Doing That Thing I Hate,

Yeah, I know that could be a very, very long list of things but I really do hate writing about not writing, but sometimes that is what it comes to. 

I wanted to write this, because even though I have been writing every day it hasn't been a blog, but I have managed to publish a blog every day and that's been feeling pretty good. Even though I haven't necessarily been publicising them every day - even when I have had photos prepared to post with them since I HATE wordy Insta stories! - because there has been a lot going on. Which I'm not going to talk about. 

Today was my first day in the office this year and it was A LOT to say the least. It meant getting up a lot earlier than I am comfortable with, trying to leave the house with what I needed for the day (and failing not because of forgetting anything, but just not being able to anticipate everything I was going to want or need) spending too long driving and that not being hugely pleasant, realising in the middle of the day something was itching and I wasn't sure if it was my skin or something that just felt itchy in my mind, or in my soul or whatever, and so even though I took my laptop with me to the office (I don't mean the work one, though I obviously did take that one) with the vague intention of writing something on my lunch break, I didn't even take it out of my bag whilst I was there. I was trying to think what I could write whilst I was on the way home and honestly, it was honestly the least inspired I have felt for the whole of this year. I felt empty; devoid of all thoughts and opinions, and let's face it, that's not like me at all. 

What changed was the closer I got to home, once I had collected the pooch from my parents, the more I felt I was getting my groove back. That's not to say I walked into the house and felt like I could write a novel in five days, or crack out a poem in under twenty minutes, but I felt a bit more like my normal self. I'm still overwhelmed and I still feel like there's an army of ants crawling across my skin, but there's a bit more "Charlie Flavoured Normality", not to be confused with the regular kind, mixed in there. I've sent the pooch to bed early (and yes, I feel very guilty for that, got into bed with a thermos-type tumbler of tea (I don't have anything against mugs, I just don't like drinking cold tea and it's too cold at the moment for me to drink hot tea, because I forget about it), my pjs on and my electric blanket keeping me warm, and I'm writing from my bed. It's not the best idea in terms of sleep, but it does mean I will get this published before midnight and I think that will soothe some of my ruffled up feathers as well.

I even thought about outlining the plot of another novel (yes, I know, finish those you are currently writing before getting distracted by any more!) before I realised it was a bit like a film that I love, without the intention of being, so decided not to bother. 

Antisocial Media,

 Truth time: I don't remember if I wrote about why I turned my Instagram private, so I'm going to do that here and if I'm repeating myself, well shit, it happens and I'm sure we can all get over it. 

As a volunteer with [I'm not actually going to put the name of the organisation because they would not thank me for swearing] I work with youngsters and the age range we as an organisation work with is vast. I haven't worked across the full span of the age range, but I'm only short by two years and that's youngsters so small I'm not sure I wouldn't trip over them. As these lovely young people grow up, they get social media accounts and they sometimes like to find stuff out about the people they interact with - it's fine, we all do it - but there are photos on my Instagram of university nights out, utter rubbish I posted years ago and never deleted because who scrolls back that far anyway (trust me, they do) and there are photos of me at Rocky Horror Picture Show. It is a photo I'm proud of, do not get me wrong, but it's not something I would share with them, it's not an outfit I would even consider wearing around them and the God's honest truth is I forgot it was there until someone said, oh, they found your Instagram and were sharing screenshots between themselves of different photos on there. And it was like alarm bells going off in my head, and the only thing I could think to do was shut it straight onto private mode. 

In some ways, getting rid of my public profile of Instagram was actually really positive, because I didn't feel the need to post on there, and I wasn't concerned about the idea of 'if you want to be a writer you're going to have to get better at promoting your own books' and I didn't have to think about content production or all of those things that I was starting to think, hey, if you actually want to do this writing thing as more than just a venting to yourself thing, or just a written version of a Sims game, effectively, you're going to have to get better (not even better, get less shit at) using social media. I know the theory of it, but I'm not good at consistency, I don't want to spend hours on it because it's not the bit I'm good at or that I like doing and honestly, although I knew it was going to affect things like readership to the blog I had already kind of fallen out with writing and started the mental health episode that I had (though it was only bubbling under the surface at that stage). 

