NaNoWriMo (again) and a spot of mild sniffiness

Girl Lacer is off school (again – she’s had so much time off this year). Her class is like Ground Zero for the swine flu in her school and although right now she’s playing raucously with Boy Lacer, she’s sniffing and although normally, I, ‘heartless’ mummy would send my sniffing child to school, because of the swine flu, I checked her temperature just in case and it was 38.5C, so fever, just about. I don’t know, if it wasn’t for the swine flu, I heartless mummy wouldn’t have even bothered checking her temperature, she looks so relatively healthy and I would have put the sniffing down to a mild cold, which it still could be and if it is swine flu and it stays this mild, well she’s very lucky.

Anyway, so not having to do the school run and the kids’ otherwise occupied, I settled down with my laptop and opened up my NaNoWriMo, I had left it a key scene, the bad guy, who currently has my heroine in his control and I had to work out what she had to do in the key scene of the book and although I knew roughly what happens in that scene and I knew what my heroine would end up doing, I didn’t know what the bad guy would want her to do and writing this blog post, I’m realising that I’m also missing a whole lot more set up for that scene, which could be to do with me writing in first person, maybe I need to write it in third, sorry, thinking aloud here. So, as you can see, my plot structure has been holey and I haven’t expended as much thought as I would have if I hadn’t be racing to this end of November deadline. Thinking about it, the ‘not knowing what the bad guys are doing’ is a problem I come up against with my completed first draft of my Egypt story, I think it’s hard if you’re writing from the child’s view point all the time, to get enough of a sense of danger and build up if you never see what the bad guys are doing behind the scenes just because the child is not there to see. I’m solving the problem, at least in part, with the Egypt story, by planning on writing a prologue, with one of my characters spying on the bad guys. Maybe I need to introduce some spying in my failed NaNoWriMo, but isn’t that in danger of being a bit too much cliched plot device?

Anyway, what really scuppered my NaNoWriMo, is that it’s set in the 17th Century and as much as I’ve done quite a bit of research, it’s not enough. The section I was approaching in the novel, involved a court Masque and whereas I have researched Masques, to write those scenes properly I needed to refresh my memory, do more research, immerse myself in it, just like I had to do when I got stuck on a crucial scene in the first draft of my Egypt novel, which after stopping writing to spend about three weeks on research, when I went back to writing, boy did that scene fly. So I couldn’t do all that research into Masques and finish the darn thing by the end of November. So bye bye NaNoWriMo.

It’s not wasted though, I had written the beginning of this story over and over again over the years, so at 15,900 words, I’ve now got more, even though I suspect I’ll have to rewrite every single one of those words, I’ve got something to work on now. So I’ve now got a decision, what do I do with my limited writing time? Go ahead and research Masques? Go ahead and edit the first draft of my Egypt story, which has been rested long enough now?  Or a work on a non-fiction idea I’ve had, which I’ve been told is a very good idea and I should definitely work on it? I think much as I’d quite like to immerse myself in some Masques, it has to come lower down in priority than my Egypt story, work on what I’ve already got, so to speak. So Egypt story versus the non-fiction idea? Once again finishing what I’ve started sounds like a good idea but the non-fiction idea is calling me a bit because being sensible, I think the non-fiction idea is far more commercial than the Egypt story. Hmmm, I don’t know. I’d quite like to do something which I actually had a chance of getting paid for, if anything so I could finance a year’s membership at the gorgeous London Library, so then I could go and immerse myself in Masques far more easily than I could do by just using my grotty local library. Like I say, don’t know.

