IWSG December

Holy crap it's Wednesday.  And the first Wednesday of the month.  I promised to get back to a regular posting schedule and damnit the hump of the week has arrived.  Which means it's time for....

For those of you not having a clue what the Insecure Writers Support Group is just that.  An official site has recently been launched which has tons and tons and TONS of fantastic resources for writers, struggling or not.  There is also a Facebook community for quick access to great knowledge and an open ear.  Do it!


It's gonna be the NaNoWriMo version today!  Mostly.  If anything, re-entering the world after NaNoWirMo.

Like I mentioned in my previous post, I was spending the next few days of November (all 2 days left of it) to take care of the many things I had left alone while cranking out my 2,000 words per day goal.  Christmas decorating, grocery shopping, random mini-projects around the house, dusting, laundry, the usual.  Monday I headed into work, running around bragging what I had accomplished.  As I work at a car dealership, I got a lot of those shut-up-and-sell-a-car looks, but a few were thrilled at what I had been able to do.  Even more surprised when I told them that the story itself was only halfway done (yes, I have tons more to write, more on that another day).

Now during my lunch break for the past month, I took my sexy ultrabook up to the meeting room and cranked out between 600 and 900 words, stuffing a turkey sandwich in my mouth and not really seeing any light of day on what was a break at work.  Oh wait, I did it!  I have my breaks back!  I took that time to run to Meijer for a couple things and Sears to check the price on some tools Adam wants for Christmas.  That was it.

What?  Wasn't there stuff I would normally do?  Hmmm, I had to think.  Get lunch?  Nah, I got into a habit of bringing something every day.  Oh well, guess I'll just chill at my desk and get caught up on Feedly and my blogs I follow.  That was weird.

I get home.  BAM!  I was go-go-go-ing with a ton of things.  Then it was ONLY 8:30.  What else did I have to do?  Anything?  I don't have 2,000 words to write.  I actually got to RELAX in the evening.  Holy shit, THAT was weird.


Point?  These past 30 days finally tweaked something in me.  You know the method/idea that it takes 28 days to create or break a habit?  It's true.  Super true.  Like insanely true.  While I am taking a good week off from my novel before going back to continue the story, I'm finding I have a shit-ton of spare time now.  I always felt when I first dove in to NaNoWriMo that I'd have zero time with a full-time job.  While it was partly true, (Monday through Friday I really did nothing but write), now that my schedule is "clear," I'm just amazed with the time I really do have.

And then I go into my dark little hole of, "Oh my sweet baby Jesus, the amount of this time I have spent gaming and nothing else!"  I try not to go there.


But yes, that means I do truly have the time to get my Batman: Arkham Asylum on. 

*emerges from a cave*

This just in:


I HAVE WON NANOWRIMO!

I need not excuse myself from ZERO POSTS in almost a month.... but this is clearly why.  And it was COMPLETELY WORTH IT.

I do intend on getting back to a regular blogging schedule once we fully roll into December.  For the remaining days of this month, I shall be sleeping, Christmas decorating (usual for Thanksgiving weekend), and catching up on a few things I've neglected while working on MY GOD DAMNED NOVEL I WROTE LIKE A BOSS.

Other than that, I do wish all of my few followers here a wonderful Thanksgiving (all 45 minutes that are left).  I am extremely thankful for all the love and support I have received from friends and family.  More details of this crazy journey next week.

I can now finally pass out into a food coma.

November IWSG and Day 6 of NaNoWriMo

Ah, Insecure Writer's Support Group day during NaNoWirMo.

I have been waiting for this day since joining the group a few months ago.

First, my lack of blog activity is DEFINITELY due to my participation in NaNoWriMo.  And it's been done (or not done) on purpose.  Keeping up with my current pace, even with a day off and one writer's block filled evening, I WILL win/finish this year.  Damnit I will call in sick to work for a day or two if I have to in order to get this done.  The OWNER of the auto-dealership I work at donated to my cause, AND matched my donation, so I'm making him cookies when this is all over.  I HAVE TO WIN!!

Yes, if anyone matches my donation, you will get cookies from me.  I don't care who you are or where you're located, homemade cookies.  Do it all for the cookie.

Seriously though, I will blog here once a week during NaNo, I don't want to completely check out and I don't mean to.  Nag me if it's next Wednesday already and there's nothing here.


I'm feeling pretty good so far with NaNoWriMo.  I did hit a bit of a wall last night, as I mentioned, not reaching by personal daily goal, but I came very close to reaching the NaNo "suggested" goal of 1,667 words (my goal is 2k, I did 1,619 to give a point of reference).  I've been lucky enough to be able to get writing done on my lunch break by taking over the meeting room at work and going at it on my sexy ultra-book I love so much.  I've normally hit an average of 800 to 1k words then, but yesterday, man, only 600.  And I wasn't getting all ADHD and screwing around on Facebook and other things.  I stared at Word and my outline/prewriting and not a thing could come over.  I knew what I had to write about, I just couldn't spit the words out.  The same thing happened at home, only I spewed out 1k over a course of 3 hours.  THREE HOURS!  I have up when I saw it was 10PM and climbed in bed.

Bleh.

And today, tomorrow as well, I work the late shift at work, 11AM to 8PM, getting home at 8:30.  Yes, I could be using my two hours this morning to work on my word count.  Will I?  depends how much longer it takes me to write this blog post.  Plus I gotta shave my legs so I'll need more time to shower.

TMI.  Sorry.  But serious, I got Endor all over my calves and Adam's getting weirded out.  I know there's sacrifices to be made this month to achieve 50k and there's the whole No Shave November, but yeah, sorry, no, Robin Williams legs have no place here.  Moving on!

I woke up this morning and sat at my computer knowing I wasn't going to write in terms of my novel.  This morning, at least.  I really wanted to share this blog post as I'm positive there others in the IWSG also doing NaNo who may not be "pros" and more of a newbie like me.

Hey, read this.

50,000 words.  Fifty thousand words.  That's fucking frightening.

BUT.