At present, I have a Facebook page I rarely use, I use my Twitter (and hate it), glance at my Blue Sky (not yet loving it) and that's about it. I had to learn how to embed links into stories on Facebook - post it from Instagram - so that I could get the blog out to my friends lists and hope that made some impact (and it clearly worked, though I'm sure the Google Analytics for the blog are broken given that it recorded a ludicrous number of views from Singapore over a few days this year (though having looked at it, I originally thought it was 2 days, and then it turned out it was over quite a few more days than that, so who knows?) I'm not necessarily thinking I want to try and build the readership of this blog massively, because that would be insane pressure to actually consistently write something worth reading, but I know I will have to go back to having more of a public social media presence, however uncomfortable that might feel, if I'm going to think about publishing anything this year, and I would like that to be the plan, but will have to see how I get on. 

I go through fits and starts of using stories, but I think they're going to have to be a bit more of a feature of my life so that I can actually put the links to these blogs out, and then hopefully, eventually, announce a date for the Fairies sequel and a couple of other things I have been working on, but I will be honest, it's doubtful if either of them will make an appearance this year, let alone both. 

Is It a Monster?,

There is this amazing song that was popular when I was at school by a band called The Automatic. Much of it is asking the identity of something traversing an incline in the topography, but it is wonderful. There were two ways I was thinking of going with this - I'll try and do both...

First thing

When we are approaching NaNo and whilst it is going on we can often feel like what is that? Is it a monster?

It can feel like it at times.

What you need to remember is that no one from NaNo HQ nor myself or anyone else is running around after you with a red hot poker trying to force you, we will not brand you with the word loser if you fail, we will not pick you up and shake you to see if the words fall out... We won't even shave your eye brows off if you fall asleep at a write in (because that is frowned upon). Nothing bad will happy if it is too much to ask at this moment.

NaNo is my motivation because I am competitive and it works for me. It working for me allows me to think of it as the chrysalis which forms around a caterpillar. The chrysalis allows the caterpillar to become something amazing, something beautiful. It allows the caterpillar to hold it together or to be held together.

To over exhaust this metaphor, the MLs provide the leaf or the branch on which this pod of transformation hangs, and the tree is the wider NaNo community. You need to be the change in yourself, but we're here to support you. This is the support network which allows use to become butterflies.

If slaying the NaNo beast works better as your metaphor, grab your light saber, throwing stars and flame throwers. Kill it with fire and a pair of phoenixes (you and your work) will rise from the ashes in a blaze of glory with Jovi blasting out in the background.

Second thing

Let's imagine that two WriMos are writing the same novel. Work with me here, it's going somewhere. The boy is sat with his diary on one side of his desk, laptop in the middle and something looking suspiciously like a Pokédex on the other side. The girl is sat with her laptop in the middle, wearing her underwear Superman style (red underwear over blue jeans). These visual representations give you an idea of which team each person is playing for.

Team Planner, what's that coming over the hill, is it a Monster? IS IT A MONSTER?? 

Team Player makes a grab for his Pokédex. "It is a monster, but fear not, my madeuposaurousatron with strength of whatever Top Trumps metaphor yada yada yada, well planned battle scene, win win injury save the day yada yada" Boom!

Team Pantser, what's that coming over the hill, is it a Monster? IS IT A MONSTER?? 

Team Pantser looks around herself and her eyes happen upon a plastic dinosaur that someone's kid sister decided to add makeup to. It has also had its body brutally melded to something that was possibly a Transformer made by that douche pants from Toy Story. Boosh: the madeuposauratron is born. Pantser thinks her way through a battle scene that is unfolding gradually in her imagination as her wrists cramp from trying to scribble down each drop of blood soaking into the ground beneath the battle field as her main character traverses this battle scene (and she knows he/she/it/they have to make it because otherwise it is Game Over for this novel. They slay and look as though they are winning, lose something like a finger or an eye, but win overall despite being viciously maimed...

