Sunday, October 24, 2010

Ready for NaNo?

I am! I have a very loose outline. I am not comfortable with that. I want a tight outline, but I still can't figure out the middle.

I will have one mid-term after NaNoWriMo starts - sucky. At least it's not till the 5th.

Sadly, I have class the morning of the 1st, so staying up late and starting at midnight is not in the cards for me. I am so writing while in class. I swear, my professor repeats everything he says on Monday, on Wednesday. If it weren't for attendance rules...


Are YOU ready? (If you're participating...:D)

Friday, October 22, 2010

It's Friday?

I woke up this morning and swore it was only Wednesday. This week went by crazy fast.

As for my possible switch to WordPress - I got excited. We found a way to move my followers. Then the server started having issues.

 Went down for maybe an hour the other day, having issues right now. I'm not switching until they get it figured out. I don't want to send you to a slow and crashing website!

Means I'm shelving the website moving until after midterms. They start Monday, end Friday.

Probably why I'm so frazzled!

And we have a minor emergency here, Zeus ran out of chewies! The world is ending! So I am off on an emergency store run, and I'm praying he doesn't chew anything up while I'm gone. He hasn't been left home alone without a chewie in a long time. Last time he chewed up something. My husband's xbox headset I think. And some paper.

He loves paper. So odd.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Middle drama!

I know how it ends, and how it begins. How she gets from being a hard ass reporter to being a 100% selfless person is an issue.
 

I'm lost, and I'm only at the outline stage! 

How do you get through the dreaded middle?

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Quick Post - Poll

Blogger or WordPress?

I love the WordPress design, but I'll lose all my lovely followers. Blogger is just super simple.

Hmm.


Lemme know what you think!

Monday, October 18, 2010

Why?

One little question that can cause so much angst and joy.

I've found asking myself why after every little bit of action has added depth and a realism to my stories. It's a recent discovery and as I am still a fledgling writer, I'm sure many of you already do that.


Author - A
Critic (muse in disguise.) - C

A: FMC moves to Smallville USA
C: Why?
A: Because that's where she meets the love of her life!
C: But why does she move there?
A: Uhh...

A: Teenage MC runs away.
C: Why?
A: Because she thinks the cops are after her.
C: Why does she think that?
A: I don't know, but I know she needs to be running from the cops so she won't call them when the bad guy harasses her then finally kidnaps her and keeps her locked in a basement.
C: Uh huh. Did she do drugs?
A: No! She would never touch drugs!
C: Did she steal something?
A: No! She would never steal!
C: Did she do anything illegal?
A: No! She's a very good person.
C: Then why would she be afraid of the police?
A: Uhh...


C: Wait, why was MC in the bus crash?
A: Because MC has to take the bus to get around.
C: Why didn't he take his car that he bought last chapter?
A: Uhh...

And so on. (Not the best examples in the world, just what's popping in my brain at the moment.)

One little word can cause major transformations if asked at the right moment.

Yay writing!

Friday, October 15, 2010

Random Short Post

Friday's Baking didn't happen. I had plans for lemon filled cupcakes. Got too busy. Next week!

I'm also now the copy editor for my friend's fledgling tech blog Tech Squawkers. I've only had admin access for like one working hour, so it still has some minor issues..:D (And it's a freebie favor. Gives me experience and gives him better grammar!)

Random writing note:
I not a pantser, I never will be. I'm in full fledged outline mode. It's awesome.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Training My Brain

As many of you know, I’ve had a heck of a time sticking to any sort of writing routine. Now that I no longer have carpal tunnel, I saw no major roadblock to establishing one.

Yeah.  I had to change my goal from writing everyday M-F on my WIP, to writing anything every day.

I’m at the point where I can sit down and write, but it’s rambling. Even sitting down to write this blog post is taking way longer than my rambling writing. I understand why. It’s a lot easier to write without thinking about it. I need to get my brain back to being able to do that with novel writing.

Right now, if I sit down to work on my WIP, my brain goes ‘hhhuuuuuhhhhh?’ and wants me to babble about what’s for dinner and the dog doing something cute. It takes me a while to get my brain focused.  I’ve started trying a couple tricks to get my brain in gear before I even open the blank word doc, or the day’s 750words page.
  1. Review what you wrote last writing session. (Only for WIP sessions, not my babbling about how cute Zeus is being.)
  2. Actually sit and think for a moment about where I want it to go next. What needs to happen, how it could happen and how to make it interesting.
  3. Open whatever I’m planning to write in, jot down the notes I’ve come up with in my head.
  4. Look for holes.
  5. Fill holes. 
  6. Begin writing.
Prepping this way is an odd concept for me. I don’t have an outline for my current WIP. I'm kinda creating the outline as I go. If I don’t think about what needs to happen before I start writing, I end up sitting there staring blankly at the screen or I’m off folding laundry.
 
It’s odd. The novel doesn’t want to be outlined, I have come to accept that.

I’m an outliner pretending to be a pantser. :D

In November, with the start of NaNoWriMo, my goal will change from writing just any words, to writing words on a novel. I know the pace is insane. But I'm hoping by then I'll be so used to doing the steps above, I'll be set. 

Monday, October 11, 2010

750words.com

I'm back! My wrist is healing well. I am super happy with the results so far. Yay! I discovered 750words while on the mend and I instantly fell in love.

For those of you with established writing routines, I doubt you'd find this site useful. But those of you (like me!) who don't have one, this could be a wonderful tool.

Basic concept, write 750 words (any words) everyday (on the site or you can copy/paste. If you copy/paste, some of the stats will go wonky), the words are kept private.

My goal with using the site is to establish a writing daily writing routine. I've had a very hard time in the past. I would blame stress, but really I'd get interrupted because I simply couldn't type anymore without pain.No longer a problem!


So far I've only missed one day. Killed my ten day streak. :( But that's okay, I had a ten day streak! :D

I hope everyone is having a non-Garfield Monday!