Back to NaNoWriMo

After my week off writing, preparing for my craft stall and Etsy shop, I’m now back doing NaNoWriMo, I knew it was a mistake trying to do both and I know pretty certainly now that I will not make 50,000 words by the end of the month (I’m currently on 15,900, whereas I should be over half way). Specially now there are now two cases of swine flu in Girl Lacer’s class, so it feels like an inevitable very short amount of time before it hits us to. I’ve also hit that middle of the story duldrums, you know, when you’ve set the story up and you just have to get your character through A, B and C before anything else exciting can happen. I also don’t like how by doing NaNo, much as word count is normally on my mind anyway, now it’s rampaging at the forefront and it’s effecting my judgement, now it’s almost not “Is this sentence, this plot point any good?”, it’s “How many useless words can I ram into this scene” instead. But on the brighter side, my NaNo is a story that has been circling in my head for literally years, one that I had written the beginning of over and over again and I’ve got way beyond that beginning now, I know my characters and other than being artificially constrained by time, I still like my story, so it has progressed, but what I’m writing to me does not even stand as first draft quality, it’s draft 0.5.

In other news, Boy Lacer had his first physio appointment since August today and he’s doing pretty well, still not running and jumping yet but possibly I think maybe as good as he’s going to get. Still, he learnt how to climb down a ladder today, which is a relief, a boy who can climb up ladders but not down is always a bit of a worry!

The physio has been moved and it’s now quite a long bus journey away, consequently we were late getting there and late getting back to nursery, the hour long appointment now literally taking up the whole morning, leaving as soon as we drop off Girl Lacer and coming back just in time (or not) for nursery. Still can’t complain too much, wasn’t the physio’s decision, she doesn’t drive either and now has to take the same bus we had to take. Found out something interesting as well, despite being told otherwise, Boy Lacer’s occupational therapist is still working there, so why hasn’t she seen him for a year now? Could really do with some OT.

Introducing Mrs. Lacer’s Attic

So, you know that Etsy shop I’ve been talking about opening for months now? The one that I said I was going to open in the summer? Well I officially opened it today, a few months late and on a Friday the 13th to boot, but I have plans for this one! Called Mrs. Lacer’s Attic , which for anyone who reads this regularly will know, is a bit of a joke, as I live in a tiny ground floor flat, hence no actual attic. I’m going to be stocking principally hand embroidered pieces, it’d be tempting to say actually that they will be all hand embroidered, but I don’t want to limit myself. Currently there are only two pieces in there, but more will go in over the weekend. It will just be embroidered art pieces, mini cushions and maybe a few Christmas decorations for a while, as after a whole week frantically preparing just this lot, I need some time now to make my own Christmas presents, but in the New Year, like I say, I’ve got plans! Including doing something that my mum used to make (the blanket covering the table in the second photo below, was something she gave to me, it was nice having something linking my crafting enterprises back to her (although she didn’t make the blanket in question)), although done my own way, something which may become my speciality and I’ll leave it as mysteriously as that.

So, I marked the opening of Mrs. Lacer’s Attic with my very first craft fair where I’ve actually made the stock (I’ve been doing craft fairs for the last two years, selling children’s books). It was at my kids’ school, so although I knew it was a bit of a risk, at least the cost of hiring the table was going to a cause literally close to my heart, that along with using what I had already in my stash, made the fair tonight not too financially risky. Anyway, when I set up that stall, something I had done with the books, loads of time before, seeing my own stuff on the table this time, I was suddenly rather proud.

But when it came to actually selling, hmmm, I sold two Christmas decorations (two of the stars with eyes, which are my personal favourites and Girl Lacer’s). I didn’t, to be honest, expect much, the amount of effort put into hand embroidering pieces like that, meant I had to price the items relatively high, making them not really impulse purchase material. Still, lots of people actually liked my stuff, the skull mini cushion and the angler fish were particularly popular with the discerning 9 year old crowd, unfortunately the discerning 9 year old crowd doesn’t have that much cash. Lots of people were impressed, in particular with Gordon Brown, that the lines making up the picture were sewn rather than drawn, nobody was particularly desperate to go home with him though! Which, much as I only sold two Christmas decorations (and as Mr. Lacer said, who’s thinking about Christmas decorations now?) and none of the embroidered pieces (which were a bit too expensive for the event), I am pleased that people did seem to like them and considering as I was making them, over the last week, I was, in my more paranoid moments, imagining people rolling round on the floor and laughing in disbelief that I ever thought it was sellable, that is progress in itself.

