What Happened With NaNoWriMo?

It's December now, which means that NaNoWriMo finished.

Unfortunately, for the second year in a row, NaNo didn't work for me, but then I decided to test a theory, to try something different.

When I signed up for NaNoWriMo this year, I knew it was going to be a struggle. I started a new job on November 5 as a police communications dispatcher trainee. While it has been interesting and something I'm enjoying, it's been harder than I ever imagined. There's a lot of work involved, but honestly, I couldn't be happier. The few times of stress and tears have been worth it and it will be worth it in the end. I already did mention in a previous post that during the first weekend of NaNoWriMo, I was involved in doing shows for a community theatre production in my neighborhood.

It soon became obvious that NaNoWriMo was going to be a failure. My job has needed my full attention. However, I decided to keep doing NaNoWriMo, as if I was actually writing. I updated my word count every day, as if I wrote x amount of words each day. In theory, I won NaNo, even though I wasn't actually writing a novel/story, while updating the word count with a random amount each day.

The conclusion to all of this is that I will be partaking in NaNoWriMo next year with a better plan, as my traineeship will be over and I'll have a set schedule by then.

I extend my congratulations to anyone who succeeded in doing NaNoWriMo the write, err right, way (see what I did there).

Happy Writing!

~Meg~

2018 NaNoWriMo Update #1

Just stopping in to post a quick update on how NaNoWriMo is going this year so far.

Well, I just started a new job last Monday, which involves training for nine weeks. That being said, I haven't been able to write as much as I would like to be, but am and will be taking advantage of off days, like weekends and off days. I hope to catch up somewhat tomorrow as it's my day off to commemorate Veteran's Day. Veteran's Day is today, however, the government celebrates it on Monday if it falls on a Sunday. I'm working on finding a balance between working, writing, and of course, sleeping.

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo Take 2

Hello and welcome back. 

I've decided that I'm doing NaNoWriMo again this year. It will be my second attempt. I say attempt because I failed when I did it last year. I'm going to do updates, but I don't know how many yet. 

The major obstacle I will have this year is that I'm supposed to be starting a full time job in November as a police dispatcher trainee. It's shift work, so I won't be writing at the same time every day. You keep the same schedule for two weeks and then rotate hours for the next two weeks and so forth. I'm working on a schedule for getting through November, but I will have a better idea when we get our schedule on the first day of work.

Last year, I was a pantser. This year, I'm a plantser. I have a general idea of what I'm going to be writing my novel about, so it's going to be more a combination of both a planner and a pantser.

Good luck to any NaNoWriMos out there!

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo 2017 Final Update and Review

NaNoWriMo 2017

I've been wanting to do NaNoWriMo for a couple years now, so I finally decided to do it this year for the first time. I thought I would have the time to get it done this year. But I didn't know what I had in store not long after it began. I'm become so used to things not working out for me and unfortunately, completing NaNoWriMo was no exception.

It got off to a great start for about a week and half. I was reaching the average word count each day of 1,667 words and if I didn't, I would catch up the next day or so. It looked promising until my mom got hit with a flare up of sciatica, which she is still dealing with now. It started out okay until it got progressively worse after about a week after the initial start-up. It became where she was able to get around okay, followed by not being able to walk at all (and we're still working on that). What it meant for me was that I gained more responsibilities than ever, with taking care of her, the house, doing NaNoWriMo, trying to get ready for a craft fair for this month, and trying to take care of myself. It left me feeling more tired than ever and there were days where I didn't have a moment to spare. The thing about sciatica is that you just don't know when a flare-up will occur and I had no idea that we would still be dealing with all of this as of this writing. She went to urgent care the first day, where she was prescribed a muscle relaxer and motrin. The following week, we ended up at the ER due to the excruciating pain while we were attempting to get her to an orthopedist appointment, but she was given a lot of medicine and got sent home with oxycodone, Tylenol, and more motrin . It was approaching Thanksgiving and it appeared to be getting somewhat better, but that would be short lived. It still really wasn't getting better and she started getting hallucinations from the narcotic. A couple days ago, we took her to an orthopedist with much pain at that. He only told us to keep giving the Tylenol and motrin; he didn't want to really prescribe anything stronger because he didn't want anything to mess with her heart problems. It hasn't helped much and now we're stuck at the same place.

When she started getting worse, I started having trouble keeping up with NaNoWriMo. While selfishly I want to blame my mom for having it happen when I was trying to focus on myself for a change, I don't blame her because it was out of her, as well as my, control.

