NaNoWirMo: Report Card Two

It was all going so well. As you can tell by my first report card, I was soaring through my first week of NaNo. Heck, I was even steaming ahead with my word count.

Then Week Two hit.

The excuses for writing built up: the Mothership's birthday meant a whole evening out of NaNo time whilst a bad day at work meant I lost the will to do anything beyond stare at the television in a grump. Add to that a planned night out plus an unexpected shift at work and I was am behind in NaNo. Way behind - over half the suggested word count. That is one of the main disadvantages of NaNo (and one of the reasons it works) is that more than two days off means you're lagging behind.

I started to lose interest in my plot and my characters. I tentatively finished off sections of text I was not entirely happy with. On the plus side, I did manage to draft this month's submission to Write in for Writing's Sake when I was taking time off from NaNo. Although I was not sitting down and writing, I was still thinking about my plot and which direction to take it in.

So I've decided to let my characters wander. Using Scrivener means I can write scenes and move them around when I wish. Today I have been writing about my MC's first day at their new job. Tomorrow I might switch back to their 'flashback' scene that takes place seven years earlier. It makes the story feel more exciting especially if I'm dashing about and gaining a different perspective.

I have a week off work and I am determined to be back on track by Thursday. Instead of doing twenty minute writing sprints, I have been setting the timer for thirty to forty-five minutes. It's a trick I picked up from Unfuck your Habitat and it makes the task ahead feel much easier. As I write this blog post, my word count is sitting on 18603. Cross your fingers and wish for me to hit the thirties by Thursday evening. Bring on the pretzels!