Wednesday, January 01, 2003

New Year - New Projects

imageOkay, part of my new year will be an increase in my overall consistency. Whatever that means. (Maybe it means I’ll be less lumpy?)

But for the time being, I’m going to start listing here places where I “write out” since my Los Angeles friends may find it of interest.

Here’s the first and my most often patronized:

The Coffee Table
2930 Rowena Ave (between Hyperion & Glendale Blvd.)
Los Angeles, CA 90039-2042
Located in Silverlake, around the corner from Trader Joe’s

Hours - Open 7 AM til 11 PM - back patio closes at 9 PM

Prices - drip coffee $1.60 (50 cent refills) - served in real cups - fancy drinks start at $2.50. Decent but limited tea selection (Numi). Pastries, desserts & full menu, $8.00 average for entrees. Great garlic mashed potatoes.

Ambiance - lighting is decent, tables are roomy but it’s often crowded, especially in the late afternoon as lots of people seem to camp there for hours, no music but sometimes the other conversations can be loud (really more distracting since sometimes they’re interesting)

Connection - decent access to plugs, sometimes you have to wait for a primo table. If you like sitting outside, they’re ample access to power on the back patio (at every table). I advise bringing an extension cord so you can tap into someone else’s plug. If you’re a smoker, the front patio is nice, much nicer than most and heated. Also, this place seems to be a cell phone dead zone for Cingular service (though AT&T & Nextel work there)

Parking - 25 cents an hour, but can’t plug the meter for more than 2 hours at a pop. Usually easy to find a spot, except at peak hours, but then again, if you can’t find a spot on the street, you’re not likely to find a table either.

Of note - this section of Silverlake is up-and-coming. There are some cool shops around and if you’re willing to walk, down by the intersection of Glendale and Rowena, there’s a cool new shop called Clover that sells clothing and housewares

POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:49 am    

Thursday, December 12, 2002

Epilogue

imageIt’s been a few weeks and I’ve been quiet.

I can’t say it’s because I’ve been all typed out or anything.

I’m looking forward to reading other novels as we start NaNoEdMo (National Novel Editing Month - which takes more than a month).

This is what I think about NaNovels. I think, by and large, they are fantastically readable things. I know everyone thinks that a novel written in a month can’t be good. And if you think about it like a real novel, a novel that’s been crafted and edited and proofed, then no, it’s not going to meet those standards. But I’ve found them to be logical enough. The writing from moment to moment is good and the writers come up with very inventive things. Yes, there are long passages that have nothing to do with the plot or the characters. Mine has entirely too much shrugging and quipping in it. (According to the Word AutoSummarize feature.)

But I love the journey. That you go into a NaNovel expecting one thing (probably things similar to what the writer expected) and you end up somewhere rather different. They’re indulgent and refreshing. Probably more honest and less manipulative than a polished novel.

I’m going to go print one out now. If you have a NaNovel that you’d like me to read, please send me an email. I’d love to take a look at it and I can give very gentle first comments. (Or I can be brutal, if that’s what you’re looking for.)

POSTED BY Cybele AT 1:17 pm     NaNoWriMo

Saturday, November 30, 2002

Help! I can’t stop writing!

imageWell, I’ve meandered myself into a wholly unsatisfying but final ending. I’ve killed off two of the five main characters. Destroyed The Russian Watercolor Plates.

It is done. For now.

As I like to say, I’ve ruined a perfectly viable idea for a novel this month.

There’s always rewriting. Or better yet, there’s always starting over.

You can read it in its entirety over there. Just click on The Russian Watercolors. And I’ve also posted my status spreadsheet, too. Though I can’t figure who finds a spreadsheet of someone’s word count interesting. Oh, me!

Final tally today - 9,504 words today. I’m going to go have some leftover turkey and watch a DVD!

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:31 pm     NaNoWriMo

And still going

imageI did my 10K yesterday and I’ve now hit 50K and verfied my novel. I’m going to keep writing until I finish the damn thing. But I wanted to come over here and change out my participant icon to the loverly winner one!

