TGIO Party: Dec. 2, 2005

We had our Thank Goodness It's Over party for all the Springs Wrimos at a private home last Friday. I carpooled with a friend of mine who was also doing NaNo--I found out a week or so in that she was doing it and that was very cool. There were about eight or nine of us there all told. A nice sized group for a gathering of people who mostly don't know each other except from the NaNo forums. It was really funny, we were introducing each other by our user names. I can't tell you how fun it was to say, "Hi, I'm MangyCat."

Laurie, the hosting ML, served a delicious spiral ham and the rest of us brought sides and desserts. I made some outragous brownies that, if I may say so, totally rocked. ;o)

We shared stories of our NaNo journeys and read excerpts. It was really cool to hear what everyone else had been struggling through during the last 30 days. We were all in it together, but we each had our own muses we tried to wrangle.

My friend Sara read my Chapter 1 from Imaginary and at the end, everyone's mouths were hanging open, like..."Is that IT? Where's the rest?!" In fact, someone actually said that. I had them so pinned, they forgot to clap. Ah, the sweet taste of victory.

Anyway, that party was very good for me. I've been feeling this sort of letdown all week. You know, the letdown that happens after some major events or holidays have passed. That's what I've been feeling. Sort of draggy and depressed. But it was good to connect with other Wrimos and feel like all that time spent sweating words in November actually meant something.

And the beat goes on...

I just had to share this... One of the gals on my teen writing forum started a topic to "Congratulate MangyCat." After role playing the set up of a virtual party, she actually made me a banner to "hang" in the room.



Thanks, MightiMidget! I feel so honored!

I did it!

This afternoon, I finished my NaNoWriMo novel and have verified my word count at 50,110 words--including "the" and "end"! Hooray! After verifying my count on the NaNo site, I was taken to the winners' page where I was able to download this lovely winner's icon as well as a nifty certificate that I can print out, hang on the wall, and smile at with my plump and happy ego. ;o)

What a wonderful experience this has been! Such a challenge but worth every ridiculously insane moment.

And by the way, I did actually finish the novel, if you didn't get the hint above. My last two words were THE END.

Thank you to everyone for their support, especially the ladies at the CleanPlace teen writers' forum! And many huge hugs and thanks to my husband for his sacrifice of time so that I could go and write like a madwoman. Oh yeah, and finally thanks to the folks at Einstein Bros. Cafe for letting me occupy their booths for inordinate amounts of time.

Final Stats from my NaNoWriMo Report Card:
Total Words Written 50,110
Total Hours Spent Writing 34.21

Avg Words Written Per Day 1855
Avg Hours Writing Per Day 1.27
Avg Words Per Hour 1464
Avg Morale Per Day 6

Number of Words Remaining 0
Number of Days Remaining 3

Hooray! I wrote a 50,110 word novel in 27 days!

Almost there

This will just be a quick post. I am so close, I can taste it! I wrote for 2 hours this afternoon and finished my climax point in the storyline. Nothing left but the wrap up.

Wrote 3,557 words, and I have roughly 1,700 remaining. I plan to write again. With 1 to 1-1/2 good hours, I may actually complete NaNoWriMo tonight!

Wish me luck...

Late night frenzy

Okay, so it's officially after midnight from November 25, so I must truthfully count the writing I just did for Saturday's count. That would be 1,670 words and two supernatural deaths later. Whew--what a night.

Layne still has four demons to destroy, and we must reunite her with Jesse before time runs out. And the clock keeps on ticking...

Words to date: 44,686
Words to go: 5,314
Days left: 4

The final countdown

Today is the day the NaNoWriMo site launches its official Word Count robots. The numbers will be pouring in. Unfortunately, I'm not yet at that 50,000 word count, but I plan on getting there as soon as humanly possible.

The holidays have been busy and made me too tired to stay up late writing. Last night, with my Word problems, I couldn't get a single letter written. But this morning, I've come back to make up for last night's pathetic mishap. In less than an hour, I pounded out 1,459 words. Not much, but at least I have saved some face for having a completely unnecessary zero day.

I'm going to write more this afternoon or evening. I'm 86% done and on schedule to finish November 29.

Words to date: 43,016
Words to go: 6,984
Days left: 6

Word is evil today

I'm having some major Microsoft Word problems this evening and with 20 minutes left, it doesn't look like any words are going to get written today. Curses! Hope to have the issues resolved before the end of the night though.

Last minutes before zip

I managed to effectively procrastinate until 11 p.m. this evening, and therefore only got to write for just under 60 minutes. No matter, I still wrote 1,724 words.

My bed is decidedly not as good a place to write as Einstein's Cafe. It gets too hot, and the TV is noisy when my husband is watching. Oh well. We take what we can get. I'm lucky to have a house, a bed, and a TV at all. Not to mention a husband who is home and awake when I am. ;o)

I breached 200 pages (double-spaced) tonight, and check out my words remaining. Whoa. Once again, I am amazed by the power of a deadline.

Words to date: 41,577
Words to go: 8,443
Days left: 7

Power Hour

I only had two hours set aside for writing today. One hour, I gave to NaNo. The last hour, I had to devote to my other novel, the one I've been cheating on. *sob!* I didn't have anything for my crit group, and I couldn't show up without anything. That's just not something I like to do. Pooh on that.

