Gratuitous Puppy Post

I know I know... but my awesome dog, Tag, turns 4 today and I just can't believe he's grown up so much! If you can't tell, I love my dog. He's my child. He's amazing, smart, beautiful, and so well behaved.

We hike together, snuggle together, play ball and dance around the kitchen together. Seriously... I can't imagine a better pup for me.

So happy birthday, Tag. You'll get a big fat treat later and a present to shred into bits. I know you'll love it. I love you!

IWSG: Finishing a project

It's still Wednesday, right? Ha!

This is Insecure Writer's Support Group, a monthly group hosted by the ever amazing and talented Alex Cavanaugh. Anyone can join in any time, so please hop over to his blog and sign up! You won't regret it.

I'm totally jammin' out to old school hip hop right now... getting back to my roots... which is completely ridiculous, because I'm Scotch-Irish. Hip hop exists nowhere in my background. But I love it.

False starts. That's what I'm insecure about. Everyone has projects that they start and can't complete, for whatever reasons... but after a certain point it starts to add up. I have so many unfinished projects it's scary. And I'm starting to worry that I'll never finish anything! I suppose everyone's process is different... and perhaps it's that I haven't hit on just the right thing yet but... at what point do you just have to put your nose to the grindstone and finish something?

Does anyone else lose interest in what you're working on like that?

I have to wonder if it says something about my character or if it's an issue with the character of my writing, or the characters that I am writing... that I can barely complete something without tossing it in the trash and turning to something new. Margo Berendsen was talking about endings and beginnings and what is the hardest part of the process for her... for me it's definitely endings, because I have to force myself to commit long enough to get there!

I love starting things. The excitement of a new idea electrifies me! If only I could recapture the romance to bring my stories to the conclusions they deserve.

Nightmares

image from
http://www.steampunklab.com/

Usually, any bad dreams I have melt away in the morning light, be it ever so dreary. But this one... this morning... still lingers like heartburn or a bad hangover. I haven't been able to shake the exquisitely painful melancholy it has left in its wake... like a shadow cast by a nuclear explosion, the memory of this dream refuses to fade.

And so I've written 600 words towards it... I can't tell if it's making it better or worse, extracting these characters, these horrible scenes, from my subconscious and giving them life on-screen. But that's all I can do for now.

That... and bake cupcakes.

A NaNo fiasco... and what I learned from failure

Ok, so... didn't even come close to hitting my word target for NaNo. I mean, yes I know there are still 4 days left and that I could probably write 6,000 words a day and reach the 50,000 word goal for the month... but I think that would be missing something.

I can think of a few REALLY good excuses for not meeting the goal this year (i.e., travel, company for the holidays...) but what it comes down to is, I got bored with my plot. I think I just hit a point around 25,000 words where all I wanted to do was end it, kill somebody off, or wrap it up nice and neatly... and so I stopped writing because I knew that attitude wasn't going to get me to 50,000 words. And even if I could have managed to pound out the word count, I would have been disappointed with the whole thing. That's not what I want!

I really like my plot/idea for this story, and I am taking this moment to acknowledge in front of my amazing writing community/followers that I want more for it than just the chance to say "I won NaNo 2012." So starting tomorrow I am going back to the drawing board and mapping out more and better scenes for my plot.

I hope you'll all hold me to finishing this project even though it'll be outside NaNo... especially BECAUSE it will be outside NaNo. I can use all the encouragement I can get!

Also, I'm jonesing for a developmental editing project. Anybody got anything they need worked on? I'll give you a deal you can't refuse! E-mail me at ekauffman (AT) writingrefinery (DOT) com.

A website and a lull in writing

First of all, I'm very excited to announce that my website is up and running! Please pop over to Writing Refinery and have a look. If anyone you know needs an editor, whether they're self-publishing or going the traditional route, I'm here to help. If you have any questions, please send me a message at ekauffman (AT) writingrefinery (DOT) com.

Next, I'd just like to put it out there that I'm stuck in the NaNo doldrums. I was doing so well writing while I was on vacation... I made sure to carve out time every day to chip away at my word count and stayed ahead of the game for the most part.

And then I came home... home is so much more distracting than vacation! It wouldn't seem that way. But it is. I have so many projects waiting to be completed, so many books to read, and cats and a dog that clamor for attention. Sigh... I really have got to get back on the bandwagon!

How is everyone else doing?

California dreams

I've been in Nor Cal for over a week now and it's wonderful. I miss it here so very much! I miss the sun and the birds and hanging out at the horse barn with my friends... it's enough to make a girl very homesick... which is a funny feeling when my husband and my beloved pets are all the way across the country. Sigh. One day I hope we get to move back here.

Things are just more... random and amazing out here. Like this for example:

I promise, window washing is random and amazing...

The other morning I was doing my NaNo writing at my father-in-law's house in San Francisco and I could hear opera... like... a really good baritone voice singing an Italian opera. I thought perhaps it was one of the neighbors. It's a classy neighborhood, after all. But no... no... it was this window washer!!! Seriously. Incredible.

Watson eating breakfast

I also have had three rides on Watson since I came to visit... and I kept myself together, no panicking or anxiety... just enjoyed the riding and relaxed. It's been a long time since I've done that. It felt nice to be back in the saddle until the next morning, of course. Wow was I sore! I really need to work on strength and flexibility more!! Sheesh!

Mallowmar the chatty kitty

Eva the beautiful

These are the two sweet kitties who sleep with me at night while I'm here and chat with me while I'm powering through my NaNo writing each day. I honestly thought I'd be so far behind on writing due to the trip. But thanks to some pre-planning and Write or Die, I am right on track! I even wrote extra on a couple of days so that I could take a day or two off in the middle. It's incredible and I'm actually excited about this NaNo lark of a novel. Things that I didn't expect have cropped up (like Clones!) and I'm just enjoying making it an outlandish story. 

I think one of my problems with writing is that I try to take myself too seriously. And I'm not really a serious person. Now that I'm just having fun with my novel, it's really become something I enjoy and I look forward to each day. I suppose it will be that way until it isn't one day... but I'm taking advantage of the good energy for now.

Aye me....

Checking in

Remember, remember, the 5th of November

The Gunpowder Treason and plot;

I see of no reason why Gunpowder Treason

Should ever be forgot.

The power is back on at home after 4 days... which was not a long time, relatively speaking... but was also an eternity. Thank gods for a public library with power for charging communication devices. And thank gods for heat and running water, two things that the power unexpectedly steals away when it goes, and that I'm very happy to have back. I finish two books and read two others while the power was out. I'm nowhere near caught up on my reading list, but I feel like I made a significant contribution.

I'm sitting in a Peets Coffee in Davis, California, today. I have missed California so very much since we moved to the East Coast two years ago. I'm so happy to be back! 

I'm so happy to be writing while I'm here, too. NaNo is going pretty well for me while I'm travelling which is... unexpected. I figured I'd be floundering and way behind, but my friends here are very supportive and I've been able (with Write or Die to help me manage my time) to keep my word count rising pretty consistently. Woot!

The plot is coming along mostly as expected, as well. I haven't had too many surprises yet, but I'm prepared for them because I'm coming to the end of what I'd planned to... minus the ending. I'm still not entirely sure what genre I'm writing in... I mean, fantasy fiction with shape shifters... but I don't know if it's an adventure or a romance or YA or what! It's sort of a mystery to me. But definitely NOT a mystery.

I love NaNo! So frenetic and muddled and adventurous.

How is everyone else doing so far? If you're not doing NaNo, what other projects are you working on?