Tag Archives: nanowrimo

Appendectomy, Mass Power Outage, and NaNoWriMo!

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What a week.

Mike had an appendectomy last Wednesday night, after I took him to the ER because I thought he had some kind of food poisoning or stomach bug. I so didn’t expect him to need surgery. I got like eight hours of sleep in three days because I worried so much and just couldn’t settle my nerves. Thankfully, he was only in the hospital one night and is recovering well. Just as I started to soothe my system into some semblance of normal, a Nor’easter hit us while I was at work Saturday afternoon.

For those of you lucky enough to not encounter one, a Nor’easter is a typical crazy New England snowstorm. We get tons of snow dumped on us, high winds, and very low temperatures. We’re pretty used to them… except we rarely get them this early. The snow was that wet, slushy, slippery kind, too, so I wasn’t looking forward to driving home in it with my currently crippled car. A coworker asked me to bring her home since her ride “couldn’t even get out of his driveway,” she said. I hated to say no, but I also really didn’t want to drive in it at all, never mind put someone else’s life in my hands in those conditions.

The store lost power twice in twenty minutes, so we ended up leaving like fifteen minutes early. The roads were a mess. She lives on a hill, of course, but had me drop her off at the bottom because she didn’t want me to risk getting stuck. I was already soaked from getting carts at work, so by the time I got home, all I wanted to do was cocoon myself in some sweats and blankets and sit by the radiator. Unfortunately, a few hours after I got home, we lost power.

We were out of power for four days (we lost it Saturday night and just got it back a few hours ago). Luckily, we have a gas stove on the third floor, so we were able to cook on it and boil water for different things. We also took advantage of the warm outside temperatures and opened up the blinds so that, during the day, we used the sunlight to warm up the house. Dad found a kerosene heater in the cellar and managed to find some kerosene in Thomaston (a town next to us), so he put that on the first floor so Noni and Biz Noni could stay warm. At night, I made myself into a human burrito in bed, and during the day we all bundled up. I can honestly say the only downside to this whole thing was not being able to take a shower, and not having a lot of laptop juice to write.

Mike’s mom got power earlier today, so he and I headed over this afternoon to take hot showers and charge some stuff. Naturally, a little while after we left, my mom texted me to tell me our power was back. As fortunate as we were throughout the last four days, I am definitely not complaining. There are still a lot of people out of power, though.

Between yesterday and today, I started working on my novel Secondhand Mom again. I decided a couple of weeks ago not to do the traditional NaNoWriMo this year, and decided instead to finish something I’d started during a previous NaNoWriMo. Secondhand Mom is actually almost done; yesterday, I went through the six or so documents I’d written different scenes in and moved them into the correct order in the master document the entire novel is in, and today I started writing another section of the novel. I had quite a mess on my hands yesterday, and since my laptop battery only last two to three hours, by the time I finished all of that, I only had forty minutes to actually write today. (I did a little writing yesterday, but mostly just a couple of “connecting” sections as I moved sections into the master document.) Altogether, I had 66,810 words before yesterday, and now have 65,414. It might seem like I made no progress, but believe me, I did; I actually had written the same scene twice — in two completely different ways — over a period of one year, and needed to scrap another section entirely because in the year or so since I wrote it, I completely changed my mind about how that character was going to come back. After today, I have only two documents I’m working on for this novel: the master one, and the section I’m writing now.

So it’s been a hell of a week. My family and extended family are all okay, and even though Mike is still sore and now has a sinus infection on top of everything, he’s okay, too. That’s all that matters to me.

How has your week been? How did you fare during the Snowpocalypse and the power outage? Are you doing NaNoWriMo? What’s your word count? (I guess mine would technically be 886, hahaha.)

To NaNoWriMo or Not to NaNoWriMo

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I can’t decide whether I want to do NaNoWriMo again this year. We’re almost halfway through October, though, so if I’m going to do it, I need to decide soon so that I’ll have enough time for prewriting!

