December 1, 2016 Thoughts about yesterday's post.

    So, I figured out the dilemma I was experiencing last night.  I realized this morning while I was painting, that I may have sounded like I was whining yesterday in my post.  Oh, whoa is me, I have to try to get a magazine interview.  :/  Why is success so hard?
    But that's not what it was.  It was more frustration in myself and the decisions I make in my life.  In almost everything I've done, it's at this point that I say: Okay, I've figured it out.  Now it's time to go figure something else out.
    I've done this a lot.  With my crocheting, I very rarely finish a project.  I figure out the pattern and how to make the pretty design and then I move on to another challenge.  This is only one example.
    Another would be my Geology degree.  I'm 18 credits away from having a Bachelor's of Science in Geology.  What did I do when I got to the last semester?  I looked at everything and asked if it was really what I wanted.  Did I really want to be a geologist?  Did I really want to make that kind of commitment?  There are other things that interest me.  So, I changed my major and tried some other things, eventually dropping out completely.
    Real Estate, Nursing, dare I say marriages as well, they have all fallen victim to my apparent fear of success.
    I've gotten some of them figured out.  I have finally found a man (actually, we were put together) I can be with, who challenges me and refuses to give up on me.  I went from Real Estate into being a stay-at-home mother which I found really satisfying.  Finding something to do with my time is what led me to pick up an old interest of writing.
    I prayed about this whole thing this morning.  So far, I've stayed on the easy side of things.  Whether I succeed at producing a book is totally up to me; it's all under my control.  Getting people to buy it, putting it out there for people to see--more people to see--that's not under my control and introduces risk.
    This is the point where I usually decide to pull up stakes and move somewhere else.
    I have a problem, however.  I love my characters.  This is a story I NEED to get out.  I feel like I'm being inspired to write this.  This is beyond me.
    If I'm going to be an agent of my Heavenly Father, if I'm going to do what he asks me to do--and I feel this is something he's inspiring me to do--then I have to do what it takes to get it out there.
    I have to call the magazine... and the t.v. stations.  I have to make the appointment for the book signing and the library reading.
    Then I have to remember my own advice from just a couple weeks ago and ask myself:  How bad do I want it?

    I've painted this morning.  My living room is shaped like a fat 'L'.  The walls are painted what I describe as a Dijon mustard yellow.  It's not horrid, but it's not spectacular either.  What makes it worse (and most of the houses I've seen in California have this downside) is that the paint is flat.  You can't clean flat paint.  When you have four teenagers, this is not a good thing.  What boggles me, is that the couple we bought the house from raised three kids here.  They should know this.
    The one side of the living room is very dark.  There is 80's style track lighting which isn't very bright and the room is dark.  So, I'm painting it a white satin and putting some color into the trim.  This is what I've done so far today:

Before

After one coat.  It's still wet in a couple places.

    I only taped off about a fourth of the floor in this section.  I didn't want the kids tracking paint through the house, that's why I'm not doing the whole thing all at once.  Besides that, I also want to be working on the book during the day.  This way, I paint for two or three hours and then write some as well.
    I think there will need to be three coats with the roller and two with the brush.  That seemed to be what the situation was when we painted my daughter's room.  So, tomorrow, I'll start with the second coat of roller, trim in the edges again and then hopefully I can to the third coat and be ready to move the plastic to the next section.
    As far as writing is concerned, I'm going to get a couple chapters in Part 2 read and edited.  I hope to get them through a grammar program that ISN'T Word.  If I still have daylight, I hope to begin the third draft of Part 3 and get the first two chapters rewritten.
    Those are my hopes and dreams.  The kids will be home soon so I better get started.
    Talk to you tomorrow.

November 30, 2016 Why is success scary?

