To Write, or Not to Write: An IWSG Post

This time of year is always extremely frustrating and stressful for me because it’s non-stop stuff that has to be done. I have to get numerous tasks out of the way before winter hits. I have to make my daughter’s (and sometimes my husband’s) Halloween costumes. I have to start cleaning for the upcoming holidays, not to mention shop…a lot. There’s chores and work, and tasks concerning my daughter’s school. These days there’s also YouTube and all that having a channel entails.

And then National Novel Writing Month comes around, and it’s like, “God DAMMIT, why couldn’t Chris Baty have decided to create this challenge in, like, March?

I’m having a hard time deciding whether or not I’m going to do NaNoWriMo this year. I’ve gotten so busy, between my work, and YouTube and all the other random stuff that comes with accursed adulthood, that it’s been months since I wrote more than 10k in 30 days, never mind writing 50k in the same amount of time. And I know that NaNo is as much about having a reason to write as it is completing the goal, but I really really don’t like not completing the goal. Last year I competed and lost, and while I still managed to write a nice number of words, it felt frustrating losing the challenge.

And honestly, that’s where I’m going to leave it for today, because I already got a bunch of whining and moaning out in yesterday’s “Goals in Review” post, and I don’t think it really needs repeating. 😛

How are you guys feeling about NaNoWriMo 2016?

September 2016 Goals in Review

Okay, I’m gonna go ahead and warn you guys in advance that September was simply not a great month for any of my goals. Part of that is because of being busy with various life stuff, and getting totally stressed out because of my job, but if I’m honest I have to say that I’m not even really quite sure what happened in September. The month just seemed to completely fall apart on me in numerous ways. So let’s just go ahead and get this ‘Month in Review’ over with, shall we?

Goal #1. Take good care of myself, specifically by walking 10,000 steps per day and taking at least 15 minutes per day to do something fun/relaxing.

Goal #1 is probably the most epic fail of the month because I didn’t even manage to accomplish a part of it. For one thing, out of the entire month, there was only one day on which I managed to hit 10k steps. One day. That’s ridiculous even for me. And to add to that, my average steps were only 6550, which is the second lowest average I’ve had all year. That number should actually be slightly higher, because there was one day during which I’d forgotten to charge my FitBit and it died on me, but the extra steps would probably only boost the average buy a couple dozen. Totally pathetic.

But to make matters worse, I didn’t even manage to pull off the 15 minutes of “me time”…not by a long shot. I counted 19 days where I managed to do something – usually just lounging on 9Gag on my phone or playing that silly Sailor Drops game. That means there were 11 days in September during which I couldn’t even manage to find myself 15 minutes. Not 15 minutes. And that is just depressing.

Goal #2. Build more readership/viewership by putting more focus and energy into my blog posts, shooting more fun YouTube videos, and putting more effort into self-promotion.

The second goal isn’t a complete fail, but I’m not really feeling a huge level of success here either. I’ve definitely been trying to put more time and effort into things like the YouTube channel’s social media, interacting with other channels and the like, and that’s definitely a good thing but it doesn’t seem like it’s doing a whole lot of good, really. We’ve stagnated a bit in terms of new subscribers and followers, and while that’s not necessarily our fault (it could be any number of things, really), you also can’t help but feel a little like you’re climbing uphill with no shoes.

Meanwhile, a little bit of good news is that the new cover for Nowhere to Hide does, in fact, seem to be making a difference. I still wouldn’t call my sales anything worth talking about, but at least there’s the occasional e-book sale, the occasional number of Kindle Normalized Pages Read popping up, instead of months of a completely dead graph. So cheers for that! I definitely need to put more effort into promoting the book though, because I’ve really been neglecting that aspect of being an author lately. Bad Tracey.

Goal #3. Write as much as I can, including writing an entire novel from start to finish.

And then there’s this. I wrote a grand total of 6689 words this month which, like my step average above, is the second worst number I’ve come up with all year so far. It’s better than nothing, there’s no doubt about that, but I’m consistently depressed with my apparent inability to commit myself to the thing that I actually love doing the most.