And I had a nice night, it is possibly rather sad that I have come to link Christmas with selling stuff, but I find there is a lovely communal feeling at craft fairs and it’s nice seeing the same old faces again, it was also nice this time, considering it was at my kids’ school, how many other mums I knew or recognised, were there manning stalls, I like that Alan Sugar spirit. Christmas craft fairs also give me a chance to indulge in one of my favourite bits about Christmas, mulled wine. Now I was very late to mulled wine, I only started drinking it when it was on offer at the craft fairs when I started them two years ago but mulled wine is now intrinscially linked to the whole thing. I love how it varies so much and how you can ‘tell a good school by how strong it’s mulled wine is’, honestly, the two best schools in the area, I’ve tried both their mulled wines now and it’s strong stuff, far better than the stuff at the historic house Christmas fair I also did last year, which was only slightly stronger than Ribena.

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So, I’m at the end of another strange week, after a week of Mr. Lacer being off for half term, followed by a week of us all being ill, followed by this last week of non stop crafting, I’m curious about when exactly things will get back to ‘normal’. This next few weeks coming up will have more of a family focus, with a slew of appointments connected with Boy Lacer (and one for Girl Lacer to), including a speech therapy appointment *keel over in shock*. There was one very apologetic speech therapist ringing today apologising about Boy Lacer falling through the gaps after his last speech therapist left and they admit they’ve lost his rather thick file. Once again though the kids’ lovely school shines through, as just as the speech therapist realised that Boy Lacer had been missed out and was about to ring the school about him, the school’s inclusion manager was on the phone ringing about him, now all the school has to do is wave their magic wand over the occupational therapist, Boy Lacer’s occupational therapist had also left and the appointments just disappeared, so on the school’s suggestion, we went to speak to our GP about it, we got a letter a few weeks ago, Boy Lacer is back on the list, a list with a 12 month wait.

So, other than quite a few appointments, I also need to do something about the tip of the flat, which wasn’t exactly tidy after half term or the week of sickness and I haven’t exactly had a chance to do anything about it this week either. This week has shown that if I’m determined to build up a business from home, I have to organise my time, including how I control this flat, a lot more rigidly, because even just from a purely business perspective, this will be where I work, I need to know where my materials are etc. etc. and I don’t want to have to pick my way over toys on the way to my work table. Just everything being more organised will mean more time, which will mean more time to work. You should have seen me trying to juggle, not particularly successfully, what felt like three million things at once, as I was trying to prepare for tonight, today, culminating in me discovering that the mouse had got into the wardrobe drawers and had gone and chewed holes into literally the most expensive piece of clothing I own (honestly that mouse has expensive tastes, always goes for Boden and now for Monsoon as well) –  this is the point where I mention to any future customers, that all my fabric is kept off the floor in wall mounted cupboards, always has been, I’m not that disorganised. This of course was the piece of clothing I was about to put on, I ended up wearing a grey M&S jersey dress and leggings, the mouse doesn’t like M&S, too ‘cheap’ for it. So once I’d got dressed in something, I then had to struggle out of the door, bulging bag in one hand, fake Christmas tree in the other, leaping over the building blocks that Boy Lacer is obsessed with at the moment, as Boy Lacer chooses that moment to go all chauvinistic on me (I know not really, it was just a change in pattern) “Mummy can’t go to work! Daddy goes to work!” he screams. Amazing I got out of the door.

Anyway, I also have to decide next week whether I’m going to continue with my NaNoWriMo, which I haven’t touched in a week (I’m coming to the (rather obvious) conclusion that I can’t do heavy bouts of writing combined with heavy bouts of crafting at the same time). I am now rather behind, but strangely optimistic that I might still be able to make it. I have to decide something though, continue with it, go back and edit my completed first draft of the other project (which is slightly daunting) or work on some nonfiction projects, hmmm.

At some point things will go back to ‘normal’

Normality still hasn’t returned since half term and what with the normal Christmas madness, I doubt it’ll return again now, until January, so things still feel slightly odd. The current bout of oddness has been due to Mr. Lacer and the kids going to the mother-in-law’s this weekend, without me. I had been due to go, but thanks to last week’s illness, I’d got even more behind on my Christmas stall preparation and although I had planned on taking my crafty stuff with me, I just needed every second to work this weekend, so I stayed at home and sewed and sewed and sewed.

