Being Somewhat Irritated At The Stupidity of Social Media,

Finding out two days before NaNoWriMo that Facebook stories don’t really “do” links that are clickable is more than irritating considering the fact that it appears either a decent proportion of the international WriMo community (if unfamiliar, see previous blog) seems to have evacuated Twitter (I’m not calling it by a letter, it’s stupid) and many haven’t arrived on BlueSky yet (yes, I know it’s invite only, because it’s still being built and yada yada yada - I don’t have to be logical and reasonable when I’m having a moan about something, okay?). 

You might be wondering why it matters. Well, it doesn’t, I guess. Except that it does… I’ve been a part of the NaNo community for a long time, have done really stupid things (great things, really great things!) like fly over to San Fransisco for the last Night of Writing Dangerously because I couldn’t square it with myself to let the idea of never going sit right - I just couldn’t. I also went from thinking, who are these mad people who finish NaNo in a week and I can’t write five thousand words in a day to doing my first 10K day, then having three in a month and then finishing in four days (secret: no sleep, lots of caffeine, and being a considerable chunk younger than I am, and currently feel) so during NaNoWriMo and Preptober, I write a lot about each, and people actually read it. People don’t just read it in - oh God I’m using a phrase from work that I hate, but whatever - penny numbers like they do over the rest of the year, a lot of people read it, probably because it’s a lot more focused - you could say hyper focused, if you wanted to… - and the people reading it are interested in NaNo. 

Unfortunately though, as much as you can Google blogs about NaNo or whatever and I would come up SOMEWHERE (no, I haven’t Googled myself to see where and no, I’m not going to even just for poops and giggles) most of that “traffic” has been generated through Twitter, and my Instagram page, but for reasons I don’t feel the need to go into here, my Instagram page is currently (and for the foreseeable future) set to private because of something which happened that just made me feel a bit uncomfortable about it being open access. 

Now, whilst the blog is and always has been something I write more for myself than anything, I won’t lie, it is exciting to see the readership of it grow during November. It is the sort of thing I enjoy as part of NaNoWriMo, partly because writing blogs can be a good way to get some words in that aren’t focused on the novel and my family have always said a change is as good as a rest (this is BS, do not believe it! Rest is always best!) so swapping out of novelling mode can be good for a bit to just give myself a little time to not need to be thinking about what happened next. (I’ve said before that I don’t write novels so much as incident reports of what happened when the characters wandered off, so those kind of periods of only passively engaging with whatever project I’m writing are hugely beneficial). With the forums appearing to have depended into a literal dumpster fire at this stage, and the fact they’re not something I’ve ever really had too much engagement with since we moved to the new site (I know, it’s really not new anymore and I can’t even remember what year it was we last moved) and all the changes going on in social media at the moment (whether you think people are abandoning Twitter or people who don’t pay for Twitter services are just getting little to no visibility) it feels like a massive loss of community, even more so than COVID was and because of being an American run organisation with a global reach, we kept REALLY tight restrictions for a very long time, even when individual countries would have allowed our events to go ahead (not challenging that decision by the way, I think it was the right decision to put everyone into a similar or the same boat. 

Given how stressful NaNoWriMo can be and the fact it can feel somewhat triggering for some people’s mental health for a number of reasons, I find it really challenging to accept the loss of community that seems to be happening, and whilst there are still a number of tools like Discord, and in person write ins are back to happening, that’s just the way it feels for me at the moment. We’re also having to accept that changes in venue spaces (I’m thinking particularly in the UK at the moment, though I appreciate it may be replicated elsewhere) accommodating events like we used to has become harder and without compromise, local writing events may not be possible anymore. Pubs that used to reserve a back room space for no deposit want something like ten to fifteen pounds per head deposit and when you’re taking about any major city that gets pricey fast. Lots of places are closing down, and with the way that prices are going up, a lot of writers, particularly the young studenty types, the very young relying on their parents type, or the broke writers trying to make money from their art and self-expression types are stuck in a position where they can’t really afford to attend some of the venues that are possible to use. But despite all of that mess, NaNo is nearly here, and it’s going to happen, and it’s going to be messy and weird and not everything is going to plan, but like Chris Bay and the founders did back in 1999, we’ll find a way. Because we always find a way, eventually.

Some Of You Might Be New Around Here,

Around this time of year I normally do a Facebook post to say ‘hell, it’s about to get crazy up in here’ but since I have been devoting so much time to the blog - yeah, I know, it’s about damn time and it’s still not really been the time that it needs or deserves - I figured I would do it here and then link it, because why not?

What’s happening? It’s nearly November so it’s nearly time for NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month. 

What does that mean? It means writers are going to go a little bit mad trying to write fifty thousand words (or more) in a month. 

Is that wise? No, of course not. But it is fun. I think.

I’ve been taking part in NaNoWriMo since I was sixteen years old and only took one year off because of my dissertation. Yeah, it wasn’t a great year anyway, but anyone who remembers me back then will remember a more grumpy, more pissy, more depressed version of me that was missing my favourite event of the year. Yes there was plenty else on my mind, not least the dissertation and the FEAR of what the hell I was going to do with the rest of my life, but missing NaNoWriMo was a big, big factor.

So, what does it mean? It means your friend neighbourhood writers, like me, are going to be a little (more) on edge (than usual), a little (okay, a lot) more strung out on caffeine than usual and we’re probably going to do some things that the general population of the world find “odd”. We might be more likely to cancel plans because we’re spending time with our laptops, we might need our writer friends a bit more than we need other people we usually turn to, and those friends might be people we just met recently who are also going through the NaNoWriMo experience, journey, Hunger Games experience…? If writing isn’t your thing, that’s fine, but I would advise that at the very least, if you’re not willing to take on the mantel of Tea Bitch and bring tea and sandwiches at regular intervals (easiest way to a WriMos heart is taking the responsibility for their own sustenance out of their hands, generally) at least stay out of the way and don’t expect too much in the way of conversation outside of how is the novel going and the response being a positive or negative sounding grunt of some description. 

Speaking of conversation which centres around how the novel is going, expect a lot of numerical references to how it’s going. Possibly. If it’s going badly that might not happen but it doesn’t mean that a lack of numbers means it’s going badly. 

The fundamentals of this yearly message are what they are always are. Be nice to your writers and if you don’t hear from them for the month, don’t hold it against them (or me) because we’re kind of focused on other things. 

What Am I Most Concerned About When It Comes To NaNoWriMo This Year,

 What Am I Most Concerned About When It Comes To NaNoWriMo This Year,

I feel like I have been writing a lot about what it’s like to ‘do’ NaNoWriMo and the best kind of days et, but I’ve kind of been doing it through a lens of I don’t want to talk about certain things because I don’t want to think about them.

First off I have been having issues with my laptop. First and foremost this is a worry because I cannot hand write quickly enough and I really, really hate having to sit and count up words. I also really don’t like looking at average words per page and trying to work out how much I have written on that basis. I don’t know whether the issues are with the Internet or that I’m depending too much from the laptop itself. I hope it’s not the second because it’s a Mac and it’s only six months old, but who knows? 

I’m also worried because I have a gig the night that NaNoWriMo starts and I don’t know if I will be home by midnight. Since I don’t currently own a camper van, I will have to come back home before I start writing because I can’t just take my home, or my satellite home, to the gig and then get some sleep afterwards - however short - then set myself up to start to write. I can’t even just head back to the car and start to write, which will be frustrating because I’m probably going to be in a queue to leave the multi-storey car park like I have been when leaving gigs before.

I’m worried because I’ve taken some time away from work recently and I can’t remember what time, if any, I have booked away from work for the start of November and I know it will be very frustrating to have to be working during the earliest days of November and not have the opportunity to write like I want to, with the speed that I want to, if I find the ability to do it again.

