Oh bother, it is that time of year again. Fresh off finally finishing last year, I figured I'd give it another go this year.
I've forgotten how painful day 1 can be when I don't know my characters that well and I haven't yet conceived most of the plot beyond a chapter or two. -_-
Earlier today I stocked myself up my pantry with caffeine sources as well as wine. Two things I found invaluable last year.
Good luck with that. :)
My cultural contribution this month will be to refrain from any attempt at literary fiction. :)
Quote from: mongers on November 01, 2014, 07:43:29 PM
Good luck with that. :)
Thanks! I survived day 1 with words to spare.
Apparently a lot of people are participating in NYC. They have a bit that shows you how many words people in your region have finished by day - here on day 1, there have been ~1.7 million words written across all New Yorkers. :blink:
Good luck, garbon. :)
Did you ever go back to your work from last year for editing/revision?
I'm throwing my hat into the ring again this year, after three or four failed attemts. :Embarrass:
I started a novel in NaNoWriMo 2010. I haven't finished it yet, but I always write a few chapters every November. At this pace it will be finished by NaNoWriMo 2021.
You know what? Maybe I'll write a short story. If I do, I'll post it here.
I would too, but I don't think you fancy learning Catalan.
Quote from: Syt on November 02, 2014, 01:05:03 AM
Did you ever go back to your work from last year for editing/revision?
Very slowly here and there. I printed everything up and re-read it. I even started fiddling with chunks in Scrivener but then largely came to a halt when I couldn't think about where I wanted novel to go from where it was. Lost heart to edit. :blush:
Quote from: Syt on November 02, 2014, 01:05:03 AM
I'm throwing my hat into the ring again this year, after three or four failed attemts. :Embarrass:
Good luck! You can do it. :hug:
I really don't dig how every year they talk about how the first week is the easiest as you are bubbling with enthusiasm that will dissipate by week 2. I always find week 1 to be the most difficult with it being nearly a literal fight to get words on page.
NaNoWriMo? Wtf?
Quote from: garbon on November 02, 2014, 09:02:05 AM
Quote from: Syt on November 02, 2014, 01:05:03 AM
Did you ever go back to your work from last year for editing/revision?
Very slowly here and there. I printed everything up and re-read it. I even started fiddling with chunks in Scrivener but then largely came to a halt when I couldn't think about where I wanted novel to go from where it was. Lost heart to edit. :blush:
Personally, I find editing more fun. Getting a first draft down, though. Ugh.
[/quote]
Quote from: Syt on November 02, 2014, 01:05:03 AM
I'm throwing my hat into the ring again this year, after three or four failed attemts. :Embarrass:
Good luck! You can do it. :hug:
[/quote]
Thanks. :)
Quote from: garbon on November 02, 2014, 10:15:08 PM
I really don't dig how every year they talk about how the first week is the easiest as you are bubbling with enthusiasm that will dissipate by week 2. I always find week 1 to be the most difficult with it being nearly a literal fight to get words on page.
I find both applies to me. I'll be enthusiastic about a project, but it takes a bit to get me going. I've been writing a few pages every morning for a while now (nothing cherent, mostly stream of consciousness), and it's still hard.
And I've hit the wall of, "this story sucks, why bother" a few times. The more tim you spend with a project, the more you will notice its problems. The trick is to fix them, not dwell on them.
Quote from: garbon on November 02, 2014, 10:15:08 PM
I really don't dig how every year they talk about how the first week is the easiest as you are bubbling with enthusiasm that will dissipate by week 2. I always find week 1 to be the most difficult with it being nearly a literal fight to get words on page.
All I got was a stream of profanities so far.
Don't try to copy CDM's style; it is inimitable.
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on November 03, 2014, 05:24:04 AM
Don't try to copy CDM's style; it is inimitable.
And if you wrap it around a brick, I'm suing.
Quote from: Martinus on November 03, 2014, 01:35:41 AM
NaNoWriMo? Wtf?
Only something that we have a topic on every other year or so. Don't worry your lumpen little head. :console:
Quote from: garbon on November 01, 2014, 07:21:20 PM
Oh bother, it is that time of year again. Fresh off finally finishing last year, I figured I'd give it another go this year.
