November, not only hathing 30 days and being the month of Movember, which I’m not doing this year considering I’m already sprouting a moustache that makes me look like the humanoid version of PT Flea, is also NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month. The concept is, in only the space of 30 days, to produce a 50,000-word first draft novel. This works out to 1,667 words a day. Not an unreachable amount admittedly, but over 30 days indeed a daunting task. And to make it all make sense… well! What were they thinking!?
(You’ll see the little doodad at the bottom of the screen, something I’ll be running for the rest of the month, containing my word count. The dark grey lines are my daily word aim, so approximately 1,667 a day, but this readjusts itself if I am ever under or over the limit from days before. Anyway, I suppose the important thing is that the green represents what I have typed or gone over the daily target, and the red what I am under. Kind of exciting in a paint drying kinda way, isn’t it?)
So far today I have managed to churn out a poorly 418 words. I have to admit that I’m writing this blog entry, poaching some eggs and sorting my washing as a procrastinational tool to avoid writing Word #419. ( Up to that bit I’ve just written 225 words – can I claim these as part of my 1,667? No? Damn.)
Anyway, from what I’ve read the trick to NaNoWriMo is not to have any idea where you’re going and just let yourself go along for the journey. No idea – no plot – no plan. With that in mind, I’m doing tops!
One of my avoidance tools was to buy some mince to make a spag bog, which I did buy but haven’t made – I just had the above mentioned eggs and asparagus for dinner instead (Note to self: ate asparagus at 20.03. See how long it takes before your wee smells). I also picked up, for inspiration, a bottle of $10 white wine. And it’s worked – it has inspired to in future spend more money of white wine.
My novel is called “Need Wine” (hence the need for inspiration) and it’s about a late 30 something gay graphic designer who drinks to much and can’t hold down a relationship. It’s a complete tale of imagination and is not based in any way on anyone I know.
At least I have an opening line:
On a bright Saturday morning, Jacob Sponge woke up.
Ain’t that something?
Right, enough of this. I’m going off to churn out some more.
Wish me luck on the journey.
Clyde
PS: For those who were wondering: 23.39.
PPS: It’s 1.410am. I’ve added considerably to the previous 418, with a nice 500 word bumper over the daily limit, and think it’s time to go to bed. I’ll leave you with my last line:
Secretly, and not kindly, he did hope that the alcoholic fumes would kill off any desire before anything came to pass.
PPPS: For those who were wondering just how long 1,667 words is, every word in this blog, including these ones, is 592. Which means I need to do around three times this every day, coherently, with structure and some form of character development. And a couple of subplots and twists and turns. And not too much padding, which is what I’m doing now. So there you go.
Thanks to Caffeinated Bliss for the word count utility.