Winter Wrap-Up Part 1: NaNoWriMo

writing with pancakes

Writing longhand in Osaka

This was my first NaNoWriMo and I was TERRIFIED. With a daunting 50k monthly word goal and the whole first weekend of the month earmarked for a friend’s wedding in far-off Osaka, come November I knew I had to hit the ground running. I forced myself to wakeup at stupid o’clock on the morning of the 1st and pushed out nearly 1k before work, which set a good (if not sleepy) tone for the rest of the day. Thanks to the Wi-Fi desert that is the Tokyo Metropolitan Area transit system, I managed to make over 3k on my furious train-hopping to Kansai, twice the daily goal, but since I basically spent the rest of my weekend eating and catching up with friends, the head-start definitely helped keep me from panicking later on.

Being so singularly focused allowed me to break quite a few personal bests, amass a great 2k+ average daily total and eventually finish November off with an unbelievable 70,131 words. The best part was that the story was so close to being finished that I could see the light at the end of the tunnel! Even while planning for my winter break, in the first two weeks of the December I polished off the story with one whole day to spare before a hard-earned vacation. Aw yeaaah.

VICTORY DANCE!

So, long story short, NaNoWriMo was a ton of fun and I can’t wait to try again next year. There’s something about watching that little graph bar go up and up and up that sparks something primal in the monkey-brain. Having a whole bunch of other people all going through the same stress, sorrows and triumphs helps immensely and my only regret is that I didn’t give it a try earlier.

See you again next year, Wrimos!

NaNoWriMo Stretch Report

Previously on Kate’s Blog: A week-long experiment to get a taste for the challenges of NaNoWriMo before November hits. Will our hero succeed, or will she get distracted by cat .gifs on the internet? Tune in this week on Kate’s Blog for the shocking conclusion!

tortoise beats hare

If you read that in movie announcer voice, good for you.

10/01

This proved to be a great day for starting. Hooray for downtime! I managed 500+ words before heading to work, then chipped away on the rest during breaks.  Success! I even finished before lunch, so I was able to spend the afternoon working on edits for a separate story.

Day 1: 1726/1667 words

10/02

My second day was smooth sailing as well. I had a ton of free time in between tasks, but I think that led me to procrastinate a bit more because I knew I had wiggle room.

Day 2: 1737/1667 words

Total: 3463 words

10/3

Typically Thursdays are my busiest days, so I was afraid of slipping on my count. But given that I didn’t have a lot, I was more determined to make the best use of my time than I was with most of my other days. Between that and having a ton of fun with the scene I was writing, I actually managed to get more work done this day than any of the others during my stretch.

Day 3: 1955/1667

Total: 5418 words

10/4

I didn’t have as much time as I thought I would and I ended up being pretty worn down by work by the end of the day. It was a struggle to make the count before bed, but I squeaked by with a few words in change.

Day 4: 1727/1667

Total: 7145 words

10/5

Ah, the weekend! I wasted too much time watching the sky to see if it would rain to get in a heavy session before I headed out for the day, then wasted time again in my few hours at home before going out to a birthday dinner. I came back home and forced myself to finish the word count before I could sleep, which lost me an hour and a half or so of nice REM-cycle rest. Well, it ain’t NaNoWriMo without an (un)healthy dose of sleep deprivation, right?

Day 5: 1829/1667

Total: 8974

10/6

Library day! I went and parked myself in the public library with no other plan but to write. Since I’d been going over word count every day since the stretch began, I calculated that I wouldn’t need much more padding to make my personal goal (getting to 50k on my WIP before the end of the challenge) and I managed to hit the mark in about 2 hours. The rest of the time I spent focusing on editing another manuscript, which had been sorely neglected since my stretch began.

Day 6: 1690/1667

Total: 10664

10/7

LAST DAY WOOO! Morning writing went great, but lack of breaks and a lot of great TV to catch up on meant that I ended up staying up half an hour later than usual to hit the mark. But hit the mark I did. And you know how that feels?

bunny falls asleep at computer

Feels like it’s time for bed.

In conclusion: Experiment was a resounding success. Tough in parts, but I won’t have to run myself ragged the entire month of November. You hear that, NaNoWriMo? BRING IT.

The NaNoWriMo Seven Day Stretch

Sometimes the creative process is like a muscle. The more you work with it, the stronger and more efficient it becomes.

For the uninitiated, National Novel Writing Month begins its annual creep on the collective soul of the writing community on November 1st. I’ve done a lot of writing over the last few years, yet NaNoWriMo and I have always passed one another like two joggers trying to squeeze down the same path, huffing away in separate directions and desperately avoiding any sticky sweat-to-sweat contact. This year, however, I’ve decided to commit to the very first NaNoWriMo of my writing career. I shall henceforth offer up my heart (and free time, social life, sleep cycle, etc.) to the spirit of November, for her to break as she pleases.

What does that mean? It means that if I’m going to take on this marathon, I’d better hit the gym.

Jump rope fail

Metaphorically, because I’m a writer and sweating is hard.

As a prelude to November and as a personal challenge, I’ll spend October 1st – 7th with the same word count goal as a typical NaNoWriMo day in November. That means producing an average of 1667 words a day and taking all the stress that comes with it. When NaNo hits me like a truck come November 1st, I hope this exercise will give me an idea of how to keep crawling along to the finish line.

So, uh, wish me luck? I might need a lot of it. And to all you WriMos out there gearing up for November, best of luck to you as well.

– K.

Hooray sports! Do the thing. Win the points.

Like this! But in a quiet place by yourself with a word processor.