Category Archives: Writing

On Weekly Goals And Keeping Updated Records

Well.

On Monday Jan mentioned in a comment on my word count that I seemed to be past my week’s goal.

And I said no, that I was a thousand words below it.

It has just occured to me, looking at my current word count (18,568 for those who must know), that I am now officially a thousand words ahead of this week’s goal. When replying to Jan, I was looking at my total as of last Friday, which was 16.5ishK, and not this Monday’s total at all. I hadn’t yet updated my handwritten sheet with the totals and weekly goals on it that I use for reference.

She was right. As of Monday, I was already five hundred words ahead of where I need to be by this Friday. (Which is, in actuality, by the end of today, since I’m not working this Friday.)

This (plus whatever else I accomplish this afternoon) sounds like a big lead, but losing Friday and Monday as work days is going to balance it out, putting me square back on schedule when I pick up again next Wednesday. (At which time I’ll start working to create a new lead to cover the three days I’ll lose to Thanksgiving and a retreat.)

So yay me, and yay Jan, and yay to the word count and the updated goal sheet. Now, back to work.

Work Update

The other project I was invited to work on that was supposed to come after ESTC has been temporarily put on hold (not dead, I’m told, just resting for an undefined period of time), so I won’t be leaping from writing one contracted book into another this fall. I’m a bit disappointed, because hey, it’s work and I like the subject a lot, but at the same time I’m thankful, because taking a couple of months off will be very, very nice and also good for my mental health. I’ll be able to focus on writing other books again, like Swan Sister, and editing the other ones lying around here. Plus I’ll finally get the down time of Liam being at daycare a couple of days a week without having to formally work those days. I can’t complain about the timing of contracts falling into my lap right when Liam started daycare, but a bit of a break would have been nice.

Okay: off to get the boy. And to fill the gas tank to the brim with gas that’s priced at 97 cents per litre along the way! Nice timing, what with our long drive coming up.

Slump

I can see the bottom molars in Liam’s mouth when he opens his mouth to cry about them — not just the bumps, but the actual teeth. They’re covered by such a thin layer of skin. If they don’t come through in the next couple of days I don’t know what I’ll do; he’s going crazy, and taking the rest of us with him. I know it will pass. He doesn’t.

I had to cancel Maggie’s follow-up appointment at the vet tomorrow, because the retest is going to cost half of what the original appointment cost, significantly more than I expected it to. I made another appointment for the following week. We’ll see if we can keep that one.

I am having a thoroughly miserable day. Because we’re driving on Friday and I won’t be able to write I had this afternoon slotted for work while Liam plays with his godparents for a couple of hours, even though all I wanted to do was curl up and hide under the covers and give myself time off from everything. (Sleep would have been nice, but just hiding was attractive in and of itself.) Instead of either, I ended up doing an in-depth vacuuming when I got home because I couldn’t stand walking on toast crumbs all over the place any more, cleaning up the bedroom because I couldn’t stand not having a single room that I felt comfortable in, and handling correspondence. Now it’s less than half an hour before I have to leave to pick the boy up again, and I feel like I’ve achieved nothing. There will be toast crumbs all over the place again tomorrow, the bedroom will be a mess again tonight, I’ve done no work on the book, and I didn’t sit down and zone out for even a moment. There’s been absolutely no improvement to my state of mind or spirit.

I hate not enjoying being in my own home. I hate not being able to relax. I hate that I can’t stop my son’s pain. I hate feeling guilty for wanting to hand my son to someone else for a while even though I know that a sane parent is a better parent and he benefits well from a change in company and environment.

This thing called life can go take a long walk off a short pier. I need a holiday.

ESTC Update

Naughty books to distract me. Bad.

But I came back:

Total word count, ESTC: 18,093
Total words today: 1,659

Zokutou word meterZokutou word meter
18,093 / 50,000
(36.2%)

So there, evil tempty books.

(Where am I going to shelve the new evil tempty research books? Waaah!)

A is for Adler and Ashcroft-Nowicki, B is for Budapest and Bonewits, C is for Cunningham and Crowley…

I just spent half an hour rearranging my Craft books alphabetically by author, because I couldn’t find something that I needed to reference. Argh.

I kept the herbalism books and the cultural/mythological stuff separate, though, because with those it’s just easier to zero in on the subject and then look for what I need within it.

And I just realised that I have about twenty books piled next to my desk, because I’ve been using them as research for ESTC. I’ll have to try to fit them back onto the main shelves eventually. No wonder there was enough room for everything. I should have known it was all too easy.

ESTC Update

That’s more like it.

Total word count, ESTC: 16,434
Total words today: 2,013

Zokutou word meterZokutou word meter
16,434 / 50,000
(32.9%)

Today was all about animals, expanding the notes I’d jotted down a few weeks ago. Not thrilling, not writing about which to be very excited, but solid. And progress.

I’m about a thousand words away from where I have to be at the end of next Friday. That kind of margin keeps me feeling comfortable. If I lose my lead, then I’ll eventually be in a position where I’ll have to produce my daily quota or more every time I sit down to write, and as we’ve seen over the past week, for various reasons that doesn’t always happen. Being ahead gives me room to move, as well as covering the days I won’t able to work, like the two long weekends in September when I’ll be travelling, as well as Thanksgiving. And since I now have Liam’s cold (it was going to happen sooner or later), I may need one of my work days next week to just sleep, or at least curl up in bed with boxes of Kleenex, cats, a pot of tea, a highlighter, my notebook, and a pile of research books.

Now I’m going to make apple muffins for the CMS open house tonight, then go get Liam. Or at least mix the batter, seeing as it’s 4:30. I can bake them once we get home.