January Challenge - Write Every Day!

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Esmae Tyler

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Day 3 - 332 words a'writed. The month is burning, gotta get to writing! Carpe verbem!


Discodowney - Welcome! 500 words a day is an absolutely fantastic goal. It may not seem like much on any given day, but if you can maintain that pace those words really do add up quick. Obviously 1000 words per day makes them add up twice as fast, so congrats there.

D.L. - Actually there was a period between Christmas and New Years where I was afraid my plot bunnies might've all died under the bed with their dust cousins. The ideas (the good ones, I mean) were just not coming. I'm planning to jump back into the project I just finished soonish. After I finish the SS thing. It needs a major overhaul so dragging my feet too long will just leave me where I was at the end of last year, you know? Congrats on YOUR 550 words!

Layla - Look at you, knocking your goals down like a superstar. (Double-plus points for going out. On your bike. In the cold.)

Oneblindmouse - Sure, you can totally count those words. Apparently I'm the only one who didn't make the 500+ club today!
 

Magnus

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Day 3
Nothing today, but that was expected as I spent most of the day sorting a birthday dinner for my mother. Back at it tomorrow!
 

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My larger goal is to get some more essays published before my book is finished. How's that for vague? Book should be complete in three months. One essay was just accepted (yea me!), another is going out next week. The shorter, more manageable goal is to spend a longer time writing every day. I'm lucky if I manage an hour a day and I can't figure out why that's all I'm getting. I spend an absurd amount of time on other stuff that's not as important to me. So I'll aim for 1.5 hours a day. I really wanted to say 2 but I'm taking the advice of Magnus and keeping it a small goal. Thanks!
 

Kithica

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I was so pleased to find this. Last year, I started with a goal of writing every day - with no specific word count attached - and managed to keep it up for the whole year. Some days it was just fifteen words, and other days it was fifteen hundred, but I sat down and touched my writing every day, no matter how busy I was. And it usually worked out to about 2500 edited and polished words a week. Not bad. After a few weeks, the momentum of the streak kind of carried me forward on its own, and I got my novel written by October.

So, I'm intending to try the same again this year. At the moment, my writing consists of plotting out the outline for my new project, and I'm making steady progress. Day 3 and I've touched it every day. It's really encouraging to see the goals everyone else is setting for themselves!
 

ajaye

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I finished the flash challenge! Feeling chuffed cos I'm more of a starter than a finisher. :D

Now to find another prompt for another story. I want to keep writing daily, and get something finished by the Sunday of each week.

Yay for everyone hitting those goals!
 

Layla Nahar

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congrats on those words, downey - it's so great when that happens
mouse, 500+ is excellent work!
Esmae - Carpe verbem indeed - & congrats on the 322 :)
Magnus - will there be a cake? I love cake!
Welcome tembers & Kithica!
& good to see you AJ :)


Day 3: about 27 lines in two WIPs; SENT the job letter. (I was really nervous about it); went to my friends to fix up my bike - & helped him with some stuff on his job hunt :) started another job letter; had 3 housemate phone interviews AND did a wee bit of Javascript and some moar work on my mobile site! w000weeee 3/3
 

D.L. Shepherd

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discodowney: Woo Hoo! Great session. Hope you manage to find a writing space that you're comfortable in AND you can access regularly.

oneblindmouse: Agreed. Even if you need to edit them, 500 words is still 500 words. Nice work!

Esmae: Glad you were able to resurrect those bunnies before the year ended! Sounds like we will be in the same boat with the editing. I have a lot of notes like "Research this" and "Research that," as well as "Change this," "Add that," and "Reconsider this." I do enjoy the editing part though, much more than getting the thing written in the first place.

Magnus: Happy Birthday to your mom!! I'm with Layla on the cake thing too.

tembers: Congrats on the acceptance!! Good luck increasing your writing time. I too find myself wasting time on lots of stuff that is less important to me. I think, at least with me, it's another form of procrastination.