POSTED BY Cybele AT 2:57 pm     NaNoWriMo

Still going

imageI’m not going to post much here, except to say that it’s midnight and I’ve written some 8,700 words so far today and I’m still going. I might finish this evening, I might just hit 50K and go to bed or I might just go to bed. Hard to tell at the moment. What I do know is that I will finish before tomorrow night at midnight.

Yup.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 12:12 am     NaNoWriMo

Thursday, November 28, 2002

The Meal

imageI didn’t write much today.

Well, pretty much not at all.

I did other stuff.

Appetizers
Brown Sugar and Cinnamon Tortilla Crisps with a Fresh Fruit Salsa of Strawberries, Kiwi and Apples
Goat Cheese with Deep Fried Shallots and a Sun Dried Tomato Tampenade on a Whole Wheat Baguette
Blue Cheese and Onion Crisped Crackers with Fresh Pears and Grapes

Dinner
Turkey rubbed with Sage, Olive Oil, Garlic and Rosemary
Whole Wheat Sage Dessing with Pecans, Leeks, Celery and Onions
Shallot and White Wine Turkey Gravy
Wasabi Mashed Potatoes
Baked Yams served with Spiced Brown Sugar Butter
Romaine Salad with Tomatoes and Balsamic Vinagrette Dressing
Green Beans with Shallots and Almonds
Horseradish and Cranberry Sauce
Cranberry and Mango Salsa with Pine Nuts

Dessert
Fresh Baked Apple Pie with Candied Ginger
Pecan Pie
    both served ala mode with Mashti Malone’s Cardamon Ice Cream and Raspberry Sorbet

POSTED BY Cybele AT 11:19 pm    

Tuesday, November 26, 2002

See, whenever I get encouraged ...

imageI guess I got a little optomistic there. Which I think is usually okay, but there’s a rule somewhere that says that you’re not supposed to share that with the universe.

I’ve got a really great excuse for not writing for the rest of the week - it involves a trip to Chinatown, some strangeness and then a call to 911 and a visit from the paramedics. Though I likely won’t let it deter me from my goal (damn supportive people in my life being damn supportive!). Mom is staying the rest of the week with me, and other relatives are already in town or winging their way here. This cuts into available writing time severely, and I’m quite exhausted as it is and it’s only Tuesday.

But, I was feeling like I’d written myself into a corner there for a while, and I think talking about it with my mother may have solved some of it. So, if all goes well, I will write a bit this evening after everyone’s gone to bed. But I’m not going to say that I’m optomistic. I have learned that much.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:20 pm     NaNoWriMo

Wednesday, November 20, 2002

This is the way the whole month was supposed to go

imageIt’s the twentieth. Two thirds of the way through the month and finally, today is the way the whole thing was supposed to go. I worked in the morning from home, I went into the office for a while, then on my way home I stopped at a coffee house (PsychoBabble again) and sat there for about an hour and got myself 2,566 plot advancing words.

That’s what I thought I’d do this month. A little work at home, a little work at work and a little work on the novel on the way in between the two.

But I guess the real point is that I’m on track and the plot is moving and the words are flowing free and easy.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:31 pm     NaNoWriMo

Monday, November 18, 2002

Things are perking up

imageSorry, illness abounds this weekend. Though I didn’t come down with this flu-thing myself, it certainly causes a sleepless night or two when there are others in the house with it.

The good news is that I got some stuff done this weekend. You’ll see that I’ve crested the thirty thousand mark today. The most amazing thing about my 5K day is that it only took me two and a half hours to do it. That’s a whopping 2,100 word per hour average. Sometimes those ding-dang words just pour out of me. Mostly because I don’t have time to milk them.

Saturday I wrote for two hours up at Bean Town in Sierra Madre and ran into two other wrimos. Then Saturday evening I was back at Silverlake’s own The Coffee Table for three hours. I didn’t get much writing done there, my battery crapped out and I forgot my power cable. Last night I sat at the dining table and squeezed out a scant 1,000 words before bed.