Saturday was ‘embroidered pieces day’, you see the plan for my stall, which is turning nothing like the stall I’ve been imagining in my head for going on years now, out of necessity really – and wanting to invest the smallest amount of money possible (I’ve been raiding my current craft supplies to do this, when possible), anyway, the plan for the stall is Christmas decorations, Christmas decorations and more Christmas decorations, as they’re cheap and don’t take that much time to produce (theoretically) however as far as my business will go, with my etsy shop (newly opened, but with currently nothing in it, hence me not giving out the address yet), I will be concentrating on larger embroidered pieces and I’m trying to think of my stall as an advert for my etsy shop, so I’ve planned to have a few larger embroidered pieces on the stall as well, if I sell them on the night, great, otherwise they’re (hopefully good) adverts. So, I spent Saturday working on the larger pieces, my plan is to have three embroidered cushions and two framed pieces and by 2am on Sunday morning, I had finished the three fronts for the cushions. I’m really pleased with them, they’re my own designs (obviously) and I’ll put them up here when I’ve sewn them up into cushions. However, they took me, pretty much literally all day (and the first one I’d done the day before, so it took me all day to do two), which made me think about pricing, I don’t want to make my stuff too expensive, but I am also not going to undersell myself. There will be two large cushions and one small one, I think on the stall I’ll be selling the two large ones at £25 each and the small one at £10 and if they end up in my etsy shop, I’ll have to put the prices up to £30 and £15, to cover fees etc. and I was sitting there worrying on Saturday that that would be too expensive, even though I knew at the same time, that even at those prices, I was working for less than the minimum wage, considering the time it took for me to do each piece.

However, it was a fun Saturday, whilst sewing I finished listening to my current audiobook, which took four hours, which was slightly frustrating, as I had to listen to nearly an hour that I had listened to before, as the book had been split into five audiobook chapters of an hour each and after I had nearly completed the second chapter, last weekend, when I had been out shopping, I must have left it running by mistake, so I had lost my place and it had looped back to the beginning again and there’s no way of forward winding it on my iphone. Even so, it made the four hours pass quickly and when the book had finished, I was rather disappointed that I’m not getting another Audible credit until the end of next week! So I listened to documentaries on iPlayer instead, I’m quite a fan of documentaries, but don’t get to watch them (or listen, if I’m sewing) that often, as if I’m watching TV, most of the time it’s something both me and Mr. Lacer would want to watch and he’s not a great fan of documentaries, so I watched listened to the latest Horizon, about black holes, which was absolutely fascinating and had the most beautiful analogy comparing black holes with waterfalls, now being scientifically trained, science documentaries are always a bit hit and miss with me, most of the time they’re aimed at people (obviously) with a more general scientific knowledge, so they can get a bit boring, but the Horizon documentary on the black holes seemed to be aimed at someone who knew a little bit about relativity and extended it for them. So, thanks to their analogy comparing black holes and waterfalls, I now know a bit more about something, which is always a nice feeling. Science documentaries (or any documentaries really), always make me curious for stories to, I think they’re a great source of story ideas and in this one in particular I found it fascinating how all these scientists were basically sitting their waiting for a new ‘Einstein’, someone to come along and sort out why Einstein’s theories fall apart in black holes, it was great imagining who that person would be and what would happen.

So, after a spot of science, I then went for a spot of history, watching the first two episodes of Andrew Marr’s The Making of Modern Britain, that was fascinating too and rather shaming as well, I had no idea that the inventor of concentration camps and eugenics was us, the British. Absolutely shocking what we did during the Boer War. I loved all of Marr’s stories about the various politicians though and all those black and white photos, they looked like that had a lot more character than our politicians these days.

