High Noon, NaNoWriMo Day 5

It right around lunchtine on day five.  How am I doing?  I've done about 2000 words today and I'm about a fourth of the way through Chapter 7.  Getting all of the magicians to Valaric's house is taking a lot longer than I thought it would.  It might take me two or more chapters to get everyone there.  I'm already noting things I'll probably change when I pick it over sometime in January.  I'm shooting for having 25,000 words by Monday morning but we'll see if I can do it.

One thing I've noticed since NaNoWriMo started is that Valaric is changing a lot as a character from the generic wizard I'd pictured him as when I conceived of the story earlier in the year.  Some of the new characteristics are mine but I'm not sure where some of the stuff comes from.

In the interest of ensuring my karmic balance is tilting toward the good side of the spectrum, check out this writing by Michael Barron.  It's called Wilderness.  Picture Calvin and Hobbes written by Neil Gaiman.  Sounds intriguing, doesn't it?  If you like it, friend his group on Facebook.  If not, do it anyway.  It won't kill you.  Michael needs your support and won't send you more penis enlargement spam than you would normally get.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to squeeze some writing into my lunch break.  Thorvald isn't going to tell the story of Sigard's flight to the stars on the back of a six legged winged bear by himself.

Day 4 - Conclusion

Depriving myself of food and limiting my TV watching to Community helped quite a bit.  I finished chapter 5 and got about halfway into chapter 6.  I'm ending the day at 13,900 words.  Not bad for a day that was agony for the first half.

I'm hoping to have the ship completed and ready to go by the end of chapter 7 but judging how Fenlock's trial went, it might be chapter 8.  I think once I get the ship ready, the old outline will need some fine tuning.

In other NaNo news, Reverend Horton Heat makes some good writing music.

NaNoWriMo - Day 4

Today is going pretty slowly on the writing front, not that surprising considering I'm neither off work nor working from home.  I'm at right around 1000 words, still way ahead of the official requirement but well below my own word goal of 3350 per day.  To sum up, working at work is not conducive to writing at work.  I might have to do the old "no food until the writing is done" trick from last year.

I have noticed one thing over the last few days.  I write much better in the first three hours of the day than I do later.  I'm tempted to try getting up at 2 instead of 4:30 for the duration of NaNoWriMo to maximize productivity.

Nothing more to see here.  Go about your business.

NaNoWriMo - Day 3 Mid-Afternoon report

Well, I did it.  I made it to 10k.  10,368, to be precise.  I'll probably re-do the chase scene in chapter four sometime down the road but it happened.  Fenlock has been captured and I worked in my Jack Vance reference.

Chapter 5 is up next and will likely be one of the ones that takes an eternity to write.  It's one of those "I have to write this chapter to get to the chapters I really want to write" chapters.  Valaric sending letters to the magicians he wants to accompany him and waiting for their replies makes for a boring chapter so I'll probably work Fenlock being under house arrest at Confederation headquarters in there somehow.  I suppose I could have the two meet.  I'm a little excited to see how it goes down.  Tomorrow.  I'm finished writing for today.  I might even try to get some reading done tonight between The Middle and Modern Family.

In other news, I love having hot water again.  I didn't realize how badly the old one was performing until the new one nearly burned the skin off my back.  Marvelous.

Oh, yeah.  I posted the first four chapters of Wandering the Web of Worlds on my Goodreads profile.  If you're on Goodreads and we're not already friends, go ahead and friend me if you like.

NaNoWriMo - Day 3 Mid-Morning report

NaNoWriMo continues to march on. 

I'm currently at 9067 words and hoping to hit 10k by the end of the day. Chapter Four is at 50%.  I think the real meat of the story will begin around Chapter Five or Six. 

In other news, I once again have hot water and keep getting distracted by the novelty. The plumber showed up at 7:30 and was done by 9.  The writing before he showed up was a lot easier than the writing after.  I've decided to take a break and go out for supplies. 

Getting away from my computer for a couple hours should help me figure out how to do the rest of Chapter Four.  I'm thinking Fenlock will get herded to a secluded place by hounds and taken into custody by Rannon Claw, the Hexhound, and dragged back to Malvernia to pay for his actions.

NaNoWriMo - Day 2

As the second day of NaNoWriMo grows nearer to conclusion, I thought I'd update everyone on my situation.

• Chapter 2 - Completed. I had an unexpected epiphany while I was walking that should tie everything together once the Hexhound gets to town
• Chapter 3 - About a third of the way done and my least favorite chapter.  While it isn't bad, I just not enjoying it.  It's a chapter of Valaric studying Selerak's notes and then going to see Glitch.  See the next bullet point for details.
• I called the plumber a few minutes ago.  They are also waiting on my water heater.  Friday was the last time I was able to take a shower in my own bathroom.  I'm going to head over to my parents' in a bit to scourge a shower and a hot meal.  I'm also taking tomorrow off so I can get the work from home monkey off my back.  I'll actually be pretty glad to see my co-workers on Thursday.
• Word Count so far for NaNoWriMo 2010 - 6059.  I'm well ahead of the minimum but I'd like to do 100k this month, not 50.  I'm hoping to get out that last 607 words before bed time.

That's all I have at the moment.  I'm feeling more confident and less fried than I was yesterday at this time.

NaNoWriMo - Day One

I'll get the downers out of the way first.  That way the good things seem damn good.

• Still no hot water.  The water heater is definitely showing up tomorrow
• My neighbor's delightful cat shat in my yard.  I proceeded to step in it and track it throughout the house before I realized that stench was coming from my shoe.
• My back aches from my uncomfortable chair.  I switched to a wooden kitchen chair around noon.  It helped.

Now for the good stuff:

• I got up early and wrote before working from home.  I am now just a shade under 3300 words.  Not bad for the first day.
• The story flowed more smoothly than I thought.  While I don't think I'll be able to consistently write 3300 words a day, I should be able to bust out a chapter without too much trouble.  I'm about a chapter and a third into the story.  I wanted to write the entire second chapter today since it introduces that asshole Fenlock but I was too fried after the first.  The Fenlock piece still reminds me of a John Cleese bit but I'm keeping it the way it is.
• The water heater is definitely showing up tomorrow.

That's about all I have.  I'm still a little fried from today's exertions.