I Took Advice!

Normally, I'm as stubborn as a box of rocks. Advice? Not generally. And not only am I as stubborn as a box of rocks, I think my head's made of up rock, too. After all, I can pound it against a problem for it feels like forever, and not see any progress. Yet, I'll keep going at it.

Isn't the definition of stupid the act of doing the same thing, but expecting different results?

So...I decided to do something different. I listened to all the great advice that came to me after my Sunday Lament.

You know what? It worked. I walked away from my problem child WIP until yesterday afternoon. All of a sudden, while I was doing something else entirely, the problems were fixed in a cascade of information that just tumbled into my brain. It was amazing.

For anyone out there that's had a spinal adjustment, it felt just like all the vertebrae in my spine rippling into place. (That makes me giggle uncontrollably, but my osteopath says that's a normal reaction. Not crazy. Whew!)

So, I want to shout out a big "THANK YOU!" to everyone that helped me, especially Bear, because, like any good bear, he's always got warm and fuzzy hugs when you need them most and he gave good meditation advice. Irene and Elizabeth, I would have thought I was crazy, walking away from a problem until you two urged me to do it.

I feel like this was a real group effort.

We Did It!!!

X - Xenophobia

To be xenophobic means to be afraid of foreigners. I got cold chills when I remembered this word.

It got me thinking about the history of the United States. Growing up, I'd always heard that we thought of ourselves as a country made up of a "melting pot" of all different kinds of people and nationalities. It's a lovely thought, but I don't think that's how it's worked out, really.

We've had a history of discriminating against various nationalities of people throughout our history. The Irish, the Italians, the Germans, the Japanese. And we can't ever forget the First Peoples.

Given the events of 9/11, and now the Boston Marathon, I can't help but wonder if our collective xenophobia is going to be ratcheted up again, this time against people from the Middle East.

I sincerely hope not. Some of the most consistently kind people I know are from that area.

We have to keep remembering that every group, from every part of the world, has a few bad apples. We have to remember not to color everyone with the same crayon.

Let's all keep clear heads.

"Q" - Quiet

Quiet, blessed quiet. How I need thee.

I guess it's evident I'm an introvert. The only way I can recharge my batteries is through some alone time that's also quiet time. And, oh, it feels so, so good.

When I was living in Michigan, I used to love to lay out in a meadow, flat on my back, and take strength from the earth. All my stress just melted away. And it was all because of quiet.

It doesn't seem in today's modern society that most people, the younger ones especially, appreciate the value of silence. That's unfortunate.

I wonder if they're afraid - maybe afraid of being alone, of having to actually take time to ponder things if their senses aren't being bombarded by something outside of themselves.

But the silence really isn't. If you unplug, you can hear lots of things. The wind, the rustle of trees and grasses, birds, insects; really, too many things to list. It's music you don't have to purchase, pirate, or download.

Try taking a media fast. No television, music, podcasts, or computers in any form - except what you need to do to work. Take some time and open a book. A real one. With pages. Sorry, no Kindles or Nooks or eReaders of any type. If you're concerned about missing your weekly episodes of Survivor, that's what Tivo's and DVRs are for.

It's thoroughly relaxing too, in the short term. Take a break.

You've earned it.

First Round of 2013

Welcome to Round 1! I'm so excited to be back. I'm at work, so I have to get my goals out really fast and get back to what I should be doing. Here we go...

Writing

• Continue planning and organizing "Immortal Blood" in Scrivener.
• Plot out scenes in detail, including transitions and/or final sentences.
• Finish 80 pages of new material.

Community/Economic

• Buy American, if at all possible. Congress doesn't seem to be able to get our country back to work, so I will do my best to help.
• Buy from local farmers, as much as I can, to keep the money in our local community.

Exercise

• I will go to the gym on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Sundays, because those are the days I have off, and so I'll have no excuse not to go.

Personal

• I will try to take some alone time for myself, to recharge my batteries.
• I'll try to write in my journal as a method of private meditation.
• Continue to eat healthier, as much from scratch as possible.

See you next time!

Too Much Caffeine Equals Stomachache

Owww. You can tell Nano's here. Between the caffeine and leftover Halloween candy, I feel like crap. I've had three cups of coffee already this morning, and I've written almost 3,000 words. The manic hamster in my head is working well; but I can't say the same for the rest of my (in)sane self.

Goals? That's been a bit of a hit or miss. Let's take a look.

Planning is going well. And since we entered the madness of Nano four days ago, I've written 39 pages. Since I only planned on 80 pages this round, I'm feeling pretty good about that. So I'm on track for a win in that category.

