Wednesday, December 05, 2012

7 Things: Reasons I Should Not Have NaNoed

1. Over the summer I switched departments.  Given that our busy season is the fall, it meant I was really testing my new job skills, oh right about November.  (And October.  And December.) Also, it turns out short staffed departments are really busy.  Shocking, I know. 
2. I hate failing at things.  (Such a special snowflake, I am.)  I know that really, it is worth participating in NaNo even if you fail, for the camaraderie, the practice of writing regularly (should that be new to you) and the joy of the word count tracker.  But, I've won that last few years, if I did it I didn't want to not win. 
3. I have this poor neglected manuscript.  I started writing it in April with some fellow fast drafters.  April was not a good month for me to be fast drafting.  And then I picked it back up over the summer.  And it's still not done.  Yes I could have tried to finish that for my NaNo but I think that story might need more help than my brain can give it right now.
4. The thing I wanted so much to do was sitting there calling to me.  But it was big, scary and hard.  It needed to be third person which is a POV I struggle with.  It was multi-POV which I have done before, but not to this degree.  And it involved research. 
5. My weekend and evening schedule of late has not really been relaxing.  (I know - I'm suffering from too much fun.  Is there a charity for that?.)  So, time was going to be a big issue.
6. Sleep.  Remember sleep?  I do.  Kinda.  I like sleep.  I used to be able to sleep in a Sunday here and there and feel all caught up.  And lately, I cannot sleep past eight.  So, all the sleep has to happen before that. 
7. Thanksgiving, the day I usually catch up and/or finish was early this year.  Really early.  While of course that didn't change the number of days available for writing, it meant that I was going to still likely have lots of words left and no other light days to do it.  Oh, and there was a game I needed to watch.
As you might expect, I did it anyway.  And I did win.  One the very last day, which I think happened the first year I did NaNo, although in that case it was because I had really wrapped up the story and was just making my characters sing silly songs to get to 50k. 
This year the story's not quite done. (I wish this meant the story was more fully realized, it really means my characters spent a ridiculous amount of time thinking deep thoughts at the start which will all have to go later.) I'll get it done in the next few weeks and then let it marinate a bit.  So, I am glad I did it.  I am really tired.  Really proud of the other participants (winners and not winners) including my NaNo mentee, a high schooler who got about a hundred pages written this month in addition to all her homework and stuff.