Monday, November 7, 2011

Wipmadness Check-in Week 2:
Almost There

First order of business: Wipmadness Team Pride!

Crafted by our very own, L.S. Taylor, this blog badge captures the spirit of our endeavor. Feel free to jump over to her blog to copy/paste the image url, or simply grab it below!

#Wipmadness Participant!

A little preamble:

Whenever my husband and I take a car trip, I read to him. This saves on otherwise expensive audio books, keeps us both amused, and allows me to indulge in a little practice for when I'm published and have to read aloud.  ;)

Especially when the book drags -- for instance, when it's LoTR and our hobbits are meandering in a forest -- I always finish up a section with an optimistic, "We're almost there, hon!" Of course, the effect is somewhat diminished by his glancing over to find we've barely bitten off the first hundred pages and have five or six hundred to go.

Anyway, #wipmadness peeps, all this to say, we're almost there! No matter what your goals were last week, you are seven days closer to being out of the forest--er, to achieving those goals.

My goals were:
  1. Write 2,200 words a day for NaNoWriMo. Some days were a struggle, but I managed to make the count each day this week.
  2. Stretch my poor, pathetic, immobile ankles. I missed one morning (Wednesday), but otherwise success!
  3. Log my food intake. I only missed one night out with the gals.
This week, Goals 2 & 3 are the same, but I'm changing Goal 1 because, in a nutshell, I've decided to avoid the Sunk Cost Fallacy (see also Sunk Cost Dilemma). More on this later.

So, Goal 3 for this month is to finish another round of edits on McCorduck 7, my MG WIP.

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How did you do this week? Need to add/subtract, augment, slash, forever destroy anything? Let us know so we can cheer you on!

17 comments:

  1. Yay for having a WIPMadness badge!

    I had a great week of editing, with several chapters successfully rewritten. I'm going for a big push this week and trying to get the rest of the book done. My goal was the end of this month, but I'm aiming high!

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  2. Woohoo for the badge! My week was not too bad. I added 3,000+ words and made some good strides in sketching out the climax details. I've hit a few speed bumps with a couple of sick kids, but fighting through it all the time.

    AND I finally met a writer in Albany!! That's one :-)

    This week...keep cranking on the climax and get at least 500 words a day. Nanowrimo is giving me a good excuse to ignore my family and escape into the WIP-ville.

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  3. Great work, mad women! This past week I put down words on the WIP and then turned back to revisions. Working to nail down the first 15 pages. Not sure whether or not I'm there yet because I can't see them with fresh eyes. HELP!!! If anyone would like to help me out, please DM me on twitter.

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  4. Lora! Great work! And great work, everyone else too, wow!

    Love the wipmadness badge. I had trouble downloading it from here, but I'll try it from LS's.

    I met my 1K-a-day goal! And I did it already today for the first day of this week, so I feel like I can really keep it up. I'm happy to participate in any sprints or dashes or what have you this week. I'll keep an eye out for you all!

    Kip

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  5. Angelina - send 'em to me - you've got my e-mail.

    Good job all on the Nano-ing - I miss the days of being lost in a story.

    But thanks to lovely, lovely beta readers, I still feel pretty much on target to send this puppy (or should I say colt - haha) to agent man at the end of the week. I had lots of hilarious encouragement yesterday on Twitter that made me feel like a million bucks (at least in my imagination!) and as a result am getting a wee bit excited about this manuscript. It's my first, dare I say it, commercial venture.

    I also finished 2 books last week, a Julie Ann Peters book and I reread The Hunger Games - I still think its brilliant.

    I'm a little aimless this month but that's okay as I've been working my tail off for quite some time.

    Thanks L.S. for the badge. I'll grab it later. :0)

    And continued good writing to you each!

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  6. Sounds like a lot of great writerly biz going on out there!

    Jennifer, isn't it nice when revising doesn't involve tearing our hair out? ;D I have no doubt you'll be able to sparkly up the rest of the book this week.

    Mary Ann - Yay for a new potential crit partner?? Love meeting in-the-flesh writers. Good job on your 3K new words, even with the sick kiddos. Luck for this coming week!

    Angelina - You're rocking. I'd love to look at the pages :)

    Kip, Oh noes! Hopefully, you can get the badge over at L.S.'s. Good work on meeting your 1K. May this week be as or more abundant with words!

    Jaye--Rats. I missed out on sending the love. So this is the week, huh? The book goes out to the agent and we get to squee with you when he <333s it! Very excited.

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  7. I'm not doing NaNo, but good job on yours! Word counts like those make my head spin ;)

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  8. Sounds like you've made great progess on your goals, Lora!

    Angelina - thirded! (Or fourthed. I lost count.) You've my e-mail address, feel free to send them!

    My goals:

    1. NaNoWriMo. Well, I'm on track so far. I also went and took some holidays so that I have every Monday in November off. So I'm writing this from the coffee shop where we hold our write-ins. I'd like to get a bit ahead because I'm not sure how much progress I'll make during the week. But we have Friday off as well this week, so there's that to be taken into consideration.

    2. Pay attention to what I'm eating. Yes and no. I've been writing it down, at least, but even though we kept the amount of Halloween candy in our house down to a minimum, we still had a bunch left over. (Living in a basement suite means that sometimes the kids come to our house and sometimes they don't.) That plus having folks over for my Friday Late Night write-ins for NaNo meant that I didn't eat as well as I'd have liked. But I'm trying and doing the best I can all the same.