Bringing that up, I need sleep more than I used to do. I feel like I’m never going to be able to push myself the way I did five years ago and I won’t be able to achieve what I did that year, but at the same time, if I want to try, I need to try. Yes, Fall Out Boy isn’t going to make that easy, and the total shambles that is the voice to text app that I’m using. If that was working properly, I might have a fighting chance of being able to make a start on the drive back, but I also appreciate my mother would be spitting feathers if she knew I was ‘writing’ at the same time as driving.

I think my biggest concern is that, when I’m back in work and I’m writing as well, I’m worried I’m going to be running though coffee like it’s going out of fashion (which I sometimes fear it is with the popularity of things like matcha latte) and that it’s going to be all I can do to keep myself focused for long enough to get through work and writing, and that if I don’t collapsed into bed from tiredness, I’ll be so caffeinated that I can’t sleep and too many days of that - about two days of late, though once upon a time it was six - and my brain just breaks. Even tea did for me once, because I quite like strong tea and I drank a lot of it, and I didn’t sleep for more than twenty minutes that night because my brain wouldn’t switch off. I thought it was the caffeine at the time, but now I know about the ADHD, I don’t know if it was more that, because I was in love with my novel and I just wanted to carry on writing it.

I’m worried I won’t love my novel, I’m worried I’ll love my novel too much. I’m worried I won’t have the time, or the energy or the inspiration. I’m worried about so many things, but the thing I need to remind myself of right now is that I have felt this every year for a lot of years, and this year is not different. It’s okay to be worried, it’s okay to be challenged, in fact, it is what NaNoWriMo is for, and that’s what makes it so phenomenal.

The Party Is Over,

Before anyone says anything, I am aware that I have said throughout the World Cup that I wasn’t supporting England and that I had a few reasons for that, and those reasons still exist, and honestly, last night was just further examples of my issues with Steve Borthwick, because he wasn’t choosing the team based on form and fitness, but on the basis of who he likes and that annoys me because it’s not fair to the players left out and it’s not fair to the fans who expect to see the best team on the pitch when they’re turning up to support their team. 

Last night was the sort of game where I thought, wow, England are actually playing the way that we want them to. I can’t help feeling emotionally invested whether they are winning or losing because I have supported them for so long, for one, and for another because whether I’m happy about it or not, I am English. There were some amazing things going on during that match, though Farrell running his mouth lead to a penalty being brought forward, his decision to go for the points on the second penalty was one I questioned since they were so close to the try line, and the most ridiculous one of all was it took so long for Steve Borthwick to empty the bench after the Boks brought in The Bomb Squad. Sadly, the England players whom he had matched to The Bomb Squad were not the right ones. I love Sinkler, Genge and Chessum, but both Sinkler and Henge gave away penalties in the scrum which makes me wonder whether they would have been better starting and bringing on Cole and Marler against The Bomb Squad, maybe with Dan. As it was Dan was on the bench the whole game and Ford was brought on when it was basically all over. It was far too late in the game for him to turn it on it’s head and honestly, I think he should have been brought onto the pitch to look for the drop goal opportunities when South Africa were back within two points of England because it was clear that they were looking for the penalty that would win it, which is exactly what happened. 

Vunipola was basically useless in place of Curry when he was brought in so Curry could have his nose sorted (he’s definitely headed for a nose that looks like Borthwick’s!) and that was disappointing, because nothing he’s done this tournament has been particularly standout, leaving the question of who outside of the England squad should have had his seat on the coach. I am furious about George Ford being used as a bench warmer, given that it was his performance in the early games where he put an absolute shift in, that gave England the momentum that left them as the only unbeaten team in the semi finals, and then the second Farrell was allowed to play again, he was like the forgotten toy that Borthwick was no longer interested in playing, but my biggest frustration with last night was Freddie Steward. 

Freddie Steward was belting last night, and the thing that upset me was that towards the end of the game, it was clear that he was tired from everything he had done, and he was kept on the pitch for, if not the whole eighty, close to it. He made a couple of errors towards the end of the game, most likely because he was knackered, and in the post match interviews it was clear that he was kicking himself from it, and he shouldn’t have been, because a bad pick on the team meant that h4 couldn’t be replaced. The second any of the Boks weren’t performing completely on form Erasmus pulled them, and it was brutal, but it was also what needed to be done to get his team to victory. I’m not saying that when Steward dropped the last long ball he should have been pulled off like he was a kid caught doing something he shouldn’t, but I do think Borthwick should have seen that he needed to come off and moved him back to the bench, telling him how good he’s been all game. 

The commentators kept talking about how ‘greasy’ the ball was because it was raining (why on Earth not just say the ball is wet, for Christ’s sake) and that didn’t help, but he’s English, he’s used to a bit of rain, and it wasn’t his only error.

Whilst there were a few decisions by the ref that definitely contributed to the loss, I have said before how much I despise when people blame the ref for losing, and I definitely think that one of those decisions was more Farrell not being able to deal with his own frustration and keep his mouth shut, especially given that England were leading the game at that point. 

Overall, it was an incredible game where England showed they still have it in them to win the World Cup, the potential that is. To be leading the game until so late on was absolutely amazing, even for someone who doesn’t want to be an England fan right now. My hope is that they continue to build on the work that has been done here so when we’re looking at the Six Nations next year, hopefully there is some new blood in the squad and hopefully it’s some of the incredible players who never even made it to the bench this time around. 

Confessions,

When I first started thinking about this blog post, the scene from Moulin Rouge (didn't try to spell it as Mulan, didn't) where Ziegler (I had to Google that I was getting the character right and have realised I should always back myself, because I was right!) is trying to cover for (it's not Renee Zelweigger) Nicole Kidman's character for being ill, and yells, "SHE'S CONFESSING!", popped into my head and made me both inwardly groan and also made me laugh, because the connections my mind makes with words entertains me but at the same time, why am I so weird?

Sometimes this little blog feels like my confessional and I'm not sure that that's always a good thing, but there we go. 

The thing I'm going to confess right now though is that, due to struggling a lot with being able to plan when to get things done and find the energy and motivation to do so, so I've been trying my best to write when I have the inclination, motivation and most importantly the time, and then I schedule them to be posted later. It's a bit lazy, but hey, that's life. It's a coping mechanism and I need it. 

The more we move into a social media age, the more there is an expectation of access, and a want for things like a schedule for when we do things, and it's one of the things I really struggle with. When I was a Twitter sprint lead, things would come up and I would be completely time blind and then realise that my shift was supposed to be a few hours ago or was supposed to start thirty minutes ago and obviously at that stage there was nothing I could do about it, so whilst I would love to be able to do more things in the NaNo community which are kind of 'live', I also find it a really difficult commitment because I don't want to let people down and I know I screw up sometimes. Even before my diagnosis I was pretty intensely aware of my faults, or the impact that 'whatever' as I thought of it as then had on me.

As I was thinking my way through this post, and it was another that was sort of shouted at the voice notes on my phone by way of a first draft, I realised that it's not uncommon to schedule things like content, but it blogs, videos and such like, and actually, it's a really useful way of being able to utilise the down time we all need and the switch off we all need. I know that social media is highly likely to be having some form of impact on my mental health at the moment and whilst it's not the only reason I am having panic attacks, it definitely isn't helping. I also know that this blog gets a lot more readership throughout NaNoWriMo, for obvious reasons, and that social media is one of the ways I promote it. Whilst this is never going to be something I do for my actual job, or anything like that, I think it would be really misguided to completely go offline like I may wish to do during the month that I write the most about, so this whole scheduling thing has another benefit of actually giving me some breathing space if I need or want it. (Though that does take a level of forward planning I'm not sure I'm quite up to given the amount of other things I need to do during November and plan for before NaNo starts... )

Certain Things Make Me Happy,

 This is a bit of a stupid one so I'm not even sure that it's going to get posted, but I'm enjoying writing some daft things at the moment, and also I'm battling a monster on 4thewords to try and beat a quest, so I need to keep going, because I want to finish this particular set of quests before NaNoWriMo starts or I'll have no room and want to focus on all of the main story stuff - and as you have likely already gathered, I don't do well with my attention divided!