I've forgotten how painful day 1 can be when I don't know my characters that well and I haven't yet conceived most of the plot beyond a chapter or two. -_-
Earlier today I stocked myself up my pantry with caffeine sources as well as wine. Two things I found invaluable last year.
:hug:
Go get 'em, G!
I'm not going to even try this year. I'm already too stressed as it is, and adding this to everything else would, I think, kill me. Instead, I'm going to make the effort to just write each day for a little while from now until the end of the year.
Quote from: Syt on November 02, 2014, 01:05:03 AM
I'm throwing my hat into the ring again this year, after three or four failed attemts. :Embarrass:
There are no failed attempts. :) There are only words written, which move you forward. Even if you don't hit 50k, you've done more than you would have otherwise.
And this time, I have faith that you'll hit your 50k. :hug:
Quote from: garbon on November 02, 2014, 10:15:08 PM
I really don't dig how every year they talk about how the first week is the easiest as you are bubbling with enthusiasm that will dissipate by week 2. I always find week 1 to be the most difficult with it being nearly a literal fight to get words on page.
I usually spend October learning as much as I can about my characters, so I'm ready to tell their story on November 1. By November 8, I find them trite, dull, and their stories boring. :blush:
Quote from: Syt on November 03, 2014, 02:11:55 AM
And I've hit the wall of, "this story sucks, why bother" a few times. The more tim you spend with a project, the more you will notice its problems. The trick is to fix them, not dwell on them.
I disagree. The trick is to ignore them, remember the Big Picture, and keep going. If I stop to fix them, I'm lost in editing mode and forget to tell the story.
Quote from: merithyn on November 03, 2014, 11:38:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on November 02, 2014, 10:15:08 PM
I really don't dig how every year they talk about how the first week is the easiest as you are bubbling with enthusiasm that will dissipate by week 2. I always find week 1 to be the most difficult with it being nearly a literal fight to get words on page.
I usually spend October learning as much as I can about my characters, so I'm ready to tell their story on November 1. By November 8, I find them trite, dull, and their stories boring. :blush:
I told myself I was going to get more detailed ahead of time this year. That turned out to simply be fitting in some character names - many of which have already changed in the last couple days. :D -_-
Writing as a leisure activity seems entirely alien to me now. Nothing's as motivating as not getting paid if you don't put words on several blank pages by the end of the day.
Quote from: Brazen on November 03, 2014, 11:46:20 AM
Writing as a leisure activity seems entirely alien to me now. Nothing's as motivating as not getting paid if you don't put words on several blank pages by the end of the day.
I was the same way when my primary income was freelance writing. I think I wrote two paragraphs of fiction during those 10 years.
Quote from: merithyn on November 03, 2014, 11:37:14 AM
Quote from: Syt on November 02, 2014, 01:05:03 AM
I'm throwing my hat into the ring again this year, after three or four failed attemts. :Embarrass:
There are no failed attempts. :) There are only words written, which move you forward. Even if you don't hit 50k, you've done more than you would have otherwise.
And this time, I have faith that you'll hit your 50k. :hug:
Thanks. :)
Quote from: merithyn on November 03, 2014, 11:35:20 AM
I'm not going to even try this year. I'm already too stressed as it is, and adding this to everything else would, I think, kill me. Instead, I'm going to make the effort to just write each day for a little while from now until the end of the year.
I found in recent months that doing "morning pages" (just two or three pages in long hand, stream of consciousness style) kept my kinda, sorta in practice.
Quote from: merithyn on November 03, 2014, 11:38:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on November 02, 2014, 10:15:08 PM
I really don't dig how every year they talk about how the first week is the easiest as you are bubbling with enthusiasm that will dissipate by week 2. I always find week 1 to be the most difficult with it being nearly a literal fight to get words on page.
I usually spend October learning as much as I can about my characters, so I'm ready to tell their story on November 1. By November 8, I find them trite, dull, and their stories boring. :blush:
This describes the problem I have with new friends.
Looks like they need to invest some money into a more stable server. I can't recall if it is generally so laggy and buggy in these early days when everyone is still with it. :hmm:
QuoteOver the last few days, you may have noticed some issues on our website.
Because of the heavy site load during the first few days of November, novelists everywhere experienced frequent 404 errors when trying to enter novels, word counts, and forum posts.
