Stuff and things...

[zinnith]

1. sgamadison wrote me a gorgeous birthday story - Woodstoves and Fireplaces. Thank you! *hugs*

2.

If you haven't yet voted in the McShep awards, it's time to do so! There are so many excellent stories that I wish I could vote for them all!

2,5. Thank you again for the nominations!

3. NaNoWriMo starts in a week! I have a bunch of characters and a very very vague plot which mostly consists of turning my main character into a cat. Much fun to be had! Also, I'll probably spend most of November in my NaNo-LJ: zinnith_nano so if you're interested in my life during NaNo, come over there and join the fun!

4. How nerdy is it that I now automatically code all my stories while I'm writing them? And speaking of code... how do you do the little hearts? I haven't been able to figure it out.

Comments

[vida-boheme.livejournal.com]

'&' then 'hearts' then ';'

♥

[zinfic.livejournal.com]

♥ ♥ ♥

Thank you! I'm going to use this far too much...

[vida-boheme.livejournal.com]

You're welcome (and the world needs more hearts!)

[sgamadison.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I have to try it now...

♥

OH YAY! I DID IT! Thanks!!

Also, I am nervously awaiting the start of nano. I'm signed up, should I be getting some emails or something? I have a vague idea of a story--at least, I have some characters in mind...yikes, I'm worried I'm not going to have time for this and yet I feel it is really important for me to try my hand with some original characters. I just read Stephen King's book "On Writing", which was encouraging because we apparently think similar things about writing as a craft (which means I'm not *totally* in left field, right?) and now I'm a bit afraid I'm going to overthink this whole thing...

[zinfic.livejournal.com]

♥ neat, isn't it?

I think I need to re-read On Writing, I seem to remember reading it many many years ago and I took a lot of it to heart - especially the 'writing as a craft' thing. Oh, how that got me in trouble in the writing forum I frequented for a while. Everyone else kept talking about muses and inspiration and I went 'If I only wrote when I felt inspired, I'd never get anything done!' I definitely think of writing as a craft, or maybe more as a job (an unpaid, unappreciated job, but still...) I just sit down and write my daily quota of words, whether I want to or not. But my big goal in life is to be a professional author - I doubt a publisher would accept the excuse 'I didn't feel inspired to write it' when I've blown a deadline.

I'm so excited about NaNo! I'm an ML so right now I'm busy planning for the kick off on Saturday. I'm going down to Stockholm to meet up with the writers there. I have a lot do do and I spent a fortune on train tickets, but it's worth it!

You should get a welcome mail, I think, and a bunch of pep mails from Chris Baty and a number of 'real' authors every week. But most of the fun happens in the forums *g* What username do you have on the NaNo site? I'll have to add you to my writer buddies *g*

[sgamadison.livejournal.com]

Well, it shows up when I log in, but I haven't received anything since I signed up and it's getting close enough that I thought I would by now...

I'm sgamadison over there too, BTW. I couldn't come up with anything else!

[zinfic.livejournal.com]

I can offer a little inside information - the first author pep mail is supposed to go out on Saturday :D I have no idea who the author is though...

[sgamadison.livejournal.com]

Okay...*looks around nervously*

I'm not really sure how the whole thing works, you know. Guess I can figure it out...

[zinfic.livejournal.com]

Is there anything in particular you have questions about? It's pretty straightforward really - midnight, November 1:st you can start writing. Midnight, November 30:th you stop. If you have 50 000 words by that time, you have won.

If you want to know what's happening in your area you can affiliate with the region of your choice - that way you should get messages from your local ML:s with information about kick-off and TGIO parties, write-ins and such things. (That is, if your ML:s are doing their jobs... I've yet to inform my poor non-forum going WriMos about the kick-off on Saturday... bad ML, no cookie!)

[sgamadison.livejournal.com]

I guess I was expecting some kind of email before now. As it is, I've barely had time to think about what I want to do. Yikes. I am a little worried about this. I wanted to try my hand at some original characters but now I'm not so sure. And I really don't have time to play around on the forums and such. (I did add you as a buddy though!)

You guys probably won't see or hear from me much this coming month--which might not be a bad thing!

[zinfic.livejournal.com]

I don't think you have anything to worry about, I know you can do it *hugs*. The trick is to give your inner editor the sack for the month and just concentrate on getting those 1667 words a day down on paper. It doesn't even have to be good words, they just need to be written. You don't have to show them to anyone if you don't want to!

[sgamadison.livejournal.com]

Now see, 1667 sounds *doable* to me. :-)

[zinfic.livejournal.com]

That's the beauty of it! 50k is a whole lot of words. 1667 a day, not so much *g*