Sometimes, I Feel Like Screaming,

It should comes as no surprise to anyone that I am quite a stressy person. I like things to go right first time, and they rarely do, and on those regular occasions that they go wrong, I get quite frustrated and don't necessarily know how to react. It's a bad habit that I am trying to break, but it takes a lot of time to retrain yourself, particularly from something that seems very instinctual. 

Part of the problem I have is that when I get stressed about situations, different things go, 'I did not sign up for this sh*t, I'm leaving' so my immune system ends up in the toilet, or I end up dizzy to the point of not knowing where the ceiling is. I had one of those last night/this morning, partly because one of my piercings is not overly happy, and I don't recommend them. 

One of the major problems is that I do not help myself at all. 

Aside fron all the normal joys of a 23 year old (working, Netflixing, saving up for a deposit for my own place, eating, sleeping etc) I am a fully certified crazy person for trying to write a novel in a month, and then have all the palaver of finishing and editing etc that comes along with it, a write in group who also have movie nights (my poor social calendar :P) and have signed myself up to learning to drive again (as in, I am again attempting to learn to drive, though the sucess of this is yet to be measured) AND, this is the big one, I am one of the new MLs for London.

Now, for those of you who aren't down with lingo, an ML is a Municipal Liason Officer. MLs are not only responsible for dragging their own sorry behinds through November alive, well and with 50 thousand words under their belt, but also hauling ass and getting as many other people there to. We set up write ins, send pep talks, moderate forums and are generally there as the wall to wail to and shoulder to cry on when we are needed.

London, as you can well imagine, is a massive region, so there are four of us sharing the load like a lovely pack of Greek donkeys trotting up the side of Santori with a tour load of American's suitcases strapped to our backs, but it is truly an amazing egion to be a part of. We're asked to attempt to provide a write in at least once per week, but we're going to aim at 4+, a Kick Off Party and a Thank God It's Over, because I need sleep and the Red Bull ran out party... As well as an overnight lock in and a walking tour of London with writing stops built in. *BIG BREATH IN*

It is insane to think that it was only 7 years ago that I was preparing for my first NaNo competition. In facct, this time 7 years ago, I'm not sure that my friend who introduced me to NaNo had even done so yet. I came out of that competition devastating at what I percieved as losing. It was an eight month slog that turned my 22,500 NaNo peice into a full length novel that, warts and all, I am still proud of, and it provided the UK size 13 boot up my butt that spurred me into my next NaNo where I managed the 50k and wrote Fairies.

Every year, I have attempted to up the ante. Last year, it was wanting to achieve the 15k day, and I was beyond proud when I realised that goal. I am hoping that being an ML will help me to help other people, not just in the London region, reach their own goals, as well as being able to set and smash some more of my own. The ground work is being laid, the countdown is on. Are you with us? Are  you ready?

A Day Late and a Dollar Short,

My priorities recently have been very much about work (my job work, not novel work) and I have been quite comfortable with that. It hasn't been because I have fallen out of love with writing or that I have changed my mind about it being something I really want to do with my life, but because I know it can be all consuming.

The other issue is that what I have been writing is nothing in comparison to what I want to do. Don't get me wrong, I love a cheeky little romance novel, I love writing about human relationships, and I don't write anything just for the hell of it if I think it is going to be awful. 

Still, everything I have been writing has been very contained. It was something that I chose to do, and I have put several projects which I knew had the potential to get me away from that, but the problem has always been that there have been other things I needed to focus on, and so I did. I focused on other things. 

I keep hoping that something will feel like a pivotal moment, but it never really does feel like a fireworks moment until it is already nearly done with. Self publishing my first novel was thing long and arduous process and I nearly gave up a couple of times, but when the proof copy finally arrived through my front door I could barely contain the excitement. Until then, it was nothing but a concept, a virtual file made of key strokes and binary and computer nonsense, but then suddenly it was there in Amazon packaging, a physical thing made of paper and ink, all black and white and beautiful, having come off a printing press in America and then being shipped across the Atlantic to me. 

I know that there is only me that can make it happen again - I am well aware of that, but the last thing I want to do is to put something out into the world that is not a patch on Fairies. Maybe that is me being far too picky, but I would rather do that. 

I may also be off the blog next weekend, again due to work commitments, but I'll catch you later...

If It Weren't For...,

I really wanted to get back on top of blogging and writing nearly 2 weeks ago, but the fact is that the list of things that I have to do before I can get to that is forever getting longer, and I am never really sure when I will have both time and energy to work on editing and noveling. 

It is an equation - time + energy + motivation = work done 

Missing any of those things means that it is either going to be difficult, nigh on impossible, or actually impossible. 

I am still saying that I love my job. I do, I really enjoy it, and I have committed to it, which means I am spending an awful lot of time either taking my desk with me or thinking about being at my desk. 

As much as I love my writing, I do not want to do it the injustice of being half arsed. When I go to writing group, I am able to do just that, but in the office, or when I am trying to think about anything work related, I just cannot do it. 

I am really hoping that the Bank Holiday gives me a little bit more time, though I doubt that it will. 

I guess I will just have to wait and see, I guess.

When Things Burn,

No, not literally. 

