In just 12 days, 14 hours, 22 minutes, and 58 seconds (or less depending on when you read this) NaNoWriMo will begin. What is NaNoWriMo, you ask? NaNoWriMo is an abbreviation of National Novel Writing Month. I call it NaNo for short. NaNo is a thirty day challenge for anyone who wants to write a novel. Starting November 1st your goal is to write fifty-thousand (50,000) words by the end of the month. All those who reach this goal are deemed winners. Although if you do not reach this goal you are not a loser. Pretty good deal if you ask me. The only rule: Thou shalt not EDIT! (at least not until December)
I will be participating this year. My second NaNo. I participated last year and I am very glad to say I won! My exact word count having been 50,511. I won't soon forget that!
What I love about NaNo is that it forces you to write. No dillydallying. No Spellchecking. No editing. No time. The no time part is what save me. My current novel has been in the works for about four years if I remember correctly. Why? Because I kept dillydallying, spellchecking, and editing. And I had lots of time to do it! I was going nowhere fast (or slow, for that matter). Actually, I was going nowhere.
When I dove into NaNo, however, that changed. I threw my inner editor in a cardboard box and shipped it to the moon. No more editing until my first draft was finished! However, my novel wasn't completely finished last year. Even though I'd reached my goal I still had a lot left to the story but I was determined to finish.
...Then February came...and my inner editor broke in and stole one of my characters away. And that was okay. She needed to go. I had realized that after NaNo had ended. She had exhausted her usefulness in one of my previous rewrites (I changed the whole idea of the story about four times before NaNo) and I was only holding on to her because she had been there from the beginning and I was feeling a bit nostalgic. At least, that's what my inner editor told me. And so away she went. And with her went the entire beginning of my NaNo rough draft. Why? Because even though she wasn't a main character anymore she was the reason all my main characters met up in the first place. And so what was my only option? Rewrite it.
After many months I have finally cooked up what I think is an equally (if not, more) interesting kick-off for my story. So this NaNo I will continue my rewriting because after this new beginning the middle and "end" (it's not really and end because I never got there) don't make as much sense. But I'm okay with that now because I feel that I've finally found a solid base (or at least a less rickety base) for my story.
NaNoWriMo is a time when writers go mad. And when writers go mad we have a blast! It's crazy, but if it weren't why would we do it?
NaNo saved my novel. But if I ever get my hands on the creators of this thing I'll have a hard time deciding whether to thank them or chew them out for organizing this thing in the middle of the SCHOOL YEAR!!! Seriously! "Thirty days has September, April, June, and November"! Why not June? WHY?
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Sunday, October 2, 2011
When I was in Portugal...
So. It's been almost a week since my last post...I'll try harder to update with something at least a couple times a week...
This post is meant to be a review of a restaurant. My creative writing teacher has given me this assignment and I must oblige him.
However, there is a slight problem. The assignment is, and I quote, "to review a restaurant you go to this week or have been to recently. Describe everything from the food you like and didn't like, to the tables and seat cushions."
This wouldn't be a problem if I had actually been to a restaurant recently. I'm assuming he isn't talking about the McDonald's where I sat with my mom using WiFi so I could read the beginners version of Beowulf (...that's another story).
If you want to define "recently" as "having happened within the past year", then yes. I have been to a restaurant recently.
In August.
In Portugal (also another story).
This is also a place where I'm hitting a snag. The restaurant we went to in Portugal was in a building that attached to a couple other restaurants and because we were all so hungry and tired I hadn't bothered to see what the name was. I hadn't known it would be useful information. I just wanted whatever Portuguese food they had (I was determined to eat authentic food while in a different country). So this assignment shall also be a test for my memory.
Commence the review of the nameless restaurant!
There were four of us from our group there for lunch. It wasn't very big (probably about medium-smallish), but it was nice and it wasn't crowded.
My sister and my mom ordered salads and I can't remember what our friend ordered...it may have also been a salad. The name of the meal I ordered was in Portuguese and I can't remember it but it was a plate of rice, different beans, and pork. It was delicious! There was enough of it for me to fill up on and then let everyone else try some.
Then we order dessert. Two tiramisu-like desserts and one chocolate mousse. I think it was the best chocolate mousse I've ever eaten!
I think I would probably rate that place 4 stars.
That's the best review I can come up with (pitiful, I know).
Now I'll probably head off to bed. It's pretty late.
Until next time!
Oh! And a note on restaurants in Portugal. If you eat the appetizers they have sitting out on the table you have to pay for them. I don't know if that's all of Europe or even other places too, I just thought I'd point that out.
God bless!
This post is meant to be a review of a restaurant. My creative writing teacher has given me this assignment and I must oblige him.
However, there is a slight problem. The assignment is, and I quote, "to review a restaurant you go to this week or have been to recently. Describe everything from the food you like and didn't like, to the tables and seat cushions."
This wouldn't be a problem if I had actually been to a restaurant recently. I'm assuming he isn't talking about the McDonald's where I sat with my mom using WiFi so I could read the beginners version of Beowulf (...that's another story).
If you want to define "recently" as "having happened within the past year", then yes. I have been to a restaurant recently.
In August.
In Portugal (also another story).
This is also a place where I'm hitting a snag. The restaurant we went to in Portugal was in a building that attached to a couple other restaurants and because we were all so hungry and tired I hadn't bothered to see what the name was. I hadn't known it would be useful information. I just wanted whatever Portuguese food they had (I was determined to eat authentic food while in a different country). So this assignment shall also be a test for my memory.
Commence the review of the nameless restaurant!
There were four of us from our group there for lunch. It wasn't very big (probably about medium-smallish), but it was nice and it wasn't crowded.
My sister and my mom ordered salads and I can't remember what our friend ordered...it may have also been a salad. The name of the meal I ordered was in Portuguese and I can't remember it but it was a plate of rice, different beans, and pork. It was delicious! There was enough of it for me to fill up on and then let everyone else try some.
Then we order dessert. Two tiramisu-like desserts and one chocolate mousse. I think it was the best chocolate mousse I've ever eaten!
I think I would probably rate that place 4 stars.
That's the best review I can come up with (pitiful, I know).
Now I'll probably head off to bed. It's pretty late.
Until next time!
Oh! And a note on restaurants in Portugal. If you eat the appetizers they have sitting out on the table you have to pay for them. I don't know if that's all of Europe or even other places too, I just thought I'd point that out.
God bless!
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