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NaNoWriMo-ish: half-month check-in
Nov. 15th, 2018 10:53 pmWe're halfway through November!
To recap, I set myself several goals for this month (admittedly none of them is "write a novel", but it's still nice to use the momentum of NaNo-month to do a bunch of writing). The goals read thusly:
–write 20,000 words (stretch goal is 30,000 words)
–complete at least three fics
–do at least a tiny bit of original fiction writing
–write every day
I'm happy to say that:
– so far I've written 10,400 words (over the half-month mark of 10,000, if just barely)
– I've completed four different fics in four different small/tiny/rare fandoms (thank you Yuletide!) and am now embarking on a fifth; plus, I've moved forward on a couple of multi-chapter Harry Potter fics that had been languishing on my desktop for a while. (I had a brief blip in early summer where I had a bit of free time and thought "I have free time! I can dare to start new fics!" ...and then I stopped having free time.)
– haven't done any original fiction yet, but I'm thinking I'll at least write a single scene for one of my multiple but-will-I-ever-write-it novel ideas I have knocking around, just to show myself I'm still thinking about it
– I have written every day, and in fact have been participating in the official Write Every Day
Thoughts:
1. Setting a specific word goal for a month, and committing to writing every day for a month, are both great goals. Previous times when I set a month word goal, it's been hugely helpful for getting significant work done, especially on longer fics. And the previous time when I did Write Every Day, I wrote at least one entire fic that wouldn't even exist otherwise (you have to write at least something each day, even if it's just a single sentence, which keeps things moving forward and in the end it does add up).
But I think it may not have been the best idea to set both goals for the same month. Having a word goal to meet (at any pace throughout the month) and having to write every day (but it doesn't have to be much) are both great, but in combination they feel much more stressful!
2. YULETIDE! Please let me bend your ear for a moment about how great Yuletide is!
I'd been afraid to sign up in previous years because the instructions look a bit complicated. And they are a bit complicated to figure out the first time. But what I didn't know is that the infrastructure of Yuletide is amazing. The mods are unbelievably responsive, kind and helpful – in a fest that runs to the thousands of fanworks, they still take time to answer every single question from (confused, newbie) participants. Then there's a whole system in place for helping people find betas (especially helpful given that these are all rare fandoms). And there's the amazing letters & prompts app, where you can search every person's requests, and write treats beyond your assigned recipient, if something catches your eye. Things have definitely been catching my eye. Yay rare fandoms!
3. Holmestice! I love Holmestice. And that's all I can say right now, since I don't want to give anything away about what I wrote. :-)
4. I love the weird, wonderful, random stuff you learn when looking up writing-related things. Did you know there's a remote, inaccessible island literally named Inaccessible Island?
5. It's snowing like the end of the world out there right now, and it's the most absolutely beautiful. I love it. I've already had to shovel at least four times just this evening, and I'm so happy every time I do it, simply because it means: snow. (Yes, I know I'm a bit of an outlier.) I'm also dog-sitting right now, so I have one dog sleeping on top of me, literally and loudly snoring, and the other next to me, twitching and dreaming, while I do my canon review for a Yuletide fic. Could be worse. :-)
To recap, I set myself several goals for this month (admittedly none of them is "write a novel", but it's still nice to use the momentum of NaNo-month to do a bunch of writing). The goals read thusly:
–write 20,000 words (stretch goal is 30,000 words)
–complete at least three fics
–do at least a tiny bit of original fiction writing
–write every day
I'm happy to say that:
– so far I've written 10,400 words (over the half-month mark of 10,000, if just barely)
– I've completed four different fics in four different small/tiny/rare fandoms (thank you Yuletide!) and am now embarking on a fifth; plus, I've moved forward on a couple of multi-chapter Harry Potter fics that had been languishing on my desktop for a while. (I had a brief blip in early summer where I had a bit of free time and thought "I have free time! I can dare to start new fics!" ...and then I stopped having free time.)
– haven't done any original fiction yet, but I'm thinking I'll at least write a single scene for one of my multiple but-will-I-ever-write-it novel ideas I have knocking around, just to show myself I'm still thinking about it
– I have written every day, and in fact have been participating in the official Write Every Day
Thoughts:
1. Setting a specific word goal for a month, and committing to writing every day for a month, are both great goals. Previous times when I set a month word goal, it's been hugely helpful for getting significant work done, especially on longer fics. And the previous time when I did Write Every Day, I wrote at least one entire fic that wouldn't even exist otherwise (you have to write at least something each day, even if it's just a single sentence, which keeps things moving forward and in the end it does add up).
But I think it may not have been the best idea to set both goals for the same month. Having a word goal to meet (at any pace throughout the month) and having to write every day (but it doesn't have to be much) are both great, but in combination they feel much more stressful!
2. YULETIDE! Please let me bend your ear for a moment about how great Yuletide is!
I'd been afraid to sign up in previous years because the instructions look a bit complicated. And they are a bit complicated to figure out the first time. But what I didn't know is that the infrastructure of Yuletide is amazing. The mods are unbelievably responsive, kind and helpful – in a fest that runs to the thousands of fanworks, they still take time to answer every single question from (confused, newbie) participants. Then there's a whole system in place for helping people find betas (especially helpful given that these are all rare fandoms). And there's the amazing letters & prompts app, where you can search every person's requests, and write treats beyond your assigned recipient, if something catches your eye. Things have definitely been catching my eye. Yay rare fandoms!
3. Holmestice! I love Holmestice. And that's all I can say right now, since I don't want to give anything away about what I wrote. :-)
4. I love the weird, wonderful, random stuff you learn when looking up writing-related things. Did you know there's a remote, inaccessible island literally named Inaccessible Island?
5. It's snowing like the end of the world out there right now, and it's the most absolutely beautiful. I love it. I've already had to shovel at least four times just this evening, and I'm so happy every time I do it, simply because it means: snow. (Yes, I know I'm a bit of an outlier.) I'm also dog-sitting right now, so I have one dog sleeping on top of me, literally and loudly snoring, and the other next to me, twitching and dreaming, while I do my canon review for a Yuletide fic. Could be worse. :-)