To accentuate this personal failure, I’ve been getting reminders in my email about how National Novel Writing Month is less than a month away, and I just don’t know what to do with that info. I want to participate, because I’ve participated every year since I discovered the challenge, but I know I’ll fail. I haven’t written 50k words over the course of the last five months, so what are the chances I’ll be able to write that many in one month? Pretty slim I’d say, and I just don’t know if I feel like setting myself up for that failure right now.

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So that’s that, I guess. I didn’t intend for this post to be so moody and depressing, but those are the facts, I guess. And it doesn’t help that I’ve been feeling tired, stressed, and pretty much just burnt out in general. Tomorrow is another day, right? I promise I’ll try to keep telling myself that, if you guys promise to believe it.

How was your month?

When it Rains, it Pours, but, You Know…Rainbows and All That (An IWSG Post)

This post is going up a lot later in the day that I usually put up my posts, and that’s very in tune with the sort of time I’ve been having lately. Let’s go through a quick list, shall we?

• Around the middle of September I had to suck it up and purchase a new vehicle. It wasn’t because the old one had crapped out on me, but rather because my daughter started school. Because of my work schedule (two weeks on the other side of the country, then two weeks home) and the fact that all my flights leave at “you’ve got to be kidding” o’clock in the morning, we became in need of two vehicles so that my daughter wouldn’t miss school every single time I flew. So that was the starting point…handing over fistfuls of cash for a very large purchase.
• Around the same time we bought the new car, I had started working on my daughter’s Halloween costume, which I make myself every year. But because, again, of my work schedule, I was not able to finish back then and had to go two weeks (16 days when you count the days of flight) without being able to work on it…keep this in mind for a few moments.
• Then, while I was on shift at work, our washing machine crapped out completely. My husband tried his best to get it up and running again, but it turned out that the required part was the most expensive one, making it pretty much pointless. And since our dryer was just as old as the washer, it didn’t make a lot of sense to get just a washing machine and then just be waiting for the dryer to die…so we ended up buying a brand new washer and dryer set, and although it’s not like we couldn’t afford it, it always sucks to have to make purchases like that so suddenly.
• So I got home, and I had precisely four days to finish my daughter’s costume, along with helping my husband go crazy decorating the house, because we do Halloween right in this family. It was an extremely busy few days, which is always a little stressful.
• Of course, after Halloween we did our traditional drive around to look for discounted candy, costumes, and decorations…and while we were out a big truck flung a rock at our windshield, putting an enormous crack in it. We were driving the brand new car. To make matters even worse, my insurance deductible is enormous, so it actually cost less to pay for it out of pocket, and it hasn’t even been fixed yet because the part that Speedy ordered arrived damaged.
• So now I’ve only got a few more days before I head back out to work, and once I come home again it’s not only my daughter’s birthday, but I’ve got to get all of the Christmas stuff done in those two weeks because the next time I’ll be home after that won’t be until December 19th.

The point of all this? Just that this is a stressful time of the year for me, and it’s not going to be over for quite a while yet.

The upside? Well, there’s always writing.

This time of year – specifically, November – is National Novel Writing Month, and even when I’m stressed out and busier than I can possibly deal with, I always have fun during National Novel Writing Month.

This year I’m doing something purely for fun, not worrying about epic plots or anything like that. I’m writing a series of short, erotic stories based on fairy- and folk-tales. It’s silly, strange, probably reads like the worst drivel you can imagine, and it’s a ton of fun. In fact, I’ve written almost as much in the past four days as I wrote during all of October.

Sometimes it can be hard to remember when you’re trying to create a masterpiece, but writing should be fun. It should be relaxing, and a release from reality, and you should enjoy doing it. So maybe, just maybe, when things are getting out of control and it feels like your brain is about to explode, maybe you should just sit down and write some really raunchy sex scenes.

