Almost everything is moved (we left most of the cleaning supplies at the old place to clean up for the walk through). A considerable amount is unpacked thanks to #booksbyliz and we’re about to go find some foodstuffs before we crash.
Tomorrow is clean clean clean and maybe more unpacking and rearranging.
Back to our regularly scheduled writing & art related posts in a few days 🙂
I’m both happy that I’m starting my move today and dreading it. I hate the process of moving but will be glad to be out of this nightmare of an apartment and into a new, nicer one that will have space for me to be creative.
I’m up to 25k words in my work in progress. That’s half of a NaNo novel, but my goal is at least 80k words, so I’ve still got a long way to go. I’m trucking along though, and am determined to finish my first draft by the end of the year.
Later today, if I’m not completely exhausted from the move, I will try to post some more flash fiction that I’ve written. I may also start posting some “Twiction” that I’ve been doing (fiction that uses a max of 140 characters, like a tweet).
After adding a couple hundred words to the latest chapter of my work in progress, I have decided to spend the rest of my free time before work today to look back at what I’ve written so far and see where I need to add more character development. I can see areas where I’ve left some secondary characters flat and one-dimensional, so making them more realistic might help with both my word count problem and also my writer’s block problems. If I get stuck, I’ll just go back and find a character that needs more “umph” and build them up.
My problem is that I see them in my mind as fully-developed characters, with lives and back stories, but I’m not putting any of this into their part of the story. It’s like I’m saying “here’s so-and-so, this is what they look like, now back to our regularly scheduled programming.” Boring.
So time to bring more of my creations to life (cue dramatic music with a Dr. Frankenstein-like maniacal laugh).
I’ll admit: I’ve been drinking this evening. I got a another thousand or so words added to my work in progress, which is great. Unfortunately, I still hit a road block.
I’m not meeting even half of the word count requirement for this to be a novel. Sure, I could make it a novella, but I’m determined to write a novel. I think I can do it, but it will take a lot of revision. I see places where I could improve, where I could add more detail or character development into the story, but I worry that it still won’t be enough.
My goal for the first completed draft was the end of the year. I still have a little over eight months, but this story is screaming to be let out. Maybe if I can just get it out to begin with, then go back and elaborate where needed, I’ll hit a respectable word count.
To get the laptop out for an hour or to procrastinate a little more? It’s not Shakespeare, but it’s the question I’m facing right now.
Most mornings, I wake up hours before I have to get ready for work, giving me ample time to get some much-needed writing done. However, this morning I have to be at work much earlier and don’t really know if I want to drag the computer out for less than a half hour of typing.
I think today will be a rest day. Tomorrow I’m off all morning and should have plenty of time to catch up 🙂
Plugging along on my novel. I’ve gotten another couple thousand words written in the last couple of days. It’s going to be difficult to get much more written in the next week, because what I really need to be doing is getting ready for our move across town.
I’ll be glad when it’s over, but that just means unpacking and getting situated, so I probably should say it’s going to be difficult to get much writing done in the next couple of weeks.
Hopefully once the move is over with I can also get back to crafting and drawing/painting. Maybe that will open up the creative floodgates and also get me out of this funk I’ve been in.
Today is going to be a relaxation day for me. A little laundry to be done, but otherwise hanging with the family.
I’m trying out some of those as-seen-on-tv arthritis gloves. I’ll give them a week or so and then I might leave a review here for those who might be interested. I know how arthritis can affect all of the arts, not to mention everyday life.
I joined a new Facebook group, Dark Fiction & Horror, and it promises to be a fun one. The following bit of #flashfiction was inspired by a photo prompt posted to the group. I give to you A Long, Strange Trip.
A Long, Strange Trip
Sarah stumbled through the cemetery, eyes wide and unfocused. She had escaped from the college frat party a few blocks away after realizing all too late that her drink had been dosed, and her dazed wanderings had brought her here.
If she wasn’t so focused on putting one foot in front of the other on the moving sidewalks—who would put moving sidewalks in a cemetery?—she might have appreciated the beauty of the old headstones and mausoleums. As it was, she found it extremely difficult to maintain her balance while trudging through the dry autumn leaves which, oddly enough, glistened in the moonlight as though covered in dew.
Somewhere in the distance behind her, she heard someone giggling. Damnit, she thought, one of those creepy frat boys followed me.
Turning to look behind her and see who it was, Sarah tripped and fell over her own feet, tumbling off the sidewalk and rolling down a small hill. She came to a stop when her back slammed against a large grave marker, driving the breath from her lungs. Gasping for air, she looked up into the leering eyes of a stone angel. She wondered if it had been the angel laughing at her, but this one merely swayed softly in the breeze, dancing in time with the tree branches.
Again someone laughed in the graveyard, this time much closer than before. Sarah scrambled to find her footing, trying to determine which way was up. She decided to grab onto the angel’s skirt to pull herself up, hoping the angel wouldn’t take offense. Despite the angel’s apparent movement, it was solid beneath her fingertips. In some distant part of her brain she realized that it was the drugs making things move, and this knowledge helped to steady her on her feet.
She turned around and saw what appeared to be a college student dressed up as a court jester in a twisted mask, a shiny blade in his hand. A little early for Halloween, but perhaps one of the pledges had been ordered to follow her into the cemetery to scare her. Then again, perhaps the jester wasn’t there at all. Damn those drugs. She vowed to abstain from drinking at parties in the future, given the absolute mess this night had become.
The jester, like the angel, was wavering in the wind, and Sarah decided that he was indeed a hallucination. This gave her a new sense of bravery, and she climbed back up the hill to face the drug-induced harlequin. She marched up to him and raised her hand to wave it through him, figuring this was the closest she would ever come to seeing a ghost.
Her hand made contact with the sleeve of a coat that she now saw was tattered and filthy. She opened her mouth to scream, but it was too late.
The knife sliced through her neck, and everything in the cemetery finally stopped moving.
After being stuck for a week or so, yesterday I broke the 20,000 word mark on my #WIP. I’m so excited to have gotten this far, but I know I have quite a long way to go yet.
I feel so much better having made such progress in only a few hours. I still wish I could do more, but this has been a great pick-me-up.
Will I reach 30k before the a month is up? Not likely. Will I reach 80 or 90k by the time I’m done with the first draft? I’m hopeful, but realistically I also know that it will probably take a few revisions to get to proper novel length once I’ve gotten the basic story down.
I am determined to see this through. I won’t necessarily see it through in the next year, or even the next two years, but IÂ will finish this. I will have a completed novel to my name. It’s not a matter of ifs or maybes. It’s a matter of will, and I have the will.
It’s frustrating not being able to do most of the #writing or #art that I want to.
The stalled repairs on my apartment and the pending move have halted almost all artistic endeavors. I can’t #sculpt, I can’t #paint, #drawing isn’t giving me the outcomes I want, and I’m stuck on my #novel. I’m so close to being able to create on my own terms, yet so far away. I can see so many things in my mind, with no way to let them out.
I try to tell myself that it’s less than three weeks of waiting, it’s three weeks too long.
I have a feeling I’m going to go on a manic art spree as soon as I have room to spread my wings.
That being said, Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all. 🙂
