I'll Think About That Tomorrow...

This time of year is hectic. Parent/teacher conferences, end of quarter responsibilities, gymnastic meet season begins, inservice presentations, and holiday performances (I'm singing three this year) all seem to be scheduled at once. You think I would remember just how much of a catastrophe my house becomes, but every year I'm surprised.

Today is the first day after conferences, and it's also Veteran's Day (Thank you, dear Veterans!), so I'm off work. I was looking forward to a restful, lazy afternoon. I'd made myself promise that I would ignore the mountain of laundry, stacks of mail, and the myriad assortment of misplaced items on every surface. I refused to hunt down every missing sock behind couches, chairs and stacked in piles at the top of the stairs. Stealing socks is a fairly recent event that is a new hobby of my cat, Angel. Today was a day to relax. After all, as Scarlett would say, "I'll think about that tomorrow."

I was doing pretty well with my self-imposed mandate. I ignored the dust bunnies that shimmered in the sunbeam streaming through my open window. I turned a blind eye to the stack of boxes in the corner that needed to be unpacked and put away. And after a few deep breaths, I even kept my cool when I walked into the upstairs bathroom and every towel we own was wet and thrown on the floor. If I was taking a day off, my kids could too. Right?

But then I saw them. FIFTEEN spider nests. There's a cover to an old, whole-house fan on the ceiling at the top of the landing to the stairs. The nests were all along the same wall next to the cover. The creep factor was too much. Out came the vacuum. Out came the orders to the children... To oldest teenager: "Get the towels to the laundry and start a load. Clean the upstairs bath. Rake the leaves on the front lawn to the curb." To younger teenager: "Clean the family room then pick up, vacuum, and dust your room." I tackled the spider webs then decided I needed to mop the ceiling and the walls as well as vacuum and mop the stairs.

My sudden obsession with clean could very well keep me up until midnight. So I decided to enlist the help of FlyLady.net. That's right. FlyLady is a systematic cleaning process for those of us who are overwhelmed, overextended, and overdrawn. She's awesome! And it works. I know, I've used her in the past. Why I drifted away I'll never know. But I'm BACK!

So now that I've put FlyLady's cleaning system in place, I have NO excuses for not getting back into my writing routine. None.

Is it too late to join NaNoWriMo?

It's Resolution Time

As I begin writing this entry, 2009 is one hour old. I really should to go to bed, but I decided I need to make my writer's resolutions official. Here goes:

1) I will write six days a week - no excuses.
2) I will continually seek to improve my writing skills by writing, attending a monthly critique group, attending at least one writer's conference, reading lots of MG and YA literature, and reading books on the craft of writing.
3) I will actively seek agent representation
4) I will write a synopsis for a sequel to the book I just finished writing.
5) I will finish writing the MG novel I began during NaNoWriMo.

That should keep me busy...

Happy New Year to All! Keep Writing!

Woefully Behind!

Whatever made me think I could keep up the NaNoWriMo pace with three nights of parent/teacher conferences, 25 WEPs (written education plans) and goals due, and preparations for directing an early Christmas Cantata??? 

Watching the gray hairs grow...

NaNo Count: 4264 Words

Random Thoughts of "Almost"

Today:

1)We celebrated my Dad's "almost" 74th birthday. It's really Wednesday, but we had our get-together today. Lots of good food. Always good company!

2) I wish I could say I've "almost" met my Nano goal for today, but I'm at a sorry 482 words at the moment. It's 10:30 p.m.  I'm going to give it another go when I finish my post. 

3)My blog has been up and running for a week, and I've "almost" had 100 visitors! It was 97 a few minutes ago.  Thanks to everyone who stops by - Ya'll come back now!

Must sign off now, I've almost 1200 words to go...

Update: End of day NaNo count: 2610

My Big-Mouthed Inner Editor

I began my Nano experience this morning. Wow! I never realized what a big mouth my inner editor is. I set only one rule: I may not edit as I go. One rule. Within 2 minutes of writing I was already snarling at my computer, "You're not allowed to edit!" Big habits die hard. 

I finally decided I'm not allowed to look at the screen as I type. It helped. I should probably turn off spell check and grammar check as well. I'm almost to my 1667 words for today. Now that everyone in the house has had their breakfast (I always cook Saturday mornings) I should be able to get the last 552 words for today finished. 

The cool thing is that once I was able to silence my editor (at least in spurts), I discovered I like what I've written. So far. I'm beginning to think I might be able to do this!

Day 1: 1682 words

Less than 36 Hours ...

With less than 36 hours to go until the NaNoWriMo kickoff I'm beginning to realize I'm a wee bit unprepared. "No Plot, No Problem!" ... no books available either. They've completely sold out. So I decided to do some surfing for nano sites. Here are a few that I found:

10 Tips For Getting 50,000 by Nicole Humphrey

NaNoWriMo Tips and Tools by Nienke Hinton (links and resources)

Advice From a Noveling Veteran by Nathan Alderman, Macworld.com (tips to reach 50,000 words)

Surviving 30 Days of Noveling by Dan Moren, Macworld.com (How to make it through National Novel Writing Month)

Useful References for Writers NaperWriMo Wiki (TONS of reference links!)

Idea Generator for Nano - by C.R. Evers 

Good luck to all you NaNo's out there!

It's NaNoWriMo Time

It's official. I signed up for my first NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). The goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days. That would be 1667 words per day. whew. It's quantity of words that count, not quality. That's good, because I can't imagine my manuscript turning out to be much more than a ramble. But that's not the point. I mentioned yesterday that I am having trouble finishing the last few pages of a work in progress. I write a few lines then edit. I write a few more lines then edit again. I'm hoping that the NaNoWriMo experience will help (force) me to learn to spill the ideas onto the page without worrying about the immediate results. The slash and burn edits can wait until December. What's the worse thing that can happen? I'll have participated in an exercise that helped me grow as a writer. Who knows? Maybe I will come up with a workable manuscript. I'll keep you posted!