Or, you know, whatever kinds of scenes are fun for you to write. XD

And with that said, it’s time to get back to my dirty scenes…and I’m telling all of you fellow IWSG writers to do the same! Get out there and write whatever makes you happy! Do it now! ^_^

NaNo Ahoy! (And a Reminder for November’s Posts and “Goals Review”)

Ahoy fellow writers (and lovely readers)! It’s November 2nd, which means that NaNoWriMo 2015 is on it’s way! November 1st is always a bit difficult for me because we do Halloween pretty big in my family, and we also usually go out shopping and scouring for discounted Halloween stuff the next day… BUT, I did managed to write almost 1700 words last night, which puts me right on track for the beginning of the challenge! Hopefully I can get a little bit ahead today and we’ll really be rolling!

But the real reason for this post is to remind you all that I plan to take it easy on the blog this month. The point, of course, is mainly to be able to focus on NaNo, because life is busy and I do hope to actually complete the challenge this year. So the first post I’ll be skipping is my monthly goals review post. I’ll just tell you quickly that I haven’t been taking very good care of myself, and that I wrote 11,161 words in October. BAM, you’re updated. XD

There won’t, however, be NO activity on the blog this month. I do still plan to do the Insecure Writers Support Group post this Wednesday, and I will be doing “unboxing and review” posts throughout the month to coordinate with YouTube videos that I’ll hopefully be posting over the next couple of weeks…I have a ton of unboxings to do this month, so I can’t possibly let those slide while I’m doing NaNo.

But that’s it! Other than that it’s all about the writing! So with that in mind, leave me alone you guys! I need to be writing! D:

Ready, Set, Write!

It’s very nearly that time of the year, ladies and gentlemen. No, not Christmas, although that has been sneaking up on me like a predator ready to pounce. I’m actually talking about National Novel Writing Month, better known as NaNoWriMo.

If you don’t know what NaNoWriMo is, at its core it is a challenge: a challenge to write (at least) 50,000 words in one month, starting November 1st and ending November 30th. The unwritten rules are that you start a brand new story on that first day and that by the end of it you aim to have a complete novel, even if it’s so bad it would take holy fire to properly edit and revise it and make it readable. The reality is that lots of people also write multiple short stories, or continue on with stories they’ve already been working on; some people even write things like autobiographies, scripts, or collections of poems. There are really no hard-and-fast rules, other than the goal: write 50,000 words in 30 days.

I’ve taken part in NaNoWriMo every year since I first discovered it, even the years during which I knew I had little to no chance of completing the task, and it’s been worth it every time.

November 2010
This is the year I first stumbled across a blogger talking about NaNoWriMo. I looked into it, found the website, and immediately fell in love with the idea. Even though I was almost late to the game (it was late October when I found out about it) I decided that I just had to take part. I’d been thinking about playing my hand at writing a zombie story, so that’s what I did, and the first draft of “Nowhere to Hide” was born. That year was my first NaNoWriMo win, with approximately 50,700 words. I came in right under the wire, and although my story was a bit messy and uncoordinated I was very proud because it was the first time I’d ever written a full-length novel start-to-finish. It was my first ever completed manuscript.

November 2011
After the fun I’d had the previous year of course I was going to try NaNoWriMo out again! This time I decided to go for something completely different from what I’m used to: sci-fi. The story was “Erased”, and it featured a cast of strange characters who find themselves abandoned in what appears to be a medical facility on a planet with two moons. I had fun in the beginning, but around the middle of NaNo I was beginning to wear, with no idea of where the story was going and a lack of faith in myself to properly write a technologically-advanced world. Eventually I wound up cheating by putting “Erased” aside and writing new scenes for other stories I was working on. Though I technically rebelled against the “rules”, I did still manage to write 57,300 words that year, so I still call it a win!

November 2012
My third NaNo was my first loss in the challenge, which is funny since what I was actually doing was a rewrite of a story I’d been writing on and off for years, “Parallels”. The fact that I already had a great deal of the story ingrained into my brain didn’t help; I was simply too busy that year and didn’t have enough motivation. Still, I enjoyed taking part in the challenge and managed to write about 37,200 words that month.

