Could someone please bring balloons to this pity party?

Day: #8
Word count: 8,490

This is the point in NaNo where this starts happening:

I'm honestly contemplating taping one of these to my keyboard. At least that way my word count would go up every time I smack into it in utter frustration and self-loathing.

I suppose the truth at this point is pretty simple. I've done next to no writing over the last year, and now hitting it full force is burning me out. And burning me out 10x quicker than doing this over the course of the last year would have. All I want to do is take just one little break. Just one night off. But the fact is, I was behind by about 3.5K on Sunday, and now that it's Monday it's almost another day down the drain. It keeps piling and piling... and somehow 300 words behind turned into so far behind that I'm starting to think I won't make it.

You could argue that ultimately I've accomplished something thus far. I've started writing again, consistently every night, even if it's only 90 words there or 1000 here. But if I don't make my NaNo count I will be utterly crushed. Why? I couldn't tell you. It's not like its ever mattered before.

Maybe because I need to finish something for me, to prove I'm still an autonomous individual capable of devoting time to me and my ambitions. But my ambitions are exhausting. Why couldn't I have picked stamp collecting for a hobby?

I'm starting to think certain people take all this as a joke. Well, tonight I'm here to remind you through my fit of defeat and complete utter annoyance at the world that it--is--not.

NaNoWriMo, yes, to some degree, is a joke. A lot of people enter, a lot of people win, who spend November writing a novel full of crap and plot holes and bad writing. But this isn't about NaNo (lest we forget my declaration against it in my first post), it's about my novel. I'm using the parameters of NaNo as a challenge to myself to help propel me forward.

But what I'm trying to do is not a joke. If you don't take it seriously, if you don't take me seriously, now would be a good time to back out. Because from here on in, it's going to get ugly. I'm going to get mean, nasty, frustrated, and unbearable.

Tonight is officially my "night off." I'm still behind on word count, but I'm calling it quits an hour early. The last two days have been too much for me and I'm throwing my hands up and walking away before I light something on fire. I hope to report better results tomorrow.

So close, and yet still a little far

Day: #6
Word count: 7,711

Admittedly, I needed to be at 10K by today. Meaning tomorrow I need to be at around 11,670-ish. Meaning between waking up and DnD (yes, I actually finally joined a game... still kind of on speculation, though) at 7:00 I have just under 4K to write. I'm not where I want to be, but I'm further along than I was expecting.

I stayed up on day #5 (Friday) until about 1:30 in the morning. Hence the lack of end-of-day blog, which I figured would happen (hence my preemptive, hedgehog of determined cuteness post). It's the latest I've been up, for a writing related reason, in a long time. Exhausted though I was this morning, I felt pretty damn good.

However, at the moment, I don't feel that great at all. I've had way too much coffee that has not helped to keep me awake and writing, but rather has given me a profuse headache. So tomorrow I think it will be water and the occasional cup of decaffeinated tea. I've spent my whole Saturday hunched over my computer, furiously typing away.

My mother brought something to my attention, so I figured I would throw it out there to anyone else still reading. If you want to read my NaNo, you are welcome to. But I have a few conditions:

1) Kacey (my co-writer and best friend) reads it first, always. Once I have her two cents and I have edited it all together sufficiently, it is open to the general public.

2) If by "wanting to read it," you mean have a fun time with a good story... okay, I accept that. But if you're willing to put in your opinions, offer some suggestions or things you would like to see as a reader, constructive criticism that you can be serious about, I want to hear from you first!

You'll have to wait until the end of NaNo, and you may have to accept that you could be cliff hung considering the novel is actually two NaNo's long. Obviously I'll bring this up again at the end of the month. But for now, just sit back and enjoy the insanity. If there's something I absolutely need help with from you guys, you'll see it here!

In other news, I have added a NaNo mascot. He is merely subbing for my kitty, Apollo, while he stays over for the weekend. His name is Charlie--he belongs to my friend Ash from work. But unlike Apollo, he's not so great about staying out of the way for me to type. And yes, he does have a face hiding under there.

My November 5th post

Day: #5
Word count: ???

No, don't get too excited. My word count hasn't miraculously gone off the charts... yet ^_^ I am about to begin an all night, no holds barred, until-I-can't-keep-my-eyelids-pried-open-anymore writing session. But, seeing as how up until this point I have posted every night, I figured I'd better do this know before we're in the hours of wee.

Especially since those hours will have moved us into day 6, and I'm a sucker for consistency. At least for now.

