NaNoWriMo: 50,049 Words! I Have Tips & Tricks! Don't Give Up!

Woo hoo!  I made it!  I tell you, the moment I glanced down and saw my word count tick over 50,000 my shoulders slumped in relief.

I've crossed the finish line of my first marathon, and it feels so good!

Allow me a moment of gratuitous celebration - yessssssss!

Man, did I just sneak though or what?  3 days to go, and now I can spend some time editing, not that I have room to edit too much or my numerical barometer will dip back into the 49,000s.

If you're languishing just below the mark, here are a few tips and tricks to tip the balance in your favour.  I don't endorse all of them, I have used some of them myself, but at the end of the day, if you're running your first marathon it doesn't matter how you cross the line, as long as you do!  Don't give up!

1. Always spell out numbers (I try to do this)
2. Ask yourself ‘what’s the worst thing that could possibly happen to your character right now?’ and then write it into the story (I've done this one too)
3. Digress – have your character think back to something which happened to them at school, or last week
4. Introduce a new character, or make a minor character into a bigger part (Yup, used this one)
5. Do you have a villain?  Or at least someone creating tension?  If not, introduce one. (two of my characters screw up along the way)
6. Write an epilogue or a prologue.
7. Use characters’ full names and make them long (only if you have to)
8. Kill off one of your characters so the remaining characters can reminisce about the good times they used to have and you can describe the grieving process (with lots of adjectives)
9. Never use hyphens
10. If you’re very desperate, expand your contractions (really only if you have to)
11. Spend time describing your surroundings, and do it precisely
12. Give your characters a voice – dialogue takes up space, and don’t forget to add who’s talking:  she said, she replied, she nodded (all my characters talk out loud)
13. Build in a dream sequence
14. Have your character listen to some music or sing karaoke – better yet, have a karaoke party!
15. Gratuitous adverb usage – these can really, wonderfully, truly and absolutely help increase your word count
16. Give your character a time out to think about things – describe what s/he is doing – for example, at work
17. Name your chapters, add a poem/quote at the beginning which suits the chapter
18. Create an echo (cave, empty room, haunted house)
19. Have your character keep a diary
20. Have a character with Alzheimer’s so things have to be explained several times
21. Have your characters speak another language that you have to translate
22. Give all your characters a back-story
23. Have a character with Alzheimer’s so things have to be explained several times
24. Take your characters out to dinner so you can describe the restaurant, the food, the wine… all in great detail, with lots of adjectives

There are still three days full of writing potential to go ("that is seventy two hours," she thought to herself longingly whilst scratching her head and thinking about when she might go to bed that night).  Turn on the music ("don't give up, you know it's true, gotta do what you've gotta do," she sang), decide which character is going to kill off the other, describe, elaborate, then give the killer amnesia.

And then they woke up!

NaNoWriMo Day 21: 28,024 Words

Yes, yes, I know I'm hopelessly behind but all is not lost.  I can do it! 

Just last week I would have told you I was running out of steam, that my plot lacked real substance, and that things were far too easy for my heroine.  She would have lived, suffered and triumphed all within 20,000 words.

That was before my literary muse stepped in and the resulting inspiration was the jolt my waning storyline needed.  Optimism has returned, as has a renewed stubborn resolution to see this through.

Photo by Bachtiar Rahady on FlickR

Have you ever thought about writing a novel?  I hadn't really.  It's a huge step up from a few blog posts, that's for sure.  

These are a few of the things which seem to be helping:

1.  Invest time up front to structure your story.  

You may want to jump straight into the creative process, but simply defining what your story is about is immensely helpful for keeping the story on track.  Trust the formula:

Disturbance: An event (can be small), that interrupts the main characters blissful life. It could have happened before the story begins.

1st Doorway: The event that pushes the character out of their comfort zone and sets them on the path to face the novel's conflict as they can't go back to their ordinary life without seeing the story out.

Midpoint:  The point where the character stops reacting to what's going on around them and starts being proactive.

2nd Doorway: The event which sets the main character on the unavoidable path to the climax and resolution of the story.

Then organise it into the Three-Act Structure:

Act I (The Beginning) – Introduce the character/overall story problem and creates the bond between the reader and the main character (the sooner the better).  The world of the story is established, as is the tone, pace, opposition etc.  The beginning ends when the character passes through the first doorway.

Act II (The Middle) – The confrontation takes place, subplots play out and plot twists keep the reader motivated and engaged, caring about the characters.  This builds to the climax in part three and ends when the character passes through the second doorway.

Act III (The End) – The resolution.  The climax takes place and the reader learns whether the main character achieves their goal and what happens.  Loose ends are tied up.

If you can fill these out with simple sentences, like your elevator pitch, then you're away.  Once I know where I'm going, I've been surprised by how enjoyable and easy the writing is.  The voices appear in my head and I'm really just transcribing their conversations on my computer like a diligent court reporter.  It's funny, in any other context transcribing the voices in my head would mean I was probably going nuts.  Perhaps I am...

Trust the formula.  

2.  Make Time for Writing

Unfortunately for me I'm working longer hours than usual this month, which is not ideal for writing, but in the spirit of 'you can do anything for a month' I'm getting up at 5.30am each morning to write for a few hours before work, and then after work taking at least an hour off to clear by brain and give my eyes a break from staring at a computer screen all day before writing until around 11pm.  Tonight I also had to bake muffins for a charity bake sale we're having at work tomorrow, so I'm working a bit later than usual.  They're delicious by the way.

