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LJ Idol, Week Three, The Bye
Nov. 7th, 2011 10:15 pmI don't write fast. Instead, I get an idea, play with it in my head until I have a reasonably clear outline of where it starts and finishes, decide on the truly crucial scenes and bits of dialogue I want to include, and then, finally, begin writing.
Of course, even once I start scribbling, it's a slow and intricate process, full of rewrites and reversals, lighthearted insertions and radical deletions, a frightening mélange of words I'm desperately trying to wrangle into some semblance of order. I know, it doesn't sound relaxing at all, but for some reason it is.
When I gave NaNoWriMo a shot in 2009, it was pure torture for me. The premise seemed simple enough, just write. Whatever spewed forth from my fingers, keep it and go on. Continuity? Unimportant. Spelling, grammar, and word choice? Meaningless abstractions. The only thing which really mattered was word count, and if by the end of the month I hadn't written an average of 1,666.666667 words a day, I failed.
Somewhere around week one of the ordeal, I confessed to Lizbeth, "I'm not doing it right you know. I keep going back, changing words, playing with the sentences until they're the way I want them to sound."
And yet, even though I persisted in doing it wrong, even though I was constantly having to travel for work, and even though I got sick for a few days, I still somehow managed to write a total of 40,000 plus words by the end of November. I called it torture, and in some ways it was, but it was also one of the happiest and most freeing writing experiences I've ever had.
Now, I'm competing in LJ Idol, and so far it's been lots of fun. It's completely different from NaNoWriMo, aside from the fact that there is still an eventual deadline. It's sneaky, because you actually have several days to think up, write down, and post your topic, and time can really get away from you if you're not careful. That's what happened to me this past weekend. I knew I had to travel for work starting on Sunday, and so decided to spend a wonderfully luxurious weekend with Lizbeth and the girlitas relaxing. Several times I thought, "I should spend some time writing my entry," but it never happened.
Until Monday evening. I had what I considered to be a good idea, and basically knew how the story should unfold. What I didn't have, unfortunately, was enough time to write it all down.
( This is what I wrote: )
Fortunately, LJ Idol contestants are given two Bye's, a "get out of writing free card," if you will. Now that I have but one left, I must be extra vigilant of the onrushing LJ Idol deadlines, as well as cognizant of my own shortcomings where writing is concerned. Time, what I need is time!
Dan
Of course, even once I start scribbling, it's a slow and intricate process, full of rewrites and reversals, lighthearted insertions and radical deletions, a frightening mélange of words I'm desperately trying to wrangle into some semblance of order. I know, it doesn't sound relaxing at all, but for some reason it is.
When I gave NaNoWriMo a shot in 2009, it was pure torture for me. The premise seemed simple enough, just write. Whatever spewed forth from my fingers, keep it and go on. Continuity? Unimportant. Spelling, grammar, and word choice? Meaningless abstractions. The only thing which really mattered was word count, and if by the end of the month I hadn't written an average of 1,666.666667 words a day, I failed.
Somewhere around week one of the ordeal, I confessed to Lizbeth, "I'm not doing it right you know. I keep going back, changing words, playing with the sentences until they're the way I want them to sound."
And yet, even though I persisted in doing it wrong, even though I was constantly having to travel for work, and even though I got sick for a few days, I still somehow managed to write a total of 40,000 plus words by the end of November. I called it torture, and in some ways it was, but it was also one of the happiest and most freeing writing experiences I've ever had.
Now, I'm competing in LJ Idol, and so far it's been lots of fun. It's completely different from NaNoWriMo, aside from the fact that there is still an eventual deadline. It's sneaky, because you actually have several days to think up, write down, and post your topic, and time can really get away from you if you're not careful. That's what happened to me this past weekend. I knew I had to travel for work starting on Sunday, and so decided to spend a wonderfully luxurious weekend with Lizbeth and the girlitas relaxing. Several times I thought, "I should spend some time writing my entry," but it never happened.
Until Monday evening. I had what I considered to be a good idea, and basically knew how the story should unfold. What I didn't have, unfortunately, was enough time to write it all down.
( This is what I wrote: )
Fortunately, LJ Idol contestants are given two Bye's, a "get out of writing free card," if you will. Now that I have but one left, I must be extra vigilant of the onrushing LJ Idol deadlines, as well as cognizant of my own shortcomings where writing is concerned. Time, what I need is time!
Dan