So far, I haven’t come up with an idea that I love enough to write an entire novel about… never mind an entire novel in a month! If the idea doesn’t hit me soon, I might just use the time to finish Secondhand Mom. Those characters have been banging around in my head lately, demanding for their stories to be finished.

Are you doing NaNoWriMo this year? What’s your novel about?

Add me on the NaNoWriMo site and I’ll add you back!

I Did It, and Other Things

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I did it. I registered for ECE at the community college. I’m not matriculated just yet (because I’m a readmit and apparently there’s a specific period when they rematriculate readmitting students), but I submitted my readmission application, got my letter from the college saying they’ve received my FAFSA, and did all of this without having an anxiety attack of, “I CAN’T DECIDE, I CAN’T COMMIT.”

I did it.

And, I’m excited about it.

I’ll be able to register for my classes soon and then buy my books, and then I’ll officially be an ECE student. Last night as I was falling asleep, I thought, I’m going to get to teach kids how to talk! and that was the most exciting thing. The only thing that sucks is, I have to wait until January to start. It’s going to be 2012 before I’m officially in school again. That’s kind of a weird thought, even though it’s not actually so far away.

It’s probably a good thing, though, because I have plenty of time to get everything else in order. I’m looking for a second job, at least for during the holiday season. The one I have is only giving me an average of fifteen hours a week, which is nothing; every Friday, I pay a couple bills, and then I’m broke again. I have no extra money for gas or doctors’ copays, or vitamins, or anything. I keep asking for more hours, and they say more are coming or that they’re going to cross-train me in another department so I’ll have more hours that way, but so far, nothing. I’m only making $100-135 a week. If I were still a teenager, that’d be cool, but not so much now. I work my ass off at my job, and my manager — who is also human resources — is always commenting on how hard I work and how well kept the registers always are when I’m working, so you’d think I’d have cross-trained already or they’d at least through me another five hours a week, but no.

I’m not going to talk about that anymore, though, because it just frustrates me.

I’m still trying to come up with an idea for NaNoWriMo. Nothing appeals to me. At this rate, I might just use the time to finish Secondhand Mom instead of starting anything new. I don’t know, though; I hate the idea of not doing NaNoWriMo this year. I also hate that I keep talking and thinking about finishing Secondhand Mom, when all I have to do is just do it.

I bought a four-pack of Play Doh, because who said you have to be a kid to have fun? I haven’t opened it yet, though.

Speaking of fun, I discovered that my laptop has Windows Movie Maker on it, so I’m trying to come up with an idea for a video. I’m so glad I didn’t buy any video editing software. Someone told me I should have Windows Movie Maker but I couldn’t find it, so I’ve had my eye on some Sony video editing software for a while. I stumbled upon WMM the other day while digging through the Accessories section looking for I don’t even know what. Thanks for hiding that, Microsoft.

Maybe I’ll make a stop motion movie using my Play Doh.

It's All Writers' Block to Me

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My writing has been suffering for months. I can write a post about my life, or music, or Grey’s Anatomy, but when I sit down to write a story or work on an idea for NaNoWriMo, something happens. Actually, a few somethings happen.

Scenario 1: I sit down and start writing a story, get about a paragraph or maybe a page into it, then stop and never come back.

Scenario 2: I sit down and write about two sentences to a paragraph of a story, leave it for a few days or weeks, then come back and write a few more paragraphs, and then a few days later finish it.

Scenario 3: I come up with a great idea for a story, then lose faith in it before doing any real prewriting.

It’s making me crazy. I used to sit down and write a whole short story or a whole chapter for a novel in one shot. I was looking forward to NaNoWriMo to fix whatever’s wrong with me, but Scenario 3 happened and I’ve got nothin’. Fortunately, the one story I have been able to complete lately turned out pretty good, according to my writers’ group, but this is probably unfortunate because if I could actually write like I normally do, I might have five good stories instead of just one.

