I didn't succeed this NaNoWriMo...

Which makes it like every other (Camp) NaNoWriMo thus far, but I've gotten farther than I ever have before.  About 20,000 words in a month, which isn't good persay, but it's also not bad.  Just... also not good.

I'd love to be able to get to a point where I could write at least three times that in a month, but right now I'm doing a full time internship (which once school starts back up will be replaced with my full-time job) and teaching myself how to code on top of going back to college.  I tend to do best when busy, but even at this rate it's really really hard to get past 1000 words a night.  Then there's the nights I just want to get roaring drunk or hang with my friends or see a band or anything but write.  My brain needs a break every once in a while. 

So.

So, at this rate, I should be done with my first draft in 4 months or so. 

Nothing like realizing you've been running for hours and haven't moved an inch...

No, I'm not on a treadmill.  I'm talking about my latest novel. 

I used to think I was a "seat of my pants" writer, having faith in my lush and fertile mind will just ~magically~ show me where my story needs to go without any real plotting or planning or world-building because, like, I'm just so fucking special.  The special-est.  Special fucking snowflake.

This train of thought lasted for about THREE YEARS.  Until yesterday.

It just took reading one little blog once (twice, actually) to change my whole world and show me what a damn amateur I've been with my writing.  And how little I've taken it seriously.  And how lazy I've been.  Here's the blog post, it's pretty damn amazing: 2k to 10k.  It shows just as it says, how the author got from writing 2k words a day to pants-dropping 10 THOUSAND words a day.  Seriously.  And it makes so much sense.  I got to that blog from this blog which is also pretty amazing.  She also follows a lot of the things in the 2k to 10k blog and she seems super super organized, which I am helllllllla jealous of.

I now know I am a plotter.  Or better put, I need to be.  I need to sit and do the work before I can just write and be like "oooooooh look at meeeeee, look at my writing, look at how much of a writer I am!"  So embarrassing.  I need to lock my doors, open up my mind and discover my own world before I can write about it.  Sounds so obvious, but it took me this long to really realize it, to realize that there is so much to be done before I can put more words on a page.  So this weekend is all going to be plotting, world-building, character sheets, "screenplays", timelines and the other junk that turn a story from just a story to a world with depth and passion and emotion and remarkability. 

Yippie freakin' skippie.

Help me be less "me": An experiment

I forgot about this blog.  I spend to much time writing my novel that I tend to forget about journaling or blogging beyond "OMGGGG REBLAWG".  Tumblr.  Jfc.

I think I'm going to use this to talk about (?) my writing.  We'll see how that works.  Hopefully this will help with a serious marketing problem I have which is I can not (NOTNOTNOT) talk about myself.  It's damn near impossible.  In real life, when people ask me about anything in regards to myself, I have become a master at spinning it back around to be about the asker.  For instance:

"Sarah, what kind of novel are you writing?"

*internal scream*

"It's still in the rough stages, but it's an epic involving a female pirate smuggling goods across alien infested waters.  What do you like to read?"

I said one sentence about my book (by the by, it took me a long time before I could figure out even that) and turned it around to where the other person would politely talk about themselves while I get to nod and try not to cry.  (Introvert, 'sup.)  Most people like talking about themselves so this usually works out for me.  I guess if I were ever to meet someone like me it would either go swimmingly or we'd both stare at each other till Schrodinger's cat starts yodelling.

So, this is me trying to not be that part of me anymore.

Okay, well...  now what?

PS : Happy 25th Anniversary, Tim Burton's Batman!!!!!

Funny/Not Funny

Sometimes people come crashing into your life without grace or logic, but they root in there like thousand year old redwoods in just a few months time.

I'm a little drunk and emotional, so bear with me.

I have a coworker who has now become probably one of the most important people in my life right now.  We met there...

I am accepting my femininity.

And there's nothing you can do to stop me stop me, fucker!

NAAAAAAAAAANOWRIMO, NANOWRIMO, NANOWRIMO!!!!

It's NaNoWriMo time, muthasuckas.  I'm going to do a full (and I mean FULL) rewrite of my alien epic for this year's NaNo.  Pretty exciting, I'm very pumped to get this done and written this year.  I've got my plot more hammered out and ready to be conquered.  Yuh.

It's also my birthday.  I'm drinking champagne in my underwear watching trashy television while the SO snores next to me.  GLAMOROUS.

Me, okay?

Like I said in my last post, I'm unemployed.  So I have a lot of free time on my hands, obviously.  I live in a glorified like free-standing one bedroom apartment.  Tiny, maybe 400 square feet?  That's just to say that I even run out of stuff to clean about 2 hours after waking.

One of the first things I did as an unemployed person was give myself a make-under.  Took out any offending piercings, tried to make myself look... hot?  Presentable?  Really, there's no different.  Even if a straight woman were to interview me, she'd prefer I be hot.  I'm not her nanny, so I need to be fuckable because really that's what it boils down to.  Not my bullshit sheets of paper touting my supposed skills and accolades.  Anyways, this was the result of said make-under:

Look at how goddamn pleased I am.  

I look so dreadfully boring, but really I've written about 8000 words in my novel, made 3 sets of earrings, sewed a shirt, patched my cardigan, and that's just tonight.  Okay, only about 700 words tonight, 8000 total.  I mean, it could be worse.

-S