Kithica: Awesome that you stuck to it and finished your novel last year! Nice to have you on board while you work on your next project.

ajaye: Nice work finishing the challenge!

Layla: Great job sticking to your goals, and glad you got your running around done on your bike BEFORE the snow. Good Luck with the job letter!!

I managed another 750 tonight. Almost there.
 

Esmae Tyler

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Day 4 - A sneeze shy of 500 words. Ran out of time since I'm hitting that "magical" window where the littles are giving up their nap. I don't think one of them slept at all today.


Magnus, I hope the party was delightful.

Tembers, welcome! Carving out blocks of time to sit and write is tough, but totally an attainable goal. Congrats on the acceptance!

Kithica, welcome! There are quite a few threads like this one, but this one is ours! Ish. And pretty motivating, all things considered.

Ajaye, congratulations! That flash fiction thing looked amazingly challenging. Accomplishing it, even a few days late, is fantastic. Not to mention sets you up comfortably for this month's goals, right?

Layla, you're killing it. I don't have to go back very many months to see where you were doing single digit line counts for your writing. That coupled with your RL stuff is great. Keep it up! Hopefully you'll start seeing some payoffs for the other stuff sooner rather than later.

D.L., you sneak! I didn't know you had anything out in the querying world. Extra congratulations here too. And congrats on pushing your own word count. Gotta be hitting The End again soon! And then, oh yes, the Time of Great Revision. I got pretty lazy in some places toward the end of December. I have some places from earlier where I ended up with with weird notes to myself like "Make this scene sad!" but I have huge chunks now that are things like "They talk about this thing" and... well... yes. At least there's something now to fix rather than the nothing that was there before, right?

Keep at it all! Stay warm!
 

D.L. Shepherd

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Esmae...nice job on the ~500 words! And thank you for the congrats!! I've been sitting on this news for a bit now, so I'm very excited to get a chance to finally announce it. It was killing me keeping it all bottled up!! By the sounds of it, my current WIP really IS in a similar state as the one you just finished. It will be fun polishing them up though!!

ETA: This is the The Post that Esmae is referring to, if anyone is interested. :)
 
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oneblindmouse

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Jan 4th

Only managed a ridiculous 200+ words today, and some editing, as we've got builders in, and they've dismantled the bathroom, so we have to go and sleep elsewhere, where I don't have writing facilities. Life is a tad complicated. Hope to do better tomorrow.
 

ajaye

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Great news, D.L., so happy for you. :D

Bummer about no writing facilities, oneblindmouse. Maybe you can brainstorm ideas or something?

Hi and yay to all.

Day 4 - I found 4 prompts to see me through Jan and got 300 words written for prompt 1. Will fiddle more with it today. Or let it stew and look at prompt 2.
 

Magnus

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Day 4
Super tired after the party and I've spent the day recovering. The good news for this introvert is that after my mother's the holiday season is officially over, so I can get back on track. I'm going to lower my goal to just writing every day, whatever, until I've made that stick better again.

Meanwhile, welcome to all the new faces and the people they are attached to!

D.L. - Good to hear you are nearing completion of a novel. You're way ahead of me!
Layla - Sounds like you're getting stuff done, always feels good to tick stuff off the lists.
Esmae - At least you're getting words down, which means you're moving ahead!
 

DanielSTJ

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Day 4--

527 words written already.

I'm going to dive in tonight too.

Here we go everybody!
 

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Kithica: Awesome that you stuck to it and finished your novel last year! Nice to have you on board while you work on your next project.

Thank you! And congratulations on your news!! (I saw your post) That's amazing!!
 

Layla Nahar

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DL: Congrats on the 700+! (I've heard people say they like the editing part… eh - for me it's just aaaalll hard…)

Esmae - nice work. 500 is great! :) (& thx for the encouragement - Ima keep on keepin on ;) )

mouse - 200+ words is actually really great. It's 200+ more than 0 - you're winning!

Nice work AJ - keep at it!

Magnus - I think sometimes the best thing to ask of ourselves is just to win against the blank page -

Daniel! fast and steady!