We are incredibly sorry about this. We invited you to the biggest writing event in the world, and you arrived to broken functionality and understandable frustration.
As of yesterday, November 4, we are thrilled and relieved to announce that the major issues plaguing our site have been fixed. While you may get occasional slowness or a minor glitch, you should be good to:
Create your novel.
Update your word count.
Or, if you missed updating the first few days, you can always retroactively update your daily count.
And with the good news, we owe you an explanation:
Throughout September and October, we plan for the crowds. We add servers upon servers, and our two-person tech team load-tests and optimizes as much as they possibly can. This year was no exception: we ticked every box and dotted every "i" so we could be sure to bring you an amazing creative experience.
On November 1, we began noticing errors and immediately took action to fix them. They seemed small-scale and par for the course, and the repairs held for a while.
Ultimately, we discovered that these site issues were related to deeper (and stubborn) elements in our database. While we'd been actively fixing things on the surface, we couldn't see the larger problems lurking. (For you tech/server buffs: we plan to cover this more in-depth in an upcoming blog post, so get pumped.)
Our technical director and web developer spent days looking at these errors and exploring potential solutions. We have a fantastic team who, like all of us during NaNoWriMo, are sometimes thrown off by an unexpected twist. But in the end, they pushed through and prevailed.
We hope these first few days haven't discouraged you from rocking the rest of November. Remember: every obstacle, whether it's a website issue or a bad case of writer's block, can be conquered.
AH so it was an issue for them specific to this year.
Quote from: garbon on November 04, 2014, 12:08:49 AM
Looks like they need to invest some money into a more stable server. I can't recall if it is generally so laggy and buggy in these early days when everyone is still with it. :hmm:
Always. I rarely bothered trying to log in the first week. Just not worth it.
I'm still going fairly strong. After failing a bit yesterday between my sister showing up and having drinks with a friend from Rome visit, I rallied today and got out about 2,800 words putting me just shy by about 50 of the total words I should have by this day to be on track. Exhausting! :D -_-
I'm carefully optimistic that I might hit 5000 words tonight. :Embarrass:
I got side tracked with plot development, world building and drawing maps.
Well, I made it to just over 4000 this morning. I guess I need to work on my commitment and especially my focus.
I'm dusting off my old laptop that I used before my current desktop PC. Currently cleaning it up to get its Win7 up to date and remove everything not writing related. Also getting the small laptop table up from the basement to have a separate writing space.
I've been failing like mad. Need to see this weekend if I can catch up or if attempt is doomed. :blush:
Quote from: garbon on November 14, 2014, 12:05:49 PM
I've been failing like mad. Need to see this weekend if I can catch up or if attempt is doomed. :blush:
How are you guys doing now?
Let's not talk about it.
I met my target!
They should rename it November. You know, like a cross between "novels" and "November". :contract:
Quote from: garbon on November 14, 2014, 12:05:49 PM
I've been failing like mad. Need to see this weekend if I can catch up or if attempt is doomed. :blush:
You non-Jewish, non-Catholic people are pathetic, in needing a special month to contrive a reason to feel bad about yourself. I just have to call my mother.
My mother generally treats me kindly. :)
Quote from: Martinus on November 24, 2014, 08:15:57 AM
You non-Jewish, non-Catholic people are pathetic, in needing a special month to contrive a reason to feel bad about yourself. I just have to call my mother.
:lol:
I have 11 months to not be motivated to write anything, why should 1 month be any more special?
I don't know why some of you guys set yourselves up for a fall over this each year.
You should be glad you actually wrote some prose, rather than you failed an arbitrary target set by someone else. :)
Hell, I couldn't string a single coherent paragraph together, given a month deadline.
Quote from: mongers on November 24, 2014, 09:55:56 AM
I don't know why some of you guys set yourselves up for a fall over this each year.
You should be glad you actually wrote some prose, rather than you failed an arbitrary target set by someone else. :)
Hell, I couldn't string a single coherent paragraph together, given a month deadline.
I completed the challenge last year, so I strike the notion that it is necessarily a fall each year.
Quote from: mongers on November 24, 2014, 09:55:56 AM
Hell, I couldn't string a single coherent paragraph together, given a month deadline.