I didn’t just spend all day sewing and listening to my audiobook and documentaries though, as I did end up needing to go out and get supplies at about 5pm. Oh it felt so decadent being out when normally I’d normally be doing tea and bedtime! I got my supplies from John Lewis’s haberdashery and went upstairs to check out the curtain fabrics (we’d been needing to replace the kids’ curtains for some time and Girl Lacer speeding up the process with the aid of some projectile vomiting whilst she was ill). Curtains are tricky in our flat, as beyond the mess, our flat actually has a neutral decor, I didn’t want neutral curtains in the kids’ room though, that’s boring, but certainly couldn’t have anything too fussy, also couldn’t have anything too boyish or too girlish, for obvious reasons and didn’t want anything too young, as the kids’ will be in that room for at least another five years and I don’t want to replace the curtains again. So, in all the great, fantastic, rather large range of curtain fabrics in John Lewis, I found precisely . . . one, a large, light green and cream check, I didn’t have the window dimensions with me though, but I reckon the whole thing will cost me about £25, bargain considering the rest of the flat’s curtains cost £40 a pair, one of the many times I love sewing!

After the curtain fabrics, I went down to Waitrose, it was just meant to be for some croissants, I didn’t even bother picking up a basket, but with my sudden feeling of freedom, I ended up arms laden with a sewing magazine, two pizzas (buy one get one free), two miniature puddings from The Pudding Club* . . . and some croissants.

Sunday, despite going to bed at 2am, I had to set my alarm and be up and sewing at 8am, Sunday was Christmas decoration sewing day, so getting a lot more actually produced. I made stars, Christmas trees, buttons and Christmas stockings, I still need to make snowmen and some more stars, just doing those four groups took me all day again. I’m really pleased with my Takashi Murakami inspired stars.

The Christmas trees were a pain, I’d had a bright (read stupid) idea to use sparkly thread, which is always a nightmare to use, despite it looking good in the end, so I like the trees, but I’m not making them like this again!

Then I worked on the buttons, which were my original bright idea (read stupid again), I’m not happy with them, I worked several variations but I’m still not happy with them and they took way too much embroidery on each, for something that is never going to sell for that much.

Then finally the stockings, which was a last minute idea, a lot simpler than the buttons, a lot quicker to make and in my opinion look better to.

So, I’ve still got a busy week ahead of me (and I haven’t done any NaNoWriMo for three days now, oops, but I had a feeling this would happen, the stall is more important, also with the NaNo, I’ve now got to that awkward stage where it’s approaching the middle of the book, you know that spot where you’re over the honeymoon but not at the finale yet, so it’s easy to get distracted by other stuff, doesn’t help that I’ve just thought of an excellent idea for another story, which I want to think about but I’m having to stop myself, but I think I’ve just got to expect that I think of all my new story ideas when I’m the middle of something else, the trick is just to remember, but not work on the idea, until after I’ve finished the last one!). Lots more sewing to do first.

*Anyone been to The Pudding Club in Mickleton? Back when I was working, I had to go away a lot for courses and a lot of the time it would be in one of those awful hotels besides a motorway, the ones with awful food, but someone in hotel procurement or whatever, obviously had a soft spot for puddings, as occasionally instead of the hotel in nowhere land, we went to the hotel in Mickleton where The Pudding Club is based and it was absolutely wonderful, even though the pudding club wasn’t actually on whilst we were there, all the food is divine, you know, one of those places where when you think of your favourite ‘insert favourite food item here’ and that hotel is the place of my ‘all time favourite steak’ and my ‘all time favourite risotto’, whether I can remember any of the training I had, that’s a different matter. The hotel rooms are lovely to and some of them are pudding themed as well, I was lucky enough to stay in the spotted dick room once!

PS I don’t put photos up on my photo blog much anymore, so worth a mention that I have just put two on, after playing with a new gadget, the photos are here and here.

The ‘long weekend’

It has felt like a long weekend round here for a long time, first it was the kids’ half term and as Mr. Lacer also had the week off and we really didn’t do much, it felt like Sunday for much of the time, which gets boring after a while. On the Friday, Boy Lacer got sick but not too bad, bouncing back almost immediately but with no appetite for a few days afterwards, then on Sunday night Girl Lacer gets sick, a bit worse, then Tuesday morning Mr. Lacer gets it and Tuesday afternoon I get it, both badly. So with the holiday and the sickness, there’s been a lot of hanging round the house doing nothing and/or feeling sorry for ourselves. Girl Lacer has only just gone back to school today (two days late) and it was so refreshing doing the school run (and another plus, they had some more photos from the class up outside the door, so that was nice to see, including a lovely one of the whole class, sitting on a giant wooden play ship they have, Girl Lacer was sitting on the prow, Girl Lacer looked particularly cute in that, I always reckon she photographs like one of those politician mug shots, you know all gleam and big cheesy smile, doesn’t help that she chose for her winter coat this year, a most lovely bright red woollen coat that when she wears it makes her look like a miniature White House intern, with her very blonde bobbed hair). The house seems so much quieter now that it’s just me and Boy Lacer again. The house is also extremely messy, which is pretty depressing, specially considering I haven’t completely regained my energy yet.

I’m meant to be at a coffee morning right now, that I organised, so that’s bad I’m not there, I just hope some people do turn up! Just don’t have the energy to traipse up to the cafe nor do I have the energy to get Boy Lacer off the climbing frame there, if he decides to get awkward and he’s been doing a lot of awkward recently and/or I just don’t have the energy to deal with his normal antics, so he just seems worse, probably a bit of both but the climbing frame there, if he gets up there and decides he doesn’t want to come down, I wouldn’t be able to get him down, much as I’m able to get onto most climbing frames with ease, this particular one has a horrible design, perfect size for the average 4 year old but not for an adult needing to get on it. I probably could get on it, if I really had to but as I could tell last time we were there, once I got up there, it was so small, I still wouldn’t be able to wrestle pick up an uncooperative Boy Lacer and get him safely off it again. Serves me right for picking that cafe as a venue.

Other than Tuesday, when I really couldn’t do anything, I have been doing NaNoWriMo, luckily I got ahead quite a bit on the first two days, so an enforced day off wasn’t too bad and I managed to get a bit more than the 1666 words done yesterday to. I’ve broken the 10K mark on my NaNoWriMo, which has been so far fairly easy, I love that beginning of a story honeymoon (don’t worry by the way for my completed first draft of my Egypt story, that is getting rested for one more month whilst I do NaNoWriMo, the timing was so perfect with no novel in progress at the beginning of NaNoWriMo, I couldn’t resist). My NaNoWriMo is my Charles story that I’ve talked about here on my blog before (not very recently mind you), I had been handwriting it and doing a lot of research, writing the beginning over and over again and then gave up on it to concentrate on the Egypt story. So, I started again, discovered that that beginning I had written over and over again, was actually only around 2000 words, I had been under the impression it had been a lot more. Now that I’m above the 10K mark I’m beginning to wonder if I have enough plot for a full 50K, but that’s a common fear for me with anything I write, we’ll have to see.

Randomicity

After a busy weekend cleaning the entire flat because the occupational therapist was coming for a home visit, we had the occupational therapist this morning, she only saw the living room lol but the flat needed a good clean anyway! It was more work on Boy Lacer’s sensory issues and talk about how ultra sensitive he is to his body’s signals, both externally and internally (we’re having some distress at the moment around going to the toilet) and he’s fidgeting a lot, especially when sitting on me or Mr. Lacer.