    I didn't write anything today either.  I'm totally okay with the 176,000 I manged to get over the course of the first 24 days of the month.  Totally.
    My burnout is wearing off.  Today, I was spontaneously thinking about my characters and some things.  I had a few small revelations, but I didn't get them down.  If they're supposed to be there, they'll come back.
    I did get some plot work done.  It's not all of the story line, I'm missing a bit, especially towards the end.  Some of it might need to get moved around.  I do have enough to get through most of the book and plug things in as I go.  That's major.
    Tonight, I'll get Part 3 mapped into my overall plot line Excel sheet.  It's a handy thing.  On the left, I have the days of the week listed.  Across the top, is each of the two main and several major characters.  The events are then plotted out so they lace together.
    Tomorrow, I'm going to do a little bit of painting in the living room.  Then, I'm going to read and grammar-ize two chapters in Part 2.  If I have some time left over, I'm going to come back around to the beginning of Part 3 and start the third draft with the new timeline.  There's no sense in finishing the second draft.  I've changed enough of Part 2 that only the skeleton of the last half of Part 3 remains.
    I also met with one of my alpha readers today and gave her a copy of Part 2.  The last one will go out tomorrow.  That's exciting.  I'm moving along. 
    The lady I met with today, her husband has worked for one of the local magazines.  He gave me contact information to get a hold of someone there to see if they'd like to do a local piece on me.  He also told me to contact the local t.v. stations.  It's kind of intimidating.
    I talked with my husband about it tonight.  He told me that if I want this to do really well, I need to jump in and swim in the deep end.  Why is success scary?  It's not even success at this point.  It's potential success.  And it frightens me.
    I still haven't locked down a book signing with the local Barnes and Noble.  That's been out there since August.  I also had an offer from a local librarian to do a reading.  I told both of them I'd have to think about it.  Why didn't I jump at them?
    My hubby has a good point.  I can continue to be a stay-at-home mom who paints her house and writes/publishes OR I can be an author who paints sometimes... and still stays at home.
    I'm sitting here crying because it scares me to death.
    I'll let you know what happens.

November 28, 2016

       I'm done with NaNo 2016.

        So, Plotting.  Yeah.  That's what I was going to work on to help spur me into the last week of NaNo.  So, I did and then did nothing else.  Actually, I really didn't need to plot much.  It's basically already there.  There's some nuance stuff that's not but it can really only come out when I'm writing/rewriting/editing.  Only about half of Daniel's stuff is written, but I'm not sure where it goes.  It's dependent upon what day of the week it is, so that will depend on where things fall timewise.  That's what needs to get figured out.

        I suppose sitting down, putting the events on cards and mapping it all out will be what I need to do.  I'm too locked into the timeline when I look at the plotlines I have mapped in Excel.  But it's set up on a daily basis, locking things into specific places.  What I need to do needs to be more fluid than that.  I need to get it all pieced together without the day to day in my line of sight.

        I stopped writing for NaNo.  I didn't do any writing for the last two days and what I did on Friday was only my blog and my journal.  That's it.  A very teeny portion of me feels guilty for not finishing the month, but I was burned out.  Completely and totally.  I spent the weekend playing on Sims.

        That was good.  I was able to clear my mind.  I started having spontaneous thoughts about the book a little here and there.  Not what it has been but it's coming back.

        I can do these last three days but I'm not sure if I'm going to.  I'm looking forward to the editing process of Part 2.  I'm planning for that… and to paint the living room.  I'd like to have the painting done so I can put up the Christmas tree.  But, I'm going to work on both of them.  I'm not in a rush to paint nor to edit.

        So, that is what it is.  I got 176k words logged into this NaNo.  It might be a little more if I decide to do some over the next few days, but if not, I got a pretty impressive number and it's a personal record.

        I think it's done.  NaNo 2016 for me, is done.

 

        I printed out the alpha versions of Part 2.  Here's a picture:

 

      The duck is sitting on an alpha version of Part 1 and represents 43 of the 49 chapters, less 10,000 words from the final print.  Part 2 is on the left and seems to be a little bit bigger....

      I'll check in tomorrow.

November 25, 2016

  Thanksgiving was a wonderful time.  We ate, talked and played games.  Spectacular.
  I even stayed until 8:30, which was two hours past what I had planned on.  It was all good.  I felt refreshed and renewed afterwards.  Good times, good times.
  We, as a family, talked to two of our children yesterday.  They're a good sixteen hour drive away so we don't see them often.  It was good to talk to them.  We're planning on Skyping with them both at some point this weekend.
  Yesterday was a light writing day.  I didn't quite get to 5k.  I sat down to write after we got home and I just didn't have it in me.  I'm thinking there's a week off coming next Thursday.  Or, a scaled down version of a writing work day.  I need to start editing Part 2.  At first I thought I'd go through one chapter a day--just comb through it slowly and catch all the errors that four re-throughs by myself and my editor didn't catch.  Be methodical.  Then I realized that would have me publishing sometime in September and that's too far out.  I settled on two chapters a day.  That's gets us back to the May-June time span.
  Last night and this morning, I've been thinking about Part 3.  It's a mess, they way I've started rewriting it.  A disaster.  Scenes are everywhere.  Bluh.  I'm playing with the idea of starting the rewrite over.  I don't know.  I don't like the sporadic-ness.
  Well, I should do something.  Maybe I'll get out the index cards and the markers.  I'm liking that idea.  I've already met my minimum and aim goals (150k and 175k).  Maybe a (partial) day of plotting will help the rest of the last week go better.
  And as I sit here thinking about it, my brain is screaming at me about my word count.  Lol..
  I'll talk to you tomorrow.