I've only worked a four hour day and have taken a fairly successful hour and a half nap, followed by delicious curry and some mind preening exercises (also known as watching two episodes of Mythbusters). I'm poised, primed, and ready.

I'll see you on day 6.

System failure

What I achieved this morning:

What I gave Murphy for yesterday:

What I didn't even REMOTELY achieve today:

Day: #4

Word count: 3,197

Yep.

That's right.

..... 90 words....

When I called this thing the NaNo Crisis, I was trying to be funny. I didn't--actually--mean it. I have to admit, even if I threw in the towel now (which I'm not) I will have still made it farther in NaNo than ever before. I think prior to this I last two days before deciding everything I did was crap and I was done.

I'm trying at this point to limit the number of times I can edit a single paragraph before moving on. So far I'm actually doing pretty good. I'm finding a way to accept that it will not be ready for send out on December 1st. Primarily because my co-author still needs to read it and put in her two cents. Let alone the people we will doubtlessly call on for opinions and revisions before subjecting ourselves to the literary world.

On the other hand... I wrote 90 words. I started late, quit early, and spent too much time talking to my bestie on iChat. My evening started out with good intentions. I headed straight to my room when I finished my 10 hour shift.

But that life not ceasing thing is a bitch. And today it really has me down. More so than yesterday because I'm tired and I've worked 36 of my 40 hours for the week, all in the span of four very exhausting days. It also doesn't help that the tension in the office today was annoying palpable. Or that I think I'm developing some deadly, stress induced skin disease.

But tomorrow will be better. I've got work until noon. I can take a power nap, then start anew on catching up first week's word count. Better I guess to fall behind at the start and know you're in trouble than to cruise through the beginning and think for even a moment that you're fine. That leads to slacking off. And that leads to no word count, no NaNo triumph, no fame or glory.

But for now I cling to the hope. 

Can you hear that sound?

It's my rusty writing skills screaming against the strain I'm trying to put them under.

Day: #3
Word count: 3,107

I didn't even write a full page tonight. For reals? I'm losing steam... and fast. Though, today was a terrible day to gauge.

What sucks most about NaNo isn't NaNo in and of itself. The word count, the innumerable cups of coffee, the lost hours of sleep as you rewrite that last paragraph in your head fifty more times even though you know there's no going back... no, that is actually mostly tolerable. At least if you're insane enough to be doing this. No, what really sucks about it is the rest of life refuses to take a hiatus whilst you NaNo your hours away.

Take this morning. I tossed and turned all through the night. No idea why--an explanation has yet to be divined to me by God or Murphy. But suffice to say, I lost sleep, and it wasn't even worth it as you can see by the sluggish word count. My brain woke up at 6:00, an hour before my alarm was set to go off, and my body craved that final hour of blissful rest. But no... no, alas it would not be mine. Not fully. So I shucked off my covers in defeat after hitting the snooze button all of twice in the belief that Starbuck's would soon soothe away the already bad morning.

I've recently changed bank accounts. I'm still awaiting the debit card from my new bank, and my old account has crept down to a mere $5. So I knew a bank visit was in order so that I might obtain the life sustaining goal of overpriced latte goodness. My car needed gas, my stomach needed breakfast, and my work ethic needed caffeine. But another disappointment was to befall me today. 30 minutes into Wednesday, all my hopes and dreams were shattered by a tiny little sign informing me that my new bank's drive thru didn't open until 8:00.

What... the... eff...

What bank doesn't open before 8:00?! This would definitely be the beginning to a Hyperbole style sneaky hate spiral. (Fyi, Hyperbole and a Half is also not mine. Her name is Allie Brosh and she's pretty much the funniest blog on the Internet. I am ashamed to admit I wish I was as good as her. I suppose I started this blog in hopes I could be, but unfortunately I am falling flat. You can find her at: http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/)

Anyway... back the the shitty, non-coffee day from Hades. Long story short (too late), I had to turn myself back around and head home to a cold bowl of cereal that wouldn't last past 10:30 and pitifully take my bottle of pumpkin spice coffee creamer to work in hopes I could make a cup there. After, of course, Sharpie-ing my name all over the cap. Nobody friggin' touches my holiday creamer. I'm currently trying to replace every fluid in my body with it for efficiency.

So, suffice to say my mind has not been in the place for writing at all today. I've spent most of my day trying to snap out of lingering exhaustion. I didn't even come into my studio until 9:30, giving me only an hour to write. What started out as 350 words behind has quickly and staggeringly multiplied into about 1,900 words behind.

Guess it's ridiculously lucky I only work until 12:00 on Fridays and have my weekends to myself. Saturday concludes the first week of NaNo, when word count should be around 10K. 27 days to go and I already feel like that straggler at the back you wished you hadn't brought on the trip.

And now, a perfectly illustrative picture from Hyperbole that gets my point across:

The novel

Day: #2
Word count: 2,522

I have very triumphant music from one of my favorite video games (Final Fantasy VIII) playing on my computer. For those of you who are familiar with the game, it's the: "yay! we got the airship that is super bad ass"song that plays whilst you fly around the world map. I, on the other hand, don't feel very triumphant. According to the laws of daily word count, I should be at around 3,334 words. As you can see by the above... I am not.

I started writing last night around 8:00 and stopped around 10:30. Today I started at 7:00 and stopped around 10:30. Yet somehow, I wrote 200 words LESS tonight than last night. That happens... how? Needless to say, not a good foot to start on. I have to admit, my reason for even quitting before word count has been reached is simply that I'm exhausted. On Tuesdays (and Thursdays, actually) I work from 8:00 in the morning until 7:00 in the evening, with an hour lunch. A 10 hour day that is certainly physically, and often times mentally, challenging. And whether I want to admit defeat or not, my head feels like it's gained 20 pounds that can only be alleviated by the sweet embrace of a pillow.

But first, another entry of insight into what this crazy scheme is all about. What's a writer without a novel? Well... not a writer, actually...

Some basic facts to start:

The first draft of this story began in the summer of 2003. It was a side project myself and my partner (yes, I co-write if you haven't been introduced to this fact yet) started as a means to alleviate writer's block on a totally different project. As a side note, I apparently really like the word alleviate this evening. I was about 15 or 16 at the time, and she only a year younger than me. Three years later, in April of 2006, we found ourselves concluding the first draft. As accomplishing and unexpected as this was, it hasn't exactly made this the most pleasant of projects.

Between the ages of 15 and 19, between high school and college, a huge gear shift happens... and in the midst of that gear shift came the realization that we actually had something here. The problem therein is this: a story you start for fun and a story you intend to publish are drastically different things. Fun stories don't need to have a plot or cohesive anything. Publishable stories pretty much thrive on that. Fun stories are, essentially, and explosion of the god complex I mentioned before. I control your little world, oh characters, and I shall unleash thunderbolts and lightning (very very frightening me! Galileo!).

So there's my first problem. I have to mostly rewrite the beginning so it doesn't come off as two idle teenagers screwing around with nothing better to do. This means deleting a lot of anachronisms, plot holes, and the rabid effects of watching too much anime. It also means adding chapters, putting meat on the bones of what's left once the thing is torn down into the pieces that still have some actual literary value.

My second problem is having to switch the format. If you're at all familiar with online chat room role playing, you can pretty much skip this paragraph. For the rest of you, the basic idea is you introduce your character into a group of characters that are being written by other people. A story of some kind is intended to form through the line-by-line writing system.

My partner and I took that and changed it up a bit in order to write something more "novel-like" in nature, while still getting all the goodies of having back-and-forth banter. Constant tense changing problems aside, I've found this method to be exceptional for dialogue. Over the years we've debated taking another approach, and it's only in the editing that I'm seeing the value of doing so. Because the bottom line is... it's effing ridiculous having to go back and edit this much. Because like it or not, no publishing company can or would take it as is.

At the same time, I couldn't imagine doing it any other way when it comes to the character dynamics. A part of literature I've always been overly critical of in the first place. In other words, it has its ups and downs like anything else. But the downs really are the pits.

At the end of it all, three years later, the total word count reached over 98K. Between April 2006 and now, 3.5 chapters had been re-written + a prologue. A prologue I am debating on getting rid of, even though I like the way it reads. A first chapter that was the point of many an emotional crisis in the spring of 2007, but ultimately remains the best of the lot. A second chapter that was never in the original draft. A third chapter that is so long it eats other chapters for breakfast.

And then we have chapter four...

It sucks. I just finished it, finally, tonight. And it sucks. I absolutely hate it. I've hated it since the third page or so. It started out well, with the best of hopes and intentions to propel the rest of the novel. Then somehow it tanked. And now, faced with a word count, impending collection calls from loan officers, and the reeling sensation I get when I realize I may never accomplish my one freaking dream in the universe... I have climbed my way through the muck and the mire that is chapter four. Just to get it over with, just to be done with the damn chapter that's had me hung up since I first tried to write it. I've spent months thinking over how to fix it.

Tonight, I said a big f*** it. It isn't fixed. It won't be fixed until my partner reads it and puts in her two cents. But at this point, the goal has to be that it's done, not that it's perfect. I've spent this whole time believing that since it is the edit of the original, it has to be spot on ready to publish. I think the average number of times a novel gets edited is about... well, I don't know. Because Google doesn't know. How frightening is that?

So... that's the basics. A novel that, in it's original form, is completely unpublishable despite it's nearly 100K word count. As for plot, characters, and all that juicy good stuff... well, I'm supposed to keep this blog going throughout the month so, can't give everything away.

And now, since I can't think of anything else to provide a photo of, here's a cartoon that's funny but still describes how I'm feeling:

The Author

Day: #1
Word count: 1,329

So... admittedly, I'm not technically an author. But I figure everyone great starts somewhere. And if they get an "about the author" section, why shouldn't I? I mean, hell... I'm the one blogging about all this after all.

Yesterday I gave you the rundown of the plot of this blog. 50K, 30 days, a 9 year project/novel that needs writing. Period. No exceptions. Now I figure it's time to introduce you to me. Assuming you don't already know me.

In other words, this post is an insight about how desperate I am for other people to give a flying rat's ass about me and my struggle for literary fame.

Where to start? I'm 24. I graduated college in May of 2009 under the assumption that I would now go live my adult life outside the safety of graduate school. My goal, not so shockingly, was to spend my time writing. Writing this very novel, in fact. If nothing else, I have to give my current situation a +4 to irony and symmetry.

I've been writing since I could form a sentence. And my love for it came not only from the enjoyment I found, but also from the fact that it garnered me the first positive attention I ever received in grade school. From the students, that is. For the most part, I was a teacher's pet. My horrendous overbite allowed me to develop a personality. The overbite has since been fixed--I now no longer resemble a crocodile. The personality, however, is still as volatile as ever.

So given all this, irony gets another +4 as I work in a dental office. I went to school for writing and English (as in literature, not necessarily linguistics)... and I work in a dental office. The "wtf?" part of this has not escaped me. Though perhaps it has something to do with the lingering trauma of being a tooth-impaired social reject the majority of my youth.

My job, however, is actually quite enjoyable. I get a lot of respect and appreciation; and, as time goes on, my co-workers get to know more and more about me and become marginally invested in my life. I would even go so far as to say I've made friends. I've only lived in Kansas since March, having originally moved from southern Missouri to Kansas City. So friends, thus far, have been hard to come by. Or at least, friends I didn't meet through my current significant other. 

I work as a hygiene assistant; meaning, I clean rooms between patients, sterilize instruments, and generally do whatever the hygienists need. In all honesty, I'm happy to do this because the five of them are possibly the most grateful people I've ever met. I'm honestly starting to believe they fear the day I have to move on to bigger things, even if they're cheering me on the whole way there. And yes, I have been fortunate enough to actually assist the dentist a time or two. Despite assisting through and extraction of a molar, I still don't have any horror stories yet to speak of.

I'm about $25K in debt, and I'm running out of forbearance time on my loans. Maybe that's why I've decided to get my ass in gear. Prayer's of literary recognition and possible movie deal seem, at this point, to be my only way out with food in my fridge.

I'm sarcastic and I take things too far most of the time. As in, yes that was funny but why are you still talking? Short explanations are not my forte. I'm a compulsive editor. Seriously... I've been editing this blog post pretty much all the way through. I'm not joking. And truthfully, I'm still not satisfied with it or sure that anyone beyond my mother would still be reading at this point. My best friend and co-author, when listening to the voicemails I leave her, often pulls the phone away from her ear until I get to the end. You know, the point of the message that's most likely the important one. Because she knows the rest of it is most likely me just going on about god knows what. In other words, this is the part she would also be skipping, despite her immense love for me.

I'm sure there's more I could say about myself. Hell, I know there is. I'm great at talking about me. It's my best subject. But you'll start to get more of me as this month goes by. I will make an attempt to post every night, even if it's nothing more than word count and what I ate for dinner.

Unfortunately, as supportive as my hygienists are, they still expect me there at 8:00 tomorrow. I've written over 1,300 words in three hours. It's the most writing I've done in at least a year. Despite being about 350 under word count, for the first "all nighter" in a long time... I consider it a success.

And now, a picture of my NaNo mascot: