NaNoWriMo is over… I can’t figure out exactly how I feel about that. I have an endorphin response to writing, as in seriously, my family swears it’s like I’m high when I come down from a writing session, and I feel pretty awesome in a sedated, floating kind of way. <- At least, that’s the best way I can think of to describe it. So NaNoWriMo being over, since it’s my excuse to get high every day in a major way, is not a little disappointing. But almost freeing too.

But anyway. As for the report…

I’ve written a total of 50,050 words, about 38,500 of which belong to The Dragon Pendant, about 2,300 belonging to Sea Wolves, about 3,900 of Follow Every Rainbow, and about 5,400 of Ancient Fire. I was going to dedicate myself solely to Ancient Fire after I finished The Dragon Pendant, but what I really felt like writing was Sea Wolves, and when I finished that, I discovered the old truth of brain optimization: It is easier (in a way) to switch between multiple stories rather than sticking with just one. If you get stuck in one, switch to the other. I’m not altering my game plan though… 🙂 (see my last point)

Freak out! IT’S OVER!!! No. Way. Already? (That went by fast…)

Fact: Everything is good in moderation, including moderation Measured writing, and all-out NaNoWriMo style noveling, it’s all good in its own place and in the right amounts. NaNo was good, but so is its being over.

Current story frustration: It’s over. I’m sad and excited, feel free and empty, gloomy and exhilarated. Just the fact that I don’t have a special story I’m working on is a little depressing, but having tons of free time to spend wherever I want (well, that how it feels compared to November 😉 ) makes for a refreshing change. I just need some time to settle out from the NaNo-high I get every year.

Caffeine front: I’ve gone clean again from my caffeine Achilles heel. Week 1 has the record for how much I drank, but after that, it was surprisingly much less of a temptation. I just didn’t have time, even to caffeinate myself. 😀

Sleep? Hooray! I’ve disposed of alarms again. (long story here, but when I was having such horrible sleep issues, my naturopath asked me what would happen if I got rid of my morning alarms, and challenged me to a three week trial if I felt up to it. So I did, and after a few months of adjusting, I’ve never looked back). I turned them on for November since I had so much to get done, and it was torture. If I hadn’t had all my perky ringtones I would have thrown the phone at the wall (though even with that I was severely tempted on one occasion…). I feel pretty awesome. For the last several days though, waking up to the dim light of winter, I get all miffed because I think it’s like 7:00 and I don’t want to be awake yet… and then I check my phone and it’s almost 1/2 past 9:00. 🙂 So, still readjusting to the no-alarm thing, but it’s certainly not as all-over-the-place unreliable as last time I transitioned.

WOOT! I got sooo much done! I’d been at a road block on Follow Every Rainbow for months, but NaNoWriMo fixed that. I’m back in the groove on that front, have built myself a buffer on Ancient Fire (because apparently I can’t handle the writing in spurts on the blog posts… it has to be in a Word document and steadily added to for my brain to cope), and finished Sea Wolves… which was also at a road block. Confession: to tell the truth, when I went back to it, I literally had no idea where I was going with the next scene. And it was the climax. THE CLIMAX. Good work, Kat. Thankfully, knowing myself and rereading the stuff I had written, I was able to reconstruct it. With a few improvements. 🙂

And… I have a game plan for the year. I have two novels to revise, three partial stories to finish (one a short story), and Ancient Fire to maintain. The reason I have two novels, is due to my arm, I was unable to revise Mastermind (last year’s NaNo novel). So now I have two to do. My game plan is to assign each of the incomplete stories a month, and I dedicate that month to finishing it. After that, I will apply the same principle but for revision purposes to my novels. I’ll probably have to alternate them every other month so I can let them cool after each revision pass. I’m not sure I’ll be able to get that all done this next year (things are already stacking up to compete for the prize of Busiest Year of My Life So Far), but my goal is to make a huge amount of progress so that any carry over into the next year will be minimal.

So that’s my game plan. We’ll see how it goes. I’ve already mentioned that I’m taking December off from writing (other than blogging 😀 ), so my arm can realize it’s not going to die and I can reorg my life a bit and prepare for this next year. I’ll take it from there. Happy New Year, everybody! (Just kidding… feels like it though, with how time has been flying. 😉 )

~ Kat