My family started shopping at Aldi a while ago and for whatever reason, it wasn't me. It's nothing against Aldi, it was just I got too stressed in supermarkets and had no idea why. Oh the answers I have now mean so much to me. 

Complete honesty, I was probably a little bit of a snob about it at first, because I have always thought it was a bit cheap and cheerful, though I have since realised the error of my ways. I do love the place, but I have to be careful when I go into the store because it being busy makes me panic and if I go into a store I'm not used to and can't find things where I think they should be, I get really upset. There is a reason that my first conversation with the doctor about the ADHD assessment was me saying I think I'm autistic. 

In not too dissimilar a vein, I struggle with Aldi for a different reason and that's because they make really awesome stuff, but only do it periodically or they make something brilliant and then they discontinue it and I get really frustrated. I know they're not the only ones but it seems to be happening a lot at the moment and it really upsets me! Nespresso did it once - they made Rosabaya coffee which was featured in my favourite BBC drama, and then they stopped making it. I had tried it a couple of times and loved it so I was gutted.

Last year, Aldi didn't do their potted Cheddars at Christmas. It's basically a posh cheese spread with a TINY bit of jam over the top in a bit of a mason jar looking thing, but they are brilliant, and they were always selling out in previous years, but last year, just didn't do them. With the recent changes in stores, they also seemed to drop the three cheese pasta salad that has absolutely no business being called a salad, because it is cheese, mayonnaise, pasta and a tiny bit of onion - though that one had now made a come back. They've dropped the original flavour of their mock chicken from the fridge (can't actually remember what that was) and they've changed the teriyaki beef, and apparently the macarons were for summer only, even though they were the best thing ever. I think they were a bit of a fashion for this year, but I love them and it makes me sad I now need to drive to the big Tesco for macarons, because even I know that's excessive, but if I have cravings, I will do it. They took away, though have thankfully brought back the tomato and mascarpone sauce jars (though the price has gone up by about 50%), have seemed to stop doing hollandaise sauce in a jar, are really hit and miss of when they have their brand of the Thatchers Lemonade Cider and Blood Orange Cider, and I could take all of that (no I couldn't, I loved all of them and when I find something I like, I stick to it for reasons) if they hadn't stopped making my absolute favourite thing of all time.

Over the summer, Aldi made a vegan prawn sandwich. I've had 'vegan shrimp' before, but I never actually ate shrimp so I have no idea whether it was anything like the real thing or not, but I actually liked prawns before I decided that fish were friends and not food, so only a reasonable faximile would ever do and nothing has ever been close until that sandwich. It was on brown bread, which I hate, because I have a tense relationship with bread in general but brown bread makes me want to cry, but this sandwich was incredible. I would honestly, believe it was proper prawns, but I knew it wasn't. The taste was great, the texture was perfect, all was right with the world and then it disappeared with no warning. At least McDonald's tells you when they're going to start cancelling things off of the menu, instead of just it going bye-bye and potentially never being seen again. To say I am heartbroken isn't an understatement, because good vegetarian foods are still pretty rare and SO MANY OF THEM come around and you think, yes, this is great, and then it disappears because ranges are reduced or companies go bump or I don't really know what happens. My mum said she read that a lot of people aren't buying Beyond Meat burgers because they're so expensive (and they are) but they're SO GOOD. They're some of the best on the market, if you can stand the fact that you will have to remind yourself a few times it really isn't meat. I have days where I can't cope with that, but I still love their burgers.

Though not the intended topic of this blog, it's one of the reasons why I try and stick to big brands now like Quorn or brands like Richmond that are expanding into meat free whilst still making slaughter sausages (oh, come on, I don't say V* stuff like that very often, I'm allowed to be a little bit militant about it on very rare occasions). These products do tend to be at a slightly lower price, but I also figure they have a bit more staying power, so if I am having really bad day, or week, or month, or longer, I know I can get the sort of thing I have developed a craving for, rather than wanting a vegan smoked salmon style thing I don't think you can even get anymore (No, it's not made of carrot, and that recipe can get in the bin where it belongs.) or my beloved prawn sandwich. Hopefully Richmond keep making their original meat free sausages (because the sage and onion ones suck!) because I could just eat those for weeks. 

Rugby,

 I wanted to write something about rugby, but everything I have been reading about rugby has been pissing me off so I haven't been able to bring myself to do it. That being said, if I don’t write this now I’m not going to write it and England will either be through or they won’t be through after the weekend and then everything will be different, won’t it?

Firstly, I rugby but I hate it at the moment, because Owen Farrell sucks. I realise some people have said he’s amazing and the tall trees catch the most wind but honestly, I think it’s a whole load of crap and he is a legitimate A-hole. 

It’s not just the lack of learning from his persistent bad tackling or the fact that there are others in the team that can do his job better, because there definitely are and George Ford has proved it this World Cup, but it’s everything down to the smarmy look on his face when he was talking to the ref about a decision. He’s so full of himself, but he had to have a kicking coach in literally earlier this year because he was doing so badly at HIS JOB! He might have broken the England kicking record this year, but that’s only because Wilkinson played for England for less time. If they factored in time, he would never break it. 

It’s not just him that’s annoyed me, but also Steve Borthwick because he kept backing a crap player that needed to sort himself out and he should have taken the captaincy off of him, but no, it’s his mate, so he wasn’t going to do that. He’s cut Arundell from playing because of a bust up between him and Farrell. It’s just not how to run a team at all.

Overall, last weekend was every result I did not want to see. I don’t think England really deserved to get out of the groups because of the way they were playing, and to an extent, neither did the All Blacks. I thought Wales were night and day better than they’ve been for a while and my heart broke for them losing out on the Semis, especially Dan Biggar, though I appreciate that they are a really young side and I can’t wait to see what amazing things that they do in four years time. I was gutted for France, because they played incredibly - that was the best game of rugby I have seen in a long while, and because they were probably the best placed to beat the Boks, unless it was Ireland again. 

I was crying over Ireland though. 

I love Ireland, even if they’re coached by Farrell’s dad. I love Johnny Sexton, especially getting to call him a loveable knobhead. I love Bundee Aki, and I can see that it will likely have been his last World Cup, for which I am gutted. I’m gutted for Ronan O’Gara as well, because those three and Mack Hansen, and honestly everybody on that team, they are beasts in the best possible way. They are phenomenal. They were ranked the best in the world for a reason and I am utterly gutted that they went home when they did and the way that they did. It was brutal.

The reason that the post match journalism has pissed me off so much has been a few things. There’s been so much crap at the refs, and yes, in all games there were some questionable decisions, and there is going to be some disagreement over what other people would have done. You can’t play the whole game through VAR and keep stopping and starting over every little thing and I think it’s easy to blame ref decisions for the outcome of a game. Yes, it sucks. Yes, I was livid that someone threw their hands, whether it was a slap or a punch or whatever you want to call it, at Tom Curry, especially after dragging him out of the pile by his ankles. The fact he didn’t throw a punch back, I was really proud of and he clearly let it go pretty quickly, but people are more focused on a tackle of his that he wasn’t penalised for. I think his red card earlier in the season was actually pretty harsh, but yes, he also needs to learn from his mistakes and potentially isn’t doing, and his coach needs to take some responsibility for that and so does he. There’s also been a lot of griping about the pools, but there have been some incredible matches from teams that are considered to be “Tier 2”. I’m glad that the conversations are being had about having more matches and potentially having England go to Fiji as well as others. 

I am gutted that England is the only Home National left in the Cup. I am confused that they are the only North Hemisphere team left. I don’t have a word for the fact that Argentina are the only team that could put the cat amongst the pigeons and be the first new winner of the cup since England 20 years ago, but I do fee like the All Blacks versus Springboks is goingbto be the final, and I’m not sure that the All Blacks have recovered enough to beat the Boks, sadly.

Why Is It So Much Easier To Write When You're Angry,

 I'm not sure if this is a me thing, an ADHD thing or actually a common thing, but seriously, why is it so much easier to write about things you're annoyed about? 

I was in the car on the way back to my house from my parents' place and was chatting away to the voice notes on my phone as I sometimes do and I realised, I don't know if it's because of my sense of humour or not, but when I'm annoyed about something, mildly vexed or just playing at being mad because it's funny, writing comes so much easier. I realise that when you get really annoyed about things like mayonnaise like I do - it was a whole other blog - then it's something that becomes quite easy to get annoyed and then write about it, but seriously, I don't know why but it's easier.

I wouldn't say I particularly struggle with road rage but there are plenty of people who wind me the hell up on the road, whether it's failing to indicate, driving at half the speed limit or, and this is my big pet hate, walking into the road and knowing that if I hit you, it's my fault.

Even before the point where The Highway Code was changed and this whole thing of hierarchy came in, the responsibility for an accident most often sat with the driver, partly because we're the ones with the insurance for being on the road. There are bits I do agree with, and that's the whole thing of making sure that drivers are reminder we're bigger, we're more dangerous and the bigger your vehicle, the more dangerous it becomes to smaller vehicles and passengers, and even if a some of the time, possibly a lot of the time, who knows, drivers aren't the problem or not the only problem, a reminder to be more careful is important. What winds me up is not the fact that we as drivers are now more responsible for children's safety near roads, but everyone's safety, despite the poor choices that people - mostly adults - make. 

Most kids school coats, particularly when they are very small, are brightly coloured and one of the reasons for that is road safety, and whilst I myself am a big fan of a biker jacket or a long black wool coat, I really detest when people decide to leave the house to walk the dog in a dark blue or black rain jacket or similar, when it's dark, the street lights are crap and the road is 30mph or worse, there are no street lights and it's a 40mph. When you're crossing the road dressed like that, drivers struggle to see you! Honestly, I could wax lyrical about this and I'm relatively sure that there are several minutes of me shrieking at my phone about it with the pitch of my voice getting higher and higher the more agitated I got. Someone walked out very close to my car, it was late when I saw them because of what they were wearing, but if something happened, it's my fault. 

I think the new Highway Code goes too far in putting the responsibility on drivers, because we've already been through a phenomenon of crash for cash for motorbikes and cars, with people essentially baiting a crash to happen so they can cash in on the value of the car and also compensation for things like whiplash, and I can only think that this transfer of responsibility is opening motorists up to the same but from pedestrians. No one wants to hit a person, or no one that doesn't need some form of evaluation, but if a person steps out in front of your car, that's not your fault and there's not always a way to stop the car and prevent damage to the person. Sometimes the worst damage we do to ourselves and others is from trying to prevent damage during an accident. 

But as I said, writing about something that annoys me is really easy, so I could really go on...

There's No Such Thing As A Perfect Environment,

Arguably I've been making NaNoWriMo sound like an insurmountable task over the last few blogs and the last thing I want to do is put off anyone thinking about trying it. I think it's worth remembering that it can be challenging for everyone, and seeing people through the challenging bits is really important, because we can feel a bit isolated in those moments and for some of us, me included, a bit of pre-planning can help to avoid the whirling pit of despair that can open up because of that. It's also been one of my primary functions for the last I can't quite remember how many years, and I feel like I might be a bit stuck in that mode.

You can make it a lot easier for yourself with a bit of forward planning and I think I've mentioned that before, or for some people the actual life side might be a bit easier. Forward planning isn't everyone's forte and it's certainly not mine in most respects, but with a supreme amount of effort and the outside motivation of "CRAP, NANO IS COMING! LOOK READY!" I can do bits and pieces that do make for an easier time.

If you live with someone else who is pretty much willing to look after you like you're a very small child, that is going to help sp much. I realise that living with parents is very often not an uncomplicated situation and not everyone's parents believe in doing everything for them, but living "at home" can help and being in a relationship when your partner is happy to take up some of the slack can help. I've also had some pretty nice housemates that were willing to do bits and pieces. Beyond that, if you live somewhere that you can get a laundry service, you're in a position to pay for meals to be prepared for you, where you don't have anyone else (including pets) to care for, you're in a good place, but most of us can't afford those sorts of services, so what do you do to prepare? 

Well first off, accept the inevitability of the fact that preparation is more like the momentum which starts the month, rather than something which will sustain you throughout. What I mean by that is, don't expect that you can have a months worth of perfectly laundered clothes, pre-made meals, bought in snacks, cleaning done and everything else your little heart desires to make it easier. Be realistic. Even if you do own enough pairs of underpants to make it from one end of the month to the other without doing a load of laundry, there's a phrase about ... 'stuff' happens, and also when you get to the end of the month you don't want to be going commando whilst waiting for the washer to finish on a load that is solely your undercrackers and they don't dry instantly. (Also, the rice pudding advert says you can microwave your socks dry, not your smalls, so just don't even think of it). You would hope that the gross things I've heard about how to make a pair of boxers last four days were out of my Scouts or the younger version, but sadly not. Let me tell you, the only way that doing something like that will help you with NaNoWriMo is going to be people talking will distract you less, because they will take a wide berth from you due to the smell. Whilst I am joking about all of this (and I am joking, believe me) the serious point is, yes, of course make sure you do all that you can to make the early few days or weeks of NaNo simpler, but also accept the fact that the majority of us are going to have domestic tasks to attend to again at some point within the month and that is not only okay, but it's actually really healthy. Taking a break from staring at the screen is right for your eyes, but it's also good for your brain.

On the theme of being realistic, it's all well and good deciding to make yourself fifty tubs of vegetable soup and freezing them, if you have the space to, before NaNoWriMo if you will actually then defrost and eat them, but if not your wasting time, money and energy into something that's not actually helping you at all. You'll be much better off thinking about really quick and easy meals that you can throw together - remembering to add at least a couple of fruit and vegetables so you don't end the month aiming to get scurvy - because it'll work out cheaper and it's easier to convince yourself to eat than something you made that you've already decided you wish you hadn't bothered with. There is a reason I'm not offering specifics here. I'm fussy about food because of textural issues - no mother, I'm not just a picky eater!! - so I eat WEIRD things, and what I eat might not be someone else's 'safe' foods, and given we are a global organisation, the things I recommend might not even be available where you are.

The most important thing, and I think this about life in general and not just about NaNoWriMo, is, think about what balls you can drop. Very often life can feel like a game of beach volleyball but in reverse, so instead of lots of people trying to keep the ball off the floor there's one person and a lot of balls. You might share a ball with other people - my mum, my dad and I all share the ball that is responsibility for Teddy (the dog) so it's not all on one of us - but other's will belong solely to you. It's worth thinking about which ones of these you can share with friends and family, of course, but it's also worth thinking about which ones matter if they hit the floor and which ones don't. The laundry, for example. Personally, I have a massive laundry hamper and more clothes than I can wear in a six week period, so if I don't do laundry, it's not going to be too big of a problem (until I have a meltdown and want a particular set of pjs and they're not washed, but that's another issue). Feeding yourself is not a ball that can be dropped. School work and similar, or work work isn't usually a ball that can be dropped, though some of us do take annual leave during NaNo because it makes things easier, we have the leave and we can. That's all fine. Limiting the responsibilities you have elsewhere is definitely valid. 

BUT...

You have to think what that costs you. I don't just mean financially though that certainly comes into it, but instead, what are the consequences of dropping that ball? For me, laundry wise, it's simple things like, what I want might not be available. It's not great, but the world isn't ending. I will then have ten plus loads to do of laundry when NaNoWriMo is over? Problem? No, but I despise laundry sitting around the house drying. Okay, so is there a different solution? Yes, my mum might be able to do some of my laundry for me when she's on her slower weeks at work. It comes back dry and folded and she even irons things for me (I don't iron) HOWEVER I need to drive it over there, and then drive back and the same in reverse to get it back. There is always going to be some degree of conversation there, which takes time I could be writing and there is also SO MUCH TRAFFIC around here at the moment that the drive is not as simple as usual and it's not overly quick. I've also been told that you can't write at the same time as driving, partly because a lot of speech to text apps suck, so I'm going to have to sacrifice writing time to be able to utilise that option. Same for if my mum offers to make me dinner. It's whether the time away from the computer screen is worth it for the benefit it gives.