November 2013
On the fourth year I tried something different yet again. While I’d already taken a shot at horror, this would be my first time writing about vampires. I wanted to write something fun that was aimed at teens and young adults, but that was actually frightening. “Bloodlust” was the story of a girl and her friends seeking out vampires because the world’s literature had lead them to believe that they were wonderful creatures, when in fact they are the monsters people once took them to be. I had high-hopes for this story, but it never really worked out in my head and I ended up abandoning it, though not before I won another NaNo with just over 50,100 words.

November 2014
Last year I didn’t have a whole lot of hope for my chances with NaNo, but I wanted to take part anyway because hey, I didn’t want to break the streak! It was my fifth year and I had a plan. I’d still been writing “Parallels” on and off throughout the years, but I’d recently decided that the story would make a much better mini-series…say, three-to-four shorter books instead of one insufferably long one. So for NaNo ’14 I decided to write that first book: “The Other World: Book One”. I ended up experiencing my worst NaNo failure yet with only about 31,900 words, but it was a huge start toward that first book (which I’m now in the process of revising) and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that!

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So that leads us back here, to the impending NaNo 2015. I’m excited to participate again, although I know there’s a fair chance that it will be another loss to add to the board, because even when things don’t go my way I still gain something out of NaNo. It’s always my most productive writing month of the year, and I feel that has a lot to do with the community and the fun atmosphere that the challenge provides. It’s not just buckling down and forcing yourself to write…it’s almost a sort of game that you’re playing with thousands of people all over the world.

This year I’m trying something way out in left-field from what I’ve done previously. I’m going to be “cheating” by writing a number of shorter stories, and they’re all going to be of the erotic variety. I’ve been toying with the idea of trying my hand at the genre for a while, and I figured what better time than NaNo, when you’re forced to write quickly and without thinking too hard or looking back? If absolutely nothing else I should get a good laugh out of the whole thing, especially since I’ve decided to base my little erotica series on fairy tales (the #1 rule of erotica, apparently, is to find a kink – or theme – and stick to it, and I figured this was something I know enough about to be able to handle).

As it has been for the past few years, this NaNo will not be an easy go for me (not that it ever is). I have a few days at home during the first week of the challenge, but then I travel out West and am tortured with 12-hour work days for 14 days straight before returning home again. For this reason I’ve decided to take a bit of a break from my blog during November so that I can focus my writing exclusively on the challenge. I’ll still write something for “Insecure Writer’s Support Group” day, and I’ll still whip up the “unboxing and review” posts for the subscription boxes I have waiting for me at home as we speak, but that will be it. I’ve been meaning to take a break from the blog for a while, so I figure this is definitely the right time, don’t you think? I’ll mention this again once or twice so no one thinks I’ve disappeared or anything. 🙂

So, I guess that’s it! I’m anxiously awaiting the beginning of the challenge and curious to know how I’m going to make out this year. Is anyone else taking the plunge into NaNo-World this year? What are you writing about? What are you planning to do with your novel after you write it? Want to be writing buddies? My username is Toreshi! Hope to see you there! ❤

Looking on the Bright Side – An IWSG Post

Well, it’s once again time for the “Insecure Writer’s Support Group” post of the month, and though I’m having what I consider to be a pretty rotten morning so far I’m going to try really really hard to keep a positive light to this month’s post.

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First thing to be happy about: a couple of weeks ago those of us who are participating in the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge got our results back from the first challenge. The way it works is that in each group (which has about 30 people), the top fifteen stories get points, and you get as many points as your rank. So the top ranking story would get fifteen points, and the lowest ranking story would get one point, with the remaining fifteen people getting zero points. For my first story of the challenge I got ten points, which I think is pretty great, especially considering that it’s my first time ever participating in the challenge. 🙂

The second part of the challenge was about a week and a half ago, so I won’t get the results back for that one until October 20th-ish. Once those points are doled out the top six scorers in each group move on to Round Two. I’m not expecting to get into Round Two because my second challenge story wasn’t nearly as good as the first one, but it’s still been tons of fun and I’ve gotten lots of great feedback from fellow participants, so it was definitely worth it.

