Month: November 2014

NaNoWriMo — Day 20 (2,059) (WTHH)


And here we are at day 20 and I’ve got not much to show for it. Granted, a large portion of this month has been filled will illness and pain. And, because of that, a serious lack of sleep. All in all, it hasn’t been a good month for writing.
I am disappointed. I had hoped to do things differently this year and to really keep on track and, hopefully, end up with something I was kind of happy with at the end of the month. 
There are many times when I do something for someone else because I don’t want them to be disappointed. I’ll do whatever I can to make someone else happy. 
This year I’m faced with quite a few problems. This illness, my cat’s health problems, the fact that I’ll be laid off in a few days and, because of that, will be spending my holidays doing nothing, going nowhere, and not spending any money. 
Last November I set a goal for myself. Not too many people cared about it, but I did. I worked hard to meet that goal. When I finally hit 50,000 words I was ecstatic because I had done what I set out to do.
This year, again, even though it’s not important to anyone else, I set a goal and failed. Miserably. I disappointed myself and I’m having a hard time reconciling that. Sure, I’ve got reasons why I didn’t make it but, in retrospect, they sound like excuses. Maybe having my face split at the seams is an excuse, maybe not. It’s just hard to take at this point what with everything else falling apart. 

NaNoWriMo — Day 03 (2,059)


One of the problems with working is that it cuts into the writing time. Not that I’m complaining; I’d rather have a paying job than writing a book that won’t make any money. I’ll all for art and all but the bills still need to be paid.
I wish I was the type of person who could just say whatever is at the top of my mind. I can’t, though. Anytime I open my mouth I’ve already run through a conversation and tried to assess what the ramifications would be. Would it be good or bad for me? Would it affect someone else? What will the person I’m talking to think? Should I be honest? Should I sidestep something? What was the question again?
I think, for better or worse, I’d be better off just blurting it all out and letting whatever happens happen.
Not much writing got done today. Technically I’m two days behind. Am I worried? Not a bit! There’s still a lot of time left. Oodles of it.

NaNoWriMo — Day 01 (1,700)


And so it begins. It took me a while but I finally got to 1,700 words today. I think it took about three hours. I don’t think it’s a good sign to be struggling this early in the month but, hey, maybe it’ll get easier.
I went to lunch with a friend of mine today on account of it being my birthday tomorrow. I thought I’d shave. What a mistake. I ended up making the smallest of nicks on the side of my nostril. It bled like a fountain for about an hour. I tried sticking pieces of toilet paper on the wound, which, by the way, was probably less than half a millimeter in length, but the flow of blood just made it drop off.
Finally, I decided that no matter how stupid it looked I would put a bandage on it. I don’t have any of those small round corn bandages, though. Worse, I couldn’t find any normal sized ones, either. I had to use the gigantic “I gots a boo boo on my elbow” bandages. Now, the cut was on the bottom of the nostril, right where it meets the lip. I positioned the bandage as best I could so that it was only partially blocking my nasal passages. It also covered my mouth, that’s how big this bandage was. 
Boy, did it look stupid. I probably should have put a tourniquet around my neck. I walked around for a while like that, getting dressed and all. When I finished getting ready I ripped it off and was instantly glad that I had already shaved. Thankfully, it had stopped bleeding and I was able to get a good look at the cut. Or I would have if it were large enough to be visible to the unaided eye.
This goes along with the other day when I re-smashed the toe I smashed a while ago. And that bled for ages, too. There was blood all over the place. I can’t imagine having emergency people show up and looking at my pale, lifeless body and thinking, “This guy went out by stubbing his toe and getting a micro gash on his shnozz.” What a way to go. Luckily, that didn’t happen.
I went to lunch and it was great, as it usually is. The server even gave me a goodie bag, which was leftover from last night. For the kids. That reminded me of when I first moved into this apartment. When my birthday came around I found a balloon and a bag of candy tied to my door knob with a note saying, “Happy Birthday!” The candy, it seemed to me, was leftover from Halloween. It’s not often one gets candy corn but when one does it’s almost surely Halloween.
Then I came home. I made sure not to turn on the Windows computer because that would mean games. So I fired up the laptop and typed away. I was interrupted a couple of times, but that’s all right. Sometimes a breather comes in handy. 
Hopefully tomorrow will go just as smoothly and I can crank out another 1,700 or more words. I’d kind of like to build up a buffer of extra words now so that I can slack off later on. 
My strategy this year will be to write the big important bits that I think of first and then somehow connect them. This seemed to work for me well last year, even though I think that story is an utter travesty. I should probably go back and read it. I’m sure it needs editing but I suspect the entire thing will need to be re-written.
Well, Happy November to ya.