The answer to the question of is it a monster is fundamentally the same, is, well, yeah, it is. The action the main character takes, again, fairly similar, but the difference is the person at the keyboard. Can you pants it? Can you plan it? What works for you? It's not monstrous, but that is a monster. 

Run, and I'll catch you later.

Erecting the Tents,

No, like actual tents. Well, metaphorical...

It's 10 days until the second Camp of the year kicks off and this time, I definitely feel a lot more committed to it, which is probably because I actually have a project on for this one. 

Yesterday I mentioned having finished the first draft of the first volume of The Single Girls' Collective, and the plan for Camp NaNo is to carry on with this project and produce a solid 35K as a draft for the next volume. I'm referring to them as volumes because I don't know right at this moment if they will be novels (50k+) or novellas. I'm just trying to run with what they are at the moment and then the framework can come later.

With Camp looming, we've all been talking about cabins, and events and such, which has been wonderful. I'm helping to organise a London based cabin, and there should be some really fun goings on. Also, there are five weekends in Camp this year, which is beautiful, because it gives me more blog time (if I stick to just Sundays, which is obviously the commitment I made at the beginning of the year) and also because, for those of us who work office hours, it gives us more time for solid writing!! 

Now don't get me wrong - Camp is still going to be intense and my estimate of 35K is still a daunting thought because it is a lot of work. It still takes a lot to drag your butt home after a day of work and sit and work or to do it before work, or on your lunch time. After NaNo, I know that it's easy to fit in about a hundred of so words whilst you go for your pee break from noveling, but still, it's intense. 

So the rest of this month is probably going to be making playlists, stocking up on snacks and making sure I have enough coffee to hit the ground running with this.  

I will be staying up from midnight a week on Thursday to welcome this into my life, and hit the ground running. Feel free to join me, one and all.

Catch you later.

Ready for NaNo,

I'm normally the worst person for being ready for NaNo. I start the competition sleep deprived and end it like a little zombie. I eat quick food and a lot of snacks and drink far too much tea. I know what I do to myself, truly I do, but I do it regardless. 

What is disappointing is that this month is not one of the Camps. I always thought it was April and June. However I was apparently wrong and it's April and July (or is it August), but the problem there is that I'm ready now. I am sitting here ready to write and with a project to work on, but I know that the competition helps. I also know that I will not be feeling like this next month, which really sucks. 

I think I'm in the mood for doing something crazy, like attempting another 15k day, or attempting to push it past that and see how far I can really go with it. That is always an option. It might, of course, include me finding other more magical and inventive ways to write for longer periods of time, or prepare myself so that I have a full 24 hours of awakeness to work.

I might just make myself an Excel spreadsheet and get on with it myself. Have my own little camp in June and hopefully, maybe, have another novel under my belt by the end of it.

Catch you later...

When There Are No Words,

I want to dispell any idea that I haven't been writing on here recently because I've not been doing much or because I haven't had anything to say. Neither of those things is correct.

It's also not true to say that I have been mentally busy to the extent that writing a little something would have been impossible, but whilst I have had things to say, I know that I often say things emotionally and then wonder why I did it. 

I react emotionally to most things in my life and it's not something I believe I can do anything about, even if I wanted to. The bad thing about it is that when there are a lot of things going on, there are a lot of things that make me want to shout, scream and throw a tantrum and I would rather do that in the company of friends as opposed to the arena of the internet. A lot of things have really, and it's rare for me to swear on here, so hopefully that will indicate how difficult this has been, a lot of things have pissed me right off.

Some of them are just more instances of things I have written on here previously. I am so sure that people are sick of how, particularly recently, have been irritated by men forcing their interest on women when they don't want it, and how women owe them nothing, but it keeps happening. I feel like I've walked into another world entirely and suddenly it's just accepted that this is a thing. I hate the whole 'safe space' things at university and 'trigger warnings' without a damn good reason, but sometimes I want to trip back there for a few days of respite. Or just not leave my flat, and I don't need encouragement for that. 