I'm pretty sure by now you know what I'm about to say. I did not complete the 50,000 word count, but I did manage to write 41,210 words during November (I did write a bit more, but I wasn't able to get them in time, but it still wouldn't have surpassed 50,000).

My goal wasn't necessarily to reach the 50,000 word count. My main goal was to get myself back in the habit of writing every day. I did accomplish that by managing to write most days out of the month. Based on what I was dealing with, I am proud of myself for reaching that far and I'm proud that I went after a goal. While I do wish I could have reached the 50,000 word count goal, I reached other goals that made it worth it.

I am planning on doing NaNoWriMo again next year and hopefully it will turn out better.

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo Weekly Update 4

NaNoWriMo Update Week 4

Okay, so I goofed and apparently didn't realize that this would be my second to last update instead of the last like I said last week.

I thought that it would get easier this week, but I still was dealing with challenges. I will be talking all about that next week during the final and overall update.

While the week didn't exactly pan out the way I thought it would, I made some steady progress over the last couple of days. I'm still not certain if I'm going to reach 50,000 words in time, but I am doing and trying my best. Right now, I'm around 34k words.

NaNoWriMo officially ends on Thursday, but my final and overall update will be up next weekend.

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo 2017 Weekly Update 3

NaNoWriMo Week 3 Update

1. I'm still running behind the word count quota. Right now, I'm around 20 or 21,000 words out of 50,000.
2. I've made a lot of progress over the past couple days.
3. There's a week and a half left.
4. My final and overall update will be posted next Saturday. I'll be  writing about the last days, in addition to my overall outlook, of NaNoWriMo.

Happy Reading and Keep on Writing!

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo Weekly Update 2

It's Saturday and that can mean only one thing. It's time for my weekly update on NaNoWriMo 2017.

NaNoWriMo Week 2

I wish I could say that I've been hitting my target and goals each day, but that would be lying. Unfortunately, this week I have been dealing with a family emergency that's been more important, but I haven't been able to write as much. I should have known that it would happen, but it's life and there's not a lot I can do about that.

For my story, I have had to change some things around, which is not helping me progress. At the end of the day, the word count doesn't matter. Yes, it's been a disappointing week filled with a bit of despair, but I refuse to give up. I refuse to let setbacks define me and the writing goals I set for the purpose of doing NaNoWriMo in the first place. I do have a lot of work ahead of me for the rest of the month and I believe I can still win this (by reaching or exceeding 50,000 words). Anything is possible if I just believe.

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo 2017 Weekly Update 1

I'm going to be doing weekly updates on how NaNoWriMo is going every Saturday.

NaNoWriMo Week 1

NaNoWriMo kicked off on Wednesday, so as of this writing, I have just finished day four. In case anyone doesn't know, I am not writing a novel per se. I am writing my long qt book.

Day 1 - I actually got off to a good start. I wrote 2,289 words. Remember, the goal is write at least 1,667 words a day. It was great to go over when I wasn't expecting to.

Day 2 - Not as great as the first day, so I only wrote 993 words. I kept getting distracted and trust me, distractions happen more than you think. It brought my total to 3,282 words.

Day 3 - I was able to have a productive day and wrote 1,917 words, bringing my total to 5,199. It puts me over what I needed. If I would have written exactly 1,667 words up to this point, it would have been at 5,001 words.

Day 4 - Today didn't exactly go as planned, but that's okay. I still got some writing done and wrote 1,003 words. It brings me to my overall total of 6,202, which is below what I needed.


Thoughts on Week 1
I made some progress, but have faced a few challenges. My initial goal of doing NaNoWriMo was to get back into the habit of writing every day, as well as finally finishing writing my long qt book. The problem is I don't know if it's possible to write a minimum 50,000 word book on the topic, but I will be trying my hardest. If I'm able to finish writing the book in under 30 days and it happens to be under the 50,000 word count, I'm thinking about starting a novel after that because it would still be writing something to contribute to NaNoWriMo. I do have a lot of work ahead of me going into next week.

~Meg~

NaNoWriMo Official

It's official! I will be participating in NaNoWriMo for the first time this year! In case anyone doesn't know, it stands for National Novel Writing Month. During the month of November, you are challenged to write a novel of at least 50,000 words. That comes to writing 1,667 words each day in the month.

I am not writing a novel, however. I am taking the month to write My Journey with Long QT book, so it will be a nonfiction novel. While I have written some parts of it already, I will be finally finishing the first draft.

I am excited to be partaking in NaNoWriMo. I will be posting weekly updates here on this blog.

~Meg~