Have had a bad day (health problems and family drama... yay. o_O )and I have zero creativity right now. I'm looking over notes and trying to get in the mindset to write but it's just not happening yet. My muse has been trying to talk to me but my mood keeps interrupting. I've got a fallback plan to get my word count (work on profiles for characters who don't really need them yet) but I was really hoping I'd be able to work on the narrative, even if it was just working up basic summaries for scenes.
/rant

I came out of the chute with a bang...good thing, it seems that life decided to get an early start this year too preventing me from spending any real quality time writing for the last two days. I only got 400 words in today.

I'll try to get up earlier. ( hee hee )

- Maybe I will try to wake up earlier tomorrow with you! I'm only in mountain time, so it will be an hour later!

- Sorry to hear about your crummy day. Mine wasn't that great either, I woke up late, so couldn't get any writing done in the morning. And I had to stay an hour late at work, and it was the first day of the year I had to scrape frost off my car, and I didn't have any gloves :( Now I don't feel like writing because it's so late, but I feel like I just got home from work.

I'm sorry you had a rough day too.

I ended up just typing up random stuff, some of it useful. I may or may not have purposely gone back and repeated myself a couple times just to get those last few words. -shifty eyes- I didn't actually manage the 1667 words though. I only managed 1422, but that put me right on that line on the bar graph so... I'm alright with that I guess.

[edit] Right. So. Still having health problems... Still thinking about family drama... But I feel a lot better now. We had thunderstorms today for most of the afternoon and now that they gone over (after midnight of course -grumble grumble-) my mood has improved so much. I kinda forget from one time to the next just how anxious all the electricity in the air makes me. Not really sure what the weather is going to be like today so I am trying to get in a little writing right now. Starting to get tired though.

- That sucks. I love writing in thunderstorms though, but we never get them at this time of year here. I managed to get myself caught up last night :D Although... I feel like I'm cheating a little though, because I 'copy and pasted' a lot of what I wrote last night from my original version of the story. Changed the wording and some of the dialogue, but didn't change the flow of the scene much. I'll probably be doing a lot of that today too. The events that happen in the chapter I'm writing right now are pretty defining moments, so I don't want to change them too much.

Awesome, always nice to have another writer here!

I'm sorry to hear everyone's having bad days. =( I didn't do well with writing yesterday, there was another idea that wouldn't get out of my head so I wrote it down, hoping it would go away. Still hasn't. >.< But I will write something today.

- That's the worst. But at least you are writing! Sometimes writing can inspire more writing.

Welcome to the thread! And good luck this year! I hope you feel better hun, always seems we never get sick when it would be convenient.

So I ended up not writing a complete makeup yesterday so today I have two days worth of writing to do. But hey I did make up two days yesterday so I don't feel so bad about it.

I sometimes enjoy writing when it is raining outside, but only when it is just rain and it hasn't been dreary for days. I get a certain amount of seasonal depression in late fall through winter-time because everything gets gray and just kinda stays that way, with only the occasional sunny day. Anyway, I am pretty sure my sensitivity to electricity is hereditary. My maternal grandfather used to not be able to keep a watch; they would just quit on him after a while. My mom can't keep a cellphone in good working order and in the right conditions I put out a measurable electrical charge.

Anyway, I'm wishing I had something I could copy-and-paste for my story. I think I might use elements of my former opening image for a scene on the third beat, but otherwise I'm basically just having to come up with things as I go. The hardest part is figuring out how to get from one thing I know to the next with some kind of smooth transition.

I'm really struggling to actually work on the narrative and not just let this month be all about world building, not just for this story but for the series. And my muse already trying to distract me with fluffy stuff. Not with a full story, just fluff. Partly because the MC is fairly refined, at least in his interactions with other people, so it limits what kind of situations I can put him in.

November is never, ever a good time of year for me. There is the dreariness, there is the cold (or warm... or cold... the weather here can never decide), there is always always family drama (in part because we all suffer some amount of seasonal depression), and because my health is always right on the border between okay and not okay, the emotional stress and the change in weather usually pushes me into the not okay zone. That, and it is amazing just how busy November can be when you have a reason for it not to be. I'm having to make a real effort to push whatever I can out into December.

- Yeah, that is one thing that I will miss if I move back out east. Here we get dry cold, so even though it's really cold outside, we still get a lot of sun all through the winter. It's really pretty. I put the Rainymood on in the background of my writing often.

I'm bad at transitioning too. Transitioning is what killed me the last time I wrote this story. The 'transitioning' ended up taking over the plot and dragging my characters through the dirt and screwing them up. Copying and pasting can only get me so far :P

If you are writing a series, world building is super important though. Even if you never actually end up using or explaining any of it, it's always nice to have it sorted out in your head. And writing fluff for your MC can be useful to get to know them better, and be able to write them better. Narrative is important too, but it won't work out very well if you don't have solid ground to build it up from.

. I get you there, I have fibro myalgia and seasonal depression, plus for some reason the fact that my birthday falls mid-month and I always seem to break up with my girlfriend or boyfriend at the beginning of November just makes November a hard month.