But I had a powerful 60 minutes anyway--2,174 words! A couple good fast-moving scenes showed up in which Layne is constantly in motion, trying to rid her fellow hospital mates from their demons. Today, she dispatched three of them!

Words to date: 39,833
Words to go: 10,167
Days left: 8

Goodish day

After much debating about where I would end up, I decided to come back to Panera to get my writing in. I've written for about an hour and have lost steam, but the count is good today: 1,752

Not great, but not bad for one hour. :o) I'm almost to that 40,000 word count. So close I can taste it.

Words to date: 37,659
Words to go: 12,341
Days left: 9

A write-in!

I posted on the NaNoWriMo forum that I was going to Panera Bread to write and lo and behold, NarniaPrincess appeared! I had already been there writing for about 30 minutes or so, so I had racked up several hundred words already. We chatted and did some timed writings. In the end, I came out with 50 words over my goal for the day. Meaning, 3,050 words. Hooray! Helped after having a zero day yesterday.

Yay for having company whilst we press on through November.

Words to date: 35,907
Words to go: 14,093
Days left: 10

Bit by massive bit

I came to Einstein's this afternoon and have written for an hour and 45 minutes. Two cups of coffee, one shmeared bagel, one dream sequence, and one demon murdering scene later, I have come out with a nice, plumpy word count of 3,712 for the day's writing. Woo hoo! *does the over-3,500-words-in-one-session dance*

The gap between my "words written" and "words remaining" counts gives me no end of pleasure.

Words to date: 32,857
Words to go: 17,143
Days left: 11

Shoving on

I actually had no internet access at home Thursday, so my procrastination was thwarted in total. ;o) Reluctantly, I started writing at 9:15 p.m. and plowed for a whole hour. The words didn't come very quickly at first, but eventually a relatively exciting scene emerged, and I managed to get 1,651 words written as I lay in bed eating a chocolate cookie.

My page count is positively dizzying to me--143 double-spaced, 12-point. How did I get that much written in just 17 days? Oh yeah, I remember. I have developed that Einstein's Cafe addiction. Yep. That'll do it.

Words to date: 29,145
Words to go: 20,855
Days left: 12

A flurry of typing

Did I say before, "It's amazing what can be accomplished in an hour"? Something happened today, actually an attack on my main character by demons, that just got the words flowing. I could barely stop!

When I did stop, I was a mere 250 words away from hitting 2,000, so I decided to continue on to see if I could make up the final bit and pass the mark. Final word count for an hour of writing tonight: 2,239

Words to date: 27,494
Words to go: 22,506

Woo hoo! I now have more words written than I have to write! (Hmm...does that make sense?) ;o)

Pidley count

I managed to type in 212 words tonight, but the last page I wrote with my eyes closed. Doesn't put me behind though. Eh. Just one of those nights.

Words to date: 25,255
Words to go: 24,745

Quote

This is on the signature of one of our NaNo participants. It made me laugh:

My plot ran away with my muse and eloped in Las Vegas and now they won't come back to help raise the child they created with me!

Back on Track

It's amazing what you can do with 60 minutes. My husband came home in enough time for me to slip away to Einstein's Cafe for a little over an hour. I was the only one there and tap, tap, tapped away until 5 after 5. Final word count for the night? 1,727 Huzzah!

I am now officially 50% done...

Words to date: 25,043
Words to go: 24.957

Two zero days, one comeback

I did write somewhere around 550 words after midnight Saturday morning, but absolutely no writing got done for the rest of the day. Sure enough, things got too busy and before I knew it, midnight had come and the day was gone. At that point, I was officially behind in my count, having used up all my extra words to make up for my two zero days. But really, who can blame me for being distracted on the day my friend's daughter dies, and the day of her memorial service?

But I went out to Einstein's Cafe right after church today and got 4194 words written. The story just flowed out of me. I'm completely caught up now--one good day will do that--so I need to focus on maintaining that.

For some reason, finishing this silly thing has become really important to me. I don't know why exactly, but if I figure it out, I'll let you know. It has less to do with simply accomplishing something great and more to do with that "something else."

Words to date: 23,316
Words to go: 26,684 (almost halfway there!)

Procrastination wins

Argh! This is my second zero day this week. Granted, I have an excuse. Today we had the Memorial Service for my friend's 6-year old daughter. Heart wrenching, causing all the tears I'd been in too much of a shock to shed.

My mind is still numb from the day, so I spent the rest of my evening surfing my teen writing forum. No words today. But I'm going to try to crank out something--even a little drivel is better than nothing--because tomorow, it's going to be rough trying to find time to write. The day is booked.

Getting back on track

I practically had to drag it out of myself, but I committed 45 minutes and got 1,720 words written. That's okay. Actually, I had 1,619 words when I did my "final" count. I'd just finished a chapter, so my mind was a complete blank as to what to write. But I managed to get those few extra words out.

Hope things start to get better. I'm glad that I'm hanging in there.

Words to date: 18,539
Words to go: 31,461