November 21, 2106

  This weekend wasn't as productive as I'd liked to have been.  Both Saturday and Sunday wound up being fairly lazy days word count wise.  However, I'm not too worried about it.
  Okay, so I say that with a caveat.  On Saturday, I still got over 10k in, however, I was hoping for more.  It felt like I was dragging because I was still trying to write at 10:30 at night and I just kept allowing myself to get distracted.  Finally, I gave in to the distractions and did that instead.  I could've gotten to 12k if I hadn't.  Maybe I needed to.
  On the other hand, on Saturday, I did get all the way through Part 2 and into Part 3.  YEAH!  Party dance.  The total count right now for Part 2 is 117k, which is about 40k more than Part 1.  It's hefty.  Today, I'm debating on whether one chapter needs to be pulled back out and stuck back into Part 3.  But that decision will have to wait.
  Yesterday, I got in about 5k, which is really good considering I should've really just taken the day off.  My hubby spent a couple hours with me figuring out a technical situation with me so that something that needs to happen can.  That was important and well worth the loss of word count.
  I printed out five copies of Part 2 yesterday, four for my alphas and 1 for me.  This will be December's project.  I love how 2 is shaping up.  It's solid.  3 feels thin to me right now.  I have to remember that it's only the second draft and that's why I rewrite things so many times.
  I'm dreaming about 12k days for the rest of the month.  I don't know if that will happen or not.  I'm not feeling it today, either.  I think it's because 3 feels so thin.  When I get deeper into the meat of the story, I should get back into it.  Or maybe, I need to take a nap.  It is after lunchtime.
  Or maybe I need to get out the headphones and the music, and reread my post about how bad I want this! GAH!
  See you tomorrow.

November 18, 2016

    I got 9.5k written yesterday.  It was good.  I had been aiming for 10k, of course, but it took me until 11:45 to get where I got, so I wouldn't have gotten the rest.  It's okay.  I was over the 10k on Wednesday and I'm aiming to be over it again today.
    Part of the problem I had yesterday revolved around two chapters.  I'd written a particular scene between Daniel and a minor character, Chelsea.  When I went through Part 2 two times ago, I had decided I didn't want the scene in the book.  When I went through it again the last time, I thought that maybe it needed to be back in there, but I wasn't sure.  The events seemed so miniscule to me.
    I thought about this scene a lot yesterday.  By about seven o'clock, I realized that Daniel was going to HAVE to do this scene and it was going to require him to act in a way that's not him.  I didn't want to write it, because I didn't want Daniel to go there.
    Finally, at about ten o'clock, I decided that I'd write the chapters and if I didn't like them, I'd get rid of them.  So I did.  Wow.  I was hiding from the emotions that came out.  Holy cow.  It wound up being really good chapters.  They're going to need some adjusting because the emotion in it is so raw for me.
    This is why I write.  I love that these words can pull such an emotional response.  It's awesome.
    I'm shooting for 10k again today, but there's also a second goal.  I'm almost done getting through Part 2 and it's Friday, the 18th.  There's only twelve days left.  I need to get moving.  And, if I dot get through the rest today, I can give myself another duckie!  Part 3 tomorrow!  Woot!
    See you tomorrow.