Day 4: 19 lines in one story and 18 lines in the other -
very happy I managed this because I had a stressful interruption to the the start of my nice snowy day BUT - I decided *not to let that deprive me of things I want* & managed to BICHOP (pen rather than keyboard ;) )

Then - rolled the new job letter in to a new resume (because they don't take cover letters) and applied for another job, and asked a former college to put in a good word for me.(<-I was a little afraid to do this, but I bit the bullet & did it :) )

After that, between sweeping the porch (& feeding the birds) & digging the car out, did more Javascript training in bits and bites...

mood: Satisfied 3/3
 

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Cheers for the encouragement everyone. Fair play to everyone getting there words in. Everyone know's its tough to find time. I live in Toronto, so it's a bit easier with that Ice Age going on outside.

managed my 1000 words each of the last 3 days. Yesterday took pretty much twice as long as the other two days. Realised I had written a big section that contradicted the hell out of earlier parts of the story.

Was a funny one today. As I was writing the end of the chapter something occurred to me. I was planning to put this chapter in around the 8th or 9th. But as I wrote it, the way the story unfolded, it fits in better much, much closer to the end and actually solves a problem I was going to have when I reach the end. Pretty delighted with the last 3 days all told.

Best of luck to those editing. I've never done it before and I'm really dreading it when I get there.
 
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D.L. Shepherd

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oneblindmouse: 200+ words and some editing is not bad with all that construction going on.

ajaye: Thank you! Nice that you can bounce from prompt to prompt. Sounds like a great way to find some inspiration.

Magnus: Hope you get some rest so that you can get a fresh start tomorrow! Good idea lowering the goal until you get back on track. I find I stress myself when I make my goals too extreme...and that goes for everything, not just writing.

DanielSTJ: You've been pretty consistent. Nice work!

Kithica: Thank you!!

Layla: Awesome that you got all of that done, especially with all of this snow!! Nice that you had someone to put in a good word for you. I find it difficult to ask for that sort of thing too, but sometimes it is the best thing to do. Good luck (as always!!)

discodowney: Wow...really nice word count over the past few days. As to moving the chapter and figuring out how to solve a plot point too...that is just awesome. I love it when those types of things happen.

Me. I wrote nothing today. I had the time, but I stopped my scene last night just short of killing off a favorite character. Or not killing the character. I'm still unsure. And once I make up my mind, I can finish that final scene and wrap things up. Ugh. I'll sleep on it, but sleeping on it last night (and a few times in December too) did not enlighten me.
 

heykatydid

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Well, it's the 5th, my family is heading back to the homeland, and I've collapsed under the weight of running around the city for three days with Type A Influenza. This will likely be a slow recovery since I've really been pushing myself, but I did manage to get 522 words written today - though it wasn't in the WIP I'm supposed to be working on. (Oh well, still words, right?)

And in the best news ever, my husband's application got approved through US Immigration and we are moving onto step two to getting his visa so we can move back home. People who have never had to get a non-American spouse into the country have no idea how awful the past nine months of waiting have been, just for step one! (And so much money.) So, I'm feeling so relieved and grateful and shakey-happy that hopefully this good mood carries into more writing & editing tomorrow, provided my fever goes down a bit.

See you all tomorrow! And good luck with words for the rest of today!
 

oneblindmouse

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So happy for you, Katy. That must be such a relief.
 

D.L. Shepherd

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heykatydid...First off...wow...what awesome news for the start of the year!! I can't imagine how hard its been, but so glad you are able to come home now. Second, get better! Having the flu is no joke. Lastly, nice job on the 500 words, especially while being ill.
 

Maria Ale Barrios

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Hey Katy,

Awesome news. I'm sorry that you went through that, though.

Day 5:

I just adopted a new cat, and I've been so mesmerized by it that I haven't written a thing. I spend the whole day playing with her. Her name is Lua :)

Guys,

Are you submitting to any contests soon? The desperate literature prize looks amazing, but I would have to write something completely new because I have submitted my other short stories to other contests. Are any of you thinking about participating?

