It's NaNoWriMo eve and I'm busy preparing for the maelstrom to come, so here is a favorite post from last year that will hopefully prove useful to you as we stand on the brink of November...
October is the calm before the NaNoWriMo storm. Having lived in Houston all of my life, I'm no stranger to battening down the hatches. Like clock work, we get together bottled water, canned goods, and other non perishables as each new hurricane season approaches. We go through a laundry list to make sure that if all of a sudden a depression pops up in the gulf, so we won't be up the creek when the masses make a run for the grocery.
In this same fashion, I created a NaNoWriMo survival kit in preparation for a month of writing with literary abandon. Putting everything together before the tempest strikes will save me from wasting time on midnight runs for NaNo necessities. The kit includes (see pic above):
My writing totem - the goat the sings "High On a Hill Was a Lonely Goat Herd" from the sound of musicMy computer - obvious I know. However, I have heard tales of people doing NaNoWriMo by hand.Coffee - preferably with chicoryTea - of the English afternoon persuasionBetty Boop mug - Betty in the painting of the birth of Aphrodite...it's deliciously tacky with a hint of inappropriateness. Whiskey - sometimes coffee just isn't enoughChocolate bacon bar - yes, you read that correctly my friends: CHOCOLATE COVERED BACON!!!! It's a heath bar with bacon pieces substituted for toffee bits.Various frozen dinners, savory bake in oven snacks - one must eat during the month of November without much prep time.Snickers Ice Cream Bars - dessert to top it all off.And last but not least, my furry minions of doom:
the big one told me that on the days I didn't meet my word count goal, he would poop on the carpet. He's a 92 pound Lab/Elephant/German Shepherd mix, so I take that threat very seriously.
What would you add to the survival kit list?
Happy Friday everyone! It's in the wee hours of the weekend and there's so much possibility for writing productivity laid out before us. Make the most of it with the best of the writing interwebs I stumbled upon over the last week.
So let it be written. So let it be done. (-Yul Brynner)
Bonjour!
I'm back from my Honeymoon in Paris :) the dust from the Wedding melee and all it's accouterments is beginning to settle and life feels as if it is getting back to normal. Hopefully that feeling is not a false positive.
A fresh new blog post is in the works and will be making it's debut on Friday!
Stay tuned!
-Lyla
Hey everyone!
I'm taking a brief break from work today to check in and drop a quick post. It's been a terribly long day and it's not over yet. :-/ Like many workdays (and even weekends before today) I'm here at the office at 8:30 pm and it doesn't look like I'm going home any time soon...boo.
On the bright side we are trying to get this beast of a report out of the door so in the next day or two my life should be getting back to normal. Normal being a relative and mostly in accurate term. After all, the word "normal" is nothing more than a setting on a dryer.
Once I'm working less than 18 hours a day without a lunch break...I'll be back to blogging with regularly scheduled posts.
In the mean time, make some word count progress for me! I'll see you all on the flip side!
-Lyla
(Please pardon any miss-spellings, I don't have a spell check on this droid app...)
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Maybe I've been living under a rock, but how did I go this long without discovering that there are podcasts on writing you can download for free. I have found they are a great way to keep my mind sharp on writing while at my desk job or in the car or doing house work. All the things that cannot be avoided and suck time out of my writing schedule.
Some of the ones that I listen to are:
Check one of these out and let me know what you think!
I saw this story on my morning news crawl just moments ago (see the link below). After nearly falling out of my desk chair laughing, the infinite possibilities of how this woman got herself into this situation began scrolling through my mind. It was just too good not to share!
So, for a writing exercise: write 3 very different versions of how this woman got into such a stickey wicket. Going the extra mile: turn your favorite version into a short story.
Naked Woman Rescued From Cliff in California - FoxNews.com I hope everyone is having a fabulous week! I'll see you all on friday with a new Writing Week in Review.
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It's Friday. And I know that is usually a really fabulous thing for all concerned...but...today I'm in the dentist office under anesthesia getting my second round of dental work done. FUN! Nonetheless, I planned ahead and scheduled this post the night before.
So, without further ado, here's the Writing Week in Review!
Happy Writing Weekend Everyone! I'll be back with a new post as soon as I'm fully with the land of the living again.
Writing is something we've been doing for a long time. Longer than the iPad, personal computer, or even paper has been around (clay tablets came before paper if you recall.) Now, I prefer the android OS, but to be completely egalitarian, I'm going to note witch programs are good for the iPad as well. Below you will find some of the best programs out there to aid you in your writing.
- My Writing Spot: This one has some great features like allowing you to email documents from the program, it syncs with it's web version so you can manage your documents from any computer with web access, and it keeps up with your word count among other great things. (good for Droid and iPad. Note: there is both a free version and one with a price)
- AK Notepad: This app is great for jotting down quick notes and ideas before they evaporate from your cranium. It's simple and easy to use. (For Droid)
- Outliner: A great app that allows you an unlimited number of outlines, due dates, and keeps track of status to help you stay organized. As an added bonus the back button always saves the data. This one is more for the front side of your project. (For Droid and iPad)
- Thinking Space: This fierce flow charting app lets you outline in a more colorful way. You will see your ideas laid-out in an organized fashion and make some serious progress. (For Droid)
- ColorNote: Keep your ideas organized through color coding. Set reminders so that you can badger yourself into finding time to write. This app also lets you set passwords if you want to keep your ideas secret until you're ready to unleash your writing greatness on the world. (For Droid)
Although, I still love writing by hand in my notebook from the bottom of my heart. I can't deny that technology sometimes makes life a lot more organized and efficient. Hopefully these tools will help reduce the friction on your writing path and get you to your destination more quickly and easily.