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Second thing to be happy about: the Writer’s Digest Self-Published Book competition is coming to a close very soon. Why is that something to be happy about? Because it’s been KILLING me waiting for it! To enter the competition you had to send them a hard-copy of your novel way back in March/April, so I’ve just been sitting around waiting for the results since then. I’m not expecting to place at all – after all, I’m sure there were probably hundreds of entrants all with amazing books – but I’m excited for it to be over because even the losers get feedback from the judges on their novel. Plus it’ll just be nice to not be anticipating it anymore! Only five more days until “all winners will be notified”, so soon I’ll be able to breathe a sigh of relief and know that it’s officially over and I don’t have to think about it. XD

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Third thing to be happy about: although it’s actually taken longer than I expected it to because my life is a ball of “go here, do this, do that”, I am almost done of the current draft of “The Other World: Book One”. That means that I can ship the manuscript off to my beta-reader and not have to think about it again until she ships it back with her thoughts. This is definitely a good thing because I’ve reached that stage in every story where you just want to set your laptop on fire rather than have to re-read the same paragraphs one single more time.

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Fourth thing to be happy about: NaNo season is approaching. Honestly, even though I love NaNoWriMo, I’m usually filled with dread at this time of year because it’s just such a god-damn busy time and I’m usually so stressed out and there’s absolutely no way that I can find the time required to write 50,000 words in one month. HOWEVER, this NaNo I’ve decided to totally rebel and do something fun and kinda-sorta-in-a-way relaxing. I’ve been toying with the idea of writing an erotic novel or two, mostly for research purposes (no, seriously), to see how such a thing would sell in comparison to my zombie novel, “Nowhere to Hide“. So, this year for NaNo I’m going to rebel and just write 50,000 words worth of erotic stories. My understanding is that the average erotic story is 5000-7000 words, so I’m going to try to write 8-10 short stories. I think it’ll be an interesting change from the usual system since, generally, by mid-way through NaNo I’m both losing interest in my story and wondering how I’m going to stretch it out to 50,000 words. With what I’m going to do this year if I lose interest I can just skip to one of the other stories in the line. Yeah, okay, technically it’s cheating, but the NaNo forums have a “Rebels” board for a reason, right. ^_~

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So I guess that’s basically it for now. I’m just trying really hard to look on the bright side of things, because otherwise my eye starts twitching and I start grinding my teeth and not sleeping well, and it’s just overall a really bad scene. 😛

So what about you guys? What are you all up to? Looking on the bright side, right? RIGHT?

Accountability Wednesdays: The LAST ONE!

Guys…guys…guys…can you believe that it’s almost the end of 2014? Like, seriously. I’m wigging out a bit.

And with that, you may have noticed that the next two Wednesdays are Christmas Eve and New Years Eve, which means that I definitely will not be writing accountability posts. Therefore this is going to be the last one! I’ll include other stats and whatnot into my “2015 Goals” post when I write it, but as far as 2014 is concerned this is the last of the accountability. Woo! I actually feel a bit liberated. So let’s get this over with!

Goal #1: Lose ten pounds and become healthier overall.

This was not a good year for this goal. There were a lot of excuses (good and bad), a lot of roadblocks, and a lot of reasons to spend my time on anything other than exercising. In the end, not only did I not lose ten pounds, but I actually gained several. As of this date I’m weighing in at about 2 lbs higher than what I began with in January.

The upside of that is that, strangely, I feel a lot more comfortable in my skin now than I did at the beginning of the year. I have my trouble spots, I have my little bits that bother me, but all in all I’m happy with the way I look, which I think is much better than actually losing the weight.

In addition to that we have the health issues, which are slowly coming under control. I had a lot of tests done on my gastrointestinal track and was eventually given a medication that helps to stop the stomach spasms that plague me whenever I travel. Then I was later given a medication for the anxiety that no one really realized I had until I mentioned to my doctor that I was the kid who threw up on the first day of school every year. Said prescription is not something that I can take every day forever (the effects weaken as you take it too much), but at least it’s available for me when I need it, and knowing that it helps proves that it’s a treatable condition. Two thumbs up to that.

So all in all, I guess it was a good year for this goal. My original intentions for the goal were not realized, but I came out of it happier and healthier, if in different ways.

