Conducting the Internal Orchestra,

Whilst NaNoWriMo was rolling along - by which I mean my own submission, as I know the competition continues for another 7 days - I was attempting to write a blog every day, however I obviously failed in this endeavor. I should also admit that I failed to write anything towards my NaNo project every day, however the important part to me is that the 50'000 word target was reached, and it was reached in 19 days, because I had a bit of a roll. 
I managed two days that were over 10k and one day that was only about 90 words short. Trust me, that's pretty special after I didn't have a 10k day last year. 

Granted, this is not the standard of Yours, which admittedly I do still need to finish editing, and I was sort of distracted by the fact that all I wanted to do was sit down and write more of my new favourite project, Dreaming in Colour, but the beauty of it was this. I proved that I can force myself to sit down and write 1667 words+ in a day. I proved that I can function within my friendships and my relationship and, in some ways, in my studies whilst also working on a novel which has taken over 99.9% of my brain. It's just a shame that that can't continue after my piece of writing is finished. 

Most of you probably get that my life is a very fast paced mash up of a lot of things. At the moment, I feel like I'm trying to perform the circus trick of spinning plates on the top of sticks, but instead of performing it like a total Master of the Trade (Mistress sounded too suggestive...) I'm letting my very Greek inclinations come out and instead of spinning the plates, I'm dropping them or throwing them to the floor, then dancing around clicking my fingers in this sort of fashion. 

In a way, getting through life is like conducting this internal orchestra, getting all the timings of things right, telling which voices in your brain are allowed to pipe up at what time, because it's slightly ridiculous to be worrying about certain things now when they're bloody months away, right? But currently, I'm trying to do this conducting with a tea spoon and a bar of chocolate, because it's about the only way I can stop myself blowing a fuse of biting people's heads clean off.

The fact is, university is stressful, even when you only have lectures for six hours a week, there is more to it than that. Work is stressful, especially retail towards Christmas, and having to think about all the things you have to do for the role you're currently doing, and a role you may be looking at, and fitting it around everything else in your life. My health is currently stressful, and I can't wait to see if and when my medication kicks in and I start feeling less ill and sleeping better without taking Nytol. Being in therapy is really stressful, because things that are wrong with you now are mostly caused by things that happened in the way back when of your existence and going back over that isn't something that's easy. 

Do you know what else is stressful? Writing. It is really stressful, because you'll be constantly thinking your're spending too much time on writing or observing and not enough time on the other. Even when you've finished something, you have to think about editing it, what you want to do with it next and then getting it through a whole different process, which in itself is another stress, because it's like a birth, but you have a choice in it. Mother's have no choice in giving birth to the baby they have been nurturing, but as a novelist, you have to bring yourself to give birth to your creation, to give it life and let it leave you, and let the world think what it will. When your writing is your art, that is a very difficult thing to do. 

The point of this blog is more than venting, in a way, because I want anyone who is still battling through the trials of NaNo and all the lovely winter diseases and distractions and procrastination stations to know that it is possible, whether it's your first or your fourteenth, it's easy to think of this as one of the labours which Heracles was spared from, but it's not.
It would also be nice if some of those annoying people who bitch about students without knowing anything about how trying it can be read it and either shut up or lowered their voices a little bit. It also might be nice if the same happened to a few of those lovely buggers who don't think of writing as a profession. 

But even if not, I've done something today. After a day with my boyfriend and a shift in work, I've sat down and I've written something, with imperfections, and given it out to the world. Today, for the first time since I published the last blog on here, I gave up something I had written, because it's not just for me. 

I can't wait to be ready to do that with Yours,, and for other people to be ready to do that with what is their's. 

Manchester Part 2,

Now that Craptop is behaving itself I can finally get this written, but first, a couple of moans:

1. The transport system in Manchester is a pile of ___________ (insert favourite profanity)
2. I think I need a children's Snuggie, since the sleeves are too far apart in mine 
3. My laptop sucks 

Anyway...since I've been back in Manchester, I've been meeting up with a lot of my old friends, and also running into people I haven't seen in years, which has been pretty odd, but ultimately interesting. Yesterday, I saw one of my old friends who essentially looks like he has a whole new face (it has been AT LEAST a year and a half, probably more like two years, since I've seen him though) and it was like, oh, hello beautiful. Interestingly though, I feel like nothing has changed. We still play video games together, I still suck at them, and they still - very accommodatingly might I add - set up the game in a different way so that it's almost impossible for me to lose. By the way, I love you guys! 

Today then brought about my very geeky side. Since the destruction of the blanket I have been OBSESSIVELY knitting to try and replace the patches that were essentially mashed and had to go in the bin, but that does mean I do things like knitting on the bus to town or in the cinema or watching the TV (or all of the above....guilty) I also hang around comic book stores and spend too much money on graphic novels, but if you've ever seen how beautiful The Watchmen and Kingdom Come are, you'll have to understand. 

Even better, Josh and I both proved our age (in our heads, somewhere between 62 and 90~) by sitting through another film, verbally tearing it apart and then admitting to having thoroughly enjoyed it. Jack the Giant Slayer and Warm Bodies (it's really odd that both films we've chosen to see recently have the same male lead) have both received the same treatment, but as I said, we really enjoyed them. 

Now if only I could find some time to edit that blasted novel!!!

P.s. CELEBRATING THE 1500 views!!! :) 

Camomile Tea,

So, currently I'm sat in my bed with a cup of camomile tea, half a blanket and a tub full of patches of wool. Am I constructing a blanket? No, I'm taking one apart.

I started making this "thing" when I was fourteen, which I always think of as not very long ago until I realise that I am in fact now twenty and no longer able to class myself as a teenager. Anyway. The bottom half is a bit scraggly to say the least, since I wasn't overly dexterous at that age, and I was pathetically bad at knitting. My short attention span is also evident since the patches are teeny tiny. Fast forward six years and they are all large beautiful, if not oddly shaped, patches.

So what was the problem?

My blanket was almost a fricking triangle. Seriously, the top was AT LEAST six inches wider than the bottom, sothe natural OCD like thing to do is take the whole thing apart.

Now, you may wonder why I'm telling you this.

I'm telling you this to describe the frame of mind that I'm currently in, because I feel that is more constructive than once again apologising for the lack of another of my novels on amazon. For those who care, okay, I'm sorry, but I'm getting on it. Honestly.