November 17, 2016

  Even with a late start yesterday, I still clocked in over 10k last night.  I have an overall total of 107,278.  I'm on track to get to 190k-ish.
  A couple days ago, I joined with a group of other overachievers.  By being in this group, I get to see their progress as well.  It stimulates my competitive streak, on an overall and a daily basis.  There's a few people at the top that I'll never reach, but I only set my sights on the three or four right ahead of me anyway.  It's an ever-changing chart because their word counts are changing as well.  It's actually helping me to stay focused on the word counts for the day as opposed to looking at getting through so many chapters, which can become tedious.
  I'm now about 90% of the way through Part 2.  I like where the book is going.  There's still a rough spot towards the end that needs some more sanding, but I think revising will take care of that.  To me, it's interesting and has good movement.  I hope that comes across.
  I can see the light at the end of the Part 2 tunnel.  It's exciting.  I think there's three or four new chapters/pull from part 3 (one total) that needs to happen.  Whether they stay or not, I'm not sure.  I'm just questioning if one event needs to happen at the end of this book or the beginning of the next.  Sometimes, the portion has to be written in order to find that out.
  I'm aiming for at least 10k today.  There's a sports meeting for one of the kids I have to go to.  Other than that, my agenda's clear.
  Well, I need to get the dog to the dog park and then get to work.  I hope you have a good day.  See you tomorrow.

November 16, 2016

   Tuesday was a good day.  I clocked in about 8000 words.  It wasn't the 14k from the day before, but I'm pleased with the number.  I was pretty brain dead yesterday.  Today, I've had a double grilled cheese sandwich with extra pepperoni and a huge glass of cardboard-tasting chocolate milk (ALL of the chocolate milk in California is 1% so it tastes like cardboard.  Partially solved this issue by adding more chocolate syrup, but that only helps, doesn't fix it.).  So, I've replaced some fats in my system so my brain will work better.  I had a good night's sleep and then I slept in this morning.  I feel good.
  Basically, I can still hit my 240k dream goal if I do 10k a day from now until the end of the month.  About three of those days, I'll have to do 11k and there are two Sundays and Thanksgiving in there.  That brings me down to 210k.  I don't know if I'm happy with that number.  And I'm not totally certain 240k will get me to where I want to be.  I'll have to think on what will make me happy and what I'm willing to live with.
  I'm about 85% done with Part 2 draft 6 now.  It's really close.  I don't think it'll happen tomorrow, however.  I'd need a REALLY good day today and tomorrow.  The day's already half over and I needed the rest so I don't see it.  Friday's good.  We'll go with that.
  Because of the resting, no walking or taking the dog to the dog park.  She's not okay with that but I am. :)  It's just the way a rest day goes.  Of course, this is Wednesday, so it's going to be busy.  Take the day as it comes, I suppose.
  See you tomorrow.

November 15, 2016

    Wow.  Today's halfway through November.  I'm a little sad.
    Yesterday was such a good day.  I clocked in 13,877 words to get my total up to 88,888.  Yes, I stopped in the middle of a sentence to get it.  It felt so good to get that accomplished.
    And today is a new day.  I'm not going to get as much done today.  I have a church activity tonight.  I normally look forward to them and I'm sure that this will be fun.  But, as with other things that pull me away from my computer, I don't want to stop writing.  But, I will.  Every time I do stop, it winds up being a good thing.  I do have a good base going and I'm on track to hit at least 180k.
    Today, I'm aiming for between 8 and 10k.  I'm getting a late start today.  I took a Benadryl last night so I had difficulty waking up this morning.  The sleep was a good thing, thought.  And I'm not feeling as mucky as I have been.  I'll probably have to take another one later this week to keep the allergies at bay.
    I'm about 80% of the way through the sixth draft of part 2.  I'm still looking at Thursday or Friday to complete it.  I had hoped the big word count yesterday would've knocked that down some, and overall, it did.  It still takes time, though.
    Okay, I'm off to work.  I'll see you tomorrow.

November 11, 2106

     Well, today is going to be a busy day.  I'm only practically calling for about 5k today, and hoping for close to 10k.  The 10k would be awesome.

    I wanted 12k yesterday and settled for 10.4k.  By the nine o'clock, I was brain fried.  But then, I felt pretty fired all day.  I unplugged the internet to help me out with my writing goals.  It worked until about lunchtime, when I wanted to update my word count.  Then it was downhill from there.  Facebook became a distraction a few times.  Once, it was over an hour.  That needs to stop.  It's hard, however, when your brain's on overload and you need a little dopamine boost.  It's quite convenient for that.
    So, I figured out what it would take to get through the end of Part 2 by next week.  If I average around 10k a day, with less than 1k on Sunday, I can be done by Thursday.  I'd rather be done by Tuesday, but I don't know how I'm going to pull that off.  I didn't pull the word counts the first week that I needed to in order to pull that off.
    So, I have to do it now.  Maybe if I buckled down today, I can get that 10k.  I'll have to really buckle down tomorrow, it's another jam-packed day.
    We'll take it a day at a time, I guess.