Boy Lacer has speech therapy tomorrow (all these appoinments always seem to come at once), it will be the first appointment since he had the speech therapist come and visit him in playgroup, which was the final assessment for his diagnosis (and why he is currently ‘labelled’ social communication disorder probable autistic spectrum, as they could not diagnose him as autistic spectrum without seeing him in a social setting). So I’m hoping we’ll get a change in diagnosis tomorrow without the paediatrician being present, it would be nice to have a ‘label’ that wasn’t such a mouth full and is more definite, I’m sure he has Asperger’s and dyspraxia but it would be nice if someone actually said that to me. Since turning 3 Boy Lacer has become more of a challenge to handle and his ‘differences’ are increasingly obvious, I stood outside the school gates just now and there was a group of 3 year olds there, likely to be in Boy Lacer’s nursery group next year and those kids had made that transition out of being toddlers and Boy Lacer has not yet. His speech is currently not really improving, in fact he’s speaking more gibberish now but I think that might actually be classed as an improvement, as before he’d only talk if he felt absolutely sure he knew the word and now his confidence is growing a bit (I think) but he still speaks, as his speech therapist would put it, ‘babyish’. He’s also been harder to discipline, he’s taken to lunging at and pulling Girl Lacer’s hair and trying to tell him off is literally like water off a duck’s back, it doesn’t sink in and you can tell that and when we try time out in his room he can’t link between pulling his sister’s hair and being put in his room and being put into his room is not what he’d consider a punishment anyway, in fact I think when he’s upset his sister and she’s screaming, he gets upset and confused and therefore putting him in his room is actually a relief for him, so we’re not using time out now, but how on earth do I discipline him if it doesn’t sink in? So instead we’re trying to modify Girl Lacer’s behaviour, a lot of the hair pulling is because she’s wound him up, but not all the time and in her defense it doesn’t take much at all to wind him up. So we’re trying to get her to recognise when he’s in one of his moods and to back off and when he says to stop something, she stops it. But it’s hard to explain to Girl Lacer that Boy Lacer is different, she’s only 5.

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In other random stuff I had a drool in the window of Kingston’s new Jamie’s Italian restaurant today, some yummy looking dishes but on the expensive (for me) side and probably a bit too dear to persuade the mother-in-law to take us out for dinner there either (Pizza Express is normally our venue for that). Although I’ve just had a thought, it’s only a few months to my birthday!

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Finally I’m having some serious second thoughts about my NaNoWriMo, it was frantic over the weekend with tidying the flat and prepping for work tonight, all I had chance to do was a little bit of the editing I talked about, on Saturday and absolutely nothing Sunday, I’ve also done nothing today, so now I’m about 5 days behind and I know I’m never going to catch up and I’ve been wondering whether it’s worth it, trying to race (and failing) towards that artificial deadline. It would be if a) I thought the story was ready b) I honestly had more time, which I just flat out don’t. Reading through my work on Saturday, the beginning of the story had such (for me) promise but quality was falling as I was trying to rush. But then I think am I just looking for excuses to stop? The NaNoWriMo e-mails have been fantastic at warning not to give up at this stage, that everyone goes through it, so how do you judge when the story really is not ready or when you’re just getting to the hard bit and you just need to battle through? So I came to a decision, walking home from drooling over Jamie Oliver’s windows, the story is going to be retired to the not too distance recesses of my mind and I need to think about it for a while longer yet, jot down notes when I see something that inspires me or I have an idea and then come back to it later. I think have the basic storyline but I need to populate it more to make it more of the complete, complex world it’s showing itself to be in glimpses in my head. I’m worried that if I force this story, like I did with my last NaNoWriMo effort, I’ll end up hating the idea and end up killing it, which is what happened last year, last year’s story idea was based on an idea I used to like falling asleep to, a woman climbing into a sleeping cubicle on a long distance starship and I killed that idea so badly I now can’t even think about it when trying to fall asleep (I’d imagine climbing into one of those snug little Japanese style sleeping cubicles and burying myself under the duvet to the distant thrum of the space ship’s engines). So meanwhile I’m back to concentrating on my Charles I story, which I shouldn’t have (temporarily) abandoned for this floozy of another story.

 

NaNoWriMo day 13 – I have to go back and edit

I know, I know, that is breaking the cardinal rule of NaNoWriMo, specially considering I am still 5k behind! But I have got to a point where I’ve realised the holes in the plot and I have to go back and mend them before I do anything else because otherwise this plot’s going to get more and more holey and I risk having (if I ever get there) 50,000 words that I ultimately can’t do anything with and therefore what is the point? My editing will be more the case of adding stuff, so it’ll keep adding to my word count, it’ll just mean slower progress. Favourite line of today though is;

“If my mother in law is a vampire does that mean my husband is   to?”