Giving up pizza and fried chicken? I haven't had any pizza. I can't say the same about fried chicken, but I can say that I've cut down. In fact, there's still chicken in the fridge. And if my roommate doesn't eat it by dinner, it's going in the garbage. (Oops...hang on a moment. I've got to take out hamburger to make chili with tonight. Brb.) Okay, I'm back.

Exercise? We don't even want to discuss that. But I have plans to get there as soon as my coffee stomachache goes away. Since I've written over 2,000 words today so far, I figure I can allow myself that break.

Prepared food? I've gotten LOTS better with that. I'm still resisting going into certain aisles in the grocery store, even though Near East has some outstanding grain mixes. One of these days I'll get around to figuring them out so I can do them at home.

On a different front, last Saturday my roommate took his blood pressure at our local grocery store. It was 238/137. To say that's not good is an extreme understatement. Immediately the Mountain Dew was gone, and he cut back on cigarettes from 20 per day to 8 per day. He's steadily decreasing until he's quitting. I got the idea from how George Carlin finally quit cocaine. He just weaned himself off it gradually. I figured that would work for cigarettes too. The good news is that he's sleeping better and his constant headache is gone. Yeah, I cut out the salt for the most part, too.

We'll see how that one goes.

Have a great day everyone!

Pressing On...

It's only the third day, so I don't have a lot going on.

My exercising isn't turning out so good. I hurt my back so I'm on hiatus with only gentle walking. Time isn't an issue right now, just being functional is okay for me.

My pages are going, but I'm not satisfied with the material. So dissatisfied that I can't even complete it. That means I'm walking away from that scene for a while. I'm working on a new one this morning as soon as I complete my check-in. I do have a question for all of you out there, though - I know you can have co-protagonists, but can you introduce both of them in the beginning of your story? For those who are familiar with the Story Engineering paradigm, before the First Plot Point? For the Hero's Journey, it would be before Crossing the Threshold. Thanks for all the input on that.

Woo hoo! I haven't had any fried chicken. Or pizza. According to my stomach, life is good so far. I did make some Capellini Alfredo with chicken breasts though. It was probably as bad as the fried chicken. My taste buds loved it, and I don't do it very often.

I'm sure I forgot something, but since I'm at work and my students are looking at me, I've got to run.

See you Sunday!

Sharpening My Pencils...

Actually, I don't have to sharpen my pencils, because I use mechanical ones. And a lot of lead. But that's because I use a fine point and I break it a lot.

Goals...I've done some thinking about that over the past week. They're still a bit basic. And there's not many of them.

1.  Write at least 80 pages this round. That equates to one page per day (obviously) but I want to make sure I build in some fluff time. Today I know I'm going to be going over the one page, because my protagonist is about to get into an argument. More on that down the road.

2. Continue using Story Engineering for my planning. I'll work on that every day.

3.  I have it in my Outlook schedule to walk for 30 minutes every day. Problem with that - I have lots of allergies, live in Florida, and ragweed will be the death of me. My treadmill is looking good. I plan to achieve this goal by walking only during the commercials if I'm watching TV. If I'm not, then I'll use the treadmill as something to unstick writer's block. If I haven't finished my page for the day, I have to remain on the treadmill until my fingers want to type. (That should work, either way!)

4. Here's a weird one. I'm giving up fried chicken for the duration of this challenge. Anyone who lives in Florida probably is familiar with the supermarket chain Publix - and their outstanding fried chicken - chicken they so-lovingly cook for your and have ready whenever you need a quick meal because you've worked late. It's better than the Colonel's, and much cheaper. Still bad for you, though.

5. I'm not sure about this one - I don't know if it's viable. I'd like to kick the processed food habit, but I don't know if I can put it as an actual goal, only because I'm not sure if it's realistically achievable, especially during the holiday season.

Anyway, there's my plan. I'm crossing my fingers and picking up my pencil. See everyone on Wednesday!

Round 4 Goals

Ok, here goes. I've been thinking about this for the last couple of days. I'm always so impressed by those members who have 7 or 8 goals covering so many different facets of their lives.

I'm going to try to do at least a few this time.

1.  Write at least one manuscript page per day. I know it doesn't sound like a lot, but I'm taking small steps on purpose.

2. Continue to organize and plan according to Story Engineering.

3. Walk for 30 minutes per day. I'm using YouTube videos of a British television show for inspiration. It's called Supersize v. Superskinny. If anyone needs motivation, that's the way to go. One contributor called ErmmTV has season playlists already set up. It makes it convenient. I don't seem to have much energy, and I've heard that if you exercise, your energy levels increase. Here's hoping. Oh, yeah, and the weight loss. That's part of the motivation as well.

Anyone else out here planning yet?