    3. Exercise and fitness: Um, not going so well. Partly due to the amount of time NaNo is taking, but also because of the unavoidable truth: I'm feeling very low-energy and my MS is acting up as a result. I hope to make it to sword class this week. Being strong and staying strong matter to me, and I hate feeling weak.

    4. Squeeze in some reading time. Yes. I finished GRACELING. And a book came in for me at the library with a due date of December 4th. I'll try to get to it, but I don't know if it'll be this week, partly due to the low-energy and partly due to NaNo. (This is why I want to get ahead. I mean, I managed 67 K last year ...)
    - Laura

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  9. I've been getting a bunch of agent-research done, and have a handful of queries out there now. I read the top book on my pile (Lauren Myracle's SHINE) and now... I'm restless. And I think I've talked myself into starting NaNo a week late, because even though I have NO OUTLINE and NO REAL IDEA WHATSOEVER, I need to write. So... this week I write!!

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  10. YAY for the badge! Nice job, LS!!! I'm enjoying my writing day and just finished my second session. I logged two pages of editing, then wrote 1,527 words. I'd like to add another 1K during the week. My other goal is to read. Sounds silly, but I have to carve out time for this.

    Great job everybody!!

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  11. Good luck with your NANO goals! I am trying to finish my new book by the end of the year.. can't quite pull off the word count for NANO.

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  12. You all are seriously rockin' the goals!

    The badge is great too LS! I can't wait to put it up on my blog:)

    This past week I realized I am totally nuts wanting to get three rounds of edits done in a week and a half! I have changed that to finishing the first round of edits(I have about 100 pages left) by the end of the week and beginning betas by the end of Novemeber.

    The other goals remain the same:)

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  13. Love the badge! I snagged on for my blog. Thanks so much for hosting. I'm finally back to regular writing, thanks in part to nanowrimo. I hope to have a new novel in 23 more days!

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  14. txs for introducing me to NaNoWriMo.It seems like a very useful tool for a writer. Good luck on your projects and kisses on the cheeks :).

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  15. Thanks, Charlie. I'm not actually doing nano anymore, though. Wasn't working for me: :)

    Laura, I'm sorry you're feeling so lo w-energy. That's tough, because then goals seem like just one more thing to sap your reserve. On the exercise front, just going for a walk around the coffee shop a few times can count, plus I find it fills the energy tank a bit. We'll be thinking of you throughout this week!

    Shari, How adventurous of you! Welcome to the crazy that is the writing process of a restless pantser. :D Good luck! And good job getting queries out. That process can be UNFUN.

    Lori, It totally doesn't sound silly. Carving out time to read is sooo hard and usually results, for me, in lack of sleep. You're making your word count goals, though!

    Alexia, Nice. I love finish-the-book goals. I almost think those ar e more realistic and important than word counts. Luck and fun!

    Deana, Hahaha! I'm totally not laughing at you, by the way, but I did think you were nuts with the 3 edits/week goal :) I wouldn't had to make a cutout cartoon picture of you and stick you on my fridge as my new superhero. Nway, good luck, dear! I hope you fly through edits and have very little stress.

    Denise,
    Hooray! Glad you grabbed the badge. I took a peek at your blog to see if you'd put it up yet :) 22 more days now. Enjoy!

    Unikorna, You're such a sweet friend. Thanks for stopping by. The wipmadness crazy will last thru Nov, but then I'll be back to the usual. <333

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  16. Hello,

    Checking in, but not a lot to report, alas. Last week was sort of a bust. I wrote the synopsis for the new project, but became busy on other things, prep for a stress busting extra-curricular activity, so to speak. And I found out just how out of practice one can get with an RPG system if one doesn’t play for a while. Still, I’m back on the story now and still look toward getting the new work written in 3 weeks. On the upside, I did realize that the contest ends January 31st, not January 1st, so I have a little more time. That doesn’t mean I’m allowed to slow down though, I will finish in 3 weeks, but it does mean I have a little more time for betas to respond.

    On another front, my wife wants to take Friday off (she has the day off for Veterans Day). So, I have to try to get my weekly word goal in 4 days. I’ve done it before, but I’m still not sure I’m going to make it this time. We’ll see, I guess. If I do get the 10k, that’ll put me over a third of the way there, which is kinda fun to think about, actually. ;)

    Nothing new on the workout front, though. Joints and back have been bothering me, which gives me zero motivation to start. However, my wife has started rearranging, so I’m getting some workout anyway carrying furniture. Course, that’s also why my spine feels a bit outta whack today too... Durn auto-immune crap.

    And I know what you mean about the low energy, Laura. With Crohn's, I have that fairly frequently. Do what you can and don't fret the stuff you can't.

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  17. Daniel, It's good that your giving yourself that little extra push to try for the 10k in 4 days, even if you don't make it. And the push to exercise. It can be sheer frustration to push a workout when you start at low energy. Though I've always found energy reserve once I get the blood pumping. Maybe start with deep breathing to get the blood flow?

    Good luck with your goals this week! It's always nice to find you've got an extra few days, like finding money in your pocket at random!

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