Goal #2: Be more active on social media and work hard on my author platform.

I’m on the fence about the success of this goal. I definitely took a couple of steps in the direction by joining Self-Publisher’s Showcase, tweeting more often, and finally recently giving in to Instagram, but I don’t know that the results have been so great. Over the course of the year I think I gained something like 80 new followers on the blog, maybe 50 new followers on Twitter, and a whopping 10 subscribers on YouTube, and while that’s great, it doesn’t feel like a lot compared to the amount of work I put in. Then again, I have a full-time job, so maybe the work I put in just feels like more than it really was.

In the end, things have been pretty good, but I hope to expand upon this goal in the future by looking to gain more followers on all mediums, as well as more readers now that I’ve got something for sale for them to read.

Goal #3: COMPLETE my zombie apocalypse novel, Nowhere to Hide.

You all know how this goal went! Though it was stressful at times and I definitely wanted to give up more than once, I managed to slog through the editing process not once, but twice, and with the help of my wonderful beta-reader I think I wound up with a much better novel than I started with. I then scoured the depths of the internet to learn how to properly format a manuscript for self-publishing purposes, designed my own cover with the use of a photo taken by my very own father, and painstakingly slapped it all together on Create Space until the result looked correct. Then I ordered the first ever print copy of my first ever completed novel and just about cried on camera as I did an unboxing video of it.

Of course it hasn’t all be unicorn rides and fluffy kitten snuggles since then. I’ve sold approximately 30 print copies (mostly to family), and approximately 15 e-book copies (mostly to NaNoWriMo friends), and I gave away almost 200 e-book copies for free on Halloween, so all total I’ve made something like $60 or $70 on this book thus far. Marketing yourself is a difficult business, especially because you have to be careful not to be annoying, and zombie novels are not for everyone, so I’ve got a long road ahead of me. But in the end, I’m just so happy to have actually done it, to be able to say that I am a published author and that my book is available on Amazon and Kindle. That is super-cool, and it just motivates me to write more, to publish more, and to prove that I can be a professional fiction writer while also working a day job to support my family. Boo-ya.

Goal #4: Write 500,000 words.

Well I’ve been very positive in this post up to now, but there’s not a lot good I can say about this goal. At the beginning of the year I reduced my previous year’s goal by half, thinking that surely I would be able to handle it, but there were many road-blocks in my way.

Now, mind you, most of those road-blocks were completely reasonable ones. For instance I spent several months putting writing aside in favor of editing so that I could publish the novel. I also had a hard go at NaNoWriMo this year because I was working and thus only able to do my daily writing by hand. In addition to those blocks the length of my blog posts went down this year as I struggled to schedule stuff in advance so that I could work on more important things. All in all, it just turned out to be a pretty stressful year for writing. But the good news is that I did manage to keep up with the blog, only missing three or four scheduled days the entire year, and I’m also coming out of the end of 2014 with a very-nearly completed first draft of Book One of my upcoming “Other World” series. So that is definitely something!

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In the end, the year was full of ups and downs, as is wont to happen, but it was a pretty good one overall. I have my (relative) health, my small group of followers, my awesome self-published book, and the makings of more books coming into the new year with me. I think all of that deserves a celebration, so I’m going to spend the last two weeks of this year not worrying about anything except Christmas and having an awesome time with my family. How does that sound? ^_~

Accountability Wednesdays: Week 47

My good people, how are you today? I have to be honest with you, I’m still trying to wake up, and there’s a reason for that, but more on that later. First I have to quickly correct a mistake. Remember the other day when I posted a bunch of random stuff that I had gotten behind on? Well I missed one. Arg! So now I’m backtracking to let you know about a little interview I did for a fellow blogger who does “NaNo Spotlight” posts every year during NaNoWriMo time. My spotlight can be found here, over at the Kelworth Files, so please check it out, and if you have the time check out some of the other spotlights as well!

Now on with all the other nonsense!