I think we'd all like to live in a magical world where there are mice to do all of the housework and a chef prepares what we would like to eat just at the time we need to eat it, and our tea or coffee cups never get cold and never run out, but in the absence of a perfect world, we're just going to have to do our best, aren't we? 

Before I Sound Too Much Like a Self-Help Guide,

I read a thing on Twitter - and that sentence never really ends well these days, does it? - about a Muller corner and honestly, I didn't really understand it, and wasn't quite intrigued enough to look it up, but it did get me thinking about adverts that are winding me up recently. 

One of them is a kid's toy that I'm getting annoyed about the way that it's being advertised, but it's a hundred percent not my issue, so I'm not even going to get into it, but the other is for Mayonnaise. I can't remember which of the big H brands it is that's made this advert but it is winding me up to a point that I want to throw things at the telly when it comes on.

There's a song that goes with it and there are images of an empty fridge and it's all about how someone turned nothing into something with the addition of mayonnaise and honestly, with the state of the world being what it is at the moment, the number of people having to use food banks and everything like that, and the soaring cost of food prices generally that most people are looking at ways to save money (and one of the quick and easy ways to do that is swap from condiments that cost upwards of three pounds per jar to the store brand ones you can get for around sixty five pence) that it genuinely pains me to see this particular brand talking about making meals out of nothing with mayonnaise. There are people who genuinely have NOTHING in the fridge and are wondering where their next meal is coming from and sadly the number of those people seems to be ever increasing, and you want to make a silly song about how you made something with mayonnaise? I realise, because I am one of those people, that do look in the fridge and think, urgh, I've got nothing in, because there is nothing quick and there is nothing easy and there is nothing I want but we've got far from nothing. The images of the empty fridge which then magic up food because there's a jar of mayo in the door is just too stark of an image for me and I can't get past my hate of it.

And there are other things they could have done with the same concept. Given that it could be quite catchy - the ear worm of the song unfortunately haunts me when I accidentally think of it, like the Triple Dent gum (or whatever it is called) from Inside Out - they could make an advert that's like, add mayo to make it a meal, or make a song out of leftover recipes like how to make chicken mayo pasta, or something else, without this image of the empty fridge which then produces some good looking dinners. I realise I'm likely being over sensitive about it, but HOLY HELL IT WINDS ME UP!! 

This interruption to your regularly scheduled Preptober blog was brought to you by fury and derision. Normal service will resume tomorrow. Hopefully.

NaNoWri - No,

 A few of these Preptober blogs have been about struggling with NaNoWriMo and I think the reason I've been focusing on that is because I've been really struggling this year with so much that it was definitely a possibility at one stage, and to some extent still is, that I take this year off of NaNo or that I take it considerably easier than I have in previous years. 

There has only been one year in the past fifteen that I took the year off of NaNoWriMo and it wasn't a happy time for me. Honestly, I felt a little bit lost after it, but it was because I needed to get on with my dissertation. I knew I needed to take some time out of things which I let rule my life to focus on what I really needed to do. Sadly, not long after NaNoWriMo my Nana then passed away, so it was good that I had spent the time during November actually working on my dissertation, because I was in no fit state to do it later and I would have had to, because I needed to get a draft in. And much like with anything else, you need a draft to work from before you can really get anywhere, especially as it was something I really needed feedback on.

This year my mental health has been particularly bad, I got my ADHD diagnosis and have been all over the place with that - it started good and then it went bad and then I bounced back up again and now I'm not great - and there have been a few other significant events that have kind of rocked the boat. 

Whether you are a veteran of NaNoWriMo or just starting out, or anywhere in between really, noping out for a year does not make you any less of a writer, and you can still be a part of the community even if you have to say this is not the year, and this is not the one. You don't owe anyone a reason for doing that, and it's completely fine to keep your profile on private, not discuss your word count or skip out on the TGIO party because those things just aren't working for you. Existing in the community without participating in NaNoWriMo is definitely a valid position.

That being said, and going back to my earlier point, I was gutted I didn't even try to get involved that year. I've spoken before about my inability to treat Camp in the same way as NaNo, so I felt a little adrift, partly because of how long I have been doing this, but also partly because I knew it was another 12 months before I could get involved in this thing I have loved. I didn't want to put NaNoWriMo down, but I had to, because my ability to regulate my focus sucks. (This is one of the reasons I could have done with knowing about the ADHD before - I might have been able to look at how to do things differently!) 

The first year I did NaNoWriMo I didn't win, but I did write twenty two thousand words. I wasn't immediately happy with it, but I've got to the point where I am. It's worth pointing out that trying is better than nothing, because trying is doing, and it's doing the best that you can. If your best comes out at 22k, cool, if you're best is 50k, cool, if you're best is just turning up to write ins and finding some new writing buds, all cool. 

I've seen people attempt NaNoWriMo through all sorts, whether it be late pregnancy, the new born stage, new jobs, new relationships, new homes, being away camping and not being a person that writes with pens, new diagnoses, all sorts. The only thing that decides that something is the kiss of death for your ability to have a go is you, though it is worth thinking not only about how you will feel if you don't, but also how you will feel if you do and it doesn't go to plan. That kind of devastation on top of other things can be really hard to process, especially when we're feeling any form of insecure, which a lot of the above can make us feel even if we're not acknowledging that it is making us feel that way.

It's okay to not be sure, it's okay to take some time out and it's also okay to plan to "fail" against the official target, because the most important part is you. Give yourself the time and space to think about what is best for you and then just be you, no matter what form that has to take. 

Of Course Crying Is A Way To Communicate,

Having spent a good number of years as an ML (Municipal Liaison for the uninitiated) I know that sometimes during the noveling process, particularly during NaNoWriMo, words fail you and the only thing that can come out is tears and snot and sobs. It happens and it's totally fine. I've been in a situation where I have been the one crying - because my laptop went crazy and corrupted the file of my novel - and I have been the person trying to help the crying person, most often because they have lost either part or all of their novel. I'm not saying it's the only reason people cry during NaNoWriMo because it's definitely not, but it is a big reason. This feels like a good place to say: REMEMBER TO BACK UP YOUR NOVEL. 

Even when you hate it, even when you're tired, even when you are in a rush, back it up. I don't care how you do it, whether it's stick it on The Cloud, email it to yourself, save it on a floppy disk (kids, look it up) or all of the above, but just do it, because you will klick yourself if you don't and something happens. It's a good way to avoid a mid month meltdown when you walk around thinking all these hours of writing, WASTED. 

But anyway, moving on, if the worst should happen, or anything really that makes you cry, most of the writing groups I have ever been to as a WriMo (Writer of NaNoWriMo...) are fully of the quirky weird and wonderful people who care about others instantly because this is our bandwagon, this is our boat and we're all in it together, so shuffle up and make room, if you start crying, we're going to understand. Maybe not everyone, but there will be a lot of us who understand. Crying is just frustration trying to leave the body. Like swearing, but somewhat more socially acceptable, depending who and where you are. 

Whilst I fully intend not to be the victim of a novel murdering laptop this year, I know there are going to be times during NaNoWriMo that I need to just have a quiet sob in a corner and that's because there are a few projects I'm planning to work on during November which make me very emotional. Now, whether I choose to do those whilst out of the house (yeah, I might actually go to a physical write in this year that's not the All Night Lock In, how strange!!) or whether I decide to hide in my hovel and get on with them is still up for debate because I live somewhere different to where I did the last time I went to a write in, so the people at this one don't know me, and I don't know a lot of them, and the idea of having a minor emotional breakdown in front of them does fill me with something that feels like sinking dread, but I also know that it shouldn't, because we all get at least a little bit emotionally invested in our novels. 