The worst thing is I know that my frustration comes out when I write, and I can't deal with ruining all of the things I work so hard on because things are a bit shit at the moment. Yes, art imitates life, or life imitates art, and there have been times where I've felt like I've been dragged through an emotional blender, because one of my characters was heart broken or brutally murdered or something, but what I don't want to do is write something when I'm feeling like this, because I would get the nickname Georgia (after George RR Martin) for massacring everyone and everything. Of course, not writing contributes to the existential frustration and it all just becomes a self-perpetuating cycle which I struggle to stop.

Supposedly a change is as good as a rest, so I'm working on changes at the moment, but it's difficult because it's not something which I have control over, so I can't say as to when things will change. Or if that change will help.

See, this is why it aggravates me when people think that writing is just putting a pen to paper or fingers to keyboard - it is so much more than that. It just becomes a part of you. It has become a large part of me.

Butterflies,

So, occasionally there are things I want to do, and I make a commitment to them, and then life doesn't pan out the way I think it will and so things go slightly off course. Or very off course. 

I had committed myself to the idea of writing every day in June, and I wanted to stick to that, but I haven't. In many ways it has been a difficult month. Finishing university felt like such a flooding relief because I didn't have such an amazing time of it, as has been evident, but the thing is, my expectations of myself were really unreasonable and I felt as though I would have all of this freedom and not know what to do with it. The actual fact is I have been run down and exhausted from going back to working full time and it's all felt pretty none stop. I have made myself feel quite ill by just throwing myself at it at full force instead of allowing myself to just stop and just be for a bit.

The good news is I have been writing, just not on here. 

I'd love to say that I have got a new novel finished or been editing or something, but the fact is that I am struggling. 

I'm tired and I'm not doing great at being healthy - in the sense of eating three proper meals a day and sleeping properly and making sure I'm taking all my vitamins and such. More than anything, I've been coasting myself along a little in lieu of a major kick up the arse. 

The fact is that at some point I need to accept that I'm 22, not 17. I'm not on a summer away from college and I don't have a separate study where I can hide out, not eat, work frantically from when I wake up at 10 in the morning and only hear my stomach yelling "feed me!" at something past four in the afternoon. If writing is something I want to do, and it is, I need to get my life sorted and be able to accept that things are different from before. I am no longer able to throw all my time at it, because I have to keep a job, pay bills and all that sort of thing. 

Saying that, there is a lot of things I could learn from 17 year old me, and I'm trying to.

Despite a habit of being something of a jeans girl, I put so much effort into how I looked at 17, not because I needed anyone else to tell me I looked good, and not because wolf whistlers don't piss me off, but because it's something of an ego boost when you walk out of the house thinking, everyone else can think what they think, because I am happy with how I look today.

On the other hand, 17 year old me is just going to have to accept that maybe Scivener isn't as bad as she thought. 

The overarching thing that I am trying to emphasise is this - the somewhat constant state of flux which my life is currently in means that I am kind of awful at making concrete plans for what to do with my noveling career, but the fact is that I am no more willing to accept that it's a pipe dream than I was at 17. If anything, the last few years have taught me to respect the fact that I can't change who and what I am, and an integral part of that has always been, and will always be, the dream of being able to write, and publish and anything else is just a bonus.

Everything In It's Place, Even If That Does Mean The Floor,

Generally, if someone asks me where something in my room is, the answer is preceded by a lengthy erm, and normally sounds something like, I last saw it on the floor near the... Currently that is not the case, and no, it's not because I have started believing in all that tidy room tidy mind ----stuff (really trying not to swear at the moment and it's really difficult!!) that other people spout. No, it's because I am moving out of my current abode into somewhere new, in another different part of London.

As much as it's really exciting, but also really stressful because of the actual physical transportation from House A to Flat B, what I find more frustrating is that because the majority of my stuff has already been boxed by a slightly over-enthusiastic Ben and myself yesterday, I keep thinking oh, I could do... oh, no I can't, it's in a box, or I could wear, ... no, also in a box. It's only those times where you can't get to them, such as when you're moving or on holiday that you think of those really obscure pieces of clothing that live at the back of your wardrobe on any normal occasion and you think, yeah, that's what would make me the happiest person I can be right now. I think my brain actually like me being like, well, that sucks. 