It's a rough draft.  I've read so many things about firsts drafts of a novel, as I'm sure you have, and guess what.  They're a fucking mess.  I had to take time this morning to remind myself of that.  If you have to crank out 2,000 words that sound like a preschooler retelling their version of Little Red Riding Hood, so be it.  Because you are most likely going to go back in December or January or whenever and start to revise it.  THEN you can make it sound bad ass, in your voice, without plot holes, and with all the names of the characters.  I am still referring to a key player as Good Guy Board Member and another as Asshat Board Member.  I will use Ctrl+F in December to find all those and change them to Brad and Gavin or whatever I decide.

Focus your energy on QUANTITY right now.  I have to keep telling myself that.  QUALITY is for December, QUANTITY is what will give you bragging rights to run around the house in your pajamas on November 30th at 11:30PM when you reach that 50k.


I am awesome at being a sarcastic hardass if you want help getting nudged along, or want to help nudge me along.  Find me at any of these procrastination stations:

NaNoWriMo Forums: doregan8
Tumblr: Dara the Writer
Twitter: @DaratheWriter



Sidenote: HOLY SHIT THE BEARS BEAT THE PACKER AND WE BROKE AARON ROGERS!!  That is all.

One more sidenote: Chuck Wendig I find absolutely hilarious, truthful, and some of the best and my most favorite pieces of wisdom when it comes to writing.  I highly suggest following his blog, if you're not already, during this month for "conversations" he has with you during the NaNoWriMo Journey.

Countdown and last minute goals

Including today, I have 3 more planning days for NaNoWirMo.  I feel like I haven't even breached the main guts of my story in my pre-writing/planning.

You are wise to be thinking, "Well Dara, what the hell have you been doing?"

Not.  A.  Whole.  Lot.

I've seriously shut myself off from the world of writing, between avoiding my own blog, blogs I read, site and forums I visit, I just stopped.  I don't know why, it's not like I haven't had time.  And sure I've gone to my comfort zone of, "Let's play Age of Empires instead of writing."  But even worse, my head was having me clean the oven and reorganize the spare bedroom before sitting down with my notebook and writing.

Yes.  I cleaned the damn oven before writing.  No, it is not a fancy, self-cleaning oven.

You are wise to be thinking, ".... what the fuck, Dara!?"

After having a way-too-fun lunch with my close friend Angie, I got myself re-inspired.  My novel is kinda-sorta zombie-ish, as I've mentioned.  I shared with Angie the main story and other fun bits of what I have planned, and knowing the LOVES the undead/zombie genre, she nearly piddled in excitement.  After that,the last thing I wanted to do was go back to work for 4 hours.  I wanted to get back to pre-writing.

I need to be talking about my novel and the story ALL THE TIME.  That's what works for me.  The kinks that I need to plow through are the 8 hours at work where I can't really do that and an average of 7 to 8 hours of sleep.

So, 3 days left, two at this point.  A few things I have want to achieve...

1. Be story-planning at least an hour for the next couple days.  This at least covers my lunch break OR right after work.
2. Launch and share my NaNoWirMo Fundraising Page.  SHAMELESS PLUG!  If you would like, no, love to sponsor me, awesome!  And if you match my own donation of $50, you'll get a little batch of homemade, family recipe Christmas cookies!  For reals.  They rock.  They're my great-grandmother's cookies and I've mastered a few of them.  Moving on.
3. Get fully caught up on the NaNo Forums.  I've been drifting in and out.  I get overwhelmed with the amount of new posts to track (and I'm not too fond with the removal of the "subscription/watching" for specific boards).  I do want to have this as a quick resource/time-killer and I just need to get down and familiar with it.

Just keep breathing.... just keep breathing....

NaNoWirMo Spotlight and Liebster Award!

Will I ever not post during the week then promise myself to make it up Fridays or over the weekend?  Hell no.

My week got thrown for a loop when I came down with an out-of-nowhere fever that left as soon as it showed up.  It hit 102 degrees on Thursday.  My rule of thumb is go to work no matter what, unless I'm dead, have something super contagious, or have a fever (this is assuming I don't have sick days... which I don't yet).  I called in, everything was fine... until my boss made me feel bad about calling in as one of the other women in our group had the day off and another has strep... so she did kinda make me feel that a fever wasn't good enough.  So I went in.  And it was awful.  And I felt like this about it...

As of Friday evening, I was fully recovered, and celebrated with illicit beverages.... which is a typical Friday for me either way.



So yeah!  Chris Kelworth is doing a series of spotlights of people who will be participating in NaNoWirMo this year.  I said I was interested to be featured for, shits and giggles, and BLAM!  Check me out!  Thanks for the feature, Chris!

And check this out!  Jennifer Chow swings by my blog and lets me know that she's nominated me for a Liebster Award.  First, I was confused and thought it was Leapster and felt that this in no way is a chile-appropriate blog (see gif above).  Then, I got all giddy.  Apparently what I share here is interesting enough for people to find their way here one way or another and see who the hell this "Dara" is and why she claims to be a writer.  So that being said...

I want to credit Evelyne Holingue with the best description of the Liebster Award:

"Liebster comes from the German verb Lieben, which means to love. Liebster is the superlative form of the adjective lieb, which means kind, likeable, lovely. As a noun liebster also means sweetheart and boyfriend. Ah the complexities of the German language!  As I understand it, the Liebster Award is like a little gift from one blogger to another."

Mission for me this week, share the love.  Rules are as follows:

1. Write a post about the nomination and link back to the nominator’s site.
2. In that post, explain the meaning of the award and answer the questions given to you.
3. Create questions for your nominees.
4. Nominate 5 blogs with fewer than 1000 followers.
5. Contact nominees and let them know that you have nominated them.
6. Post the award button on your blog.

First, anyone who I nominated, please do use these same questions (add or subtract); I borrowed them from Jennifer as I liked them.  Second, I'll be searching for said nominees this week.

My nominees:
Samantha May, at Writing Through College
Julie Luek, at A Thought Grows
M.J. Fifield, at My Pet Blog
Shannon O'Regan, at Papillon D'Amour (p.s. that's my mama's blog!)
DB, at 204 and Losing it


Do you remember your first blog post?
In days of yore, I had a LiveJournal.  Remember that?  Apparently it still exists, and it looks just awful.  End tangent.  I've tried to start blogs many times since then, and at this point they're all a blur.  My first post on this one here was a bit of an intro post, who I was, what I'm trying to do, the usual.

