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 Wed Oct 09, 2002 « recent »
* Inkygirl *
Filk FAQ
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So call me stark raving mad, but I've signed up for National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo), an annual challenge to write 50,000 words in November. Yes, I know I'm still working on another novel, but this will be even more incentive for me to finally finish revising my current novel before the end of October. There are no prizes, no promises of publication, authors keep all rights, no entry fees (though a $10 donation is encouraged), not even an obligation to post your entry unless you want to. The main incentive is just to see if you can do it or not. Yes, I'm sure 50,000 words written in a month won't be particularly well-written, but then I figure I can revise and edit it to death after it's done. 50,000 is short for an adult novel, but a pretty good size for a young adult novel. I might also make my novel consist of a bunch of shorter sections, each of which I could turn into a chapter book for younger readers. I have too many ideas; it's a matter of choosing between them. The creator of the NanoWriMo stresses that the winning strategy is "quantity, not quality". :-) 50,000 words in a month means I have to write an average of 1,666 words a day. For my fiction novel writing, I find I generally can write about 800-1200 words on a good day (I can write non-fiction more quickly). Heck, I usually write 600-800 words every day in my Blatherings. However, when I was under deadline pressure while co-writing the fantasy short story with Michelle, I found I could churn out 1500-2000 words a day. It made me realize how much more productive I can be under deadline pressure. Can I write 50,000 words in a month? I'm looking forward to finding out. Anyone else out there going to sign up for National Novel Writing Month, too? Movable Type has a new release available, woohoo! I downloaded and installed it immediately, of course. One of the cool new features is the search function. I was using Picosearch, which is great but will only index up to 1500 pages for free. This is fine for most personal sites, I know. In fact, if you're at ALL interested in making your site searchable, you should take a look at Picosearch. It's really easy to implement (you don't have to be a techie). I told Moira Allen about it a while back and she put it on Writing World with no problems. Over my five years of online journalling, however, I've accumulated nearly 1500 entries, and anticipated running into my indexing limit sometime next year; the cheapest pricing Picosearch option is US$250/year, so I was wondering what else I could use. Now that Movable Type has integrated a search function, I don't have to worry anymore. The search function looks pretty flexible. I've only implemented the simplest version so far, and am experimenting with the different options, and also plan to modify the search results template. By the way, I have to say that I'm super-pleased with Movable Type so far, and it keeps getting better. The most recent version of MT had 85 changes or additions, making it clear that the authors are constantly improving the software and listening to user suggestions. And it's free! (a $20 donation is encouraged) I rarely have to rebuild my site (one of my initial complaints about MT), and when I do, it takes less than a minute. The MT authors encourage outside users to contribute comments and additions, so there are also plenty of plug-ins available. I decided to implement the word count plug-in when I upgraded, just out of idle curiosity to see how many words I write for my Blatherings. I'm highly intrigued by the TrackBack development, which encourages linking and interaction between different blogs. I might implement that option as well. So little time, so much to experiment with! Speaking of experimentation, I've started to add things to my CafePress store. I don't expect to ever get rich off this (I get about a dollar for every t-shirt purchased), but it's fun to be able to put some of my cartoons on t-shirts and other stuff. Some Waiting For Frodo fans recently wrote and asked if I could put one of their favourite strips on a t-shirt, so I obliged. Links/News: One year ago, I took nature pics at the cottage during Thanksgiving weekend. Four years ago, Allison and Jodi took me to be tortured. Five years ago, I saw The Full Monty. Do you sneer at children's books? Perhaps these Fairy Tales For The Erudite are for you (or your genius children). Blatherphoto: I took this picture of a reflective mirror (I'm in the bottom left corner) while waiting for Jeff, who was in the changeroom, in the Men's Clothing department in the Bay a few days ago. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