Another fantastic example of this is thinking about novel notebooks that I haven't touched for so long that they required dusting before packing - and yes, there is a point to that, and it's so you don't transport the old dust to your new place der, I am not the weird one here -.- - and they're now in the bottom of a big box, which is at the bottom of a big pile and behind a stack of other, let's call it what it is, crap (and no, that is NOT a swear word, just FYI) so of course my brain now goes, here are all the wonderfully magical things we could do with this... And I end up being like, Dear Brain, Hold your horses, Chill your bean and Keep you ----socks together for just a week and then we will make all of these magical dreams come novelliciously true, but I already know that is not going to happen, because using the words Calm down to my imagination is like telling me Don't stress, and if you want to know how pointless that is, speak to my boyfriend, because he really knows. Yeah, if my brain and I had a contract, I would be seriously trying to renegotiate it's concept of when it's acceptable to be thinking about novels, because this flexitime nonsense that it has going on at the moment is just not really working for me. I genuinely worry that I will be in work at some point, someone will tell me about some vicious ailment they have and I'm going to spout some glittery garbage about how I'm dispatching the unicorns to fix it. As much as it would probably be amusing for a few minutes, I'm pretty sure that I would end up some combination between sectioned and fired, and none of those look too pretty from where I am sitting.

So, I have a to do list longer than any piece of string, and it seems to casually keep getting bigger, I have two Orchids to attempt to move without inducing plant-y panic attacks, and my very antique typewriter is currently in quite a lot of bits across my coffee table, which if you follow me on Twitter, you will have seen. As much as the many parts are now a severe amount cleaner than they were when he was all together, he's not quite as easy to put back together as I thought/hoped, though I'm pretty sure that I have it in theory now, it's just the actual practical getting all the screws back in the right place, but I've felt that way about driving for a while - as in, I'm well aware how to do it, it's just actually getting my brain to stop going ARGGGGGGH, I DON'T LIKE THIS!!! WE'RE BEHAVING LIKE TOO MUCH OF AN ADULT!! MAKE IT STOP!!! and to actually engage with the task at hand, aka not crashing, is a "little bit" more difficult than I have ever hoped for.

Basically, the upshot of all of that is that the novel that was meant to be edited by the end of last year might end up getting put off until the end of this year... I don't know. It'll happen when it happens, and I'm far too comfortable with that fact quite frankly. It also means that I'm probably not going to be posting blogs as often as I would like, and I am attempting quite loosely to aim at once a week this year, and if I could set aside an hour, of one day every week then I would be like 'here's the day I will attempt to publish it on' but considering how chaotic just everything is, I don't really think there is much point. But, the good thing is that the a forenamed 'computer which potentially works' ought to now be known as 'Zeus' because he's fast as lightening, has a funny symbol on the front that looks like Zeus' headdress and also because he is basically the God of all my writing machinery, so might as well be named such, so when he and I move into our new place, we have no worries of major technically hiccups getting in the way of dissertationing, blogging or general wordsmithy, so that is a major plus.

So, essentially, follow the yellow brick twitter page....

Too Much To Do Does Not a Life Make,

I keep getting really annoyed that I haven't really been writing any blogs for a while, but I have so much to do that I haven't even played Sims 4 or SimCity for a month, and they're my destress things, so I'm sure you can imagine that I'm a little bit of a X Track 2 (I'm a Mess - for all those who didn't get the Ed Sheeran reference). 

So, what's been happening? Well, more doctor's trips because I've been having inconvenient stomach pains - not that any stomach pain is particularly convenient if you actually like doing your job and are no longer in high school wanting to miss PE - getting infuriated at the library in my university when people are requesting books that I'm using for my dissertation, getting a bit panicked by essays and deadlines, going to see Ed Sheeran in concert (twice :P) and watching the filming of Russell Howard's Good News last night. Why does life always seem to fit much more nicely into timeslots when you list it all out? I always feel so busy!!

