NaNoWriMo, here we go!

And so, in the words of Fable II, our story begins.

It’s nice that the first day of my first NaNoWriMo has fallen on a weekend. A full day of preparation, then a full day for writing, and a chance to get ahead of schedule in the first flush of inspiration.

I was considering throwing down a few words at the stroke of midnight, but instead, hit by a sudden waft of perfume from my Muse, revised my plot in a fairly dramatic way and immediately went to bed. I didn’t dream of my book. I wonder if I will. I would rather like to. It seems like it would be an interesting way to develop the story if I lack inspiration one day.

Anyway, I have begun. 3318 words so far, roughly four hours work and about 6% of my total. I even allowed myself a reasonable amount of editing, so I don’t hate everything I’ve done so far. But I’m not allowed to read it now I’ve had a glass of wine. My self-critic is a harsh bitch when I’m tipsy.

If you want to keep an eye on my progress, you can do so here. Once they turn the widgets on (or just fix them) I will lodge one over there on the right hand side of the page. I am accountable to everyone. If I am lagging, do not let me get away with it.

I know I said I’d never do it, but…

… it’s for a good cause.

I knit. I crochet. Sometimes I dye yarn. But spinning always seemed to be going just that bit too far. There are perfectly good machines to do that, I said, which are far more efficient and reliable than some bint with a bit of wood.

I still believe this.

But my NaNo is set in the ancient Mediterranean. It’s pretty hard to image a female character – in fact any character, without knowing what they would have been making or wearing. I was researching such matters when I came across this:

Lekythos by the Amasis Painter

And that was it. I decided to give it a bash. So I bought a bottom-whorl drop spindle and a lump o’ roving, and spun some yarn:

It’s pretty cool to think that I’m doing something that women have been doing for thousands of years. I like to think that all of them swore as much as I did on their first try as well. And I am so going to adopt the fleece-on-a-stick-like-candyfloss method once I’ve got my technique down.

Blogtoberfest < NaNoWriMo

Bad planning on their part, really. They should have put at least a month in between the two for respective recovery and preparation. It’s hard to pull a blog post out of your arse when you’re too busy researching the harvesting season of chickpeas.

Yes, I’ve decided I am doing NaNoWriMo (thanks for the encouragement!). I have a vague plot, some characters, and a setting. I’ve spent the last few days doing some ‘research’, mostly from wikipedia (it’s a novel, it doesn’t have to be that accurate, right?). I’ve made vast lists of questions that I need to answer before I can write, or while writing. I have trawled the internet for pictures related to my topic (my desktop now cycles through them to be a constant source of inspiration). I feel – almost – prepared.

However I am a teensy bit terrified. In a perfect November, I would aim for 1667 words a day. I’m already losing at least five evenings to already-planned events, so that brings it up to 2000 words immediately. Factor in my notorious inability to stick to *anything* for that long and I’m going to have to write 10,000 words a day for the five days I manage to do any writing at all. While probably being completely dissatisfied and disheartened by the entire thing because I am not allowed to edit.

However, fear not – I’m not disheartened yet. How can I be disheartened with all these pictures of goats on my desktop?

kitchenkill.

Just thought I’d share a tip I heard a while ago, and a resultant lightbulb moment.

When chopping vegetables, save the offcuts and peelings in a plastic bag in the freezer for future stock-making. It saves you using fresh new veg just for boiling, and reduces the amount of chopping you have to do. Sure, the compost heap suffers a bit, but as we can’t get into ours anyway I’m willing to take that hit.

Just the other day I used my bag of frozen offcuts and a chicken carcass to make some awesome stock. Now this was good, and I felt thrifty enough, until I suddenly thought hey, I have stock simmering, why not make risotto the way they always tell you to.

BING.

I have never seen a recipe suggesting this before. Recipes for risotto often say ‘have a pot of stock simmering’ but no recipe for stock ever says ‘Making stock? Why not use some of it as it’s simmering to make risotto for that evening’s dinner.’ Outrageous.

For each cup of stock I removed, I added one of water back in. Because it was still simmering, it continued to take up flavour from the kitchenkill and so I still had enough left for an entire ice-cube-bag of stock for future use. Not only that, but because the carcass was from a whole chicken I’d jointed myself, there was loads of meat left on it to shred back into the risotto. In fact, there was not a single item of non-waste-food used – the bacon was on its last legs and even the rice was a bag of pudding rice that had been sitting in the back of a cupboard for a year and given one last chance to prove itself useful.

I can’t say I had as much fun the other day, having cold polenta and chilli for breakfast. But the layer of thrifty smugness (and bacon) definitely made it and my day more palatable.

NaNoWriMo.

I’ve just learned of the existence of National Novel Writing Month. Basically, you take November to spaff out 50,000 words, and ba-baaa! You have a draft for a novel. This, as I tweeted earlier, interests me.

Like billions of other kids before me, I wanted to be a writer. I had folders full of stories. I wrote science fiction, I wrote Mills & Boon, I wrote some alarmingly violent horror. Then one day, there came that ‘careers’ day. Careers days were excellent for those of my classmates who knew from the age of five that they wanted to be a vet. They could be pointed towards the right A-levels, pointed towards the right work experience, and were generally a joy to assist. I, apparently, was not. We were told to write down a list of five jobs we would like to do. Three of mine were writer, fashion designer, and astrophysicist. I think I was asked what I wanted to write about. I didn’t know. And that was the end of it. Barely anyone makes it as a novelist. And journalism is really hard to get into. Might as well give up now.

I’m not trying to say I HAVE ALWAY WONTED 2 B A RITER AND THEY TRAMPLD ON MAI DREEMS but come on. They didn’t even try. I would try so hard to think of things I could see myself doing and every time it was greeted by ‘you can’t do that’ and no alternatives. I am so jealous of people who know what they want to do with their lives. You do not know how easy you have it.

Anyway, bitterness aside, I have several novels in me. They try to come out sometimes, before paranoia and self-doubt beat them back into submission. I get an idea. I ponder excitedly, thinking of what I can do with it. Then I do a little research, realise how little I know about the subject. I don’t want to look stupid. Then I start to wonder if anyone else has come up with the idea, and I’ve just not read it. How bad would that be? Unintentional plagiarism doesn’t look like that from the outside. And, if something has already been written, how arrogant is it to think that I could write anything better?

This is why NaNoWriMo seems like a good idea. There are no rules. Just get the words out of you. It doesn’t matter how good it is, just that it is. After that, the only way is up.

And there are signs. I have conveniently discovered its existence just before the relevant month. As I was sat wondering if it would be a good thing to do, a new concept and proto-plot popped into my mind from nowhere. As I was adding the NaNoWriMo link to the top of the page, the http text appeared in the ‘enter link here’ box before I’d even typed it.

So I’m tempted. I have nine days to decide if my idea can be expanded into a full novel with interesting characters and plot devices that would make Aristotle proud. What do you think I should do?

Paranoia Cake Protects Self From Mind Rays

Done and done. Now to feed it whisky for the next 2 months.

Oh is that teasing? OK. Here’s a cake shot too.

Cor blimey look at the raisins on that. Etc.