If your own novel is making you cry and not just because it has vanished into the lines of computer code and is utterly unrecoverable, it's because there is a whole lot of 'you' going into it, and sometimes that's the best kind of therapy anyone can ask for and sometimes it feels horrible. Sometimes, particularly when you share your work online, or if you know it's going to be published, sharing THAT MUCH of yourself feels like you're left overexposed and honestly, for me it made me feel a bit sick. 

In my lifetime, (God why does saying that make me feel like I'm in my mid sixties?) I have self-published two novels. One of them can still be found on Amazon, and the other can't and there's a reason for that. I loved it when I wrote it, and to an extent I love it now, because it was the first novel I ever finished writing. I started it for my very first NaNoWriMo way, way, way, way, way, way, way back when, and I finished it nine months later. I am proud of younger me for failing NaNoWriMo but still seeing that novel through to the end, and I'm really proud of putting myself out there and self-publishing it, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't also proud of having re-read it, thinking, Christ, this is actually kind of trash and pulling it. Fairies was written by someone who had grown a lot by writing that first novel (I'm not mentioning the title of it because it was really bad!) and I'm still supremely proud of that one. Yes, you can tell it was written by a teenager, but there is a reason for that. It was written by a teenager!! 

I recently re-read a lot of Fairies and there were points that made me cry. I didn't do it to try and turn on that emotional tap like I do with watching films that make me cry, sometimes, but I did it because I have still been struggling to write a sequel to Fairies, which has had a title for over a decade, but is yet to be much more than that. Every time I write parts of the draft of that novel, I have to stop to have a sob and wipe my eyes. Honestly, it's a good job I can touch type because sometimes, I can't see anything trying to write it, but it's because I love it, too, even if it's little, weird, half formed state that it's in now. Fairies helped to make me who I am because it is still one of the biggest achievements in my life. I think maybe one of the reasons I struggle with Butterflies - the sequel - is because I put too much pressure on it to be like it's older sibling, and I think if it doesn't feel like I'm investing as much of myself into it, maybe I'm doing it wrong. (Which of course, is also total nonsense.)

If any of these blogs seem a little nonsensical, it's worth remembering that getting back into the habit of writing takes some time and I'm really struggling to think in straight lines at the moment because of the struggles I'm having with my mental health issues. Please bear with me (why do I always have to Google if it's bear or bare?) and hopefully normal service will resume, shortly. I'm still going to be weird though. That's engrained at this stage. :) 

What Happens If I Fall Out Of Love With My Draft?

Okay, so you start NaNoWriMo and you are however far into writing it and you think, hell, I'm not in love with this anymore, let me reassure you, you're not alone. Like every relationship, your relationship with your novel is highly unlikely to be smooth sailing. There is plenty of opportunity for your novel to make you sad, make you happy, make you angry and make you excited and maybe, just maybe, make you all of those things at once. There will be times you fall out with your novel, and that is a hundred percent okay. If you were a novelist on a deadline you might need to be worried, but if you are working on your debut, writing for fun, or you have plenty of time before you need to submit something, falling out with your novel is just one of those things that you need to accept is highly likely to happen. There are a range of things you can do if this happens, but firstly, you need to figure out what went wrong.

The first thing to think bout is are you really in the mood for this? If I’m not in the mood to be writing, it is going to show, because I will get testy and stroppy and I will think everything I am writing is a steaming pile of horse dookie, and if there is nothing I can do about the mood - sometimes I need food, sometimes I need a drink, sometimes I need some wine, but sometimes, none of that does anything and at those times I need to take a break. Sometimes it’s as simple as saying, I’m going for a shower, sometimes I need to go for a walk or a run, or just play with the dog for a bit, but what I need is to get away from the computer screen and what I am writing for a short break. Sometimes it needs to be a longer break because I’m too stuck in my head, and actually, sometimes it’s worth just saying I’m going to go back to pen and paper or use one of the typewriters because a change can be as good as a rest. The novel, at that point, is not the problem, the problem is you and your mood and your attitude. Sort yourself out and look after yourself and it’ll all get just a little bit easier.

Sometimes a break doesn’t do anything, because what you are writing actually isn’t that great, and do you know something? That’s the point of a draft. I’m sure some people do crack out amazing first drafts, but they’re the exception, we’re the rule. (Yes, I am quoting a movie and yes it is He’s Just Not That Into You. I haven’t even seen it in years, but that line always sticks with me.) The most important thing you need to decide is, will it do for now? Again, if you’re on a deadline, it’s probably worth looking at whether you can do what you’re doing better, but if you have time, it’s worth just bashing through to the end and then picking it up in the redraft or editing stage, because it’s really easy to get obsessed with getting ‘this one bit’ or ‘this one scene’ just right and it is to the detriment of everything else. If you just move on from the bit, whether that is skip that bit because it’s not working, or keep slogging on until it gets easier, at least you’re getting away from having a blank page. You can’t work with something that is not there, so something is better than nothing. There’s plenty of places in novels that have been published where the text isn’t perfect and actually you might want to throw a book across the room, whether it’s because there’s plot holes or because that particular bit is boring, but necessary, so don’t feel like your first draft has to be perfect, when it doesn’t. Don’t beat yourself up and make yourself feel like you’re not as good at what you’re doing because it doesn’t go right first time.

Another option, and I think this is a good one during NaNoWriMo is to sit and think, okay, this isn’t working, I’m going to try it again. Now, this works best when you try it in a different way, but at the same time, you don’t have to. If you want to just take another crack at it, do it, but sometimes changing tenses works, sometimes changing the voice of it helps, again, sometimes changing what you’re using to write helps. If I’m writing something like crime fiction, or something really dark, I have to do it on the typewriters, because it’s the only way that it comes out right, but at the same time, anything I try and write on the typewriters, particularly the manuals, takes a turn for the dark side. Sometimes that’s necessary and other times it does not work, but at least I tried. During NaNoWriMo, I keep both or all copies of whatever bit I’m trying to write and it all adds to the total. I’m not saying it’s the reason she did it, but Stephanie Meyer did re-write Twilight from the perspective of the guy, as did E. L. James. Again, not saying they’re literary geniuses, but sometimes thinking about the same thing in a different way actually helps you see where the problems are and helps you find your way out of them.

Maybe it is one of those things where nothing is working, or actually this whole project doesn’t feel right anymore, it’s not working and you no longer have any love for it. You do know it’s a hundred percent okay to change your mind, right? Changing your project part way through is definitely okay, both in terms of NaNoWriMo and in general. Just like with relationships, sometimes it’s not that it’s not the right one, it’s that it’s not the right time. I’ve been working on a few different projects for a while that occasionally I just throw the towel in on, because it just doesn’t feel like it is working, but then when I have left it to simmer on the back burner for a bit, I might look at it differently, or see it a different way, or something happens in my life that makes me feel somewhat inspired differently and whether I go back and try to edit, redraft or finish the draft I was working on or I decide to just have a whole new go at drafting it depends on what it is, but I do it, because it works for me. 

Sometimes the temptation is to throw the baby out with the bathwater and burn the notebook, delete the file, scrub it from the server or whatever. On Grey’s Anatomy, someone ate their novel, because it was a load of crap. I don’t recommend this, because paper wasn’t made to be digested, but the point is, don’t be tempted to get rid of it completely just because it’s not working right now. You might not be able to polish a turd, but if you leave it in the right place for a few months - somewhere you can’t see it or smell it - it can turn into something like compost which can help you to make something else turn right eventually. 

God that’s a lot of similes and metaphors, isn’t it? 

The most important thing, to my mind anyway, is just remembering you are not alone. It can feel disastrous when everyone else seems to be doing really well and you’re sat there struggling or hating your idea or novel. Like any social media, it’s worth remembering that there is a whole lot going on behind the number that people are posting and NaNoWriMo isn’t, primarily, about competing against other people, it’s about competing with yourself and your life and your priorities, so remember that some people are better at blocking things out, some people have less commitments and responsibilities and some people can just afford better noise cancelling headphones. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t mean anything, so don’t lose hope. All is not lost on one bad line, paragraph, chapter or even draft.

