Yesterday we had a lovely dinner at Kristen’s parents’ home. More food than you could feasibly eat in one meal, and I was stuffed silly. Today is Black Friday, and while Mom & I didn’t go out at 5am like in years past (Stores were opening here at 3! I’m not going out at 3am. And if we went out at 5am, we’d already be 2 hours behind the rest, so may as well sleep in, head out at 10 and call it good.) it cut into the writing time.

So here I am, formerly ahead, now trying to catch up.

On our travels today, I bought this little guy from Starbucks. His real name is Huxley and he’s a writer mouse.

Squeeky squeeky! Here's some candy if you write!

But we’ve renamed him Nano and you may think he’s sweet for offering me a Hershey’s kiss if I make 2000 words tonight. But Nano is an intimidating force to be reckoned with. This is what he does when you’re not looking.

I will paint my face with your blood!

So, uh, I’ll get back to writing now. (shiver) I have 42,103 words written. Tuesday is the last day.

Progress report

This year’s story has been kicking around in my head since my JCPenney days – almost 20 years ago! I was a bit worried because I ‘tipped’ the climax of the whole plot shortly after 25,000 words, but since I did that the writing’s been so easy. Even if I finish the story before 50K, I’m convinced I can go back and flesh out the characters and scenes and the “he replied”s that I’m sure I left out.

I’ve been to two local NaNoWriMo write-ins so far, both at Jersey Java and Tea in Haddonfield, which is a really cute coffee shop! It’s where Three Beans used to be. Three Beans was cozier, but also gave off a slight “you’ll get fleas here” vibe.

With Thanksgiving at Kristen’s family’s house this year, Black Friday and its sales and a mini-reunion of sorts on Saturday* I’m really going to have to work hard this week to build up a buffer. I’ve been writing at lunch so that I don’t have too much to do after work.

The drawback is that I’m seriously braindead. My mouth can’t form words correctly. The planet that World of Warcraft is set on is literally being shattered tomorrow, and I haven’t had time to enjoy its last days. Good thing this is done on 11/30. Cataclysm comes out on 12/7.

And I took a 4 day weekend to enjoy it, too!

*Bowling with a group of friends I hung out with a lot during my Jr and Sr years. We decided to pass on the $78 per person reunion and do something a bit more fun.

See, I was completely going to do 8K words this weekend. But between this blog, my WoW blog, the freelance job that might come up again this week (please?) and the rest of my life, I was running behind to begin with.

Then…he came along. And oh my gosh I haven’t had a weekend like this in a LOOONNG time.

I spent the whole weekend with him.

I went partying with friends…

I saw new species of weird, walrus-like men…

I was chased by giants…

And for the first time since February…

I levelled!

Anyway, remember that it’s not you, it’s me.

Maybe next year?

And I’m doing NaNoWriMo, where I’m writing a 50K word novel by 11/30. I’m logging about 2K words a day now.

And I picked up and completed a Freelance job this week, which may be an every other week deal for a short time.

And I have all those plates spinning, plus a half-dozen projects going on at work at any one time.

So what could POSSIBLY bring all those plates crashing to the ground?

By the way, I love my bangs

Wrath of the Lich King expansion pack, baby! The WoW level cap has been pushed up to 80. Step aside, projects…I have Winterskorn to kill!

This pic was taken at work by the lovely Coworker S after I picked up the game at lunchtime. You’ll see there is absolutely nobody in the picture. That’ll get worse in about a month where you’ll probably be able to shoot a cannonball down the middle of the advertising side of the building and not hit a soul.

Ain’t nothin’ gonna to break my stride
Nobody’s gonna slow me down, oh-no
I got to keep on movin’

NB: If you care about my adventures in World of Warcraft, clicky clicky the “World of Warcraft” blog link in my gray menu bar to read my musings on this crazy game that is more addicting than bejeweled, texttwist and minesweeper combined!

NaNoWriMo on the other hand has been a lot harder. I have no idea how I did this years ago. Things were looking pretty grim for me at the beginning of the weekend. I had let five whole days go by without adding one word to my story. I was facing the necessity of writing 10K words in one weekend to catch up. I was considering quitting because I was too far behind.

Then I took a breath and broke out the calculator.

To reach 50K in 30 days, you should write 1667 words a day. I’m aiming for an average of 2200 a day, which will still get me to 50K with time to spare.

The “novel” (if you can really call this that) is about a group of people who play an online game and meet in person. It is not autobiographical. I’m having fun developing the various dork characters.

And I’m on the fence about CookieCam. This place is so teeny…

I see two possible scenarios:

1) If I don’t lose my job the first week of December CookieCam will be a limited-night engagement and probably streamed live. I’m looking at picking up a freelance job for about 5 or so hours a week, and I also have an application in for holiday work at my local Disney store*. Time is going to be limited.

2) If I do get laid off (nobody is safe) then I’ll have time to do CookieCam during the day while I’m being paid severance and looking for another job. I’d probably get a bigger audience that way!

*Trying to squirrel away money while I can in anticipation of future layoffs.

When I come home from work and I’m already wearing my sneakers, this means that I have been to Curves already. And I’ve exercised already. And I most likely am tired and sweaty and do NOT want to take you for a walk.

We have a yard big enough for you to wear yourself out while running around it. It is full of trees and shrubs for you to pee against, and gardens for you to poop in.

You and I have taken over 1100 strolls together since we brought you home. A break once in a while would be nice.

And since you’re smart enough to surf to, read, and understand this blog entry, it would really knock my socks off if you could have dinner waiting for me once in a while.

Love,
Mama ( yes, I consider myself his mom, and until I get a Homo Sapiens child, Max, Misty, and Charlie are all I gots)

****
I’m going to stick with NaNo, even though I think I am totally hopelessly behind. At worst, I have some vacation time left. Thankee for the encouragement!

I’ve written over 7600 words in the last two days, and to finish by midnight 11/30, I’ll have to do 2952 words tomorrow and Tuesday. In reality, I feel as if I can finish tomorrow after work. It’s the home stretch, cats and kittens.

In other odd developments, I’m not worried about work tomorrow in the least. If you take into account the fact that when I DO worry about work, everything turns out fine; then tomorrow should really suck. But I’m motivated to go in and start tying up loose ends of current projects and reigniting stalled ones.

Plus, I’m off to the gym tomorrow before work. Ambitious thing, aren’t I?

I just hit the 40,000 word mark on my crappy novel, Tumble Dry. For padding’s sake, I just had the main character (whose name I changed from Anne to Meg) find out that her newly outed lesbian sister and her boss (Anya, which was too similar to ‘Anne’ for both names to stay) are girlfriend and girlfriend. I have to write 10,000 words in 4 nights. That boils down to 3,333 a day if I don’t write any more tonight. Once I finish, I’m going to put it away until January. Then I’ll edit it and put some of the better scenes up here for you to peruse.

I went to the gym today for the first time in months. I did a difficult 23 minutes on the treadmill, a difficult 5 assisted chinups, and a difficult 48 stomach crunches. It was the first time I had brought my iPod, SirenSong, along for the journey. It was a lot nicer than wearing the Sony DiscMan in a bulky pouch around my waist. And my exercise playlist was fun!

As I excited the Y, “Naughty Girl” from Beyonce came on. Which, of course, was the impetus for a slinky dance down the walk in front of the building. Nobody was around, anyway. I hope.

The Black Friday Photo gallery is up at Ofoto now. You won’t need to sign in. And below, I leave you with a shot of Mom and I on Thanksgiving night, planning out our Black Friday strategy.