November 8, 2014

     Yesterday wound up being a good day.  About halfway through the day, I started feeling better.  At that point, I think I was about 3000 words in.  By the end of the day, at 11:45 p.m., I was over 10k for the day.  I was buzzing.  It was a good day.

     I'm looking forward to trying for that number again today.  I'll be bouncing around town.  Since I went and exercised my right to vote as an INFORMED voter, I'm treating myself to Chipotle for lunch.  I'll probably spend a couple hours there, writing.  Before I go there, however, I'm headed to one of the libraries in town so I can donate a copy of my book and write there for a while.  After lunch, I'll head to the library near my house where there's going to be a write-in this afternoon.  That'll be done at 7.  Depending on what I still need to get done, I'll either continue writing or take the evening up.  But I know me--I'll probably continue writing.

    Tomorrow is Wednesday… notorious for being uber-busy.  Having a head start going into the day would be a good thing.

    We're done with week 1.  Looking at my foundation goal, 150k, at the end of week 1 I should be at 37,500.  When I went to bed, I was at 40,241!  Woot!  For my dream goal, 240k, I needed to be at 60k.  I'm a little off.  But there's still time.

    For week 2, I'm setting my goal at 75k, half of 150k.  However, I want to be all the way through Part 2, which is between 107-115k.  I've added one chapter and I know of at least two, maybe three more that I need to do.  When I was done with the 5th draft, the manuscript sat right around 107k.  I figure three or four chapters will add at least 3k.  If I want to get through Part 3 by the end of the month, that's where I need to be next Monday.  Or at least there on next Tuesday, the 15th.  Just doubling what I did this week isn't going to work.
    So, I better get to work.  I have about 80k words to write this week.  Yikes.
    It's a good thing, though.  I'm dreaming about scenes in Part 3.  That means I need to write them.

November 7, 2016

  This weekend was not a good weekend for word count.  I was sick both Saturday and Sunday.  I had hoped to get 14,500 words written over the course of the two days, intending on doing more on Saturday and only having to make up part of the difference on Sunday.
  Nope.  My stomach decided to catch a bug.  I spent most of Saturday dragging myself around, and Sunday was spent sleeping and dragging myself around my bedroom.  Not at all what I had hoped.  I got 3173 words written over the course of the two days.  Now, that's not bad and if you're looking at just getting 50,000 words written this month, I'm just over 30,000 so I'm doing really well.
  But we all know that's not my goal.  My base goal is 150k.  My dream goal is 240k to be honest.  I'm NO WHERE near that.
  And I'm dreaming about scenes that I need to add to my rough draft for Part 3.  I'm happy with what's being rewritten in Part 2.  I yearn to get into 3.  I have to.  My sanity depends on it.  So I HAVE to get more than the 150k base.  I HAVE TO.
  So, my stomach needs to cooperate.  My head needs to stop hurting and my body needs to quit telling me to go back to bed.  I have to get this done.
  My goal today is 7,500 words by midnight.  That will get me 1/4 of the way to the 150k goal.  Since today is the end of week 1, that's a solid goal.  It's also only 250 more that my daily minimum.
  But you know I want more than that.  You know I'm going to shoot for higher... if my body and mind will let me.
  See you tomorrow.  Hopefully, I won't be brain jelly.

November 5, 2016

   So, I didn't get my daily word written yesterday, let alone the make-up words.  I'm okay with that.  I stopped writing at 6 last night because some friends went with my hubby and I to see Dr. Strange.  It was well worth the 3000 words.  I needed some non-writing something.
   The movie was so good!  I enjoyed it thoroughly.
   So, I wrote a little over 6000 words yesterday.  I think I've been doing it wrong.  I've been putting in a movie during the mid-part of my day.  Even though I've seen the movie several hundreds of times, I find that I watch it instead of writing.  The movies might have to go away.
  I also find that I write more easily when I get out of the house.  Maybe I need to treat this like a real job and leave?  Go to the library or something like that.  I don't know.  I don't want to do that every day.  I'll have to experiment this week.
  This next week, I'll have to get more serious about hitting my daily word goals.  I hope today, I'll be able to make up what I've gotten behind.  I would rather take tomorrow off and regenerate.
   I'm really tired.
   I need to get to work.  I won't be checking in tomorrow.  I'll see you on Monday.