Today I wrote at Espresso Mi Cultura in Hollywood on Hollywood for an hour before rehearsal and at PsychoBabble on Vermont in Los Feliz for another hour after.

The story is getting bogged down in NaNoNess, and the fact is, I’ve got plenty of story left for the last twenty thousand words and I can just let go and stop typing Bureau of Printing and Engraving all of the time. Call it BEP or something. Or just the Bureau.

All files are updated here now, so you can read the glorious hundred page (space and a half) tome-in-progress or check out my stats in the cybelestatus.xls file. Do, please, understand that the file that you read here is rough, very, very rough. I’ve not proofed it in the slightest and I’m embarrassed to say that I’ve noticed some typos, especially when it comes to homophones. I do know the difference between “know” and “no” and “knew” and “new”. I just hear things in my head and transcribe them. Sometimes I catch it as I go, sometimes I don’t.

I’m getting really jazzed about things because it practically writes itself. If I can just do 1,500 words in an hour, I can probably do a little work in the evenings this week without losing steam on my other projects.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:34 pm     NaNoWriMo

Friday, November 15, 2002

Getting back in the groove

imageI went to the doctor this afternoon. This is what the MRI results were:

    “The medial meniscus demonstrates degenerative signal of the posterior horn. There is mild irregularity of the inferior margin which is due to degeneration.”

But it wasn’t all bad news, I spent a good two hours at the Silverlake Coffee Company on Glendale Blvd. A very good two hours. I blasted out 3,366 very nice, coherent words. My total is actually coming up to an acceptable level.

I promised myself I couldn’t leave the coffee house until I hit twenty thousand words, and I did just that.

I celebrated with some ice cream after dinner and installing the new network card on my laptop. Yay for networking!

POSTED BY Cybele AT 11:45 pm     NaNoWriMo

Monday, November 11, 2002

In the groove

imageI was supposed to have a database meeting this morning. I got up early and did lots of data entry to get ready for it, but about fifteen minutes before, it was cancelled. No matter, I had back-up plans, which was a rehearsal for one of my plays. I went. And I felt so good afterwards I headed off to The Coffee Table in Silverlake for a little lunch and writing. I was there for scarcely and hour and I got over a thousand words in (along with a full meal).

Buoyed by this, I went home and bought plane tickets for the holidays and then headed out to another coffee house, The Silverlake Coffee Company. I’d not been there since they opened, which was probably about six years ago. Most notably it’s across the street from Rockaway Records. Which for me is a very dangerous place to be. I did not go across the street, I did not spend endless hours sampling new and old music. Instead, I sat there with my little lappie for an hour and a half and logged almost three thousand words! I had a lemon bar.

So, tonight, I watch TV and fold laundry. I’m not exactly on track with the word count at the moment, but I know now that I can have 4K days that only take about three or four hours and that’s not entirely unworkable. I think I’m going to plan for three 4K days a week and the rest to be 2K days. So, by next Monday, that’ll put me at 36K - well within the new goal of getting to 50K by the 23rd. Whee!

POSTED BY Cybele AT 5:33 pm     NaNoWriMo

Sunday, November 10, 2002

Thanks to all who advised me capably

imageI think I’m ready to get back on track with the novel. I am going to ignore reality and have another Bureau of Printing and Engraving in the United States of my novel and it will be located in San Francisco. No editing involved, in fact, I may add some words that explain this previously unknown BEP facility (maybe it’s top secret, who knows?).

Onward. I’m off to CyberJava in Hollywood for some cafe-styled writin’ before rehearsal.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 12:06 pm     NaNoWriMo

Saturday, November 09, 2002

Damn the Internet!

imageThis morning I started typing away on my little novel (which is still considered little at 10 plus words) and I decided to check the Internet for a little fact or two to help me with a scene I’m working on.

Problem is, I’ve had this nagging feeling in the back of my head about the setting of my novel and the fact that I’m taking on a fact based layer - with the counterfieting. I decided to set the book in San Francisco, because they have a mint there. Little did I know that there is a difference between a Mint and the Bureau of Printing and Engraving. Turns out there are only two locations in the United States that print currency. Washington, DC and Houston, TX. Neither of those, you’ll notice, are San Francisco.

So, I’m stuck. What do I do? Do I go back and edit to reset the whole damn thing in Washington, DC (which I know rather well, at least the museums). Or do I just continue on pretending that there is a Bureau of Printing and Engraving in San Francisco.

I’m very, very tempted to go back and edit. I’m thinking it wouldn’t take more than an hour or two. But I always think things will take less time than they do.

Oh, sigh.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 1:13 pm     NaNoWriMo

Friday, November 08, 2002

Week two starts with some procrastinatin’

Good Heavens! I couldn’t resist.

I thought it kind of went with the theme of my novel. Founding fathers are on dollar bills ... right?

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:53 am     NaNoWriMo

Thursday, November 07, 2002

Still more nothin’

imageI didn’t write.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:15 am     NaNoWriMo

Tuesday, November 05, 2002

Posting and feeling okay about it

imageI did a few words this evening. Two hours, 1829 words. I’m not setting the world on fire. I ended up surfing around the web a bit. I found a great site for info about counterfieting. I was surprised at how many questions it answered for me. I’m getting a better handle on my Secret Service Agent character, Gregory Conklin. And I think I’m finding a way to put a little humor into the whole thing. Which will make it all much more bearable.

I’m not able to resist the editing thing. I go back and tinker with things. Thankfully I haven’t hacked anything else out since day two.

So, I’m at 7,988. I wanted to break 8,000 tonight, even though it means that I’m still behind. But tomorrow is a work at home day, so I may be able to get some stuff done while I upload.

The big thing was tonight I finally posted an excerpt on the NaNoWriMo site in my profile. I’d been resisting. I don’t know why. It’s not like we all have great expectations about our work we’re doing. I just don’t want folks to look over that particular block of text and start to wonder why they were in my company ... must reinforce, it’s the fact that I am fearless enough to not only post the excerpt, but the whole damn thing so far over there. Yeah for courage!

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:51 pm     NaNoWriMo

Nothing ...

imageDay five is beginning and if you look to the left, you’ll notice that I haven’t written anything since Sunday.

Well, I have written, just not on my novel. I had to do a rewrite of a monologue for rehearsal. And in general, 1,400 words would not normally take me that long, but these had to be 1,400 good words, so that kind of ate up the morning.

Today is one of my “go to work” days, so that makes working on the novel so much harder. I’m going to take the file with me and try to keep it open in another window, but I don’t have the greatest faith that I’ll be able to multitask that well.

Maybe I’ll just post more here later.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:32 am     NaNoWriMo

Sunday, November 03, 2002

Finally some words

imageThis morning I got up early. Not really on purpose, I just woke up rather early and then, well, didn’t go back to sleep. Then I decided to go out and get some new headphones for my laptop to use while I’m writing (I’ve loaded about two gigs of MP3s onto the hard drive already). This is really a nice thing to have. So I loaded up all of my stuff and headed over to the Bourgeois Pig in Hollywood. I met up with three other wrimos. The good thing was that I was the first one there. I staked out an excellent table and got in about 1,000 words before the first one showed up.

The other cool thing was that even though there were four of us sitting at the table, all of us had in earphones, so the temptation to talk was slightly reduced and therefor productivity enhanced. That’s not to say that there weren’t several hours wasted on that socializing thing ... well, I wouldn’t call them wasted. I quite enjoyed it.

I had a bit of a breakthrough ... or maybe a red herring, but it was good territory to mine as I’m getting to know my secondary protaganist (Gregory Conklin). I’m having a little trouble getting into the meat of the story as I struggle to “set things up” in some satisfactory way and I’m still editing as I go. But if I continue at this rate, I’ll still make it in time and perhaps end with a better first draft than last year.

I’ve posted the 15 pages that I’ve got there on the link with my word count. That PDF file will evolve (in case you’re reading this in the archives) into the full draft as the month goes on.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:54 pm     NaNoWriMo

Saturday, November 02, 2002

A few steps backwards, a good foot forward

imageWell, as I thought would happen, I have gone ahead and started editing my novel before I even get into it. Though I hate the prologue at the moment, I am keeping it, with the understanding that whenever I am blocked or feeling like I need to do some research or something before continuing, I can at least go back and work on that.

I deleted everything else that I did yesterday. So I started today at 517 words. I’m now at 2,968. Not entirely bad. I’m posting my word count chart thingy here: cybelestatus.xls. It’s not really that big a deal yet. But it will be.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:54 pm     NaNoWriMo

How to NOT make your daily word count

imageHere’s a handy tip. If you don’t want to make your word count goals, go to a great coffee house and try to write with your best friend.

At least I’m not able to do it very succesfully. Maybe as my priorities shift later in the month from important things like relationships to these trivial goals like finishing a book in a month. Then I’ll be able to blow off the guy sitting right next to me.

I’m thinking this writing out in coffee houses this November is not going to help me much. It was great last year because I didn’t know anyone. But this year I’m the frickin’ Municipal Liaison and I’ve now personally emailed everyone in the Los Angeles Basin.

The good news on the goals front though is the fact that I had a little meeting with my boss yesterday morning and told her that I’m only coming into the office two days a week for the rest of the month and then one floating day a week when I’ll work from home. Jeeze, I love freelance!

Okay, I’ve got an hour before I have to leave for rehearsal. Maybe I can do some catching up.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:40 am     NaNoWriMo

Friday, November 01, 2002

Is writing the same as caffeine?

imageSo, I did that little jumpstart of writing last night. And instead of following my own advice and leaving off at a spot where I know where I’m going, I left off at the end of the prologue.

I went to bed thinking that I’d just start the novel in the morning. But then I thought, “How will the novel begin?” And I started writing in my head. For hours. Four hours. I probably should have just gotten out of bed and come downstairs and typed it out so I could sleep. But there you go, writing is not tiring, it’s energizing.

Kept me up until about 4.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:27 am    

Just a little taste

imageI stayed up until midnight so I could at least do a little before bed. Then I could wake up and know that I at least had 500 words in the bag for the first day.

And that’s what I did. 516 words. And the encouraging part was that it only took me 15 minutes. At this rate, it’ll only take me another 23 hours. Well, maybe I can’t just sit and write for 23 hours straight and have the novel. I don’t think I know much about what happens after this. But I do have about eight hours before I have to think about it again.

If you’ve come here to read it, well, give me a day and I will start posting the ENTIRE thing over there on the left as a PDF file. Make sure you have Adobe Acrobat Reader. Should I post it as one file or break it up into chapters? Is anyone going to read this thing? Or am I just doing this to prove that I’m doing it?

Off to bed!

POSTED BY Cybele AT 12:23 am     NaNoWriMo

Wednesday, October 30, 2002

Binge Writing

image I’ve seen a lot of talk in places about writing habits. Some people seem to have it in their head that writers write. Writers are supposed to write every day. Writers are not any good unless they write every day for the rest of their lives. That sort of nonsense.

That’s what it is.

Writers are people and all people are different.

Writing is not a sport. It’s not like you can train for writing. It’s not like good writing involves special muscles any more than bad writing does. Being a strong writer has nothing to do with exercise. It has to do with thinking. Thinking is what makes you a good writer. (And sometimes not thinking makes you a good writer, too.) Writing is drawing connections between things, making combinations and then showing them to us.

I say all this mostly as a rationalization. I am a binge writer. I write in huge vomitous spurts (if that’s a legal phrase). I will go months, even years without writing anything substantial and then I will sit down and in a matter of hours pound out a one-act play or a draft of a full-length within a week. Or, in the case of November, I will write a novel.

I write when my brain is full. Writing is a way of containing ideas for later use by others. I’ll have an idea. I noodle on it. I read about things related to it. I observe things that help me solve problems in it. I develop it in my head and then eventually it’s done and has to come out. Now, I know that not everyone works like this. And by no means is the thing done in my head. I don’t know every word, I don’t even know what’s going to happen.

