Day 16 - 13,963 (27.9%)
I doubled my word count on Friday by attending a write-in hosted by the DFW NaNoWriMo group. It was a unique experience and I was glad that I went, even if I had to force myself to go.
After a long day of work, I packed up all of the energy drinks in the house, grabbed my laptop and hit the road. The even was being held at a church in Arlington, which is pretty much the next town over, so it wasn't far from home, even though I had to jump on the interstate.
The moment I arrived, I had to talk myself into actually getting out of the car and inside before I decided it would just be easier to turn around and go home. I did all right until I found the room where everyone was gathered because it was packed to capacity with chatty people, all of whom looked younger than me and more like they belonged at an event like this one. I persevered and managed to shoehorn my fat ass into a little corner by the door after they assured me that we would be moving into a larger room as soon as soon as the wedding rehearsal also going on had cleared out.
An hour later and we were able to move into the other room, which was much better for my back and the leg that kept falling asleep from being bent at a bad angle. The main room was spacious enough fro several round tables to be set up and I randomly chose one on the edge that had good power supply access and snagged a seat where I could keep my back to the bulk of the room so that I could attempt to stay focused.
The organizers had people bring food to share and in turn provided words, "plot ninjas", and arranged word wars to help people boost their word count if they got stuck at some point. The event was held from 7pm to 7am the next morning and I made it through most of it, arriving at 8pm and staying until 6am. I did really well until about 4am and then sleep deprivation really started to slow me down. Also, the scene that I started working on in the early morning seemed to get unexpectedly serious and I was pretty much flailing as a writer. Fortunately, it all worked out well in the end and I managed to keep at it even though I wanted to pack it in several times.
There was flailing, repetitive stress injuries, indecision and too many energy drinks confused, but at about a thousand words an hour, I went from 6k words to almost 14k. Not as much as I'd hoped for, but I impressed myself and actually got somewhere with the story. Totally worth the fatigue and lack of words the next day!
After a long day of work, I packed up all of the energy drinks in the house, grabbed my laptop and hit the road. The even was being held at a church in Arlington, which is pretty much the next town over, so it wasn't far from home, even though I had to jump on the interstate.
The moment I arrived, I had to talk myself into actually getting out of the car and inside before I decided it would just be easier to turn around and go home. I did all right until I found the room where everyone was gathered because it was packed to capacity with chatty people, all of whom looked younger than me and more like they belonged at an event like this one. I persevered and managed to shoehorn my fat ass into a little corner by the door after they assured me that we would be moving into a larger room as soon as soon as the wedding rehearsal also going on had cleared out.
An hour later and we were able to move into the other room, which was much better for my back and the leg that kept falling asleep from being bent at a bad angle. The main room was spacious enough fro several round tables to be set up and I randomly chose one on the edge that had good power supply access and snagged a seat where I could keep my back to the bulk of the room so that I could attempt to stay focused.
The organizers had people bring food to share and in turn provided words, "plot ninjas", and arranged word wars to help people boost their word count if they got stuck at some point. The event was held from 7pm to 7am the next morning and I made it through most of it, arriving at 8pm and staying until 6am. I did really well until about 4am and then sleep deprivation really started to slow me down. Also, the scene that I started working on in the early morning seemed to get unexpectedly serious and I was pretty much flailing as a writer. Fortunately, it all worked out well in the end and I managed to keep at it even though I wanted to pack it in several times.
There was flailing, repetitive stress injuries, indecision and too many energy drinks confused, but at about a thousand words an hour, I went from 6k words to almost 14k. Not as much as I'd hoped for, but I impressed myself and actually got somewhere with the story. Totally worth the fatigue and lack of words the next day!