What am I currently procrastinating from (I don't care if that's incorrect use of the word, you understand what it means)? Well, I have to choose between two really fun essays: One about HIV and contraception, the other about the ethical status of natural family planning. Considering this is one of the courses I am technically resitting - not that I failed, I just didn't do the course first time... - I would rather do the second option, as I attempted the first last time, and I don't think it went so well...

In other news, I've finally reached a decision concerning National Novel Writing Month this year, and I have decided I'm not doing it. I'm sick of the amount of Facebook spam I get about it and, quite frankly, the pressure to focus that much on my novel writing at the moment would not be a welcome thing - I actually can't think of anything worse. Last year was amazing - 3 10k days and I finished within 19 days, beating my personal record (previously 20days) - but I kicked my own ass so hard because NaNo was the centre of my world; this year it can't be, and I don't know any other way to behave with it, so rather than make a royal fluff up of my last year at uni, I would rather put NaNo onto the backburner for a bit and focus on the stuff that I really need to do.

It's been a bloody hard decision, and it's not like I'm walking away from it for good, but I guess that at some point I have to see that NaNo doesn't and can't own me, and I don't need it, I just want it. If I never go back to it, it has been extraordinary for me - not just for the writer that I want to be, but also the person that I am. I've met some amazing people because of it, and I hope to stay in touch with a lot of them for a very long time, but like I said, I have far too much else going on at the moment to be able to afford the time to it that I spend on it. 

Best of luck to all those competing this year.

Anyway, best get back to it. 

Oh Joy,

The stats page of this blog is always pretty interesting to me for more reasons than just viewing numbers. For those who've never used it, there's this wonderful map showing where your audience is across the world. It's pretty interesting actually... Oh, and there is that wonderful graph which shows that the most people view this during November (NaNoWriMo) and the early days of December, which I think is pretty cool. 

Of course though, there is more to me than just the blogger, the novelist and the WriMo, which almost sounds like the start of a bad joke. 

I'm a student in university that gets annoyed with a lot of the same things other students in London do. I get annoyed with how people make assumptions that because I'm a student, I sleep all day, party all night and use Wikipedia to write my essays. I get annoyed when I can't get books from my university library to finish an assignment. I get annoyed with assignments that are either too many words, not enough or when I feel like I'm metaphorically polishing a turd. I get annoyed by the price of housing, I get annoyed that landlords don't want to fix problems, and take forever about doing it. I get annoyed when I forget my pens or I drop my notes all over the floor. I get annoyed when I can't get my head around something or my neighbours are making too much noise for me to concentrate.

I'm also becoming a naturalised Londoner. I get annoyed with tube delays, and buses, and people. I get annoyed with Oxford Circus. I get annoyed with people who walk slowly. I get annoyed with four week suitcases that take up the space of an extra person on the pavement or on escalators. I get bored on the tube, but I've found my way of dealing with it - I practice French on my iPhone.

I'm a woman. I get annoyed for no reason. I get annoyed because of what I've read between the lines of the statement you haven't even fully formed in your head yet. I get annoyed because it's cold and I forgot my scarf, but even when little things annoy me, little things make me happy, too. Little things like you texting back, even when life is hectic.

Most of all, I'm human. I get annoyed when I can't figure out the answers. I get annoyed when I feel like I'm at the doctors every other week. I get annoyed at being upset or annoyed for no valid reason. I get annoyed with myself more than anyone else, and sometimes, the best way to get things which annoy me out of my system is just writing them down. 

I know what it's like to have a bad day - I have them a lot. I know what it's like to get angry at yourself for being upset or pissed off with everything. I know what it's like to feel like Atlas, carrying everything on your shoulders. And I'm glad I know what it's like to be able to put some of  it down.

As it gets to exam time, it's more important to be able to do that, so you have to find someone that you can share your troubles with - even if you need that to be a diary, or a councilor, rather than a family member or friend. You need to find a way to let go of some of the things which upset you, or annoy you, or hurt you, because the sum total of all your faults is not you - you are the person who learns to push back and deal with them. And you can.