And So Ends Another Round...

Where in the world did the time go? And when are we going to start up again - I'm already planning my goals for the next round. (Oops! I just saw the start date in Kait's post. My bad.)

I started out slowly, but once I latched onto Story Engineering, I felt things begin to fall into place. Now that I have a procedure, it's going to be much easier for me to make visible progress. There are times when being a Capricorn and a Type-A personality is not a good thing...I'm such a perfectionist sometimes it's hard to get where I need to be.

I'm so glad I discovered Row80. I know people have said this before, but it's true - no one knows the ups, downs, frustrations, and joys of writing like other writers. Let's face it - if we tried to talk about some of this to Muggles, we'd probably be locked up (for our own protection, of course) and forcibly medicated.

I used the word "Muggles" above because in a very real sense what we do is magic. We create. We produce things of out thin air. Houdini himself couldn't do this.

Doesn't it make you want to dash to the keyboard right now? It does me.

See you there!

Finding the Writing Magic

Something struck me this morning. Sipping on coffee and thinking about gearing up to write, I suddenly asked myself why it was so easy to write backstory and have everything fall into place. I mean, the first draft can be an agonizing process, slow, torturous, feeling like you're walking through quicksand that's halfway up your thighs. And that's on a halfway decent day. Why doesn't it work that way with backstory?

Why is freeing yourself from self-imposed shackles so hard? And how do you cut them off?

Nora Roberts said once (in some interview I read somewhere) that you just have to vomit out the first draft, and then fix it up later. When I think about that, I find it much easier to work. When I lose sight of that direction, everything becomes murky and confused. Nora's advice gets me through Nano every year. But I sure have problems remembering it from day to day.

What do you use to motivate yourself on days when the vision eludes you?

BTW, I still plan on blogging during our down time between sessions, so feel free to pop on by.

Happy creating!

Lara

Post 4th Check-In

Hi, everyone. Did you have a good holiday? I had company, so blogging and posting wasn't something I was able to do yesterday.

I'm all geared up and ready to go on some scenes I blogged about Tuesday (see below). My page count is low, but I've been getting planning accomplished.

Today is going to be about production, production, production. I'll let you know on Sunday how much I was able to achieve.

Does anyone want to race - see how many pages we can write by Sunday? Sort of like a mini-challenge?

Let me know.

Lara

Goals This Round

Hi everyone! Back, refreshed, and ready to rock?

Me too. And I'm going to take the challenge to be an action verb. That's a great idea - not only for production, but to form and ingrain a new habit. And let's face it, if we want to be professionals, the first and foremost thing we have to do is...WRITE!

So, that's going to be my goal and my daily mantra. I'm putting it up as my screensaver. I've set up Penzu Post to send me reminder emails just in case I haven't put anything down that day. I'm setting it up in my Outlook as a repeating appointment - just me and my computer. What a cozy relationship we'll develop!

Now, if I can just keep the werewolves from gnawing on the chair legs when they're bored, it'll be a great challenge!

Lara

Trying For Round 3

Hi everyone! I'm going to give this another go. I think I just got a bit overwhelmed and depressed for the last month or so...I couldn't write anything and just threw everything aside. I guess my Calculus class plus teaching during the week and on Saturdays didn't help much either.

Goals? I think maybe just to do something on a regular basis. (But I sure would like to get something finished during these events!)

"I promise to try to do better this time," she vowed, putting up her hair and pulling her laptop close.

Here we go...

Lara

Masochistic Tendencies...

Is anyone out there crazy enough to get sucked in to the June clambake that is Camp NanoWrimo?

One of my "friends" pointed it out to me the other day. Now, she knows that I have enormous difficulty turning down anything that has to do with writing. It doesn't matter that I'm involved with our 80 days event. Nope. Not a bit. She's luring me into the woods with the promise of more words. I can feel her emanating her peculiar brand of treacherous glee from here.

But is it really treacherous? Is it a quicksand-ridden meadow that hides the death of plot, or something that will help me achieve my final goal - a published novel? There's only one way to find out. Be as brave as Sam Gamgee and put one foot out there, beyond anything I've ever attemped before.

So, sure, what the heck...I'll give it a shot. Two challenges at once. More words, more craziness; not a problem. I think.

The only thing I can be sure of at this point is that I'm most definitely insane. And I don't think there's anyone here who would disagree with me.

But, just in case you want to hang out in a cabin in the woods with me for the month of June, look me up. I promise - we'll have fun. And I promise - no mosquitos..

(Now if I could only make sure to get my Calculus done...)

Lara

A Whirlwind of Craziness...