Why are you blogging?
Partly at the recommendation of my friend (see that first post I mentioned), also as an excuse to write to fill my daily quota.  Mostly to share the experience of starting out.  I'd like to think I have a fun sense of humor, so the ride should be entertaining.

What do you like best and least about blogging?
Best: sharing and meeting new people and communities online.  It's fun, and for me, the best way to find support in writing.  Least: actually sitting down to blog.  Example, I've been trying to post this entry since Friday.  I suck.  I procrastinate like it's my job and I get all ADHD so I just never OH SHINEY RED BALL!

What blogs do you like to follow?
My current news feed is filled with writing blogs; I find if I surround myself in it, I'll get it done myself (most of the time).  Though there's a few other I follow.  Friends, family, sites like xkcd and Penny Arcade.

What would you like to share with your readers that they might not know about you?
I got my head caught in a revolving door when I was six-years-old.  Yes, I still avoid them at all costs.

If money, job and family weren’t an issue where would you live and why?
Ireland.  It's a hell of a lot more laid back and filled with less bullshit that here.

Have you learned more from your successes or failures?
I'm still learning.  And at a quick glance, from my failures.

What one key message do you want your readers to take away from your blog?
Oooooo.... never thought of having a message.  Right now, I just see it as sharing my experiences while I go through with this whole novel/writing thing.

Do you prefer the book to the movie or the movie to the book?
I go both ways.  (HA!)  Some books I would have never read if it weren't for the movie, and vice versa.  Some movies butcher the crap out of the book, some do well on their own.

The image says it all.

Damn straight.

I did at least want to get a quick post up.  Here's a few fun tidbits.

TIMELINE COMPLETE!  That's right!  I finished the timeline for my NaNo novel!  What's hilarious is that I didn't think I finished it.  I sat down with Adam again after he read it and he goes, "Okay so what's next?"  I have to finish the timeline.  "I read it.  It's done."  It is?  "Yup."  Oh.  Well that's just wonderful!

Next I'm working on my characters.  This I'm finding difficult.  I've looked at scores of character sheets, and sweet jesus, TMI (too much information)!  Superstitions?  Phobias?  Pet peeves?  Annoying gestures they do?  I can see this being awesome, but right now, as other than the timeline, I have written nothing about any of these people.  Other than figuring out last names, fuck, first names, I'm starting with basics; seriously, my timeline is littered with things such as Spanish Lawyer, Social Worker, Good Guy Board Member, Asshat Board Member, Woman Similar To Sylvanas Windrunner.

Last night the following phrase left my mouth: "Honey, I'm going to get in bed with my new toy while you finish up with that."

I'm priceless.

Really though, I got my sexy new ultrabook: Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga.  It's a laptop, it's a tablet, it's frickin' awesome!  The keyboard flips around to use as a tablet, but as it's not a tablet, I can still run Word and other such programs.  What's even better is that Adam spotted it for half the price online as a refurbished model.  I love it!  Now when November hits I don't have to be tied to my desktop.

Only there's not a whole lot of places in this area with WiFi, other than McDonald's.... and call me snobby, but I ain't sitting in McDonald's for 2 hours writing.

October IWSG

Awesome news in terms of Alex J Cavanaugh's Insecure Writer's Support Group.  There's a full website now!  I'm very excited to be apart of this group in the mist of the awesome upgrades.  You can find it here!


Now, on to how freakin' insecure I am.  It's quite entertaining as it reared its ugly and nonsense head last night.

October has begun, and with my, my goal of having my novel plotted out by November 1.  Nails already chewed off, I get home from work knowing I would get something written down by the end of the night, some sort of early planning.

What came out of it was Adam fully realizing how my brain operates, or cannot operate, between my actually diagnosed generalized anxiety disorder and my pretend diagnosed obsessive compulsiveness.  Because we both have a twisted sense of humor, we got both frustrated and laughed hysterically knowing I was going in circles and he was about to have a nosebleed trying to keep it as simple as possible.

I look at my big goal, the main goal, write a novel, and that's all I see.  Okay, that's fine.  But really, marketing and publishing and revising aside, actually WRITING it takes steps.  And then, the steps take steps.  This is where my head goes, "Bitch, you're on your own," and looks to go play World of Warcraft or some other game, maybe even wash the living room floor instead.

I wrote down research undead and then plot novel, and immediately complain that I can't come up with other stuff.  "I need to decide on the ending."  "Okay, put that under plot a novel."  "Wait, I didn't make room, DAMNIT."  *rips out paper and starts again*

This was an hour and a half... plus with the also pretend diagnosis of ADHD, we both kept getting off track arguing about how a disease would still be in the family with chromosomes and how I had a brief lesson on that as I nearly failed biology in high school.

I still wanted to come up with a daily goal of what to accomplish, weekly goals of what to accomplish, just a plan; I need a plan down because if I don't articulate every little thing, I won't do it, or half-ass it, and then thing I know it'll be October 30th and I won't have anything but this written down:

Literally my title right now.

So that's happening.  BUT!  The ONE THING I decided on was, by Friday, have the timeline written down.

Which I am already scared to do because I need to plot out the plot at the same time, but need to work on the characters that I have in mind...

Oh god, not again.



And question for those who use Blogger for their blogs.... how the hell do I tell Blogger to stop putting a thick, white frame around images I put here?  It's obnoxious and I find it ugly.  I will cry if it has to do with the HTML.  All I do is click the "insert image" button at the top while drafting a post and then Blogger gets all, "Hey, let me put this stupid shit around your image for you."  Can I get around this easily?

The planning commences!

So between football games yesterday, I asked Adam if he would help me get some goals/deadlines down for the month of October in regards to NaNoWirMo planning.  Of course he said yes because that's why he's the most awesome man in the universe.

We got totally off-track.  But good off track.  In explaining kinda-outline method I was going to use for planning, he says, "You know, if I were a book publisher or agent, and you brought me a story that is basically about dealing with vampires, I'd turn you away."

