Figured I should just get this out of the way whilst I have a spare twenty minutes - Yay, first post of 2015 *moderate sarcasm for those who don't know me too well* -.-
The last two months have been a kind of crazy blur. Third year is turning out reasonably well since I've managed to submit all my essays on time - win! - and the results I have got back have all been 2:1s - a win deserving cheesecake - now if only my dissertation were going so swimmingly... Let's call it a day there, rather than discuss that one.
So, what else has been happening? Well, my university seems ready to drop off the face of the earth, I went see Hollywood Undead and had to go steaming 'tup Norf for a family funeral. I've never understood why the word fun occurs in funeral, because they never really are...
Anyway, Christmas and New Year and everything like that happened and Yours, is still not finished, my head's still buzzing with characters - arguably more than ever - and I don't really know where to find the time to start writing let alone where in this web of lives to start writing. I mean, I love them all, how can I choose?
It's also difficult because my wrists are so damn sore that I can't type properly, or hold a pen without pain, and the only other alternative is my newer quill. It's absolutely delightful, but I'm so scared of dropping it and shattering it that I almost hate using it as much as I love it!
So I'm stuck in a place where I'm not sure if writing, typing and knitting is actually making my wrist better or worse, but since there is no other option but to plow headlong through life, that's kind of what I am attempting.
Showing posts with label awesome. Show all posts
Showing posts with label awesome. Show all posts
23 Nov 2013
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.
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.
31 Oct 2013
From October,
I do realise that's been almost an entire month since I've posted anything on here and for that, you all have my apologies. I've been having some pretty awesome adventures, been spending some quality time with the loved ones and have also encountered a couple of health problems, but I'm now on the mend, and just in time, as NaNoWriMo2013 starts at midnight tonight. Are you excited?
I KNOW I AM!!
I'm also petrified. For those of you who don't remember, I was a stroppy little sod last year after not achieving my favourite 'I have no life' goal of completing a 10k day. It is quite literally as the name suggests, a day where you write 10,000 words. I took three days off last year and finished on the 20th of November - definitely an 'I have no life outside of NaNo' achievement, but I couldn't quite feel satisfied. This year my goal is to have that 10k day. Maybe even have two, one for this year and one to heal my wounded pride from last year....I'm kidding. I think....
I've already had one of those nutty 'OHMYGOD IT'S NEARLY NANO; IMMA DIE!' moments yesterday, so it's probably a good thing that my housemates are in Portsmouth and there's possibly a strike of our uni lecturers, because I don't cope with people very well the day NaNo starts and I get the same sort of look as a piece of flat pack furniture with no instructions. (The best description of it is, I don't know what it is, and I have less idea of what to do with it. That kind of a face.)
On the plus side, I have an idea, a vague form of a plan, and a freezer drawer full of homemade ready meals, so that I don't just resort to pizza and coffee. I am also, because of my recent health blip, required to eat at least once a day so I can take my medication. It also requires me to consume vast amounts of orange juice, so maybe I won't end up with too dreadful of a NaNoFlu this year - trust me, it's a thing - but then again, who can know what November will bring?
I have two gigs planned, can hopefully throw in a trip back home to see Jamie, Dean and their lovely cohort of Manchester WriMos, a rugby game this weekend (no, I'm not playing, look at the size of me for Pete's sake. :')) lectures, assignments, my family, my friends, my job, my amazing boyfriend :), and the general things of life like cooking, cleaning and the wonders of the ASDA weekly shop. There's Christmas shopping, sending Christmas cards and all manner of stupid things to think about, but they can wait, because it's coming, it's starting.
REAL LIFE ENDS TONIGHT,
Welcome to NaNoWriMo2013
4 Oct 2013
Welcome Back to the World,
I got back from Greece on Sunday to something amazing.
God knows I have complained enough times about the state of my laptop - teetering on the edge of existence ready to fall off. I'm not sure if I actually informed you all that a week before I went away, it fell rather violently. The hard drive stopped playing dead and instead was dying rather rapidly, and there was seemingly nothing I could do about it. Admittedly, that is partly because I'm not an IT genius, but thankfully, I know someone who is. :)
Not only did he stop the hard drive dying before the only existing copy of the novel I was trying to write to NaNo targets was destroyed - it was the only thing which wasn't on the back up drive, since I forgot to turn the computer on to do it's scheduled back up - he also got me a new hard drive that will probably outlive the rest of the laptop by a couple of years, which is pretty awesome.