I don't really know how many people noticed my long absence from this blog, but there is a long story and right at this moment I don't feel like telling the whole of it. Partly because I've had to retell it so many times I'm surprised that the entire world doesn't already know it. The important bits are that some people are a complete waste of oxygen, I can be a lot stronger than I think I can, I am surrounded by some truly amazing people and things do get better. 

Unfortunately, all of that did mean that a lot of my stuff, including my PC, was in storage for a week. Let no mistake be made, the last few weeks haven't been me having a jolly. The last few weeks have been intense with me moving my stuff more miles across London than I have the whole time I have lived here and despite being In a new fixed and settled home, I'm by no means back to being sorted.


Every time you move house there are three million things to do and I am nowhere near through that list. I mean, you have to change GPs, and notify Everybody that you've moved house and it is just intense.


I haven't gone to pieces though and I have been writing and working and reading even, which has been a novelty. I even got to have a bath the other night with a face mask on and my book and a Lush bath bomb in the water and I'm not kidding, it was glorious. Now I just need a holiday and I really will be set. Well, let's see when that happens.


People can often think that I'm pretty highly strung, maybe I am, but I think that I have just had so much going on for such a long time that trying to calm down has never really happened. I would love to go away for a week and just chill out on a beach sometime, but it doesn't look like it is going to happen any time soon, which is a damn shame.


This weekend I will be working, which I am simultaneously looking forward to, whilst being rather anxious. It's going to be a long one and I won't actually get a break now until the following weekend. My new job is something pretty wonderful though so I can't really complain too much.


I am hoping that all of this should now be resolved, or as resolved as it can be and I should be available to be back to the once a week blog posts (and I'm even going to try to do this on the weekends when I am working). I really didn't want to drop the blog, but I didn't have much of a choice with everything else that was going on, but I'm going to try and stop it from happening again.


Catch you later.

Woo!,

I've been pretty vocal about the fact that this week has been busy, and I was well prepared for the fact that my word count was going to kind of tank. (Well, not tank, but not quite get on the ladder really.) It's been difficult to see where I would be able to fit in writing and I really have been struggling with getting any sort of word count recorded. 

Thankfully (really?), well, thankfully yesterday I spent a scheduled few hours in hospital being poked and prodded and spun around at low speed with lights flashing. It was quite as *fun* as it sounds. The good thing is that between all the bits and pieces I was getting tested or questioned about, I was able to sit in the reception with my iPad and type furiously to try and catch up. I'm pretty blessed to have a myriad of writing tools and several of them are actually very portable which does help when I have spent 90% of the time I've actually been in my flat this week asleep. 

It's been annoying because I really want to work on the novel that I decided would be my project this time around. Thankfully I got well enough into it today that I've managed to not only get to the 10k I was aiming for this weekend, but actually caught up with how many words I was supposed to be on today - 11290 (and a little bit more). 

I'm going to try a little harder this week in order to get some words in on the train in the morning and on the way home, and maybe some at lunch time, too (though that might be pushing the boat out a little bit) because I really don't want to fall behind again. 

As much as it is Camp, and Camp is a lot more laid back in terms of deadlines and such than November, I don't want to fail when I've decided to go for a little bit less than the November target.

Ah well - we'll see how it goes. Catch you later. 

Well, That's an Unfamiliar Phrase,

Even though I am exhausted, and it's been a long week and my mouth has been in pain many times where I am missing a tooth, I can honestly say that I love my job. 

I started my new job on Monday morning and it is a very steep learning curve, believe me, but knowing a lot of different things for my job is not the problem. The "problem" which isn't really a problem per se is that I went into my last job with at least a small amount of knowledge, whereas with this I am learning pretty much from scratch. 

To say that I have not got as much writing done as I might have hoped would be the understatement of the century. I barely got a few thousand words done after the weekend, which means that I am struggling in terms of word count. It always seems that drafts of my novels end up as a sort of Frankenstein's manuscript with bits and pieces here and there that need to be sewn together. Part of the reason that they all need bringing together is because otherwise, I have no clue what my actual word count is; it's all guess work and underestimations. 

I don't miss my old job, but I do miss having the time to write whilst doing my job. Whilst in the call centre it was more than possible to be scribbling a few paragraphs or drawing up a little plan or something, but my new role is much more intense, and I don't have that luxury. Granted, having a few canine compadres wandering around more than makes up for it. Then again, I'm biased. I prefer most people's fur babies (dogs, cats, rabbits etc...) to actual babies because generally, they don't make quite so much noise - though I do love a terrier more than anything and they can be yappy little sods. 

So I have a million and one things to try and get done and nowhere near the amount of time I need to do they, but I'm just going to try and get stuck in. 

Catch you later

My Own Limitations,

Camp started a few days ago now and I can't say that I'm where I wanted to be. 

Last year I had this great starting day of fifteen thousand words, and yes, it nearly made me keel over, but it was excellent in terms of how much I got done. 

This time around I started in my sweat pants, so lord only knows where this is headed. I've also had to head to the dentist to get a tooth out. And I'm starting a new job. And trying to find a new place to live, too. 

We're only three days in and I'm already dressing like a hobo, but thankfully still making normal foodie things. 

And I really need to sleep.