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Oct. 31st, 2005 11:11 amWell according to the Chinese tea promotes keen thinking; therefore it is a perfectly reasonable thing to overindulge in over NaNo! Not to mention tasting good and being full of caffeine…Mmmm caffeine!
While reading through my own notes yesterday I remembered that there are supposed to be more than just the two children; that left me frantically reading the rest of them to find out how many and if I’d set genders yet! Once more Novel Writer Standard is wonderful and Arhien Galenthias is now in all my little tables and things. I really must think about setting the timeline at some point, it’s one of those things that seems really important but is horribly difficult to do without at least part of the story written…guess it just proves that I’ve never particularly enjoyed making essay/story plans! I still remember having to write an essay plan in my first couple of years at Dover, it was something to do with looking after rabbits and must have been one of the few pieces of homework that got done on time. Come to think of it that probably means that it was some time in my first week of school when it was mostly fresh and new and exciting! Well as exciting as it ever was with Sarah Taylor for an English teacher!
A part of me considered not taking my laptop back with me today, well since we’re going to be out most of tomorrow and then going back to Mandarin where I can’t charge it anyway there didn’t seem to be much point. Then I remembered what I’m like and realised that if I start the first day of the month without doing anything and with a manana type attitude I’ll just keep doing it all the way along and that will be the end of any chance of me winning! So tomorrow will see me up and about making a good start on things while my Mum is at work. There was some vague suggestion that I stay up until midnight and start typing dead on 1 minute past…I probably would if I was at home, either that or I’d be at Jackie’s and we’d both be poised to start then. It will be kinda nice to have something for us both to read when we finally do get to meet up and compare notes though.
I’m still woefully short on characters even though my list has grown to nine with the inclusion of Arhien (and I’m going to have to put that name into the spell checker or I’ll keep putting the ‘h’ in the wrong place!). I need at least a couple more heads of Prydes and the human liaison between V’ridan and his mages. Not to mention the fact that I’m still short one title! Makes me wonder if Jackie has had any more luck getting all of her ideas pinned down.
Strangely I’m looking forward to this still, it’s not so much stress levels or sanity levels as anticipation. It seems like forever since I had this kind of challenge to get my teeth into. I think the reason I always had so much trouble writing essays was that they were someone else’s words, I usually quite enjoyed the research because there was always some new titbit of information to pick up, but no matter how much you waffle or how many different ways you phrase things, it’s never your own words. We get penalised for plagiarism but what are essays if not the bringing together of many many fragments of other people’s work? Stories on the other hand I could draw out for ages, I always had problems finishing them in exams because there were a thousand and one more ideas floating about in my head. I still remember the story we had to write in one of my junior years at Primary, I think it was the third year – year 5 to all those modern types that don’t remember the days of being first years and not year sevens. We had to write a story with at least five chapters and at least one full page of an exercise book to a chapter. I seem to remember having seven chapters and even then it was fantasy. Something about a young girl who had wound up in a strange world and fulfilled the prophesies about the one who would save them or find some great treasure… don’t remember it exactly but I know they all thought the girl was called Malandra (I’d just seen the name in the credits of Emmerdale (well, still Emmerdale Farm in those days…dear Lady I’m starting to feel old!) and was obsessed with it. Her real name was something else but she never quite managed to convince the people of that realm to call her by it...I’m rambling aren’t I? Sorry.
So yeah, anticipation… I think once I’ve done this I might develop a little more confidence to finish Goddess and Sleeping Dragons. There’s this little voice in the back of my head that worries that they’ll never be long enough never mind good enough and that so long as they only ever stay half written I don’t have to worry about the endings. Maybe once I’ve proved that I can write 50,000 words and make a reasonable story of it that voice will shut up! I can only hope that my inspiration faerie doesn’t decide to desert me at the last minute. I’m having enough problems coming up with an opening line…Ok, I admit, I’m having some issues with my opening chapter! I’ll probably end up writing a couple of versions and seeing which one fits, I can always break the other version down and use it somewhere else if I need my word count bumping! That’s one thing I have to remember, the important thing here IS word count. Quantity first and quality is just an added bonus! Ah well, if all else fails there’s always the ninjas!
Cups of tea: At least 10 over the last couple of days…mostly while thinking of other things though.
Word count: Still at 0/50,000 I’m a good girl and not starting until tomorrow!
Sanity: Dubious as ever.
Time spent procrastinating: What else do you think this entry is?!
Flashes of inspiration: Three major, several minor…I’m not in trouble yet.
Times considered throwing laptop overboard: 0 (v.good!)
While reading through my own notes yesterday I remembered that there are supposed to be more than just the two children; that left me frantically reading the rest of them to find out how many and if I’d set genders yet! Once more Novel Writer Standard is wonderful and Arhien Galenthias is now in all my little tables and things. I really must think about setting the timeline at some point, it’s one of those things that seems really important but is horribly difficult to do without at least part of the story written…guess it just proves that I’ve never particularly enjoyed making essay/story plans! I still remember having to write an essay plan in my first couple of years at Dover, it was something to do with looking after rabbits and must have been one of the few pieces of homework that got done on time. Come to think of it that probably means that it was some time in my first week of school when it was mostly fresh and new and exciting! Well as exciting as it ever was with Sarah Taylor for an English teacher!
A part of me considered not taking my laptop back with me today, well since we’re going to be out most of tomorrow and then going back to Mandarin where I can’t charge it anyway there didn’t seem to be much point. Then I remembered what I’m like and realised that if I start the first day of the month without doing anything and with a manana type attitude I’ll just keep doing it all the way along and that will be the end of any chance of me winning! So tomorrow will see me up and about making a good start on things while my Mum is at work. There was some vague suggestion that I stay up until midnight and start typing dead on 1 minute past…I probably would if I was at home, either that or I’d be at Jackie’s and we’d both be poised to start then. It will be kinda nice to have something for us both to read when we finally do get to meet up and compare notes though.
I’m still woefully short on characters even though my list has grown to nine with the inclusion of Arhien (and I’m going to have to put that name into the spell checker or I’ll keep putting the ‘h’ in the wrong place!). I need at least a couple more heads of Prydes and the human liaison between V’ridan and his mages. Not to mention the fact that I’m still short one title! Makes me wonder if Jackie has had any more luck getting all of her ideas pinned down.
Strangely I’m looking forward to this still, it’s not so much stress levels or sanity levels as anticipation. It seems like forever since I had this kind of challenge to get my teeth into. I think the reason I always had so much trouble writing essays was that they were someone else’s words, I usually quite enjoyed the research because there was always some new titbit of information to pick up, but no matter how much you waffle or how many different ways you phrase things, it’s never your own words. We get penalised for plagiarism but what are essays if not the bringing together of many many fragments of other people’s work? Stories on the other hand I could draw out for ages, I always had problems finishing them in exams because there were a thousand and one more ideas floating about in my head. I still remember the story we had to write in one of my junior years at Primary, I think it was the third year – year 5 to all those modern types that don’t remember the days of being first years and not year sevens. We had to write a story with at least five chapters and at least one full page of an exercise book to a chapter. I seem to remember having seven chapters and even then it was fantasy. Something about a young girl who had wound up in a strange world and fulfilled the prophesies about the one who would save them or find some great treasure… don’t remember it exactly but I know they all thought the girl was called Malandra (I’d just seen the name in the credits of Emmerdale (well, still Emmerdale Farm in those days…dear Lady I’m starting to feel old!) and was obsessed with it. Her real name was something else but she never quite managed to convince the people of that realm to call her by it...I’m rambling aren’t I? Sorry.
So yeah, anticipation… I think once I’ve done this I might develop a little more confidence to finish Goddess and Sleeping Dragons. There’s this little voice in the back of my head that worries that they’ll never be long enough never mind good enough and that so long as they only ever stay half written I don’t have to worry about the endings. Maybe once I’ve proved that I can write 50,000 words and make a reasonable story of it that voice will shut up! I can only hope that my inspiration faerie doesn’t decide to desert me at the last minute. I’m having enough problems coming up with an opening line…Ok, I admit, I’m having some issues with my opening chapter! I’ll probably end up writing a couple of versions and seeing which one fits, I can always break the other version down and use it somewhere else if I need my word count bumping! That’s one thing I have to remember, the important thing here IS word count. Quantity first and quality is just an added bonus! Ah well, if all else fails there’s always the ninjas!
Cups of tea: At least 10 over the last couple of days…mostly while thinking of other things though.
Word count: Still at 0/50,000 I’m a good girl and not starting until tomorrow!
Sanity: Dubious as ever.
Time spent procrastinating: What else do you think this entry is?!
Flashes of inspiration: Three major, several minor…I’m not in trouble yet.
Times considered throwing laptop overboard: 0 (v.good!)