Not only does this mean the Craptop is back in action; it also means that it's not acting like a craptop. It's running faster, it hasn't crashed since Sunday and it almost looks prettier, too. Probably because I'm not directing my hatred at it anymore.
Admittedly, this means I no longer have the excuse of "the Craptop" as to why I'm not getting things done towards publishing the next novel, but I have the excuse of uni has started up again and I'm in lectures for a while SIX HOURS A WEEK (that was sarcasm by the way, but uni does take up more time than just the lectures) and I also have a new job, which will be keeping me pretty busy.
It is however, only 27 days until my favourite day of the year - the wonderful launch day of National Novel Writing Month - and as usual, nothing will get in my way of celebrating that joyous event, so at some point during the time between now and then, Yours, needs to be edited and emailed to the two lovely people who have agreed to read it, and tell me how much they either love or hate it. It's a pretty scary moment when that happens. After that, it's ready to go into print and a touch of reformatting will make it ready for being an e-book.
God knows I have complained enough times about the state of my laptop - teetering on the edge of existence ready to fall off. I'm not sure if I actually informed you all that a week before I went away, it fell rather violently. The hard drive stopped playing dead and instead was dying rather rapidly, and there was seemingly nothing I could do about it. Admittedly, that is partly because I'm not an IT genius, but thankfully, I know someone who is. :)
Not only did he stop the hard drive dying before the only existing copy of the novel I was trying to write to NaNo targets was destroyed - it was the only thing which wasn't on the back up drive, since I forgot to turn the computer on to do it's scheduled back up - he also got me a new hard drive that will probably outlive the rest of the laptop by a couple of years, which is pretty awesome.
Not only does this mean the Craptop is back in action; it also means that it's not acting like a craptop. It's running faster, it hasn't crashed since Sunday and it almost looks prettier, too. Probably because I'm not directing my hatred at it anymore.
Admittedly, this means I no longer have the excuse of "the Craptop" as to why I'm not getting things done towards publishing the next novel, but I have the excuse of uni has started up again and I'm in lectures for a while SIX HOURS A WEEK (that was sarcasm by the way, but uni does take up more time than just the lectures) and I also have a new job, which will be keeping me pretty busy.
It is however, only 27 days until my favourite day of the year - the wonderful launch day of National Novel Writing Month - and as usual, nothing will get in my way of celebrating that joyous event, so at some point during the time between now and then, Yours, needs to be edited and emailed to the two lovely people who have agreed to read it, and tell me how much they either love or hate it. It's a pretty scary moment when that happens. After that, it's ready to go into print and a touch of reformatting will make it ready for being an e-book.
12 Sept 2013
5053~
I could have given myself more time to write today, but I didn't need to as far as goals were concerned, and I did have a lot of other fun things to do. In our usual style, my house mate and I managed to continue our breakfast conversation until lunch, even with the arrival of the new paint - because adding bubble wrap just made it more fun!
It's been a busy day and I'm finally starting to feel better from my chest infection, which can only be a good thing, surely.
After a wonderful day of painting and cleaning, you can imagine it was tempting to vegetate on the sofa with Stevie and Grand Designs, but instead I went out on a date :) to see Kick Ass 2 - before you judge, I chose the movie and I loved it.
After that, we went to Zizzi for dinner. Seriously, it was a lovely evening.
And I even had time to get to 53 words above my goal the for the day. Let's see how tomorrow goes.
~
It's been a busy day and I'm finally starting to feel better from my chest infection, which can only be a good thing, surely.
After a wonderful day of painting and cleaning, you can imagine it was tempting to vegetate on the sofa with Stevie and Grand Designs, but instead I went out on a date :) to see Kick Ass 2 - before you judge, I chose the movie and I loved it.
After that, we went to Zizzi for dinner. Seriously, it was a lovely evening.
And I even had time to get to 53 words above my goal the for the day. Let's see how tomorrow goes.
~
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