Think of it this way: writing is like baking. I’ve got this recipe. I’m not even sure what it makes, but I put all of the stuff in it. I see what I’m putting in it and sometimes I add other stuff (you know, raisins would be really good with this, and pecans ... maybe a bit of lemon zest). Then I mix and pop it in the oven. That’s the typing part. It bakes and I wait. I type, I give it a sniff now and then and eventually it comes out and there’s a draft. I just know it’s ready and I need to take it out of the oven and taste it. Then I know what it is.

So, for any of you out there who feel guilty because you don’t have umpteen journals lining your shelves and you don’t work on a schedule of “five pages a day”, take heart. You can be a writer. You do have to write, mind you. But you don’t have to feel like not writing isn’t being a writer either. Eventually you let it all out.

Editing is another matter.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 4:07 pm     NaNoWriMo

Thursday, October 24, 2002

It’s the Bee’s Knees

Just a brief update on the whole knee thing. I went and got an X-ray (actually, four) and nothing’s broken. Well, I knew that I didn’t break anything. They knew that I didn’t break anything, but in order to get a referral from my HMO primary doctor to an orthopedic, I had to have an X-ray. Well, the orthoped doesn’t need the X-ray, because they know it’s not broken, what they really want is an MRI, but they can’t order an MRI until they see me. But before they order an MRI, they have to do an X-ray ... you can see where this is going.

Mostly, I don’t want to waste anyone’s time or precious radiation. But really, I must learn that’s not how modern medicine works. Hey, maybe I’ll work all of this into my novel anyway. I haven’t had an X-ray since I was nine and went to have my tonsils out (don’t ask my why I had to have a head X-ray for that… I recall that they couldn’t decide whether my ear infections were being caused by severe strep infections or a brain tumor ... go figure). This was less scary than that. And they let me keep my clothes on.

The silly result of all of this is that I still can’t get an appointment with an actual physician until the 30th. By then I’ll be completely healed and look like a real nutcase.

But hey, I got some cool pictures out of it! That’s really my patella there. My femur, my tibia ... am I revealing too much?

POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:15 pm    

Friday, October 18, 2002

Word of the Week: Typetive

typ e?tive [ tai pEh tihv ]
adjective
inclined to excessive writing: tending to write readily and at length

also
- typ e?tive?ly adverb
- typ e?tive?ness noun

Usage note: typetive, a general and fairly neutral word for somebody who writes a lot, especially as a matter of disposition

Usage Example: “When Raina was feeling particularly typetive, her sister could get emails from her that were well over 2,000 words long.”

Thesaurus
Typetive (adj)
Synonyms: chatty, loquacious, verbose, garrulous, voluble, prolific, fluent, glib, conversational Antonym: reticent, brief

POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:21 pm    

Wednesday, October 16, 2002

The Philosophy

image About two years ago I started living my life by a new philosophy. One that fits in perfectly with NaNoWriMo.

Basically, if you want to accomplish anything in your life, you’re going to have to start somewhere and you’re going to have to turn off that critic in your head that tells you things like, “Anything worth doing is worth doing well.” I’m not buying that anymore. My attitude is this: Make a list of the things you want to do and start doing them. Check them off. If you liked it the first time, then go back and do it again and do it well.

I wanted to write a novel. And I hoped to write a great novel. But let’s face it, even though I’m an experienced writer, chances were pretty damn good that my first novel was going to be rather weak. So why pour my soul into it? Why not get the first one out of the way and then either go back and rewrite it entirely or use that experience to go on and write a good novel?

I’m putting this into action in other areas of my life too. I’m in training (well, will restart the training after the knee heals) for the Los Angeles Marathon. I’m not even going to run it. I’m going to walk it. Which might sound like a cop out, but to walk a marathon takes about seven hours. That’s a commitment. And if I like it, maybe I will take up jogging and run it the next year. Or at least I’ll have my little medal and can tell folks that I wanted to be in a marathon, and I was in a marathon.