Let me know if you have a favorite app or program that you like to use!
Happy Friday everyone! It's a beautiful and sunny morning here in Houston, an absolutely fabulous start to the weekend. In order to get your writing juices flowing, check out the following links I've stumbled upon in the last week:
Hopefully this group of links holds some help and inspiration for you. Have a happy weekend of writing!
It's another beautiful Friday! Here are some of the writing resources I came across this week:
Barbarians: The Character Meme of 2011Beat Blank Page Syndrome: 10 Tricks to Get Your Writing Started5 Ways to Make Your Novel Unforgettable11 Reasons You Won't Get Published9 Traits of Sympathetic CharactersWhat Makes Readers Care About Your Characters?A Classic Nontextbook on WritingI got some great feedback on my last Writing Week in Review so I'm going to make this a regular Friday blog post.
Let me know if there are topics yous guys are particularly interested in and I'll dedicate a week to links on those as well.
I hope everyone has a fabulous writing filled and productive weekend!
Hello everyone!
Although I've fallen off the blog wagon, I am still here. I promise. However, I've had a lot on my plate lately. For example:
- I'm working late and long hours for a project to keep us on time and under budget
- I'm recovering from oral surgery I had last Friday (which the late and long hours are not helping...)
- I've got a wedding date speeding toward me like a bullet train
The good news is I have been able to keep up with my writing tip tweets (check them out! I'm @SouthernBella03) and I've got some fresh new blog posts I'm going to be rolling out starting TOMORROW!
I hope everyone is poised for a weekend of epic writing. Keep your eyes peeled for tomorrow's post!
Happy Friday everyone! Here's a collection of the fabulous writing resources I found on the interwebs this past week. Peep through them, and hopefully you will find something that helps your writing this weekend.
Hope everyone has a fabulous weekend!
Do you write what you know? Do you write what you do? How do you fully flesh out something on the page when you don't have any experience in the topic? We're writers so we do our research...google, reading topical articles, talking to people in the know...but it can sometimes come out flatter than the page it's written on.
Nothing comes close to first hand experience. After all how would you describe chocolate if you've never smelled it's aroma, tasted it on your tongue, or felt the way it melts against your cheek. If you have only seen pictures of it there's no way you can get it right.
I was pondering this the other day when I remembered a drama class I took in high school where we covered the topic of method acting. The basic idea is: if you were playing the part of a homeless man, you would live that way for a few days or weeks, if you were playing the part of a nanny, you would borrow some kids to look after for a good period of time, if you were playing a sleep deprived mad man, you would forgo your pillow for a night or two...you get the point. In order to portray a role as purely as possible, they would experience their character's world on an intimate level.
This same concept can be applied to our writing. Immerse yourself in a hobby or dabble in an interest of one of your characters. This may not always be affordable, legal, or sane. In those cases, google might be the best that you can get. But if for example, your MC likes to sew her own clothes, by all means, take a sewing class. It will give you a better understanding of why your MC might like sewing so much and at the same time it will help you broaden your horizons. Never a bad thing.
How would this method be best applied to your characters and story? Feel free to share your ideas below!
Because of this crazy-cold-for-Houston weather our energy provider has been ordered by a high muckity-muck to implement rolling blackouts across the state of Texas. Already this morning we've had three 45-minute outages and I'm estimating that another one is due to arrive at about 12:30ish (CST). Unfortunately we only have about an hour of power in between the outages. That doesn't leave a lot of time for us to get anything done round these parts.
I'm kicking myself for not bring a book with me today (like I often do so I can read on my lunch hour) nor do I have my notebook (so I can write like I often do on my lunch hour)
...grumble...grumble...grumble...
So, I'm off to scrounge up some blank paper so maybe I can get some writing done the next time the lights go out.
Of course it's definitely not as bad as some of you in the northern regions that are snowed in and under. Hopefully everyone is staying warm and safe and getting some writing done!
It's a new year so I thougt it would be a good time to get a new note book for new ideas. There's a lot of "new" happening :). So I've parked myself at a table in my B&N with my new purchases and I'm working on that pesky plot bunny I mentioned in the previous post.
I hope everyone had a fabulous weekend and...here's to a painless Monday! (As painless as Mondays can possibly bee anyway)
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On January 6th I downloaded a new-to-me audio book, The Year of the Flood by Margret Attwood from the Houston Public Library's Digital Catalogue. (Side note: I heart downloading audio books from the library! The files just expire when your time is up so you never have to worry about incurring an late fee. Not that I'm bad about that or anything *cough cough*) I was in the middle of listening to chapter 1 while plugging away at a statistical analysis on water well pumpage for a suburban community, an idea for a new story line hit me like a beer truck.
While most people would be overjoyed to have been pounced on by a plot bunny that excited them this much, I was substantially annoyed.
My inner monologue went something like this, "SERIOUSLY!?!?! I've barely started chipping away at my NaNoWriMo manuscript. WHY IS THIS ACCOSTING ME NOW!?!?!" Well truthfully, I'm annoyed and excited. I really do love this idea for a post-apocalyptic science-fiction story that just manifested from the dark depths of my cerebral cortex. I love it so much it's really difficult not to completly abandon my NaNo novel for a while just so I can flesh out this idea.
While I'm figuring out just what to do with this rogue plot bunny that I'm head over heels for, I wanted to put this situation forth as evidence that reading is just as important to a writer as is the act of writing itself.
Although I love reading with a passion. It's one of the first things to get squeezed out of my schedule when things in life get busy. And as proven by the events above, that can only be to the detriment of my writing life.
P.S. I'm not finished with listening to the book yet, but so far it's really fabulous.
