(no subject)
I'd forgotten that today was a bank holiday. There goes my plan to send Nick up to the pharmacy to get some surgical tape so that I could try strapping my toe up. I guess I'll have to go another day of hop-limping about the house (which at the very least seems to amuse the cat).
***
Someone in cfids_me asked an interesting question this morning: How do writers with CFS manage re. typing, writing, eyestrain and general exhaustion et al? It got me thinking about how my writing arrangements have changed since I became ill... and it was then that I realised that they actually haven't changed all that much.
I'm one of those people that likes to handwrite their first drafts, even in this digital age (at the very least, it actually means that I have first drafts, which is something I never really grasped in school), so while I do get the problem of wrist pain after a few pages/paragraphs (depending on what kind of day it is), I've found that I can minimize it by writing with a cartridge/fountain pen (I find I don't press as hard, which eases pressure on my hand). I always handwrite lying down on my bed, always have and always will - even in school I would write with my entire upper body lying flat on the desk, which did admittedly get strange looks from everyone else, so I don't have to worry about getting tired sitting.
I don't like writing from scratch on computers because staring at a blank white screen for long periods now gives me eyestrain and migraines. So I tend not to sit down at the computer until I've at least got a good idea of what I'm writing. The only other problem I've developed with the CFS is the fact that my typing has gone to hell - I've become much clumsier, and so I'm constantly hitting the wrong keys when I type now, or several at once. And I'm also one of those people who doesn't like to wait for the spell-check at the end and so has to go correct her mistakes as soon as she sees them. Which is time-consuming, as you might imagine.
The biggest frustration I have is wanting to write or having ideas when I'm too physically exhausted to do anything about them. It's actually quite distressing sometimes to not only be barely able to stay awake, but also be desperate to write something important down that you know you'll forget in a few hours. I haven't found a solution to that yet.
I also gave up trying to follow a linear mode of writing/storytelling a long time ago. Now I just write chapters and snippets as they come to me, and form everything else around them as things develop. After all, I can always go back and change them later.
Nick says that, when we have the money, he'll help me get a laptop so that I can type in bed as well as write (and maybe even write less... I think he's trying to wean me off my stationary fetish), which could prove to be useful as long as I can alter the settings on the screen so that I wouldn't be staring at a bright white screen when the word processor is open. I'm also not holding my breath too much for the laptop because not only do our finances go up and down more often than a yo-yo right now, Nick being the techie elitiest that he is will be insisting on a good laptop, not one of the ones you can buy for a couple of hundred quid at Woolworths, no doubt.
But overall, my writing routines haven't changed all that much. I still handwrite at first, I still prefer to write whatever comes to me at a particular time, rather than in some sort of order, and I still have to correct every mistake I make as I see them, regardless of the trouble it causes. I wonder if that's helped or hindered me since I became ill...
***
Someone in cfids_me asked an interesting question this morning: How do writers with CFS manage re. typing, writing, eyestrain and general exhaustion et al? It got me thinking about how my writing arrangements have changed since I became ill... and it was then that I realised that they actually haven't changed all that much.
I'm one of those people that likes to handwrite their first drafts, even in this digital age (at the very least, it actually means that I have first drafts, which is something I never really grasped in school), so while I do get the problem of wrist pain after a few pages/paragraphs (depending on what kind of day it is), I've found that I can minimize it by writing with a cartridge/fountain pen (I find I don't press as hard, which eases pressure on my hand). I always handwrite lying down on my bed, always have and always will - even in school I would write with my entire upper body lying flat on the desk, which did admittedly get strange looks from everyone else, so I don't have to worry about getting tired sitting.
I don't like writing from scratch on computers because staring at a blank white screen for long periods now gives me eyestrain and migraines. So I tend not to sit down at the computer until I've at least got a good idea of what I'm writing. The only other problem I've developed with the CFS is the fact that my typing has gone to hell - I've become much clumsier, and so I'm constantly hitting the wrong keys when I type now, or several at once. And I'm also one of those people who doesn't like to wait for the spell-check at the end and so has to go correct her mistakes as soon as she sees them. Which is time-consuming, as you might imagine.
The biggest frustration I have is wanting to write or having ideas when I'm too physically exhausted to do anything about them. It's actually quite distressing sometimes to not only be barely able to stay awake, but also be desperate to write something important down that you know you'll forget in a few hours. I haven't found a solution to that yet.
I also gave up trying to follow a linear mode of writing/storytelling a long time ago. Now I just write chapters and snippets as they come to me, and form everything else around them as things develop. After all, I can always go back and change them later.
Nick says that, when we have the money, he'll help me get a laptop so that I can type in bed as well as write (and maybe even write less... I think he's trying to wean me off my stationary fetish), which could prove to be useful as long as I can alter the settings on the screen so that I wouldn't be staring at a bright white screen when the word processor is open. I'm also not holding my breath too much for the laptop because not only do our finances go up and down more often than a yo-yo right now, Nick being the techie elitiest that he is will be insisting on a good laptop, not one of the ones you can buy for a couple of hundred quid at Woolworths, no doubt.
But overall, my writing routines haven't changed all that much. I still handwrite at first, I still prefer to write whatever comes to me at a particular time, rather than in some sort of order, and I still have to correct every mistake I make as I see them, regardless of the trouble it causes. I wonder if that's helped or hindered me since I became ill...