Lower your expectations. Broaden your horizons.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:32 am     NaNoWriMo

The New Report Cards Are Here!

image And I thought I was detail oriented.

It was on my list. I was going to create an excel spreadsheet to track my progress and create a little chart I could post and all. But someone done gone and beat me to it. Erik posted this thingy.

The scary thing is that I was so fascinated by it that I actually took all of my totals from last year and plugged them in to see how I did. Now, I know I finished. I finished a day early! Why would I need to plug last years numbers into the spreadsheet? I am such a pathetic nut sometimes. Anyway, as you can guess, the spreadsheet told me I finished. It gave me a swell graph and at the end of the month, my little pie chart was all one color because my novel was 100%.

As for an update on the whole knee thing ... well, it’s been five days and the dang thing still smarts. I don’t know why I got it into my head that I could just walk it off or something. But it’s getting better slowly. I’ll be working from home for the most part these next few weeks. So perhaps that means more frequent updates! Or additional complaining.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 12:10 am     NaNoWriMo

Saturday, October 12, 2002

File This Under Things That Could Slow You Down

imageSo, tonight I got my first experience at an emergency room as an adult. I’m afraid I watch too much TV and was quite disappointed to find it all rather civilized. I was in and out in about an hour and half. It’s the first time I’ve actually been grateful for my health insurance ... I actually specified this civilized hospital as my critical care of choice.

Anyway, I’ve been immobilized. Apparently I’ve blown out some tendons or something in my knee. And this doesn’t relate much to my noveling except for the fact that they said that I have to wear this dang knee brace for six to eight weeks. Somehow, I don’t see that happening. I see, maybe a week.

But I am going on vacation anyway. Gives me an excuse to snuggle down with a good book and order room service, eh?

POSTED BY Cybele AT 2:21 am    

Friday, October 11, 2002

How Much is Too Much?

imageIt seems that many, many people are taking NaNoWriMo very seriously. Perhaps it is the fact that I know I can do it that I’m feeling a little cocky. I do have hindsight. But I also have this terrible problem of wearing these vision correcting rose colored glasses ... I forget that I must have struggled to finish. I look over some of my postings in my log and realize that I must have had trouble. I was 13,000 words behind on November 15th.

But I can’t imagine being “prepared.” Perhaps it’s the fact that I write from my brain and not from my notes, but I can’t have chapters and outlines. Maybe I could, but somehow I think that’d take all the fun out of it. What if I knew what was going to happen, I mean, really happen in my novel? What’d be the point. I like writing to find out.

I’ve got an idea, I’ve got questions and the only way to answer them is to start writing and let that figure them out for me. I think writing is really a computer. I input ideas and the act of writing solves them for me.

But again, maybe I’m not doing this the proper way. I’m amazed to see that people have so much done already. How can you name a chapter already? How do you know that you have 14 chapters in the first place?

Well, I’m not even going to think about it this weekend. I’m off on a trip up the coast and I’m going to shut off my writing brain and turn on my paddling and hiking brain.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:45 pm     NaNoWriMo

Wednesday, October 09, 2002

What about the Look?

imageOkay, I’ve been dicking around with the look of the blog for about a week now.

And you’re probably asking yourself, “Why the engraved design elements?” Well, my novel is supposed to have a large component about counterfitting. So, in order to inspire or remind me or whatever, I decided to give my blog a bit of a look to that effect.

What it has meant, however, is that I have spent hour upon hour on eBay looking at scans of money from around the world. Really. It’s quite addictive.

I’m thinking of having some illustrations for my novel as well. Perhaps picking portraits from currency for each of my characters. Would that confuse anyone? To see an engraved little picture of, oh, say Bernardo O’Higgins when I mention Dwight, the babyfaced Secret Service agent? Let me know if you think that’s a bad idea.

I thought it’d help me focus. Or be a total distraction.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 4:25 pm    

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During November it's all about me writing a novel. Sometimes it's about whalewatching. You know, and then there's other stuff.