I want to write. I just can’t seem to make the magic happen. A couple months ago, I thought it might be that I needed to get out of the house and away from distractions, so I went to the Starbucks café at Barnes and Noble… and just sat staring at my laptop screen for an hour or so before my battery died. I’m still writing Astrid and Dante with Mary, but even then it takes me a good hour before I can even write a sentence in response. I’ve tried music, which usually makes a great muse, but now it only distracts me more. I really had to force myself to write “Loving Guererra,” the story I did finish, and I honestly kind of just hated myself for it the whole time. It wasn’t fun like it normally is.

Hell, if I’m going to be completely honest, the blog posts I write take an hour or two longer than usual, too.

I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t know why I’ve got literary constipation, but here we are.

How do you cure your writers’ block? Please tell me! I need your help!

2010 in 700 words

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Mike and me, New Year's Eve (taken by Sandy)

Mike and me, New Year's Eve (taken by Sandy)

Last year was a lot of things. I’m not naive enough to believe that the year itself was evil, and that this year will make all of the bad of last year go away. I can, however, look back at the ups and downs, and try to take something from it. I can also admit that this was totally not my idea, and that I stole it from Jess.

I started off the year a university dropout, working two jobs, trying to figure out what I wanted in life and what was going on with my body, worried about my grandfather, and minus a good friend. I ended the year with a good idea of who I am and what I want for my career, a better picture of what might be going on with me, working one job, minus a grandfather, and plus a good friend. Life is very strange.

At the beginning of the year, I started rebuilding one of the most important relationships in my life. I am so grateful that Sandy and I were able to fix things.

Sandy and me, New Year's Eve (taken by Sandy)

Sandy and me, New Year's Eve (taken by Sandy)

I also gained about twenty pounds, thanks to a depression medication called Seroquel. As soon as I realized that was why I gained so much weight, I stopped taking it. I haven’t — knock on wood — felt the need to take medication for my depression since. I started working out, and also rediscovered softball.

In April, I got my second tattoo, to represent my family.

Because we didn’t know how much time Popi had left, we started seeing my two cousins, Mindy and Vinny, more often, even though we hadn’t seen either of them in a long time (both from different circumstances). It sucked that it took Popi being really sick to get everyone together again, but it made me so happy to have all of us together. I know it made him really happy, too.

Lauren, me, Mindy, and Vinny, July 2010

Lauren, me, Mindy, and Vinny, July 2010

Just a couple of weeks after we were all together, Popi took a turn for the worst… and we lost him on July 9th, 2010, early in the morning. I was dreaming that he was gone as my parents woke me up to tell my sister and me that he had passed. It still hurts, especially since my birthday and Christmas card from Noni were signed just from her. I would give anything for his name to be on those cards, too, for him to be here with us now, healthy.

Not long after Popi’s memorial service, Mike’s family lost their house, his mom and stepfather separated, and he had nowhere to go. So, he moved in with me, my parents, my sister, and our two cats. Our relationship has strengthened since he moved in, even though I had been afraid living together might be a bad thing.

In October, at New York Comic Con, I learned that my mystery autoimmune disease has severe physical limitations. Because I’d spent a day walking, I spent the next three or four days unable to walk without being in pain.

November was probably the weirdest month of all. My worst flareup ever began with weird itchiness all over and an even weirder rash on my face, I got my first rejection letter for a short story, my blood work came back all kinds of positive and my doctor referred me to a (third) rheumatologist because he thinks I have Lupus, and I wrote and finished the first draft of a 50,000+ word novel.

In December, I found out that I inherited migraines from my mom’s side of the family. It was only the third or fourth I’ve ever had, but it was by far the worst. I hope it’s a long, long time before I get another one.

December 2010

December 2010

I definitely went through a lot this past year. I’d like to say that I wouldn’t change any of it, that I wouldn’t be who I am without all that happened, and that I’m grateful for that kind of shaping, but I would give anything to have my Popi back. I also wouldn’t mind living without chronic illness and pain. I am, however, grateful for the good things that happened, because if there hadn’t been so much good, I wouldn’t have been able to cope with the bad.