November 5, 2007
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NaNoing Like a War Weasel ...
I love English. The noun NaNo invented only a few short years ago has become a verb in my lexicon. And the best part? My family and friends totally get that. I NaNo every year. Last year I NaNoed a semi-autobiographical story - very cleansing experience. This year I'm NaNoing the most complicated novel I've ever attempted. To accomplish my goals I have to be "NaNoing like a War Weasel" every spare minute.
That's my new phrase, I love new phrases. I'm using that one excessively because I'm in love with the alliteration and the slanted rhyme. I NaNoed pretty hard on Saturday. Brought my total word count to 10,028 which is 28 words more than exactly double the number I would need to have in order to be on pace. I'm working at double pace for a lot of reasons. First, I had a "bye" day yesterday. With church and quilting for charity obligations, I wasn't able to do any writing so I needed to have my bank padded for just such days. Secondly, I know that Thanksgiving is coming and there is a chance that if I'm not at 49,000 at least before the turkey is served, I will not make it to the finish line. And lastly, I'm cheating.
Here's what I'm doing. I've lined up a plot genius to help me when I get stuck. I'm not sitting at my desk agonizing over whether the character in question should do A or B. When I realize that I'm coming up on such dilemmas, I call my plot genius, outline the situation and get an immediate, "They do B, then they do C, and you need to mention D, and I'll be thinking about the subplot while you work on that."
How cool is that?Well, to me it's exceedingly cool, but it does somewhat violate the spirit of the thing if not the letter. (I am after all writing 50,000 words and as anyone who's done this knows, no matter how much you talk about your story, unless the words actually get written, it's just talk.)
Okay, I have a little while before it's time to log in to my work, so I'm gonna go NaNo a bit and see if I can't get a jump on today's count.
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Tucker talking about his cat: "I'm the boss of Joe, but Joe doesn't seem to know that."
Comments (11)
When the last thing you think about before heading to bed is the next place in your story, and the first thing that comes to mind when you wake up is a scene that would follow the scene from the night before, you know that your brain is in NaNo mode.
Congrats on the word count!
That is cool....who is your plot genius?
Good luck. Just keep writing.
Sounds cool.
Cats don't have owners. cats have staff.
who IS your plot genius?????
I'm almost afraid to ask what a war weasel looks like when nanoing? *smirk*
Much luck to you in this year's endeavour!
Sounds as if you already have this thing whipped! Where can I get a plot genius? Can you buy them at Wal-Mart?
Who's your plot genius and how can I buy them out?
Good luck with your month of power writing!
NO! Not minimizing at all. That is very encouraging! Thank you!
'gratz!
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