Aeärwen's Corner

My encounter with Real Life™ as an obstacle to NaNo continues apace. I had the entire morning planned as a writing time - but NO!!! JJ has to decide, after he gets to work, that his ankle hurts too much for him to spend all day on it (okay - I can understand that a bit, but still...) so I lost over an hour in commute time driving the 25 miles down and 25 miles back to pick him up. No, he didn't feel like he could walk back to the bus stop (that's right in front of the job site) and take the bus home and have me pick him up at this end's bus stop. No, I had to drop everything and drive down there now, now, now.

*sigh*

There are times that Attention Deficiency Disorder can be a real PITA. We got the call back on the x-ray - no fractures and no broken bones. So this is either a sprain or something else. He *does* have a rather long-lived bruise on the ankle-bone, so something is going on. But I honestly think that he's milking it for as much attention as he can get - and right now, that doesn't sit very well. He goes back to work tomorrow - and no, I will not be driving down again to pick him up if he decides he hurts too much.

Anyhoo, so I did finally get to write some - although not as much as I was hoping. Hopefully I'll have better luck tomorrow.

3765 / 50000 words. 8% done!

Yeah, I'm off to a slow start. Seems that Life™ is fuller this year than last, with more that I need to do between which to sandwich my hours at the keyboard. Still, it is a start - and this time around, I've done research so I know (1) where my story is going; and (2) more or less how I want to get there. No, I haven't got an outline, but I'm doing the first "part" of my novel for this year's NaNo. The novel itself will have two parts, taking place roughly 1000 years apart.

It's fun tho, and the research has been quite a treat. I've looked into what makes a planet habitable, what is known currently about extra-solar planetary systems, done quite a lot of postulating on how my green-skied world would work and how it would differ from the world we all know. I've looked into various forms of housing, heating said domiciles, ethics of space colonization, the problems encountered by other colonial efforts in the past.

On another note entirely, IT RAINED IN CALIFORNIA LAST NIGHT!!!! Or, more precisely, it rained in my little parched corner of California last night. In fact, considering that we only got four inches total rainfall last year, we got fully one half of last year's precipitation last night. Lost power too - o joy and rapture! Better still, it took until mid-morning for the cable and internet to be fully restored. Now THAT'S what I call "winter" weather!!

Believe it or not, I'd be perfectly happy for it to happen again this winter. Often. Our local reservoir lake is down to 40% capacity, and several natural lakes in the area are completely dried up (and are being dredged because of it - taking advantage of the situation.) I've got all my fingers, toes, eyes, knees and other flexible body parts crossed that we do end up with an "El Niño" of sorts - plenty of rain for us means our water issues will ease dramatically.

Anyhoo. More on NaNo tomorrow - providing that all my music obligations won't get completely in the way of producing any word count. Like I said, Life™ itself is a real obstacle this year around.

526 / 50000 words. 1% done!

Ta, folks!

Well, after a ten-day hiatus to deal with all the associated fun that goes along with a family member trying to kill herself, my Muse has finally cooperated in giving me more word-count for my NaNo attempt.

I sat down with the calculator and figured out how much I'll have to produce everyday to win the 50k word challenge - not that I'm going to actually finish the story. It's do-able: min 3000 words per day, with Sundays off. That includes Thanksgiving Day too. Still, our family doesn't kill itself trying to produce a feast that will leave us groaning on the floor after standing up from the dinner table, so I should be able to write some that day while nursing what's on the stove.

( More nattering under the cut )

And now, so you know I wasn't fooling, my new word-count for the day:

26553 / 50000 words. 53% done!

Have a good evening!

Gee.

After a day where I began to think that I would NEVER get a chance to sit down and work on my NaNo for one reason or the other, I actually managed to pull my daily 2k words out of a hat. The plot is moving right along, and I'm happy with getting things at least pounded out in first draft form – realizing that I'm gonna be doing a LOT of rewrites/edits when the time comes.