FYPFY :P
Quote from: CountDeMoney on November 24, 2014, 09:41:21 AM
Quote from: Martinus on November 24, 2014, 08:15:57 AM
You non-Jewish, non-Catholic people are pathetic, in needing a special month to contrive a reason to feel bad about yourself. I just have to call my mother.
:lol:
I have 11 months to not be motivated to write anything, why should 1 month be any more special?
Today, when talking to my mother, I mentioned off-handedly that my boyfriend's grandmother is dying in a hospital, which makes him feel down, which in turn makes me feel down. This triggered a 5 minute diatribe how I never care about my parents' health and how my father has a bad knee. :P
I had mentioned in passing once that I would like to go to Europe sometime before I die.
"Well, if you ever plan on going to Europe, you should work on your table manners first."
I so want to smash her head with a cupboard door repeatedly.
Quote from: CountDeMoney on November 24, 2014, 10:39:08 AM
I had mentioned in passing once that I would like to go to Europe sometime before I die.
"Well, if you ever plan on going to Europe, you should work on your table manners first."
I so want to smash her head with a cupboard door repeatedly.
Sounds like my mother. It's as if they deliberately scan any message for something they can go off tangent on, no matter how trivial and irrelevant. They are like grumblers of nagging.
I think I may actually prefer the silent judging, complaining to my sisters, and occasional comments ("Well, you must know what you do.") from my Mom.
Quote from: CountDeMoney on November 24, 2014, 10:39:08 AM
I had mentioned in passing once that I would like to go to Europe sometime before I die.
"Well, if you ever plan on going to Europe, you should work on your table manners first."
I so want to smash her head with a cupboard door repeatedly.
What an odd notion, has she actually seen Europeans eat ?
I think your typical Brit was some seriously compromised table manners as compared to many Yanks.
Quote from: mongers on November 24, 2014, 12:36:17 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on November 24, 2014, 10:39:08 AM
I had mentioned in passing once that I would like to go to Europe sometime before I die.
"Well, if you ever plan on going to Europe, you should work on your table manners first."
I so want to smash her head with a cupboard door repeatedly.
What an odd notion, has she actually seen Europeans eat ?
I think your typical Brit was some seriously compromised table manners as compared to many Yanks.
I'd say your handling of fork and knife looks better than our "exchange hands, set one down" maneuver.
Quote from: garbon on November 24, 2014, 12:41:12 PM
Quote from: mongers on November 24, 2014, 12:36:17 PM
Quote from: CountDeMoney on November 24, 2014, 10:39:08 AM
I had mentioned in passing once that I would like to go to Europe sometime before I die.
"Well, if you ever plan on going to Europe, you should work on your table manners first."
I so want to smash her head with a cupboard door repeatedly.
What an odd notion, has she actually seen Europeans eat ?
I think your typical Brit was some seriously compromised table manners as compared to many Yanks.
I'd say your handling of fork and knife looks better than our "exchange hands, set one down" maneuver.
Does that include the classic middle-class fork hold or the more earthy shovel manoeuvre?
Remember class in all things, dear boy. :bowler:
Quote from: garbon on November 24, 2014, 12:41:12 PM
I'd say your handling of fork and knife looks better than our "exchange hands, set one down" maneuver.
I'm left-handed, so I've always used the "European" method.
Just found a quote from one of my favourite Polish 20th century writers/poets, Julian Tuwim, that I thought I'd share:
"So, you have some chap,
who sits at his desk and writes a novel for months on end.
I don't understand.
Wouldn't it be cheaper to just walk into a book store and buy yourself something ready-made for a few zloty."
:D
After scrubbing out last year (-_-), I'm giving it another go this year. 2nd successful attempt in the making?
Working on a futuristic/survival type piece which I was just told today is superficially similar to Hard to be a God.
Above word count for at least day one. :)
That time of year again, eh?
I love how each year it's the same people saying why they can't finish the goddamn book. :lol:
Man, I can barely spell my name. I ain't gonna right no book.
Quote from: Martinus on November 02, 2015, 05:42:52 AM
I love how each year it's the same people saying why they can't finish the goddamn book. :lol:
I think it's only garbon this year. :unsure:
Besides, I did finish in 2013. :huh: