Madge's Weblog

NaNoWriMo -- Week Four

I said that I was going to post every day about my writing progess and, as you can see, that didn't happen.  This is mainly because I've been procrastinating during the week and making up time on the weekends.  My current word count is 35,000 so I'm about 2,500 words behind pace for today.  I was much further behind last year and I was much better about writing last year.  In fact, I wrote every day last year.  This time around I've written a little during the week and used the weekends for catch-up time.  I've stopped doing 30 minute word wars and started the 10 minute.  I think later this week I might even sink so low as to do the 5 minute word wars.  Word wars are really the only thing that is getting me through, that idea that I only have to write for a set time and I get the 'reward' of posting how many words I've done.  I average about 500 -- 700 words per round, which isn't bad at all. 

My goal today is to reach 40,000 words.  Then tomorrow I plan to reach 45,000 words.  I know that during the last week all sorts of things crop up at work or in my personal life that interfere with reaching my 50,000 word goal.  I want to rack up some spare word count so I can take care of those little problems and not be so stressed.

NaNoWriMo -- Week Two

Okay, so week one didn't go so great.  I've been using this weekend to try to catch up and stay on pace.  I'm happy to say that I caught up quite a bit this weekend.  I'm close to 15,000 words right now and I'm take a break to write this post.  Too bad the words for this post don't count toward my novel :-)  I thought that sharing some tips will help me stay motivated and on pace for the next week.  Week three is always the worst week for NaNoWriMo and I'm sure it will be extra hard because I've been slacking.  My goal is to write every night on my novel and post here to let everyone know how I'm doing.  I'll let you know my tips and how I keep myself motivated every day.

This weekend I used 30 minute word wars to stay motivated.  I also broke up the word wars with cleaning.  I would write 2,000 words then move around the house doing chores before sitting my butt back in the chair and starting again.   The activity seems to keep things fresh and moving.  I find that I'm a little jittery like I've had too much coffee right after I've done a word war so it helps to move around a bit.  If I'm really concentrating I can usually do about 2,000 words in 30 minutes.  Its sounds like a lot, but it really isn't.  You have to write non-stop whatever comes into your mind at that moment.  Kinda like this blog entry right now.

Wish me luck!

NaNoWriMo -- Day late and a dollar short

I've had a really hard time getting going with NaNoWriMo this year.  Right now I'm almost caught up.  I'm about a day behind on my word count goal.  Below are a few tips that have helped me try to keep pace.  Normally I'd refer to the forums, but the website is so ridiculously slow that those aren't much help this year.  Not sure what happened, last year the format of the site was much more involved and it was fairly fast.  The page load times make me think that their server is in a basement somewhere with smoke pouring out of every crevice.

My word count right is now is a little over 6,000 words.  I need to be at 8,334 words tonight to be on pace for 50,000 words.

Tips:

Word wars on the forums - see how many words you can write in 30 minutes.  Just let it flow and don't think.

Rewards - bribe yourself with your favorite food or drink.

Get up and move around - after a half hour of word wars make yourself get up and do something active.

Time yourself -- start writing on the hour and tell yourself that after you write a thousand words you can take the rest of the hour off.  I once wrote 10,000 words in a day using this technique.