The Brain Dump

The day is done. Better than yesterday; not as good as I had hoped:

1,701

Yes, I did add two extra words at the end to get over seventeen hundred. Unfortunately, I'm still 546 words short of where I should be. Not a big problem, but disappointing nonetheless. Luckily, a three-day-weekend approaches, and I am hoping to make some big gains then.

*fist to the air*

Staying strong.

Alllllllllright. So Day One of "NaNoWriMo: April Edition" was a little lackluster. I kept postponing it for various (bad) reasons until it was 7:30pm and I had zero words. So I got to it, and the getting was . . . tough. It's been kind of a while since I've written anything of substance on Duncan, and writing (to use a cliched metaphor) is like a muscle. If you don't work it out, it atrophies. Fast.

Long story short, I banked 1,087 words. 580 short of my daily goal. Not catastrophic, but a slow beginning. My brain is exhausted now, so I'm going to get an early start tomorrow and make us the 580 words.

I'll let you know then.

Alright, so it's clearly Wednesday, but I am posting this here anyway. Christina and I have decided to embark on the mystical voyage that is the National Novel Writing Month challenge once again. With a slight twist: April is actually Script Frenzy, during which people are supposed to write a one-hundred-page screenplay in thirty days. This can be for a movie, TV show, play, whatever. That's what Christina's doing. She's writing a screenplay. I, however, still have a novel to finish, so I will be doing a standard NaNoWriMo: 50,000 words, 30 days. That's 1,666.6666 . . . words a day.

I'm pretty confident, as I have yet to fail, having done it . . . one and a half(-ish) times. It does seem to be the best way for me to vomit a first draft onto my computer. And I can't imagine that I have (much) more than 50,000 words to go in the novel. I say this now . . . who knows? But if I don't finish I'll be damn close.

Wish us luck!

Alright. This is it. The last day. And I have 5,059 words to write. Totally doable (I wrote 5,036 words the day I crossed the 50,000 word finishline), but it's going to be a long day.

Assuming you're interested (which, I suppose, is one of the reasons for writing a blog in the first place), I'll be updating sporadically throughout the day. So here's hoping it's at least exciting. The good news is I have two scenes coming up that I've had all night to think about, so I know more or less exactly what I want to happen. So at least I'll hit the ground running.

My father wants to take the family out to lunch and I need to shower, so my first update will probably be in two hours or so. My goal is 1,000 words per minute--16.666 . . . words a minute.

Alright, enough stalling. Time to get to it!

Update: 3:40pm

Ooooook. So my dad waited until two minutes before 1pm (as we were finishing our lunch) to tell me that he had scheduled a half an hour massage for both myself and him. So how do you cay "No" to a massage? Which is my way of saying I did not. We got a massage by the same lady, which meant we were there for an hour, which meant I did not finally settle in to get down to writing until 2:30. Which means I've only been writing for an hour so far. It hasn't been so bad. I have 653 words.

I've been writing in the living room, so as not to seem anti-social to my parents. But my father went to the store to by some cable that he wants for his new PS3 and my mother is asleep in a reclining chair . . . leaving me the only one aware of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang on the television. Time to go to my room and get serious about this.

4,406 words to go.

Update: 4:44pm

Another hour past and you can add 720 words to the count. That brings the total to 1,373. 3,686 to go. I imagine my family will want to eat dinner in an hour or so, so I'll update you again right before that.

Update: 5:45pm

Wooooo! One more hour: 906 more words. I'm starting to get cocky . . . 2,279--almost halfway there. I'm feeling a might peckish, so I'm going to take a break before finishing out the day. At this rate though, I'm hoping I'll only need another three more good hours. Kinda makes me feel bad about all those days I was a total slacker . . .

Update: 7:43pm

I'm back from dinner. So it's back to writing. My parents (naturally) chose today to rent the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie, which is . . . about the longest movie this side of The Lord of the Rings. I told them I would write and watch it at the same time. We'll see if I can keep up the pace.

Here we go.

Update: 8:43pm

645 more words. 2,924 words total. I'll try another hour of watching this movie, but I don't know if this pace is going to work.

Update: 9:47pm

Well, not quite an hour has it been, but a wonderful time I have had. I've effectively managed to ignore the movie more or less, whose intricacies have lost long ago. It's a confusing mess of a plot and it's trying to be way more than it should be . . . at least to me. Anywho, that's not why I'm writing. I'm writing to say I've had a heroic hour, managing 1,173 words, bringing my grand total for the day to 4,097. Ahhhh . . . 962 words left. If all goes well, I should reach 31,000 before this movie is done.

Huzzah!

Update: 11:08pm

Here the mighty stand triumphant!

Oh yes! I stand triumphant. 5,996 words! Here, wait. Hold on a second.

. . .

6,005 words! Is that a personal best? I have no idea. I'd have to check my January records. I don't care--I'm calling it a personal record. 6,000 words and I made my deadline with forty-nine minutes to spare! I'm glad I didn't leave it till the end . . . :)

Alright. It's been a long day. Time for beddy-by. Good night, and a Merry August to you all!

Well, I added another 937 words to my total and now it's time for some bed. That brings the total to 2,830. Guh, that leaves a little over 5,000 for tomorrow. I can do it. I can do it. Just one more day of intensity and then I can relax a little. Just one more day, just one more day . . .

So today was not quite as glorious as I wanted it to be, though the day is not finished. I managed 1,893 words--and this while fending off my father and his new PS3. I'm still working away here but I thought I would give everybody an update.

I still have a normal day's writing to do before reaching this day's goal. Back to the salt mines.

OK. So I've fallen out of the blogosphere for the past week or so, but the good news is I was not completely idle. I have been writing (most) every day and clawing my way closer and closer to the 31,000 total. The bad news is I'm not nearly as close as I want to be. I can't tell you on what day I did what, but I can tell you that I have a grand total of 23,111 words.

So. That's not 31,000. But I have two more days. Two more days to write 7,889 words. 3,944.5 words a day. 328.70833333 . . . words an hour (if I only write for twelve hours). That's . . . doable . . .

OK. So. The lesson is: meeting up with old friends and spending time playing video games with my mother (that's right--my mother!) takes time. This is doable. This is totally doable. No one's putting me on the Altar of Shame!

I will post my word count tomorrow probably around the same time as tonight. Then Sunday, the 31st, I will give continuous word count updates until what I am assuming will be my Moment of Glory--as I stand triumphant above the month of August and laugh and cry and scroll through my 31,000 words.

See you tomorrow.

Well, today was one of those days where I just had to put my head down slug through the words. The good news: I did. Ended up with 1,001 words, which, right now, is another day I don't have to make up. In other words: a good day. The total stands at 9,094.

I've started jumping around in the narrative, just trying to find words to write. I still firmly believe that as much writing as I can get done is a good thing, so I don't mind that it's out of chronological order. We'll see how long I can keep it up . . .

Hello Readers!

I write to you from beautiful Austin, Minnesota, home of Shelley and Lloyd Brandon, Christina's rambunctious parents.

Yes, I've been here since Tuesday, till Tuesday, breaking up the monotony of the Texas life. Christina's parents are fun, and, of course, it's wonderful to finally be close to her once again. Sigh, and only after twelve days being apart. I flew in to Minneapolis and Christina and her mother were there to pick me up. We drove past the Mall of America, Cabela's store of everything outdoorsy, and 5 of 10,000 lakes. So I've seen most of Minnesota's sights. One more awaits me: the ever-fabulous SPAM Museum! Complete with all the SPAM paraphernalia I could ever want.

Christina has also made sure to keep me writing. I have not been as disciplined as I need to be over the past few days. I visited with my friends Travis and Laura over the weekend . . . ensuring a zero word count over those two days. I tried to make up for it on Monday, writing 1,542 words, but then I was traveling much of Tuesday and so that was another zero day.

Wednesday, however, was better. 2,087, making up for the previous day. That brings the grand total to . . . *drum roll* . . . 8,093. Sigh . . . only 5 more days to make up for.

I haven't done any writing yet today, so I'll be back to let you know how I do.

This is me keeping the faith!

Well, the opening ceremonies for the Beijing Olympics has sufficiently caught my attention to stop me from writing for the day. It got harder to concentrate when my parents turned it on, but I was able to get 1,002 words, bringing the grand total to 4,464. Almost a third of what I had written up to today. That's a better start than I had on August 1st . . .

I still have some catching up to do. But I'm gaining confidence.