Clearing the way and sailing in for NaNo

Before I forget -- remember that you can download the free 'NaNo for the New and the Insane' ebook at my site: http://www.lazette.net/FreeStuff/NaNo.htm

We are only days away from the start of the insanity. I still have far too much to get done -- Vision for Writers update for the new issue, Forward Motion update for the new month, the DAZ3d Newsletter for this week -- all in all, it looks like a difficult few days!

Vision is nearly completed, at least. FM doesn't have much left to do. I have not started the weekly newsletter because I still don't have all the info I need for it. Lucky for me that I've been doing these for years, and I don't anticipate having a lot of trouble with it when I do get the rest of the info. I hope.

I've been working at getting the house cleaned up, too. That's not all too difficult, except for the time factor.

So, it looks pretty much like I'm going to leap into the Devlin Books come 12:01 am November 1. I have five full outlines for books that should be at least 90k each -- that's far more than enough to see me through the month! I might have the sixth outline done as well, but I'm not worried about it. Even though these were based on earlier works, the new outlines are almost entirely new stories -- and, of course, I'll be recreating them all from scratch anyway. I'm looking forward to the work.

This is what happens when you look at something 20 years old and realize that you actually have a clue how to plot a story now and maybe it will even make sense. This is a project that is going to continue on into 2011, and likely editing until 2014 or so. I don't mind long term projects. Always having something on the list to work on is good for me, especially when I'm so busy.

I had hoped to do some cover art or at least a banner. That is looking less likely, but I might still get a chance before the end of the month.

As usual, I plan to go crazy for the first couple days of NaNo. I can afford to take that much time before I have to focus again on other work, especially if I try really hard to keep everything cleared off going into the month. Before long, though, I'll be back to work on the weekly newsletter and such. It's hard to say how much I'll get done this year. I do have good outlines, though, so that should help.

The work tonight is to finish up what I can and then sit down and list out everything that has still to be done. I'm going to get things done and start preparing to have all kinds of insane NaNo writing fun!

Russ is home!

He's busy tonight, but we've been going like mad the last few days. I now own a slightly outdated, but wonderful laptop that we picked up new for $169. I am very happy to have it! This not only allows me to work away from my office now and then, but also to work away from home if I have a chance to go anywhere with Russ!

I'd been saving up money in hopes of finding something inexpensive. This was far more inexpensive than I had expected. I thought I'd have to spend at least $400 to handle even the small amount of absolute things I needed.

So I bought a Nook with the rest of the money.

Yes, I did. And I LOVE it.

I am reading one of the three books that was on it when I bought it -- Pride and Prejudice. I have never read it before. I think I might have read parts of it for school at some point back in the dark ages, but I really didn't remember much of it and I have never watched any of the shows or movies that have come out. It's exploring whole new territory for me.

And the one thing I have noticed is the almost total lack of description. Well, that and the Omni POV, of course, but I expected that one. I'm catching a lot of the humor, which I didn't expect. It often takes me a little while to get into the feel of a story.

My first actual purchase is a set of Andre Norton novels. She's the person who started me in my love of both science fiction and of writing. I'm looking forward to reading them all. My plan isn't to buy much of newer material at all, but to stock up on classics and historical material. It should work out wonderfully for me.

So it's been quite a week for me. We went to De Soto National Wildlife Refuge a couple days ago. I went to the zoo yesterday and took 577 pictures. Yes, it will be a while for me to sort those out, though many of them were sets of three bracketed shots.

I'm writing about 1k a day while Russ is here. I'm enjoying the slow pace and working my way up to NaNo.

So, that's it! The only real problem I have at all is that the DAZ people are VERY late with stuff this week. I need to get to work on it now!

Work

Russ will be home on Friday.

This pretty much means a round of insanity for the next couple days. I've started realizing there are all kinds of things I wanted to have done before he got here, and that's not even counting trying to get real work out of the way.

It is quite likely the last time I'll see him this year. We're about to head into winter, and the weather is too changeable to risk him coming home and getting snowed in. So I'll be heading into another winter (the fourth here alone), and we just have to have things ready this year.

This also means preparing for writing. NaNo is just a few weeks away (how did that happen!), but I am pretty much set there, if I have to be. I have 5 full Devlin outlines, and I can just start with #1 and see how far I get. I'm still writing the 6th outline now.

I did finish the edit of Glory. There's a little bit more work to do, but it's pretty close to ready to submit. Yay! I might even have that done before NaNo. That would be a nice goal. And it will give me something to do after Russ leaves again. I'll need goals and such then because it's not going to be much fun.

I'm about half way done with the sixth outline. That's probably going to be the last one I do before NaNo. I might do another one or two in December, depending on if I feel as though I want to invest that kind of time in it. Right now, I'm just looking at leaping into November and not coming back out until December. How much can I write? Probably around 200k again, but we'll see.

So, not a lot of interesting things to say today. Too much going on to stop and think out anything really interesting. (grin)

And now, back to work!

Odd Things

 

From For Blog

I've been busy, and I fear that I am going to remain busy for a good long time. Maybe that's all right. Winter is coming and I really don't like the idea of being here through hip deep snows again (like the last two years). If I'm busy enough, maybe I won't notice the snow. Right? Maybe I should just plaster the windows with pictures of the mountains and oceans and just pretend I'm somewhere else.

About a week ago we were talking in FM chat about stories and how we see them. One of the things that seemed to be pretty common was the 'movie effect' version, where the author sees the story as a movie in her mind.

I do that. Except I didn't realize that my version is a bit different from the others.

They actually see the movie. I see the movie with a constant voice-over saying the words as they would be written, so even when I'm seeing a visual representation of what's going on, I'm also getting what should be the written version.

Very odd. I never thought about it until then.

I had to slow down on the Devlin Team books because of some outside work. That's okay. I'm on outline #6 out of 14. I should get it done soon and I might get one more in before November and NaNo. Or I might stop with 6 and work on other things that I need to clear up so that I can have a week in November for silly, fun writing. I'm not sure how much I'll do this year, but then I'm never really sure, so that's not a surprise! I have outlines. We'll see how far they take me.

What else?

Russ will be home in a week. He has classes to teach and will be very busy, but it's going to be great to see him again. We have to get me prepared for the dreaded coming of winter since it's very likely he won't make it back before it's over -- which would be February or March. He did make it home for the last week of December last year, but that was a fluke. And the weather was so iffy it was really risking him getting stuck here and in a lot of trouble with work.

I am using Word to write and post this, just to see how I like it. I'll have to go back in and add a picture afterwards because I can't quite see how to match them up yet. That shouldn't be too hard.
Of course, if there is no picture here, it's because I couldn't get one to load in at all.

So, let's give this a try, shall we? Since I normally write the blogs in Word anyway, and then copy/paste them in, this might just save me a step. Or it might prove to be even more work. You never know until you try! 

Note: Upload went fine.  Edited it to put in picture, no problem.  Need extra lines between paragraphs and consider the font size next time!  Changing that in edit mode!