Goal #1: Lose ten pounds and become healthier overall

Okay, so it’s been a really long time since I actually bothered to weigh myself so that I could make a proper report, so I literally just stepped on the scale for the purpose of this post. Then I had to go through my archives to remind myself of where I started, and now I can report to you that I am still approximately 40% in the wrong direction. I mentioned before that over the course of several months I actually gained ten pounds rather than lose any, and now I’ve lost about six of those pounds, which still leaves me in the wrong side of the column. The upside of that is that for whatever reason, I actually feel like I look better later. Don’t ask me what’s up with that. Maybe I’ve just gotten so lazy that I’m convincing myself to change my mind, but I honestly have been feeling pretty happy with my appearance. Whatevs.

On the health side of things, the reason I feel so tired as I’m writing this is because I’m trying out yet another new medication. The prescription I got last month has been helping, but there are still other issues that need to be resolved, and so I’m trying out a new med that my doctor thinks will be helpful, but that so far makes my mornings feel like my brain is moving through molasses. Wish me luck with that.

Goal #2: Be more active on social media and work hard on my author platform.

I’ve gone a little downhill this week when it comes to the author platform side of things, because I’ve been busy with lots of life stuff, and when I do get a moment on the computer I’ve been using that time to do YouTube videos and bang off quick additions to my BzzAgent and Influenster campaigns. I’m hoping for things to even out a little next week, once my daughter’s birthday party is over and I have significantly less to worry about.

Goal #3: COMPLETE my zombie apocalypse novel, Nowhere to Hide.

Done and done, and still not getting tired of saying it.

Goal #4: Write 500,000 words.

Oh MAN is this goal not going to happen. In fact, it’s not even going to come close! But I’m okay with that. I’ve come to terms.

Here’s the deal… Right off the bat, I spent a great portion of the year working on goal number 3, which was really important and I’m not the least bit sorry about that. But then I also had several periods throughout the year during which I did very quick, simple blog entries so that I could focus on other, more important things, so I lost a lot of words there as well. And then came NaNo. I’m really proud of the 30,000 words that I managed to handwrite in those first two weeks, but the end of the month came to a complete standstill. I had way too much (again, more important) stuff to worry about, and so as of today, with less than five days of NaNo left, I’m only up to about 33,000 words. Could I finish if I really wanted to? Probably, yes. But I’d have to lose a ton of sleep and gain a ton of stress as a result, because, again…more important stuff to do. So it is with a heavy heart (and yet, lighter shoulders) that I admit defeat to NaNo this year, for the second time in a row. But don’t worry…I plan to continue working on the manuscript and expect to have it done by the end of December, so I can start editing in the New Year.

But the 500,000 words thing? Not gonna happen. Just letting you know.

The Post Where I Catch Up on Things and Explain Absenses

If you follow my blog you may have noticed that I missed three posts this week: Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, which should have been one Accountability post and two “642 Things to Write About” posts. And if you’re a follower you would also know that for me missing posts doesn’t happen very often, so I hope you’ll sympathize when I say that there just wasn’t any time. I traveled home from my shift out West on Monday/Tuesday, and though I normally would have gotten the “642 Things” posts written and scheduled during my layovers, I was actually feeling quite unusually nauseated and motion sick during my flights, so I instead spent my layovers curled up in the fetal position on the seats at flights’ gates. Then I got home and threw myself immediately into decorating for Christmas, which may seem like something that isn’t exactly a panic just yet, but since I fly back to work for two weeks on December 1st I really wanted to get the Christmas stuff out of the way so that I can actually enjoy it a bit before I leave again. And on top of all that my daughter’s 4th birthday is next weekend, so I’ve been running around getting stuff together for that. On the upside of all of this, I’ve only been home for three days and I’ve got quite a ton done. Today I should get  a ton more done, and then I should (mostly) be able to relax a little for the rest of the week.

In the meantime, here’s a couple of things you’ve missed because of my sporadic week:

Authors Answer #3 is up, and it’s a pretty interesting one! In this installment the 10 other authors and I discuss how easy or difficult it is for us to write characters with a different set of beliefs from our own. Check it out!

My goals are a bit scalded from being on the back-burner, and I refuse to step on a scale today, but I can tell you that social media has been my friend, I’ve sold a few more copies of the book, and my arm is damn near broken from all the handwriting I did while I was out at work without my laptop.