Best of luck!
 

Esmae Tyler

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Day 5 - 500 more words! What's funniest about this is I'm about halfway through the story. Short fiction is so incredibly different than novel writing.


D.L. - did you decide what to do about that character? I'm kind of in that same boat with my own resting piece. I don't quite know how to end it because I don't know if I should kill one of the characters off. Are you having trouble because it's a favorite character of yours, or because you can't tell which choice is right for the story?

Oneblindmouse - oh dear! I hope your living/writing situation is fixed up soon. It's intensely cold and snowy here right now, so I can't imagine trying to have the facilities fixed. Good luck with that! And trying to squeeze in some writing and/or editing in the process.

Ajaye - seems like you're off to a good start. I spent a while over the holiday looking at prompts. I think I was looking in the wrong place, since about 95% of them looked like they were meant for YA audiences.

Magnus - this time of year (really all of November through the beginning of January) is a stressful writing time. I mean, life is a stressful writing time, obviously, but today is a fresh opportunity, and not writing yesterday just means you have more words to write tomorrow. You've got this.

Daniel - kicking back into gear I see. Very nice!

Layla - you changed your picture! I barely recognized you! New year, new image? New way to take names and kick butt with those goals, huh?

Disco - oh the joys of the first draft and stumbling across little gems like that. Did you go back and fix the problem? Technically that's revision...!

Katy - congratulations on surviving the holidays, and getting work done despite being suck. Also good luck with the visa process. My mom went through that a few years back - she had her documents bounced twice (which means when she refiled them, they got moved to the back of the queue... twice...) for the absolute dumbest of reasons. Once it was because she neglected to put a zero in a column somewhere to indicate that it was nothing, but because it was blank they kicked it. So she had to refile, and re-pay, and... I hope it goes more smoothly for you guys. Feel better soon!

Maria - oh no! Cats are worse than plot bunnies for distraction! I've actually only submitted to... two? writing contests, ever. Short fiction is such a strange animal to me. Good luck with your submissions though!
 

oneblindmouse

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Jan 5 - 600 words! I'm not sure how I managed it, but I'm not complaining! I just finally got around to writing up an anecdote that's part of a story. It needs editing, but at least it's on paper.
 

D.L. Shepherd

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Maria...Adopting a new four legger *always* takes precedence over writing, at least in my household. Congrats on adding Lua to your home!! I may write stuff revolving around dogs, but we have two dogs AND two cats in our family (although my one little guy is very sick and we will be losing him very soon, sadly).

oneblindmouse...nice work on those 600 words!

Esmae...Yay for making the halfway point on your short story! Sorry to hear you are in the same boat...to kill or not to kill!! (Lucky we are on a writer's forum!!). So, I wouldn't say it's a favorite character of mine, but it is one of my main character's favorite characters, which is why I should keep them alive. But I don't really see a place for them in my next book, and I am 100% sure I am doing a sequel on this one, so it comes into play. I mean, I could get rid of them at the start of the next book, but that just seems mean to pull them back from the brink of death, only to kill em off anyway. LOL! I thought of skipping that scene for now and just doing the final wrap up scene (yes, I'm THAT close!), but the tone of the last scene is definitely going to be different no matter which way I decide to go.
 

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Day 5
I've poked around my documents but should have gotten around to it earlier while I still had more energy. The weekend is quite busy, but I'll try to at least poke around a bit more and get some plans down. I'm writing a bunch of connected short stories and I haven't quite found the voice. It's a challenge because I'm writing in a narrator's voice. It's so different! Need to hit my writing literature again.

katy - Get well from that flu and grats on the good news!
D.L. - KILL THE CHARACTER! No, really, just do it. And then you can look at the scene and you'll know if it's right or not.
Maria - I have a story that I should really get back on because I think it will be competition worthy. But it's super complex and I keep getting beaten by that, which is silly. I'll endeavour to push forwards on it.
Esmae - It's great for the confidence to write shorter stuff from time to time. So manageable!
 
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