November 4, 2016

  I feel good today.  I went to bed last night at a reasonable hour.  I haven't gone back to bed, either.
  Yesterday, I did.  I was really tired.  I slept until almost noon.  I'm sure I'd have reached me word count goal if I had stayed up.
  I was close, though.  My word count goal was just under 10,400.  I got 9471 for a total of 20,834.  Today, if I'm on track, I should break 29k.  That's my goal.  The hubby and I are going to a movie tonight, so I'll have to stay focused this morning.
  The rewrite of Part 2 is going well.  I'm through chapter 8.  I love these chapters.  When you're stuck in the middle or the end of a rewrite, you sometimes forget what happened in the earlier chapters.  It's good stuff.
  I don't have too much to report.  I'm just chuggin' along.  I've made a few changes, but not major ones, only a word here or there, or changing up the sentence.  NO major moves or deletes.  Of course, it still has to pass the reading-aloud test and then the editor, but I think we're doing well here.
  I'll check in tomorrow.  Have a good day!

November 2, 2016

  Yesterday was such a good day.  I felt comfortable all day with my writing.  I didn't feel pressed until the evening, but I'll explain that in a minute.
  Things flowed well.  I'm through the prologue and chapters one and two.  That, along with the blog and the journal, added up to 8199 words for the day.  Awesome!  I love days like that.  And, I could've done more, had my activities allowed that.
  I went to the write-in at the library at 4:30.  I donated a copy of Part 1 to the library and set to work.  There were at least ten people there, if not twelve.  It was an awesome turnout.  At one point, a few of us started talking and that went on for almost an hour.  I got behind then, but that was okay.  Socializing with other writers is good stuff.
  I then went to the kickoff party.  I took my laptop, not knowing what to expect.  Well, I didn’t need to take it.  We talked and ate and talked some more.  I love meeting new people and these people were writers too!  It was great!
  But when I got home at 9:00, I still needed 1500 words to meet my 7250 word count goal.  I prayed with the kids and got them headed to bed and then got back to work.  My husband, who was out of town for the night, called in the middle.  He let me finish and called back 35 minutes later.  I had just reached 7250.  When we got off the phone, I finished the chapter I was on, which got me to my 8199.
  It was a really good day.
  Today, I'm going to work on David's journal.  The last page from that is the prologue for Part 1.  Chapter 3 delves into the journal a bit.  I want to have it all mapped out before deciding what pieces I'm sticking in there.
   My goal for the day is another 7250.  I'm volunteering at the Family History Center today from 2 to 5, but most of the time, I can write while I'm there.  The kids have church activities tonight.  They'll require me to be an attentive parent, so I need to have things done before seven this evening. 
   Whoo!  Here we go!  See you tomorrow.

October 31, 2016

  The fifth draft of part 2 will be done today!
  I can't believe I didn't post on Friday and Saturday.  Both days slipped away from me.  I've been busy, preparing for NaNo.  It starts tomorrow!  I am so ready for some creative abandon.  Whooo... shivers.
  So, this morning I got up and stayed up.  I started working on the final chapters of Part 2 right away.  I've already gotten 2600 words written, composing one chapter.  Last night, before I finally drifted off to sleep, I realized I need to pull one more chapter from Part 3 and put it in towards the end of Part 2.  It needs to happen before what occurs at the ending of Part 2.  Yeah.
  That leaves me with two more chapters.  It feels good to have this draft over with.  On draft four, I realized there needed to be a major shift of an event.  I didn't get all the way through the fourth draft before I started over.  It didn't make sense to do the extra work when this move could transform so much.  So, I haven't seen these chapters since the third draft.
  It also means I'll need to do one more draft before getting it out to my alphas.  There's been too many changes and I need to make sure it all flows and makes sense.  That's what' I'm planning to do with the first half of November, punch that out.  I had hoped to get Part 2 to the alphas by today--in my original plans--but that hasn't happened.  Oh well, a good book is more important than self-imposed deadlines.  I don't think this two week timing change is going to shift the end deadline at all.
  I'm still slated to publish Part 2 by summertime 2017.  I don't think I'll need that much time.  However, I needed two and a half more months for Part 1 than I first thought so I built in extra time in case I need it.
  So, I'm going to get back to work.  I hope your Halloween is good.
  I'll check in tomorrow, from my loft and NaNo goodness!