How Do You Decide What You're Going To Write For NaNoWriMo?

If you're in the position to be asking this question, generally you'll be sat in one of two situations. One of those situations is staring at a blank page and wondering what to put onto it. The other is having multiple ideas, too many really and either not knowing where to start or not knowing which to carry on with. There is one important thing to remember in each of these instances and that is there is no right answer. 

One of the things that is great about NaNoWriMo is that, whilst there is general idea of how we write for it, there are very few hard and fast rules for it. Obviously you want to write an original work (I include fan fiction and everything like that in my idea of what constitutes an original work, I just mean you can't borrow everything from something else), it has to be written in the timeframe and the genre doesn't matter. You can write more than fifty thousand words and you can write across a few projects if you really want to. One of my favourite things on that is definitely the ability to abandon a project if it is just not working.

For some of us, a blank page is exciting because of all of the possibilities that it presents, but for others, it's anxiety inducing because there is a lot of pressure from a blank page to fill it with something, and writers always want to write something great. It's hard because that kind of pressure, for most people, isn't conducive to a good working environment. When we stress ourselves too much, we actually make it impossible to achieve what we are trying to achieve, because stress compromises our cognitive functions. That being said, I know first hand that a little bit of pressure is good. Write or Die has only ever been as successful as it has because of the added pressure of Kamikaze mode. I think 4thewords battles are the same because, although you don't have to deal with the computer deleting your words if you don't keep writing, involvement in 4thewords only works if the game motivates you and then you want to beat the monsters, gather the items and all those other things that you do by writing. Obviously that extra activity causes extra pressure... 

If you don't know where to start and the blank page seems to baffling, write what you know. Write about people you know, write fan fiction, write something, because it flexes the muscles that you need to be creative, and it might be that you happen upon something when writing about something else. If you're still stuck, Write Ins, whether virtual or online, are a good way to shake your ideas around with other writers and I can guarantee there will be other people in the same situation. Some people LOVE talking about their current project, some people don't and some people will be as lost and just winging it. That's fine. It's also fine if it doesn't magic itself up in the first few days. There is a theory of micro-actions which suggests that taking the smallest of steps towards a goal actually helps to prod your brain into the right direction, so even just sitting down at the laptop or with the notebook and trying to tease out something  is a step in the right direction, even if it is only a baby step.

If you're in the opposite situation and you're struggling with too many ideas and not enough time, energy, focus or paper to crack on with all of them, figure out which one you are most passionate about first. There's nothing wrong with choosing to flit between a few different projects, though it is worth limiting this to only a handful because otherwise you'll waste time trying to get yourself back up to speed each time you change. If you need to write something  sad when your sad, violent when you're angry and dramatic when you're happy - I dunno, people are weird - then there's nothing wrong with that, and whilst traditional NaNoWriMo is bashing through fifty thousand words of one project, there's nothing wrong with using it to bulk up a few projects or even finish a few projects if the feeling takes you. Like I said, no right answers, but the great thing about there being no right answer is there is also no wrong answer. Even if you decided to cheat NaNo, which I am in no way supporting by the way, you're actually only cheating yourself. Cheating is definitely the wrong answer, even when there is no wrong answer.

If you want to write, whether that be for fun, to relax or for a career, cheating your way through NaNo isn't going to be anything like as entertaining as finishing your novel, it won't relax you as much as writing something that helps you to process thoughts and feelings and events and it's not going to produce a novel for you that you can then start trying to either self-publish or start querying for an agent or publisher. If you are going to do it, you just have to do it, and accept that sometimes it's going to be hard. I hate the phrase of what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, but everything you write does make you learn, even when it's total crap. 

Sometimes, It's Not Even Being Tired,

I've already mentioned that over the last few weeks I have struggled a lot with a few things with the dreaded ADHD, and one of the biggest things with it, other than the slight identity crisis that it sent me into, was, or is, brain fog.

I am used to feeling tired. I have spent a long time being tired and not really knowing why, and it's in part because my sleeping pattern is massively affected by the ADHD, but it's also because a few things feel like 'tired' but they're not actually the feeling of being tired, so it doesn't matter how much sleep I get, those feelings or emotions or whatever may be there anyway, because sleep is not what I need in those moments. Sometimes, it's as simple as I need caffeine, because it is enough of a stimulant to be able to sharpen my focus a little bit and let me get on with what I need to do, sometimes, it's a bigger issue of being fully burnt out and needing to take some time out to do things that all me to reset a little and sometimes it is the beloved brain fog that I haven't really got used to and I don't really know how to shift, if there even is a way.

Mostly I am pretty good that I can drive even when I am having a bad day, but when I have a bad day with it, I really can't drive. Driving is like my base line because even though I've not been doing it for long, any time I render myself unable to drive because of medication or alcohol, I miss being able to use my car, and any time my car isn't there, I struggle without it. I'm rather attached to the freedom of just being able to go anywhere with it since I've done quite a lot of driving since I passed my test and not being limited to doing things I can get a lift or public transport to has been pretty great.

Over the last couple of days the brain fog has been so bad that I have kind of felt as though I shouldn't drive if I can avoid it, because caffeine isn't doing anything to make things clearer, sleep is doing nothing and I don't really know what else to try. Other people with ADHD have said that medication can help, but I would be lying if I said it didn't make me anxious because of all of the bad experiences I've had with medication for anxiety and depression. Honestly, the way I've been feeling recently feels like the early days of citalopram all over again, and nothing but time actually helped with that, and eventually recovering enough to come off of the medication all together. That also really helped.

Whilst I'm not sure what's causing it, I'm trying to battle through it and also realising that there is a problem with brain fog in that it makes me forget to do things like cook until the point where I get dizzier, I can't exercise because I already feel dizzy and don't want to go out on my own (as in, without another person) and if I took Chai then I would be concerned that if I fell over or collapsed walking her again then she would do a runner again (though when that happened, she had only been with me for a couple of weeks and may not have realised that her name wasn't China anymore when I was calling for her) and I can't remember what I've drank so I am more inclined to have coffee, given that it is caffeinated and the caffeine can help, but it is also very dehydrating so when the brain fog is even partly to do with dehydration, I'm at risk of making it worse. 

All of this makes me feel as though I sound incapable of looking after myself, and the truth is that sometimes I am. Sometimes I ask my mum if I can stay with her, or she can have Chai, because I either can't look after us both at that moment, or I can't look after myself if I'm focusing on her. There are times when I use things like HelloFresh, because they stop me from needing to plan or make too many decisions and their instructions are pretty simple. I can also tell that I've not been eating properly by how many of the recipes are sat around my kitchen. (I never said it was idiot proof.) Sometimes the things which have worked before don't work the next time things are hard and sometimes the things you think will work don't do anything. The whole thing is a balancing act between what I actually have the capacity to do and what will help me to focus less on things that I can get help for. I think that makes sense, but on the day I'm writing this I'm so foggy I'm not even sure. Then again, iced coffee, a banana and a packet of crisps have taken the edge off of the worst of it.

The Happy Accident of Being Called Charlie,

Fourteen years ago, I decided I was a bit sick of being called Charlotte, because being from where I am from people don't pronounce it properly and it has annoyed me for longer than I can remember. For reasons that have never been known to me I've never been much of a fan of because called Chaz or similar and I got to the age where Lotti felt a bit infantile on me. (No judgement for any older teens or adults called Lotti, Lottie, or any other spelling, it was just how it felt for me.) I decided I was going to try out Charlie, and if I hated it, well then, it was two years of college and then I was moving to London, so it didn't really matter. Yes, I had already decided I was going to London at that stage, even though I had never even heard of the university I went on to attend. 