NaNoWriMo has also been put on the back burner due to all the stuff I’ve been trying to get done, but it’s not as bad as all that. Before my sickly travel day I managed to get my (HANDWRITTEN, remember) word count up to 30,000 words. That means that as of today I’m 5000 words behind, but you must remember that I’m also home now…where my laptop is. If I could HAND WRITE 30,000 words in 18 days, I’m sure I can use my almost 100-words-per-minute typing speed to bang out the last 20,000 words in 9 days.

I KILLED a brand-new pen, straight out of the box!

Maybe.

We’ll see. >.>

I feel like I’m missing a thing or two, but at the moment I can’t think of anything and I really should go about trying to get the rest of my nonsense done so that I can have a bit of time to myself, so I’ll leave it at this for now, and I’ll say that I’ll try to have proper posts up for next week, but I’m sure you’ll forgive me if I don’t. Because you’re all awesome. You know it. ❤

Accountability Wednesdays: Week 45

Ladies and gentlement, we are a week and a half into National Novel Writing Month, and I am exhibiting signs of writing insanity and breakdown! I am getting constant comments from coworkers on how I can possibly write so much by hand and not be in horrible pain. And then, on “Double Up” day (when you are encouraged to double your word count for the day), I wrote so much that I genuinely was in a great deal of pain (luckily it felt better by the next morning). Today my pen started to act up, and upon examination I had run it completely dry…the same pen that I had pulled fresh from the pack less than five days prior! And now I’m getting into the giddy multiple-personality stage of the game, wherein one voice is screaming at me about how horrible the story is, and the other is screaming that editing is for December. My GOD, do I love NaNoWriMo!

But I digress. Let’s get this accountability nonsense out of the way, shall we?

Goal #1. Lose ten pounds and become healthier overall.

Let’s not mince words here, people. This goal means nothing to me at the moment. How can I think about weight loss when I’m trying to HANDwrite almost 2000 words per day (whilst simultaneously working 12 hours a day)? I can’t, that’s how! Then again, all this writing has been distracting me from eating maybe there’s something to be had there…

Anyway, the real important thing is that the meds my doctor gave me seem to be helping quite a bit. There’s still an anxiousness factor that I can’t seem to get past, but hopefully as time goes on and I have fewer issues, the anxiousness will abate. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Goal #2: Be more active on social media, and work harder on my author platform.

Man, I have been ALL over Twitter this week. I’m just sayin’. Mostly that’s been because I’ve been hanging out and chatting with the #NaNoWriMo crowd, but that’s all good. It’s been keeping me (somewhat) sane through all the writing sprints.

In future news, I have my first ever Influenster Vox Box waiting for me when I get home next week, and I should also have my second ever BzzAgent campaign box waiting for me by then as well, so look forward to some fun! The Vox Box has a game for my daughter to play, so that should be tons of fun!

Goal #3: COMPLETE my zombie apocalypse novel, Nowhere to Hide.

Nope, still not tired of reporting the completion of this goal. Bwa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

On an unrelated note, buy my book! 😀

Goal #4: Write 500,000 words.

Obviously I’ve gone a little wacky this week, and it’s mostly the symptom of this goal, exaccerbated by NaNoWriMo. I have been writing like the wind, killing my wrist, and putting together a manuscript that I really hope I will be able to make something off in the months following NaNoWriMo. If I were able to write by laptop (since I’m out at work I am severely limited in what I can accomplish) I would probably have twice the word count, but I am happy to report that as of your reading this I have already written 18,598 words for NaNoWriMo so far. Now, not all of those words were this week, but if you tack on the words I wrote for recent blog posts it makes this week’s total 16,723. And remember, the overwhelming majority of that was BY HAND. I’m going to be crippled by the time I get home to my laptop, but I’ll have one hell of a notebook to bring with me.

And with that all said, I need to lay my head down for a moment and “rest my eyes”. If you hear snoring, don’t worry, it’s just, um…the gears in my head turning. Yeah, let’s go with that.