No, he wasn't being overly cockey since his Detroit Lions beat my Chicago Bears yesterday (don't get me started, it was a bad weekend for football in Dara-land).  I at first was like WTF honey, screw you too!  But from a point of view, he's right.  Vampire tales WERE all over the place, and it's petering out now.  Twilight books and movies are over, True Blood got cancelled, everyone and their mom is/has been doing vampirey stories and novels.

Know what's all trendy?  Zombies.  The whole living dead thing.  Yes, I suppose zombies will go the way of vampires as far as literature/TV/movie fodder and open the door to minotaurs or whatever after that.  But he threw me his thought knowing in my what was then current vampire story a massive plot hole that I was going to try and avoid at all costs, he solved it.  Just by dumping Dracula's spawn for Shaun of the Dead.

And it totally works.

I had a dream centered around it (kind of), could barely get to sleep last night, started thinking more about it in the shower this morning.  BLAM!




So being October 1st tomorrow (WHERE THE FUCK HAS 2013 GONE?!), we got back on track after I started wigging out how to re-tool all the scenes I already had in my head, and decided not to fully can the method I was going to do, but to at least get all my thoughts down (because NONE of them are), timeline it all out.  This will help as well because we also developed a huge pre-history of how my MC got to where she's at and how the current society is how it is.  Which I really hope will help me decide on an ending.

Because I have no idea what it will be now.

That, and will it be a series or just one book.  NO, no, nope!  Work on writing it all out THEN split it up if I need to.

Follow Fest aftermath and countdown

In case you're not sure what day it is...

Yup.  I totally just did that.  Good luck getting that song out of your head.


First off, a ginormous THANK YOU to Melissa Maygrove and her brilliant idea of Follow Fest 2013!  I've discovered so many more awesome blogs to which I'll meet so many other writers.  THANK YOU as well for all the folks who stopped by here and dropped me a note and followed me on Tumblr and Twitter.  Now I got some accountability to be sure I stay on top of things here and there.

I feel like I kinda "failed" at this follow fest.  I literally made my post (which was insanely short compared to others I saw), quickly added new blogs to my Feedly every day.... and that was it.  I read most of them, super-duper quickly.  There's seriously so many I follow now where even if I do stay on top of them all, it'll take forEVER to go through!

And like I've said, with a full-time job and trying to write, time's a factor for me.

You're right, I also shouldn't be comparing my blog/post to others.  That's what I do, I always compare myself.  I'm nearly 32 and I'm still floundering around financially and with a career/job, and there go all my friends, being happy doing what they like and aren't working on filing bankruptcy.

Yes, I am VERY HARD on myself.  It's difficult NOT to do.  I can only imagine how my system is going to handle life after writing a novel, i.e. revising and editing and getting someone to publish and whatever the hell else happens.

Wow, that escalated quickly.

At least I didn't stab anyone in the heart with a trident.  Moving on....

So THANK YOU again for the comments, follows, and love and hugs and so forth.

I'll be setting some hardcore goals this weekend for October to be sure I can get down to planning the novel for NaNoWirMo.  Adam rocks at keeping me in check by withholding beer, cheese, potatoes and sex from me if I don't follow through.

Follow Fest 2013

By the way, welcome and thanks for staring at this mess of crap I call a blog!

Name:
Dara (the Writer) O'Regan

Fiction or nonfiction?
FICTION! Mostly. Though I'm pondering a psuedo-memoir once I get through what will be my first novel in November.


What genres do you write?
With the few stories I have in mind right now, I'd say fantasy, satire/comedy, historical fiction, biography/memoir. Maybe. Kinda sorta.


Are you published?
Oh, I will be.


Do you do anything in addition to writing?
Currently, I do not. I do want to one day be writing full-time, or at least be in the field. Editing sounds fun.


Where can people connect with you?
EVERYWHERE! No, not really. I have a "contact me" form to the right if you'd like to shoot me an email, as well as....

Blog (choose your favorite follow method to the right)
@DaraTheWriter
Tumblr


Is there anything else you’d like us to know?
Clearly, I am at the beginner level of writing. I'll be participating in NaNoWirMo this year, so expect to see much news of that as we get closer to November. Expect to also see the typical speed bumps and rainbow farts any other new writer would share.... only mine are more awesome because I'm Irish, I'm hilarious, and I will occasionally post after indulging in a few beers. OCCASIONALLY. I want to keep the girlish figure.


Thank you again for stopping by! I shall surely be of a great source of entertainment, at the very least.

More blogs because I clearly can't read enough of them

Are you like me and want to read more blogs than you have time for?

Lesson that was learned today.... check my feeds and read them on a DAILY basis.  Between football and catching up, took me 3 hours to get through a week's worth of posts.  Oy vey.

So yeah, answer my question.

If so, I highly encourage you to join up for Follow Fest 2013.  It going to be a great way to find new blogs of fellow writers to stalk and commiserate with... I seem to use those two words together a lot.  Melissa Maygrove is the host/creator.  She also reshared a post of hers with some tips on making sure your blog is to the max that it can be as far as social marketing/networking.

You may have noticed a few new tidbits to the right.  :)  Watch for my post this Tuesday!

Outside of writing, I turned into Betty Frickin' Crocker over night and made kick-ass granola bars from scratch on Saturday and we cranked out some awesome turkey chili today.

Writing advice; who, where, when

Over at the Pub(lishing) Crawl blog, which I HIGHLY recommend, there was a recent article written by Julie Eshbaugh that had to do with managing all the writing advice that's available on the internet.  Yes, holy cow, there's a ton.  And that's exactly what Julie was saying, along with her thoughts on getting and following suggestions and opinions of other writers.

As not just a writer, but a newbie writer, here's my two or three cents from that perspective.


I found it as a surprise that the thought of not getting writing tips from a writer was even mentioned.  My first thought was, "Wow, so someone who wants to be a writer is chatting it up with plumbers and financial advisers?  That's odd."  The analogy I used in my comment to Julie's post about a chiropractor at a proctologist convention nailed it.  I thought so at least.  That aspect just seems so obvious, I won't waste your reading time on it.

