cranky pixels

NaNoWriMo: Day 1 was a rousing success. I got almost 1700 words and can’t wait to do it again tomorrow. This is because I am a crazy person, but crazy people are fun, right?

Not So is watching Ghostbusters. This is what we do. We watch things.

In other news, I was really sick a couple of weeks ago with what may or may not have been swine flu (take that, specificity!) and realized one night I forgot to take my prozac. Since then I’ve continued to not take my prozac and I’ve felt kind of fabulous, so I’m counting that as a win. The prozac was great, actually, but it made me so freaking tired I could barely keep my eyes open, except at night, when I would just lay in bed with a million ideas running through my head. I enjoy my sleep, but I also enjoy not sleeping at appropriate times, kwim?

Speaking of sleep, I’m tired, and I have a TON to do tomorrow.

So. Don’t tell anybody but I seem to be re-working my manuscript. The first one. From 1998. There’s no good reason for this, except for the fact that there is clearly something wrong with me (and also I’m waiting to hear back from any of my several beta readers before I can do another draft of the latest novel). I mean, it’s not like I don’t have enough other stuff to keep me occupied, what with the business and the kid and the house and the cats and the husband. But, see, writers? Writers are crazy.

In other news, I think the new draft of the old novel is going to rock.

The boys are camping this weekend.

Wait a second. Let me say that again: the boys are camping this weekend.

Given that there are three of us, with two of us gone that just leaves me. Alone. Completely, blissfully alone. For the entire weekend.

I barely know what to do with myself. I feel like the horse in Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency. To wit:

It slowly surveyed the whole field, and then decided to plan out a nice relaxed day for itself. A little trot later on, it thought, maybe around threeish. After that a bit of a lie down over on the east side of the field where the grass was thicker. It looked like a suitable spot to think about supper in.

Lunch, it rather fancied, could be taken at the south end of the field where a small stream ran. Lunch by a stream, for heaven’s sake. This was bliss.

It also quite liked the notion of spending half an hour walking alternately a little bit to the left and then a little bit to the right, for no apparent reason. It didn’t know whether the time between two and three would be best spent swishing its tail or mulling things over.

Of course, it could always do both, if it so wished, and go for its trot a little later. And it had just spotted what looked like a fine piece of hedge for watching things over, and that would easily while away a pleasant preprandial hour or two.

Good.

An excellent plan.

And the best thing about it was that having made it the horse could now completely and utterly ignore it.
- Douglas Adams

The horse, people? The horse is me.

Heeeeeeeeee.

I may be the only person who takes a vacation to write a novel.

To be fair, the damned thing’s about 80% finished already. Well, maybe 75%. The point is, I’ve got verbiage, people, and I’m not afraid to use it.

I started this book (not to be confused with the other three books which are in various states of unfinished-ness on my hard drive, which is not a metaphor, though possibly it should be) around the same time we moved to Portland in 2004. 2004!

It is high time I took steps to get this thing finished, and by “steps” I clearly mean “a five-day trip to New York, where I have never been but always wanted to go.” Because that it totally what any rational person would do, right? Five days sans kid: that’s what I’ve got, so that’s what I’m working with. Also: five days in New York! I am totally bounce-off-the-walls excited, or I would be if I wasn’t working so damned hard, which is half the reason I’m taking this vacation in the first place.

I’ll be documenting the trip like the OCD princess I am, armed with camera, laptop, and BlackBerry. New York is clearly preparing for my arrival by forecasting snow (…) and icy temps, which everyone knows are my absolute favorite things ever (/sarcasm). Who will prevail, and who will freeze to death under the Brooklyn Bridge? Tune in this time next week to watch the madness begin.

Someone should keep track of all my NaNoWriMo puns. Seriously. It would waste a good five minutes and give you something to do on a Saturday night which does not involve miserably hacking up bits of lung, which is what I’m doing. Oh, I know, waaaah. (Note to those who haven’t noticed yet: I get cranky when I am sick.)

But the last three days of fever and sore throat aren’t the reason I’m dropping out of NaNoWriMo a mere 8 days in. No, it’s much more prosaic than that: I have too much work to do. Work + active toddler + more work + housework = no time. Oh sure, I could something out to make time for writing. Let’s see: sleep? Well, I’m already knackered all the time, and despite all my best efforts I seem to prefer sleeping as long as I can rather than dragging myself out of bed while my angelic offspring slumbers. So that leaves either work of housework. We know what happens when I do not clean the house (SPOILER: the cleaning fairy isn’t real, and by the way, neither is the Easter Bunny) so that’s out.

So I could cut out early from work in order to write, quit maybe the part-time freelance gig I added on a couple of months ago during a particularly worrisome point in our financial cycle, but therein lies a funny realization: I’m unwilling to risk insolvency to further my writing career.

Huh. When did that happen?

The depressing part, of course, is that this means I Am Not A Writer. Which in turn means I wasted a crapload of time wearing lots of black and cramming together enough bad metaphors to fill not one not two but THREE mostly-unfinished novels, the latest of which I was really excited about, damn it. Er, plus the one I’m supposed to be writing now, which I’ve been planning for the past two years, which is even more depressing when you think about all the other things I could have been doing when I was scrabbling down notes and marking articles on Wikipedia and generally being way, way too full of myself.

I don’t know. I mean, I know failing at NaNo doesn’t mean I can never write again, but it’s a pretty good indicator of my commitment level. The way I look at it, I can either be willing to make sacrifices in order to be a writer, or I can quit whining about never having enough time to write. And I’m not sacrificing anything, am I?

Happy NaNoWriMo, everyone! Yes, I’m doing it again this year. This is because I am a crazy person.

I’m ridiculously excited. I’ve got all my notes bookmarked, copied into Scrivener, or saved. I’ve got a reference book lurking just to the right of my bed (it’s a psychological thriller, this year’s novel, which is an entirely new genre for me) and a bunch of back episodes of Cold Case Files at the ready. (Funny story: I realized before we decided to get rid of our cable that I had seen every single episode of Cold Case Files at least once, and could tell which case it was just by seeing the opening teaser. This cannot have done good things to my psyche.)

Want to know what else I use to squeeze 50,000 words out of my head in 30 days? I broke it down on Buzzverb for those following along at home. Whee.

You know, I was going to post something substantive and clever, but then I realized that I left the diapers at home. The office is now somewhat…odoriferous. Thusly, I leave you with these three things:

1. I posted a new video rant – scroll down if you’re on my site, or go see it on Viddler, or look for it in your rss feed or whatever. Or ignore it completely. So many options! (Note: it looks like Viddler’s having some issues, so hang tight if you can’t see the video & try again later.)(Seems to be back up now…)

2. Is Russel T. Davies the UK’s answer to Joss Whedon? Discuss.

3. I have 61,300 words on my book. Who wants to make guesses on how many words I’ll cut in this round of edits? Winner gets to be a background character.

Off I go to decontaminate the toddler. Here’s hoping we have the elevator to ourselves!