Another week bites the dust, tss, Another week bites the dust.
This week has been really fantastic, but I suppose that’s because I got to play pretend that I was a professional writer by spending all my holiday days off working on my novel tucked away in my office. It’s back to grind tomorrow, squeezing in what I can in the evenings after work. I’ve got my work cut out for me this week if I want to actually finish the manuscript, but more on that later.
For now – let’s review this last full week of Nanowrimo in another recap post:
Week Two: November 18th – November 24th
Nanowrimo Week Four Projection: 40,008 (Based on the daily 1,667 to finish in 30 days)
Word Goal: 55,000
Word Count Achieved: 56,125
One thing I learned: I am so fast. There were several days this week that my writer bud Ouranose and I were in my office, lounging and writing in pathetic 30 spurts throughout 8-hour work sessions. But let me you what – I can really type when I’m inspired. Also, you have no idea how much better you feel about your novel when you can brainstorm with someone you love and trust. Having Ouranose has made my Nano experience this year so much healthier, and I hope that I’ve helped make it a positive experience from her too. But, yeah, this week, I found out that I can really power through my word count without realizing it. Yesterday I wrote 4,908 and I don’t even really remember doing it because it was just in like 400-600 word spurts from like 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. That’s only about 1,200 words/hour, but that was wild and exciting. I love when I’m able to just power over a mountain of words like it’s nothing.
One thing I want to improve on for Week 5: I hope I don’t get caught up on the ending. I changed the ending of this novel at least four times that I can recall, and it is a sequel that I’ve been mentally planning for a year, so I’m sure there were many other endings that I considered in the past that are long gone with the wind now. I worry a lot about how the story is going to end and whether or not I’ve represented a group of people or a type of person well enough, and if the ending I’m giving those characters is positive or negative. Obviously, bad characters should have a negative ending, but what about the positive characters. I keep tripping up on it and changing it and that’s going to slow me down a BUNCH, especially since my husband is going back to school this week. I won’t have much time to begin with for writing, really only three of the six more nights where I’ll have scheduled time for undisturbed writing. It’ll be okay, though, that’s what I keep telling myself. I won’t get distracted and I’ll get what I need to get done done because I do my best work when I’m under pressure.
One thing I did really well: This week I did a fantastic job of balance my planning on paper to my actual writing time. Other than one day this week, I hit a decent amount of words each day (over 1,000 generally, and four of the days were over 3,000). There was a nice pace between jotting out my ideas, soundboarding my writer pal, and piecing the scenes together. Since I hit 50,000 words early, though, I think having the weight of winning off my shoulders helped a bunch too. I didn’t lose my momentum after I won, though, which is another thing I was proud of this week.
Week Four Hopes, Recap: Last week I declared that I would be winning Nanowrimo’s challenge this week, and I did, so that was fantastic. I purchased my winner’s tee, got my banner and icon up declaring myself a winner, and I kept going a little bit past my target word count for the week. Any extra writing during Week 4 just lowered what I’m aiming for in Week 5. All in all, it was a great week. Hands down the best week of Nanowrimo this year!
Week Five Hopes: Here’s where the hard work comes in because I have a lot of goals here that I want to accomplish. First, I want to finish my novel. This is the most important of the goals because come December 1st – it’s family time. I gotta get back into the proper rhythm of cooking four nights a week, as I usually do during the school year since my husband is taking college classes for work. I’ll have to go back to being the primary housekeeper and running all of the errands. December is my husband’s relax month since he gives me everything I need to succeed in November. So that novel – it’s gonna be donezo November 30th.
Secondly, I want to hit 65,000 as the drafted word count of my manuscript. Being 9,000-ish away from that goal with 5 more sections to write, I don’t see it being a problem. But it is not a “necessity goal” since i could finish my novel before that point depending on how the scenes flow. It’s an ideal goal but not a mandatory one. Although, I feel I’ll surpass it with what I’ve still got left to write. Then thirdly, I’m wanting to update my word count all 30 days of November. I’m being a completionist this year, and I missed it last year by only a few days. That’s not going to happen again. So that’s something I need to keep on top of this week as I finish out the month.
And lastly, I need to have a plan for what comes next. I don’t know that this is reasonable for me to expect of myself, but I’m trying. I’ve considered utilizing crowdfunding resources to help me work towards a writing career. I’ve got some loose ideas for maybe a Kickstarter or a Patreon, plus the idea of traditional publishing still on my shoulders. But, I’m ready, you know, to really start pushing in this direction. In everything I do, I ask myself if I’ll be able to keep writing if this happens or if this changes, I can’t waste any more of my life with this being a third “for fun” job that I don’t’ get paid to do. I’ve done some ghostwriting on Upwork that I’ve been paid to do, but I need and I want more than that. So, hopefully, during this week I’ll start having more concrete ideas of where to go post-Nanowrimo.
Week Five Goal: 8,875 (Small, but I am only aiming to hit 65,000 by Friday night)
Nanowrimo Week Four Projection: 50,010 (Based on the daily 1,667 to finish on time)
You guys don’t comment very often, and that’s fine, but I can only succeed at my job if I’m getting you excited and engaged in the stuff I’m doing. Instead of sharing what you’re doing with Nanowrimo, let’s throw that mantra out the window. Why don’t you tell me what I would need to do to get you active in the comment section? I want there to be a conversation and enthusiasm from readers that like any of my posts, be it a blog update like this or a writing piece posted in my fiction section. Let me know so that I can start working in that direction.
As always, thanks for joining me in my brain space today. There’s so much going on and I’m thankful for such a successful week. While I did the work, many of my family members, namely my husband and son, have given me the environment for success. You can help too by liking this post, sharing it with a friend, or commenting below. Until the next update, remember – you are worth it.
Love forever.
–ab
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