Hi, I want to learn how best prepare and cook fresh lobster.  I'm meeting with a chef born and raised in Cheyenne, Wyoming tomorrow.  WTF!?

Okay, ending that rant.

My fellow writing-newbs... holy shit, there's so much advice out there for us!  It's amazing and overwhelming at the same time!  Between getting this new path of mine started and still holding the full-time job to pay the bills (which to remind you, has nothing to do with writing), it will take me a whole week to get through all the info I find regularly.  And even then, I've found 6 more blog posts that each have their own recommendations after that for the next week.  It's the Neverending Story Part IV, and Falcore's luck with finding all these tidbits is getting ridiculous.  I feel like I know so much but have actually written so little.  Oh wait, that's because it's true!

One thing I have stuck with (oh no, more advice!) is researching in order.  There are posts about world-building, character sheets, finding an agent, finding a publisher, ways to plan a novel, ways to plan flash fiction, how to market your novel, designing a cover, software, pens, notebooks, it's insane.  In my case, I am wanting to prepare for NaNoWirMo this year.  I know I want to plan my novel out and not "pants" through it because I know from previous experience, I suck at it.  If I see a blog post in my feeds about how to write a query for the novel I haven't even frickin' written yet, I'm not going to read it.  Sure, I'll flag it to read another day, because I love the information I get from that blogger, but I'm not going to read it when I'm still defining my novel planning approach.

Once I've survived NaNo, because I'm going to, I will focus on the articles I've found about revising and first drafts and that shit storm.  Then I'll work on the confidence to get critiques.  Then I'll do whatever a suggested next step with my novel would be.

This way works for me between the ADHD and the OCD, so it nails my productivity right on the head.


So long story short, never fear, my fellow writing beginners.  There is an endless supply of knowledge out there.  The best way to sort through it is trial and error.  I've felt I've wasted time stalking some blogs after discovering it's nothing but word count updates and no substance, or forums that haven't had a discussion in the past two months.  We'll all find our little nook and cranny that we'll fit into like the Missing Piece and the Big O.

Here's a swift kick in the pants.

I don't have much of an excuse for taking a week off.  BUT.  I have returned with a fun blog post that I'm sure will give my other fellow writer beginners the shove we need.

Chuck Wendig shared last April (2012 April) 25 Things Writers Should Stop Doing.  No, this is a not a grammar, style, publishing, editing, nothing like that.  It's all about mindset.

And my mindset kinda sucks.  Revolves around that whole anxiety and depression issue, too.

Seriously though, I loved this.  I would totally want to build reading this every day of my life into my daily routine.

In other news, I have acquired my most awesome notebook "system" courtesy of Staples, as well as solving my pen problem; I'm too lazy to drive 45 minutes to pen shop, so I just got refills.

I have been putting off my mission to begin a journal-ing routine.  Actually, I'm putting off trying to establish any sort of routine.  I do have a plan that just came to me: ask Adam for help.

No, Adam doesn't write, but he rocks when it comes to helping me plan out things like that.  Finances, things to do over the weekend, etc.  Sticking to the plan, that's different.  That's all me.  And as I mentioned, my mindset kinda sucks.

Surprise! A Saturday post!

I had SO MUCH FUN participating in this month's Insecure Writer's Support Group!  This was my first formal run of it.  Between the new blogs I discovered and all the visits to my own blog here (and I loved comments/support, THANK YOU!) I am so thrilled!  Huzzah!

I shared a goal of mine for the month of September on the NaNoWirmo Forums.  A few goals, actually, and one of them was to post to the blog twice a week.  I want to keep this blog about my trek through the world of writing, but I must share the following personal info.

I am a Notre Dame fan.  HUGE fan.  Since I was 2 years old.  I kid you not.  Adam, the future husband, is a Michigan fan.  Today is the Day of Reckoning in our house.  Two teams enter.  One person sleeps on the couch.

Having shared that, I am a few beers in.  That's happening.

On to writing!

So I had mentioned I found a "method" of novel planning that from reading it over, seems to fit with how I operate.  Rachel Aaron's post on how how she plots a novel in 5 steps really turned me on *giggle* to this approach.  I found it very similar to Randy Ingermanson's Snowflake Method.  Basically, you start from a short statement on what your novel is, and build from there.  I personally preferred Rachel's method over Randy's, but again, they're both a bit similar.  In my mind at least.

I appreciated the concept of Story Bibles, but it almost seemed that putting one of those together was just as much work, if not more, as writing the novel to begin with.

The Unofficial NaNoWirMo Resource Binder has TONS of info.  Overwhelming at first.  After pillaging through it, I did find some great info (the Snowflake Method being one of them).  I highly recommend it, whether you are participating in NaNo this year or not.

On that note.....

FOOTBALL!!!!!!

Insecure Writer's Support Group

I found this "blog hop" sort of group a month ago, LITERALLY on the first Thursday of the month.  I WOULD find this and have to wait a month to participate next (beyond reading through a few of the blogs involved).

First thing I try to think through on a mere 2 cups of coffee is what do I think "insecure" means.  It's all encompassing.  I feel that any emotion that I am not wanting to be having, particularly anything I deem negative, falls into the "insecure" category.

How does my writing fit in?  Let me count the ways...

Shame: Because it's a horrid thing to not be able to fit in any writing in my busy day.
Guilt: Goes hand-in-hand with the shame.
Paranoia:  OMG, what will people think of me when I start writing shit, let alone READ my shit!?
Confidence: Or lack thereof, also goes with all of the above.
Overwhelmed: 17 tabs open in my Chrome browser with 20 minutes left before I need to get ready for work.
Laziness: More of an action, but hell, that extra 30 minutes laying in bed this morning was wonderful.

I can go on, but like I mentioned.... 20 minutes until I need to get ready for work.

I made some AWESOME progress over the weekend between non-writing errands and to-dos (I finally have clean underwear!), 3-day weekends help with that.  So by the time Monday rolled around, I put a nice dent into the blogs, articles, and guides I have wanted to read regarding planning my writing.  I found a method I am going to try.  Now it's just making myself do it.  Why is that always so hard?!  I'll spend 3 hours screwing around on Kongregate, but I can't sit on the couch and write?  Doesn't help when Adam points out to me that Rift is now free-to-play; by the way, my World of Warcraft subscription finally ended, and I already haven't been on in weeks before that.  I was doing so well!!!