October 27, 2016

  Happy Thursday, everybody.
  Like I was thinking yesterday, not much writing got done.  I did get all my beta's books autographed and ready to either get into the mail or deliver.  I'm hoping to have all of them taken care of by the end of Saturday.
  I did get the next chapter of part 2 set up yesterday.  It's the one that has developed from Tuesdays rewrite.  I also decided one of the chapters I have to rewrite still doesn't actually need to be in the book, so it's gone into the old drafts pile.  It's there if I need it for reference if I decide I need to put that scene back in, but I don't think it's necessary.
  I spent the morning going to the grocery stores.  There's another flag football game this afternoon.  This evening doesn't seem to be too busy, so I hope I can get that chapter done, the one I set up last night.  Maybe I'll even get to another one.  That would be nice.  Looking at it right now, there's six more that I need to finish.  Once that's done, I'll print out copies and get them to my alphas.  Then I'll be ready to dig into NaNo on the 1st!
  I'll check in with you tomorrow!

October 26, 2016

  So, I did get two chapters (re)written yesterday for a total of around 5300 words.  Some of that word count is warm-up and me 'interviewing' my characters.  That's a technique I use when I'm staring at a blank page and don't know where to go.  It works really well.
  I spent most of the day avoiding these two chapters.  I have a suspicion that I know too much in my head and I know (at least I think I do... it's possible it could change) what's going to happen to these two and I don't like it.  I had a long discussion with myself (yes... sometimes it has to happen), telling myself that I needed to be true to my story and write these chapters.  It took all day, but I finally got it done.  I feel better now that it is and the whole process produced another chapter that now needs to happen.  It's all good.
  It's busy Wednesday today so I don't know how much I'm going to get done.  I'd like to get two more chapters done today, but with my performance yesterday, I don't if that's going to happen.
  I got the rest of my shipment of my book order in the mail today.  Next week, I'm going to go talk to the local Barnes and Noble to see if they'll put them out.  Maybe there'll be a book-signing too.  We'll see.

October 25, 2016

 Good morning.  I'm starting early today. 
  I realized last night that I've been avoiding this chapter that I'm stuck on in the rewrite of part 2.  During the afternoon, I discovered I haven't written anything in two weeks.  I know I've been busy with other stuff, but the writing/rewriting is what gets me excited.  I've written beyond this chapter by about four, but I feel like I can't go too much further without filling the holes.  So, that means I need to go back and do it.
  I've known that for two weeks and yet here I am, not writing the chapter.  While, I've been finding good things to be doing (most of the time, FB prowling has increased significantly), reading, taking care of the technical parts of publishing part 1, spending time here, I'm still not writing.  That means something about it isn't right about this chapter, but I'm not sure what that is.
  As I began reading part 2 to make corrections a couple weeks ago, I came across a related chapter early in part 2.  It's an information dump, necessary, but I think I've allowed it to become burdensome.  I decided during the reading that I needed to completely rewrite the chapter.  Therefore, I need to get this early chapter done before I can get the later one taken care of.
  Or is that me just prolonging working on the chapter?
  Could be.
  Here's the deal, though.  I promised myself this morning, I would get that chapter written before I allow myself to do anything else.  The dog needs walked before it gets too late, and I'll need to take a shower afterwards because I have more parent-teacher conferences this afternoon.  So, I have to have the dog walked before lunch.
  That means I need to get going.
  I'll check in with you tomorrow!  Have a good day.

October 24, 2016

  So, I started feeding my brain for November.  I began reading The Maze Runner yesterday and finished it this morning.  I'm planning on starting the second one, The Scorch Trials tomorrow.
  I've been thinking more and more about what I need to write.  I'm anxious to start writing new stuff or even just working on Part 2.  I hope to do that this afternoon, but I have parent-teacher conferences so we'll have to see.  I'm not going to push it this week.  I'll be doing plenty of that starting next Tuesday.
  I'm getting fired up for NaNo.  I'm excited for it to start.
  I'll check back in tomorrow.