Ok, here's the update on my chaotic world:

1. Got the car. It's great. I haven't been able to name it, though. I kept Serenity. She deserved more than an ignominious end in some junk yard. She's become a long-term fixer-upper project.

2. Calculus is kicking my butt. I've already had one quiz. I have another on Monday, and a major test on Wednesday. Sigh. This is NOT fun.

3. The only bright spot is my writing. I've about gotten to the point where everything needs to be printed, organized in its final form, and a first draft finished. Woo hoo! That's really the point I was aiming for, because once I know where I'm going, I can whip things out in no time. I usually see it like a movie that's scrolling about a foot in front of my face. Makes it much easier for me.

How are you all doing?

See you Wednesday!

Lara

Epiphany!

Hi everyone,

It's been something of a slow writing week. My attention has been focused on my car. Instead of doing a second transmission rebuild (along with several other things that need to be fixed) I somehow ended up seriously looking at a new Subaru Outback. Huh. Who woulda thunk it?

I made up for it today, though. While I was waiting for a student, I had a whole cascade of information that took care of my problems with the protagonist. In the beginning, she's shown as weak, but after she gets back home she automatically becomes stronger. It didn't ring true, and THAT was what was leading to my problems with my middle.

So, she's going to be strong from the beginning, and resist, resist, resist going back home until someone's life is at stake.

Even though my next calculus class starts tomorrow, my fingers really want to dance on the keyboard.

See you on Wednesday!

(And this time I'll try to make it!!)

Lara

I'm Baaaaaaccccckkkk.......

Hi everyone!

Final exams are over, and just about all of my students made it through - at least, the ones who put forth the actual effort. So, barring one staff meeting on Wednesday, I'm free for fiction! Woo hoo!!

So, in the midst of finals madness, a weak spot in my WIP struck me. I really didn't have a good reason for Hayleigh's research assistant, Nasir, to travel with her back to the US. Then I realized that her countdown for success (or failure and death) wouldn't begin until AFTER the artifact was translated. And, since Nasir is also part of the Bani Anubis werejackal clan, he MIGHT have knowledge she would need at a critical juncture. So...now he has a reason for being in Rhode Island.

I'm off to my on-campus office in about half an hour to get some work done. It's so much easier to write away from home - that way, other tasks don't take my attention from the page. Yay!

See you all on Wednesday!

Lara

Goal Revision Already!

As it stands, I have a middle that's as confused as a huge bowlful of pasta. I can't begin to write scenes until I see even a somewhat clear direction in which to go.

So...

This is going to be a planning period for me for the next little while. I'll still be using Story Engineering and The Writer's Journey to find my way. I'll do my reporting on what I've been able to figure out and where I am in the process. When (or if) I can start writing scenes during Round 2, I'll revise my goals again to add it.

I'm adding a health goal too. Everyone feel free to nag me about them - I need it! Here it is:

In deference to Johnny Depp's new role as the wonderfully gothic Barnabas Collins in "Dark Shadows," I've decided to stay on the dreadmill (yes, you read that right) for the length of two episodes of the original series per day. Netflix has four seasons on their live streaming section.

And now, I'm off to teach math. Have a wonderful, productive day everyone!

Goals and Gibberish!

Welcome back for Round 2, everyone!

My goals are going to be substantially different this time. Here goes:

One scene per reporting period (or at least 2 scenes per week).
Pre-plotting 4 scenes per week, not necessarily in story order.

And now, the gibberish portion of our morning. I've come to realize I'm more of a plotter than a pantser - by a whole lot! There are two books that I've come across - Story Engineering and The Writer's Journey. I'm going to be using these brilliant guys to keep my story straight, because as of right now, I think I've blossomed into 3 stories in one novel. Not good. And all of them can be made into a stand-alone. Really not good.

So, I'm into major planning mode.

See everyone the day after tomorrow!

And they're off...

Revised Goals and Serial Killers

Reality has finally hit me on the head. And it hurt. I'm not certain when this first round ends (I am sure it will be much too soon for me), but I have to face the fact that I probably won't be able to catch up. Hence, the revised goals.

Okay. Here goes. I'm going to forget about trying to catch up. I'm just going to go on from here, but I'll still stick to my two pages per day.

I'm considering another project, one that might help my productivity in a sideways sort of way. I'll be on spring break next week, so I'm considered converting my dining room into an exercise room for my treadmill, free weights, and yoga stuff. That way, if I don't have my butt in the chair working on my WIP, I will have to be on the treadmill working in another way.

I wonder how much my complete dislike for the treadmill will motivate my writing?

I'm having a lot of fun with my serial killer werewolf. I made some changes today, and I'm really excited to get home to get more on the page.

See you all Sunday for another update!