What am I, Crazy?

[bcholmes]

So, like, I signed up for the National Novel Writing Month thing. This could all go horribly, horribly wrong.

From November 1st to November 30th, I have to write 50,000 words. I figure I should target 2000 words a day. I'll be off work for most of the month of November, so I hope things work out.

Comments

[epi-lj.livejournal.com]

Hi,

I clicked through to your journal from the list of friends-oft-listed-but-not-on-his-list posted by jodawi. I believe you've met okoshun (who I'm married to) at the Toronto poly group meetings -- I recognize your name and recall her saying that you were nice and an interesting person. In any case, I just wanted to say that both myself and okoshun have signed up for NaNoWriMo as well. It would have been funny had you come to the Toronto NaNoWriMo kickoff party yesterday -- okoshun would undoubtedly have had that 'small world' feeling. :)

Going to the meeting was reassuring. Almost everybody there was a first-timer. Most of the people either had just signed up and had no idea what they were going to write yet, or only had the vaguest of ideas. Only one or two people (about fifteen people showed up) had an actual outline of any sort jotted down. Two people there had done it before and not finished (one twice), but were back again this year, which leads me to believe that even if you don't finish, it's a worthwhile experience and not utterly demoralizing.

The mantra that the people on the NaNoWriMo forums gave me to repeat to myself when I posted in their, "I Hate Myself And I Want To Die" message board about my pre-November stress flurries was, "Quantity, not quality." They advised me to keep reminding myself that this is not to be the Great American Novel, that it's only a first draft and/or an exercise to get into the swing of regular writing. Even if I didn't make the target, the attempt was more important than the success, but that if I kept in mind that all I had to do was bang out my number of words that month and I'd succeed as well. I'm highly self-critical, so that is going to be a difficult mantra to bear in mind, but I'm practicing it, and it does help to calm the, "This could all go terribly wrong," voices.

The people at the get-together were all very nice. They're planning more get-togethers over the course of the month to chat and write, as well as a "THANK (GOD) ITS OVER!!" party at the end of the month.