I know, it's practice.  Making the habit.  Just sit and write for 10 minutes a day.  Add 10 more.  Keep going to an hour eventually, or whatever I can fit within the parameters of my full-time job.  What I hate, and I shared this with a friend over the weekend, is planning to write for 10 minutes, or an hour, or whatever, and it ends up taking me that same amount of time to come up with something to write.  Ding!  Time's up!  Need to make something for dinner!  Break's over, time to go back to the job!

Can you tell I over think?  Yes, writing prompts.  Those are nice.  I've posted a few here previously.  But that damn over-thinking is my downfall.  "A guy walks into a Tarot Card reader spot."  I don't know shit about Tarot cards.  So the 10 minutes dedicated to that is just me trying to think of a damn Tarot Card or what the hell the person I have in my head is doing in there.  "Well just write that he thinks that and immediately leaves."  Yeah but then that kinda puts the kabash on that writing prompt.  It said "Tarot Card place," not "bus ride back to the bar."

Add "over think" onto that list above.

Remember how I mentioned laundry being a reason?

It's not just DOING laundry, it's FOLDING it that kills my time.  That and trying to make phone calls to Bank of America regarding my Deed in Lieu.  But I digress.

I found a few GREAT blogs/articles/bits-of-info that I did one of the following with:
- read fully
- read parts for later
- read none of it with the intent to read later

All of wish I will share here.  Paying it forward.

2k per day to 10 per day
The first of 3 blogs posts I found from Pretentious Title.  I loved this thought/planning process and will certainly be applying much of this to my own habits.

Plotting a Novel in 5 Steps
As I've said in every post to this blog thus far, I am at ground zero in terms of any sort of novel/story planning.  I'll read anything, and as this is also from the same blog, I'm sure I'll get a good deal from this post as well.

12 Days of Glory
Haven't read this one yet, but it looks like a bit of an example of Rachel's word count tracking method she explained in the 10k per day post.  I'm a visual person.  Score.

Unofficial NaNoWirMo Recourse Binder
Via the NaNoWirMo Forums I visit and stalk, one of the users there was awesome enough to compile a wealth of knowledge in once place.  Awesome!

Story Bibles
I hadn't heard of this term before until I saw it also discussed at the NaNoWirMo Forums.  It's got my curiosity.


Tomorrow is the Friday before a three-day weekend, and I could not be more excited.  Because I have time to get my lazy ass caught up, get organized, and get some serious planning and preparing for NaNoWirMo and more of my writing life.

And FOOTBALL!!!  Did I mention FOOTBALL?!?!  Just one more thing to distract me.  FOOTBALL!!!!!

Milestone in terms of a realization

Welcome to nearly 2 weeks later!

P.S. It's Hump Day again.  I thought about posting a picture of the Miley Incident, only with her and a camel, but the one I had seen disturbs me.  Use your imagination.

In terms of my writing activity, I have been having a difficult time.  I've been keeping up on the other blogs I follow and the forums I stalk.  I stare at a page I have at work that I use as a "vision board" of sorts that has pictures of writing and pens and notebooks and books that I have written things like, "I wrote this one!" and "This one is a series!" and "This one became a movie!" and "This one became a TV series!"

I have not been writing.

I get very down and hard on myself once in awhile.  When I do, not only am I short, rude, and unloving to myself, but to everyone I am close with.  Adam didn't do anything wrong.  Mom didn't do anything wrong.  If I had the time to spend with my few other close friends, it wouldn't be their fault either.  I am punishing myself because I feel that it is wrong what I'm doing (or not doing), and therefore I have to punish everyone around me to be sure that they can't give me the love I still deserve no matter what I did or didn't do that day?

I've rolled this way for decades.  All three of them.

I had previously alluded to the fact that I long for the day where I don't need to hold a separate job as a source of income.  That I want to one day be able to write when I want and not around a schedule that I have no say in.  I envy people who are at this point in their lives and/or career.  I also envy people who may be creative writers, but they are in a job that still involves writing in some way.  I long for that day, too.  And what sucks as being born in 1982, I'm apart of that instant gratification generation.  It doesn't help that I was also spoiled growing up, being the only child.  It also doesn't help that I inherited the family trait of having zero patience.

Yes, it's okay to be disappointed that I didn't plop myself down and work on whatever project it was that I was writing.  It's okay to be annoyed that I hadn't posted to my blog in nearly two weeks.  It's okay to feel all-talk-and-no-action when I haven't followed up with any freelancing opportunities.  There will be days where I will NEED to do laundry all night because we're low on underwear.  There will be days where I just don't have the energy to get up early and instead sleep a few extra hours on the couch before work.  And there will be days where I whip out a notebook and jot something awesome down before I forget it.

NaNoWirMo is just about 2, TWO, months away.  One thing I do know is that I can't go into that without a plan (if that's one thing I got out of the Camp NaNoWirMo in July).  I want to do a bit of journaling, working with whatever schedule I have for that week, and begin to envision how I will operate not just in November, but also on a regular basis.  I have this in-my-head-only process, as I have my whole life, and it just doesn't ever come out the way I think it will.  I know that getting it down will.

Super short!

I did nothing writing-wise today as I had to bake cupcakes for work tomorrow (and they KICK ASS!!), however I did find another writing community I want to check out, and I also kept up on a few forums/blogs while at work.

I would like to share a video I watched not long ago that I got a lot out of.  You might, you might not.  But I enjoyed it.  Plus, Dan Wells (the author leading it) and I seem to have the same taste in books/movies, so it kept my attention for quite some time.

Enjoy.

Insert Happy Camel Here

If you don't watch much TV not on a DVR or live some place where Geico commercials don't exist, you won't get the reference of the title today.  Here's a hint:

I was literally about to shut off my computer before I realized I hadn't stopped by here yet.  No recent developments other than I am greatly, very, really, TRULY excited for the day where I can do my writing activities all freaking day long and not have 8 hours taken up by a job I have so I can pay bills.