When I use my actual name online or I talk to people in public, I've found people have a tendency to use pet names that drive me crazy. It was particularly bad when I worked in a DIY store and there was a tendency to call all of the guys mate and then single me out (I was usually the only girl in the store as there weren't that many of us in the company) by calling me either darling or sweetie (or something similar) and it winds me up. In that particular context, it was because the guys doing so looked at me sceptically when I gave them answers to the questions they were asking, and that was if they got over the reluctance of asking a woman in the first place, they would look at me sceptically and then try and locate the nearest male member of staff and then be satisfied by the same answer from them. One of the things I have always taken pride in is that if I don't know the answer to something, I will say I don't know, because I would rather do that than anything else. Whilst most of the people I met in the store didn't know me or know anything about me, I still took it personally (joys of ADHD, particularly when it's undiagnosed) and it's also really sexist. Assuming someone doesn't know something because of their gender is actually properly sexist even when you're not doing it intentionally. To be fair, I should have expected it a little bit, but really it wasn't a good job for me, and one of the reasons I got it was because I was a woman. I think the company were catching shade from somewhere about their diversity figures and the lack of women in the business, or they were trying to anticipate that it was going to happen eventually, so they were looking to recruit more women. 

Although I have never changed my name officially, I have considered it a number of times but I do occasionally go back to using Charlotte, though very rarely. My online name has been CharliesWrite for long enough that for things like emails, Charlie is ambiguous enough that a lot of people assume I'm male and have a tendency not to talk down to me, assume that I don't know things, and also tend to call me mate instead of the sort of pet names that make my skin crawl a little because they're a little too much like terms of endearment from someone that I don't know. It wasn't the reason I actually chose to use Charlie, but it was a happy accident. Honestly the decision to use the name Charlie was such a quick one, that the only thing I thought about was not being Charlotte, that Lotti had T's in it as well and that always caused a problem, and I wasn't that big of a fan of my middle name to start using that instead. (It's not horrendous or anything, but I just didn't fancy being called Elizabeth, because it didn't seem to fit me, and neither did Liz, Lizzie or Eliza, though if I had decided on Lizzie I would probably have spelt it was Lizzi because I really had something against the letter E, though I don't know why.) 

There are times when that ambiguity has caused a problem. My ex partner took great exception to the fact that my name was unisex, because he used to be 'accused' of being gay and dating a man called Charlie. He liked having photos all over his Facebook of the pair of us because at least then he could show people photos and 'prove' that he wasn't gay. It was something I never really challenged him on at the time, but it was always something he was pretty sensitive about and looking back on it I really wish I had asked him why the hell he cared. The idea that anyone would think he was gay was a really touchy subject. Then again, it did seem like when the conversation came up it was more that people were making fun rather than getting genuinely confused and in all honesty, I find it disappointing that people still think it's something to be joked about, or that me being called Charlie was such a big deal to some people. Anyway, being the stubborn person that I am, when he asked me to change my name for that reason or at least let him use a different version of it, I said no, but it made me realise I had become somewhat attached to the name, and what it represented to me and about me. I had kind of adopted it into being a part of my identity, and it's something I'm no longer quite sure how to put down, even if I wanted to. Even if my screen name confuses people when I'm trying to tell them how to spell it. He still tried to get me to use either Char, Charl or that one I've always hated of Chaz (God, I don't know why I hate that one so much but I really, really hate it on me) and I was just too stubborn to respond, or I would just ask him what my name was. Whether it is thankfully or sadly I don't know, but I was the more stubborn one, so the name Charlie stuck. 

What The Fudge Does Preptober Even Mean?

It's been over a week since the calendar flickered over into the dreaded month of October and for most people it means the world gets colder, the days get darker, and everyone has a mostly unneeded excuse to watch scary films. I say mostly unneeded because if you like it and you want to watch it, I think you should go ahead, but people like me need someone with them to be convinced to watch most scary films and a few of my friends won't even watch them then, but saying 'But Hallowe'en is coming' seems to be enough enticement. By the way, yes, I do know that Hallowe'en is considered to be an archaic spelling, but I don't care. If you don't know why it's Hallowe'en, click here. 

One of October's other names, at least if you are in the NaNoWriMo world, is Preptober. Preptober is the month before the biggest month on the calendar - NaNoWriMo - and it is when we get ready for November and the start of NaNo. For some people that means planning out their novel and what they are going to write, for some it is a scribble of an idea on the back of a postage stamp, and for others it is no different than any other month in the calendar in terms of writing. They write or they don't write, but they don't plan because writing is more fun by the seat of your pants. No prizes for guessing which camp I pitch my tent in! Preptober means different things to different people and often for me it's about nesting. Everything that I can do to make where I'm living more comfortable, and then also things like making ready meals for the early days of November, considering that otherwise I would either forget to eat, live on take out or I would just be having snacks that I could grab quickly. (Originally I just thought that this was being a full indoctrinated WriMo, but it's definitely more of an ADHD thing.) When I lived in the flat in Sutton, I did manage to convince myself to go to Morisson's a few times and get things from the salad bar, and even convinced myself to eat a banana once in a while. I think that that was the year I finished really quickly as well, though that was after I had finished the initial fifty thousand words and I was carrying on to see how far I got. I intended to write until about a hundred and fifty thousand but then I pretty much ran out of steam and decided to finish on something like a hundred thousand and one words because I quite like palindromes, but then realised that if I finished on a hundred and one thousand and two words, because that meant that I finished the last day with the exact same number of words as I finished on the first day, so whilst it wasn't the sort of perfect and obvious palindrome I was going for initially, it was still something like one. It made for a pretty graph anyway. 

This year Preptober is more about me putting myself back together a bit so that I can actually function through NaNoWriMo since I'm really struggling with executive disfunction and a few other things at the moment. This year it is even more important for me to use Preptober to get myself ready for November because otherwise November is going to be a rough one. I don't know what I will be writing by then, I have no concept of whether I will be struggling to write then or not, if it's going to be a little bit of a slog or if it will be something a lot easier like it has been before. When I was writing 'Fairies' I didn't know what I was writing until about day three and then I enjoyed the process of writing the rest of the novel, because it felt like it fell out of my head through my hands, and it was beautiful. I still love that novel like the day I wrote it, which is far more than the day I edited it. 

What's strange to note is that this is the first Preptober in a long time that I haven't been an ML. I decided to step down, and it was a decision I was somewhat torn by at the time, that I'm still torn on now, but ultimately I knew that it was the right decision to make. There were a lot of things going on that lead to me making that decision but none of it was not wanting to lead the region. I loved the London region. I love the people, I love the city and I love the community and events that have been years in the making, and it wasn't really something I ever thought I would be ready to step away from. Although it's not even close to being the reason I decided to step down, I'm actually glad that I'm not having the responsibility of MLing this year because it means that I can focus on looking after myself and making sure that I'm okay, or at least getting there. As much as it feels selfish to say it, I feel like it's actually quite important for me to do that right now.

What I have considered though is, given the issues with Twitter and my personal dislike of Discord, I wanted to think of a different way of being involved in the community. I've previously used Twitter a lot and also my blog, and whilst I'm still happy with one of those, I have been tempted by the idea of using Twitch particularly with 4thewords, but also potentially for a few other things, though saying that I'm not sure that NaNoWriMo would be the best time to do that because the kind of interactions which make a stream actually work aren't really the sort of thing that most people have time for during November, because some people are trying to juggle with their lives and their novel and other people are able to be intensely novel focused, and neither type of person is in the place to be involved with a Twitch stream, even if it would be a good platform to run an overnight event on, alongside Discord, which I really wish that we had thought about before, because during COVID we could have really used it, though I'm not sure that their co-hosting feature was available during that time. Whilst I'm considering it, I am thinking that it might be something that I need to work on for next year as opposed to trying to do it for this year, given that I'm not in a good place at present and given that it's the sort of thing that would take a bit more setting up than I have the time to devote to right now. I'm also not amazingly familiar with the system and again it's not the sort of thing that I think I can remedy as quickly as I would need to. Which is a shame, because it's the sort of thing that could be really cool. 

This turned far more into a stream of consciousness than I originally planned it to be, but sometimes that is what actually gets me to focus enough to write, so it's not a bad thing. Expect more babble as October goes on...