( The things that got in the way under the cut )

So... Today's word count:

21418 / 50000 words. 43% done!

Talk to you all tomorrow!

Had a lovely time at coffee this morning. A group of my friends and I, my hubby and (when he's around) JJ get together at 8AM on Saturday mornings at a local coffee deli. Today only Ron and Nashoma were there, but it was great seeing them again. Evidently Nashoma had been ill last week. (For those who don't know, Nashoma was my cohort in the piano/organ duet team until nerve damage made her participation sketchy. I miss our practices greatly, lemme tell ya!)

( Weekend whittering - and NaNo natttering - under the cut )

For those paying attention, today's word count:

19229 / 50000 words. 38% done!

Tomorrow's a designated no-progress day - so we'll see if I get anything written at all. Not ruling it out completely, but I've also got a Broadchurch fic (a new one, sykira) that has decided to push on me. Wish my Muse would stay focused on Phoenix, and not find other "squirrels" to chase after!!

Laters...

Well, I finally got my word count done, plus a bit; but it took a lot longer than usual, and it was interrupted several times. Darn it.

( Grumblings about NaNo-Interruptis under the cut )

All in all, a pretty good day. The clouds are coming in; the weatherman says we're not scheduled for rain, but the temps will begin to fall a bit. That's okay - I'm ready for Autumn to really land on us. The leaves on the grape arbor are turning and beginning to fall. I wish more folks would like to come help themselves - I'll go pick some for juicing, but I'm afraid the vine is loaded and will most likely ferment in place. The mockingbirds will LOVE that! Nothing funnier than a drunken mockingbird doing battle with his reflection in the garage window... :-p

Finally, for the record, my word count stands at:

14517 / 50000 words. 29% done!

Cya all later - probably tomorrow. Have a good one.

Today's words came fairly easily, which is really nice.

( Mundane midrash-ing under the cut )

Ah yes.

Before I forget, my word count for the day:

9724 / 50000 words. 19% done!

Cya all tomorrow!

Today was a scheduled no-progress day, which was just as well. I had plenty to keep me occupied through the day - and I'm currently writing this as a way of procrastinating on doing a couple more read-thru's on the next chapter of my Pretender fic before posting it. I skipped last weekend (bad Aeärwen!! bad!!!) and really do owe them an update. Still, the chapters on that thing tend to run in at about 8k words each, so the read-thru's to remove my former obsession with using hypens everywhere and to tighten up POV aren't just a quick scan.

( More not necessarily writing relating nattering under the cut )

I'm genuinely looking forward to sitting down first thing tomorrow and continuing with my story. My mind has been actively toying with what scene I'm going to have following the one I ended with yesterday, and whether I'm going to span a good deal of time between where I left off and where I pick up the story again, or whether it will continue on from basically the next day or so.

I'm tired, though. May hit the sack early. Until next time...

( Writing Muses are fickle - BIG time! )

Just when you think you have things all worked out, something like this happens to remind you that it's the Muse that runs the show. You're only along for the ride.

And all my nice plans for today are blown to Hell when I stepped on a piece of wood and drove a nice splinter deep into my heel. My DH tried to get it out - and failed. All he got were splinters off of the bit buried practically all the way under the callous on my heel. Soooooo… no shopping trip to SLO for needed supplies, no chiro appointment (because DH was digging at the spot with his knife and a pair of tweezers to no avail) and no new neon tetras for the big fish tank in the living room to keep the one sole survivor out there company.

Damn!

Happy Monday, f-list, she growls…

( No, really. This week, at least, Monday is a GOOD thing! )

I'm sure my chiropractor will be glad when I'm through with the week too. Evidently between the stress and the physical postures and positions I get in while playing, I throw my back out rather nicely. Funzies.

And that's it from the Grey Havens of the Central California Coast for this week. I'll let you all know how well I survive sometime next week.