Though I did speak to the editor of the local paper, to which he referred me to two other editors there (as he is the Editor in Chief and didn't directly handle any freelance work).  I didn't get around to emailing or calling them today.  Yay!  More stuff shoved to tomorrow!

I am slowly exploring a site that goes by Text Broker, which from the whole one sentence I saw it mentioned in, looks to be a place I can register to hopefully gain freelancing gigs.  Cracked also takes in work, and I friggin' LOVE that site.

And, happily, I got a solid hour of writing in.  Again, 20 minutes was spent staring at fragmented sentences, but hey, got some done.

Writing Prompt #3 and other cool things

I've decided that it's okay to not post on Mondays.  Because Mondays.

A couple pretty cool developments!  I finally had the pleasure of meeting Adam's cousin, who is also a writer.  On top of us bonding over it in general, she did confirm an awesome tidbit for me: drinking while writing sparks the creativity, and revise/edit sober.  I foresee Lindsey and I getting along great.

The other awesome thing is that it finally dawned on me that a friend-of-mine's father works for the local paper out here.  I asked her the favor of possibly her dad giving me a reference there for some freelancing work.  I was touching base with my Google Gods and found a couple interesting articles on "how to start a writing career."  Both had some short, informative bits, but a couple of the big points that struck me were:

• You might not have any previous experience, and that's okay.  Put a few writing samples together, and/or create a query.
• Start by inquiring to local publications for any available freelancing opportunities.

Paying it forward, the two articles I found are the following:

How to Start a Freelance Writing Career in 24 Hours or Less via The Real Life of a Narrowboat Wife
How to Start a Freelance Writing Career via Theta Mom

There were tons of other great nuggets of info, but those two are the ones that really stuck out to me.  To the point where my mind went, "Hey, this is actually possible.  Awesome!"

And then, as would be expected, Anxiety Girl here instantly jumps off the deep-end with such classic lines as, "Query?  Wtf?  And writing samples?  Dude, you HAVE NO WRITING SAMPLES that would work in the world of non-fiction freelance!  And local publications?!  This isn't Chicago anymore, Dara!  There's practically nothing!  You can't even find a damned yoga class that doesn't meet in the middle of the friggin' day, what makes you think you'll even find somewhere that will give you a few shots at writing for them?!"

I have quite the Debbie Downer in my head, I tell you what.  Moving on.

I left a message for the editor of the local paper, saying that my gal-pal's father recommended I reach out to him.  Nothing back yet.  I've got a gag in Debbie's mouth for now, it'll probably last only until the end of the week.

And now, for some writing time, care of Today's Author.

"There was no one in the rest stop, but the parking lot was full."

Outside.  Of course, they had to be.  Imagine if some normal person walked right in to see ten to fifteen businessmen with fangs standing around.  Maisie crossed through the rest stop to the exit at the opposite end, back into the humid, nighttime air.  The rest stop wasn’t large by any means, but still, the sight of so many cars and no bodies accompanying them was unsettling.  At least Devin would be there.  And Perry, as well.

A short, shrill whistle got her attention.  She saw a figure waving the screen of a cell phone in her direction, to which she quickly made her way over.  “May want to use the light on yours,” Devin pointed it towards the ground as he led the way through a faint path in the grass, “These tree roots don’t mess around.”

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Maisie did as suggested, watching her steps as she followed, “Perry didn’t call me until he was already on his way, and I was with Bree.”

“Bree.  Shocking,” Devin muttered.  Maisie could never put her finger on it, but she couldn’t help but assume her best friend and he had a history.

Writing Prompt #2

Today's Author had another writing prompt today, so off I go.  This one I messed a bit with the idea I had from a dream the other night.  I can't remember the dream anymore, hell I forgot it the second I got out of bed, but I wrote down my idea in a quick few sentences after I had some coffee.

Just to share, I now have 4 "big" writing plots in my head.  Kinda makes me feel all warm inside.  Enjoy.

“The Tarot reader looked up from the cards, a panicked look in her eyes.”

Even being as high as he was, Calvin could easily see her exaggerated reaction.  “Oh no, must be bad,” he couldn't help but smirk.

“I don’t think you understand,” the Tarot reader turned the cards so they showed face-up to him, “Look, you should not even be here.  You should be dead.”

“I know, I got hit by a bus,” this wasn't news, he didn't drop fifty dollars to be told what he already knew, “I was dead on the table for seven minutes.”

She shook her head, seemingly now annoyed as Calvin was, annoyed he wasn't understanding her, “But you are alive now.  You should be dead at this hour, and alive again by morning.  You die after dark, you live again after dawn.”

The woman wasn't making any sense, and being sober wasn't going to help any.  Calvin doubted why he bothered to stop in.  He muttered a thank you and stood to leave, heading for the door back outside as she shouted after him, “You do not dream, you sleep to die.  When the sun rises, you live again.”

Making progress.

So this Huffington Post article sort of lifted my spirits as my mind went to the You-Are-31-Years-Old-And-NOW-You-Want-To-Start-Writing zone.  That shut it up real quick.

I also found out this morning about the Insecure Writers Support Group, which is a "blog hop" that occurs on the first Wednesday of each month.  Of course I would find it on the first Thursday.  I joined up my blog here with it for the next month.  I'm still going through to get a grasp on it, but it's sounding like we writers post that day regarding our insecure selves and how we feel "meh" about our hobby/career, while at the same time, giving support to each of us.  Sounds fun.

I previously mentioned my Speed Dial To The Universe book.  I'm a big believer on the whole Law of Attraction thing, The Secret, whatever you want to call it.  I use this book to get my thoughts and desires down on paper (sometimes, SOMETIMES I'm clearer when I write things down).  Everything from getting a ton of new leads at work to getting over a cold in a timely manner to how grateful I am that Adam does all the yard work.  One of the items I of course have been including are my thoughts on writing.  How I would love to have a kick-ass mentor.  How I can write confidently  How I can be involved in an online writing community or two.  And, how I want to also be involved in a writing group.