I also have no damn motivation today. I decided to reread what I have already written and see if I can at least get half of what I need to done today. I figure if I only stay a day behind it won't be too hard to catch up as I will at least have one random day of fanatical writing need.

I think maybe I will end up writing a world bio. The world my character is involved in is still our world but its like the underground juicy bits that need written. Gotta love being a part of a large group of family power. I'm still trying to decided whether I want my main character to be a grim reaper or not.

I just set out with the idea that I was going to do a proper novel this year, but I guess if I'm not ready, I'm not ready. I need to think about it objectively... I'm most happy working on the background stuff because I can see how it is helping the plot develop. The narrative is coming along slowly and while I have clearer ideas for later scenes, I'd really prefer to work on the narrative for each of them in order, at least getting a solid handle on the framework of the scene before moving on. (I am making notes for the later scenes... Doing a little brainstorming for them.) Maybe I should just commit to using this month to get a solid start to the series, which will include getting some of the narrative for this story... I mean, it's pretty much impossible not to think about the other stories when the other stories are going to be centered on other characters in this first story. Even when I am working on the main character and his love interest in this story, I keep thinking "is this going to be important in this story or is it important to one of the others?"... I think that's partly why my muse is beginning to get a little grumpy with me. I keep trying to ignore inspiration.

You should work on the world bio. I'm trying to tell myself not to, and look where it's getting me. That stuff's important. It... I... -has internal hand-to-forehead moment- (I'm about to tell you what I need to be telling myself...) It may not go into your novel but it is part of your story. Letting yourself explore the world gives you the opportunity to really understand your character and the narrative will improve. It's kinda like going from pesky reporter "hey! MC! tell me everything! yeah, I know you don't know me but... wait! come back!" to a welcome observer, like a friend they personally invited. Just don't want to let yourself get too distracted (unless you decide it's the better story) because that's kinda like ignoring the invite.

- Write a little mix of everything, background, world building, narrative, and side fluff! I think that you should write whatever you have inspiration for, if it doesn't end up going into the first story, maybe you can move it to one of the other ones later, or hint at it and then explain it later. At least a grumpy muse is still a muse, I think my muses for my story all died in the 3 year hiatus. I'm hoping they will start to perk back up again soon. (getting the cat and the transgender character back in the story will help I hope, although, they were the two worst offenders of killing characterization in the original)

I think part of me is far too into dream sequences, but now that I'm writing this I'm doing a face palm moment as well. Maybe my character has visions, and actually that would actually fit really, really well with my story.

I didn't really write as much as I wanted to write yesterday, but it's Saturday and I have nothing better to do with my life. Guess I will be getting my writer on today. I also really think that an explanation of the world would fit decent enough into my story to help me get with it and to help my word count. This is after all the rough draft and the point is just to get the story on paper no necessary have it ready for publishing.

-stops in for a moment- Had stuff I had to do today. Like most Saturdays, this has been the busiest day of the week. So far I've 153 words, which is all I was able to get this morning. That means I've basically got 2 and a half hours to come up with just over 1500 words. Never going to happen. I'll try to get as many words as possible but that number is going to be much lower than I would like.

No time to waste though, I suppose... -grumbles on the way out-

[edit] Yep, only managed 658 words. First time I've actually been under the line this year. I am going to try to write some more after I take a break. I'll need to write 2613 words to get back up to the line again. I'll probably end up have to just try to go a little over during this coming week. I don't think I'll be able to write enough to get it back in one day.

It may be just what your story needs. Some of the best elements in my pile of unfinished stories have been ideas I dismissed at first.

, I'm nearly caught up but I have about half an hour to come up with like 800 words. I'm going to bounce off and try to get that done quick. My head is pounding a little and honestly I want nothing more than to curl up and sleep.

[edit] Well I got yesterday's finished, and then this morning I did get today's done as well. I find it entertaining how my motivation works. I can go three days not wanting to write at all and then out of nowhere I can write 5 days worth. I'm pretty proud of myself though. This is the longest I have ever stuck with one Nano project and not scrapped it to start a new one.

- I didn't end up writing anything yesterday either, after being at work an hour late for the third day in a row, and then watching Spectre, I just didn't feel like writing anymore. Went to bed early with the intent to write today, and instead let my sister drag me into painting the basement instead.

- Congrats on getting caught up! It's good that you've been able to stick with your story! I'm hoping that I can establish the base of this story a bit better the second time around and not have to abandon it.

pokes head in omg I had no idea there was a thread haha I'm in my eighth year doing NaNo and attempting a rewrite of a really old book...stumped currently but trying to get back in the groove. I was out all day yesterday and didn't get to write and today I feel like I'm just sitting on blah. Here's hoping I can at least get today's goal by midnight.

Ah and I am Other_Beings on NaNo; I'd love some more writing buddies over there!

Oh, hi! I'm doing NaNo!

I competed in 2009 and 2011 and won both years, and now finally have time to give it another go. It's going quite well, and I'm very excited about what I'm writing.

- Sounds like what I'm doing. On the one hand, it makes it easier cus I have a better idea what I'm doing, on the other hand it's harder cus it's like... I already wrote this, why am I torturing myself to write it again!