This is the fun part.  I had the day off today and Adam offered to treat me to lunch.  Score!  After that, I made a point to stop by the library near our house to see what sort of writing events may be occurring.  I had already heard that nothing really exists in our county, but it was still worth a shot.  I come to find out there IS a writing group that meets there monthly.  Awesome!  She, the librarian at the counter, didn't have the details, so I gave her my info to pass on to someone from the group, who literally called me the second I got home 3 minutes later.

Lovely woman.  The group sounded wonderful.  Though I come to find out that in talking with her and sharing my age, she says, "Oh!  You're so young!  I won't be the baby anymore at 63!"

Oh my.  There's 3 others in the group, she tells me, 2 travel frequently, and they are apparently in their 70s, from what she tells me.  And of course, as they are all retirees, they meet Tuesdays at 10AM, when I work at my full-time job.

I'm not meaning for this to sound like I'm ragging on the elderly and that I'm too cool to hang out with anyone over 60.  A group like that would be a fan-TASTIC knowledge base.  The thing that sucks is how my current life-schedule is set, it's a no fit.  She did mention that once October hit and the Farmer's Market was over (apparently one of the participants is an organic farmer), they may move it to Saturdays.... which is still a bit of a bummer as I work Saturdays twice a month.

So lesson learned, be a bit more specific in my thoughts of what I want.

Writing Prompt #1

So once of the previously mentioned blogs I said I was now following is Today's Author.  Every couple days, or few days (I haven't figured out the pattern yet), they post a writing prompt.  Meaning, "Here's a sentence.  Go do something with it in 5 minutes."

I can of course go beyond 5 minutes, and my reason/excuse for this evening is I have a few other things I need to accomplish before bed and today was a late night at work.  Can you tell I'm good at coming up with excuses?  YEARS of practice, let me tell you.

The whopping 148 words I got in 5 minutes involves a couple characters in my head for what I plan to be my November NaNoWirMo Novel.  Yes, I'm aware I need to be writing a fresh, not previously written novel.  I want to use these little writing "sprints" not only to meet my goal of somehow writing daily, but also to get my brain going on what ELSE I can include in the story I've been fantasizing about for years.  Because as I learned from July, I'm not as strong in the ways of zero planning as I thought I was.

So here is the link to the post for today's prompt, where you can see other folk's results from their minds, and even participate for yourself.

Enjoy.  Feel free to critique... but be nice, I'm tender, and I'm PMS-ing.



“They huddled under the bus shelter as the rain and wind got heavier.”

John, being the tallest and bulkiest, after Bree of course, sat between the women as they shivered, slurred, and sneezed.  At least Maisie sneezed, and he knew of all people to be sick, Maisie was the worst.  Not even Nyquil could knock her out to rest.

“J-just call a cab, John,” Bree’s arms were crossed in front of her, hiccuping as she tried to speak, “The b-buses run maybe once every half hour at this time of night.”

“It’s gonna be jus’ as hard to get a cab,” he burped himself, carefully checking the app on his smartphone once again.  Maisie said nothing.  She was still at a loss of what to say.  What to do.  Was she not supposed to go there with her friends?  Probably something I should have asked  *attorneyname* ahead of time… and calling him at 2:15 in the morning would be just brilliant.

Annnnnd a month later...

How cool would it be that the reason I haven't posted in the month of July is because I was frantically writing and typing to reach my goal of 15,000 words for the month for Camp NaNoWirMo?  It'd be TOTALLY COOL!

And sadly, not what happened at all.

I didn't rage-quit like the last time I tried something like this.  This time, I did nothing.  I got up to 6,437 and just kinda stopped.  I woke up every day with the thought, "I am SO going to write the crap out of this scene."  And then it's suddenly 10:00 PM and there was nothing done.  Let me share with you some of the reasons/excuses why, because that's what I do:

• Started my new full-time job and I suck at creating a new routine.
• Adam and I had a kick-ass BBQ for the 4th of July that really took 3 days to prepare, host, and clean up after. (Adam read this over my shoulder and wanted to point out that I did not par-take in much of this at all; I entertained our friends and guests and went to work at my old job for the last time hung over the next day.  Moving on....)
• Played a bit too much WoW (World of Warcraft)... and even then nothing WoW related, the Battle Pet/Pokemon crap in there now.
• Spent time laying on the couch eating string cheese and catching up on the DVR with Restaurant: Impossible.
• Whined about not being used to working 8 hours a day, 5 days a week so therefore I had no energy.
• Paced around the house trying to find something to do other than write.
• Spent a lot, LOT of time on Kongregate trying to earn badges.
• For a week, studied the "scripts" I needed to be comfortable with for my new job.
• Cried and whined to Adam and my Mom about how I want to write and like writing, but I have no motivation, and when I do, I still don't write.
• Made the decision to leave roller derby while I begin writing, which through that I found that a few people who I thought were my friends actually were far from it (that's a whole 'nother mess I'm not even going to explain further).

So that's all been going on in my head.  All those same excuses/reasons can also be applied as to why I haven't posted here.

But here's what I know now.

I CAN write on a daily basis.  Give it a minimum of an hour.  Any sort of writing.  Working more on the story I had for the Camp, blogging, journaling (kind of, I have this Speed Dial to the Universe book, more on that another day), I'll even count reading all the writer-themed blogs I've been adding to my Feedly like it was my job.

My other hump/bump/mess I'm letting hold me back is the whole wanting-a-writing-group-or-mentor-or-people-to-have-coffee-with.  It's not exactly panning out the way I thought it would.  To be blunt, it's not panning out at all.  I'm having a difficult time trying to "rev up" the folks who I thought would be interested, and it's just not happening.  I'm sure part of it has to do with my own "attitude" in writing, so I kinda brought it on myself if you look at it one way.  And/or, I just haven't opened myself up to the right people yet.

The next task of mine is begin to find an online writing community to participate in.  Yes, keeping up on this blog and staying up on the blog-verse I personally as counting (it's just a bit more challenging to "get into it" since I can't even friggin' post).

And now an hour and a half later, I finish this post.  I blame Adam for calling out my laziness regarding the BBQ.