3.  Do. Not. Edit. As. You. Go.  Do not do it.

This is incredibly difficult for me.  I spend so much time deleting sentences, correcting spelling mistakes and pausing to contemplate which synonym sounds better in the sentence.  Do not do it.  What ever you have to do to stop yourself editing, do it.  Do not stop writing.  At the moment I am typing with my eyes shut so I can't see the mistakes I'm making.  It's actually working well.  It helps me focus on the story and how my characters sound, and the words seem to flow better.

Next time I'll fill you in on some of the ways I've bolstered my word count.  There are tons of ticks out there, some of which I think are a little outrageous and completely undermine the quality of the writing, but some of them are actually genius.

If you're a bit behind like me don't give up!!  There is still one full weekend and one working week left.  You can do it!!

NaNoWriMo Day 5: 2,231 Words

16% of time gone, 4.5% of word count reached.  At this early stage every decimal counts!

I'm on my way!

Technically this is my first full day of actual writing since procrastination forced me to allocate four days to outlining.  Doing an outline is brilliant, I have to say.  I feel like I know where my story is going, although I have grave insecurities on my plot line.

Initially I'd planned to keep the whole thing under wraps and do the 'big reveal' at the end, but somehow Sander convinced me to convey the storyline.  He's damned persuasive when he wants to be!

Anyway, my self esteem was crushed when, after an admittedly quite drawn out explanation, he responded with an 'interesting', and that's it.  'Interesting' for Sander is code for 'yeah.... nah...'.

Sigh.

I contemplated changing my storyline (to what?), or adapting some well used generic plot line into erotic fiction (so current!), but in the end decided to stick to the story that had been swimming around in my head since February.

Frustratingly, work has exploded lately, dramatically cutting down both daydreaming and writing time (constructive daydreaming!).  However, I will not fail this challenge, so I'm setting myself a new routine of getting up very early (5.30am this morning) for a cup of coffee and a few paragraphs, going for a run (my thinking time) to plot out my next literary attack, and then a few more paragraphs over breakfast before work.  This meant I busted out around half my daily word count target before Sander was even out of bed!

Ok, I'm keeping these progress reports brief because I've now been sitting at my computer for a grand total of thirteen hours and everything is becoming a little blurry.

Until next time...

November 30-Day Challenge: Write a Novel in a Month

Oh no... this is the one I've been dreading all year.... "November Write a Novel in a Month" month.

Gulp.

I've brushed this challenge off month after month, thinking "it's ages away, don't worry, you'll come up with something", but "ages away" is upon me and "come up with something" has become "COME UP WITH ANYTHING!!".

As I said, gulp.

Image by hummyhummy @ FlickR

Dubbed NaNoWriMo by those in the US (National Novel Writing Month), it runs the month of November and gives you 30 days to write 50,000 words - that's 1,666.7 words per day.

There are a few rules naturally.  You can't write the same word 50,000 times (bummer), you have to start from scratch and all you can do in advance is plan your outline and do some research.  You have to be the sole author and it has to be a novel (lengthy work of fiction).

Sounds simple right?  If you're organised maybe.  I've been telling myself for the whole of October to get organised and prepare.  Did I?  Of course not!  Luckily during one lengthy decent of a Javanese volcano in February I came up with the basic outline of the story, and weirdly, the title.  When we reached the tent I pulled out my trusty red Moleskine and brain dumped.  So I guess that's research right?

But how do you write a novel?  Where do you start?  I start by tapping 'how to write a novel' into my iPad over breakfast on November 1st.  Apparently you need an outline.  What's an outline?  Hmmm...  clearly I have some due diligence to do.

So here's what I'm going to do.  I'm going to spend the weekend doing my outline and start writing on Monday.  That gives me 25 days to write 50,000 words, which happens to be a nice round 2,000 words per day.

For perspective, I've written about 300 words in this post so far... so another seven times that, per day.

Gulp.

September 30-Day Challenge: Daily Yoga Done!

Daily yoga was always going to be an intensely personal challenge for me, both mentally and physically.  Physically because I hadn't done yoga for about three years (despite telling myself over and over that I needed to get back into it) and couldn't touch my toes, and mentally because I knew there would be times where I absolutely did not want to go, or that I would have to force myself to be organized every single week day of September to get up early, pack all my work stuff into my gym bag and head straight from yoga to work in order to sneak through the door at 9am, or take myself away to practice while I was on holiday for the weekend with friends.  

All of these things I faced and it was with a considerable amount of glee that I didn't take my gym bag to work this morning, and that I can now I can touch my toes with my fists rather than the very tip of my middle finger.

It was actually very lucky (in hindsight) that my daily yoga challenge coincided with an absolutely insane period at work.  I really counted on my one internally focused hour to give myself a kick start and feel calm about the day ahead.  It is amazing how difficult it can be to focus solely on your breathing and not let your mind drift to your deadline for that day, or how you were going to be at work until 9pm that night, but once I snapped into my zone everything else melted away for 60 minutes.  Brilliant!

I battled with myself constantly.  Being a naturally competitive person I was never able to focus just on myself for a whole class.  Sneak peaks at my fellow yogis showed just how far I had to go.  I tried to celebrate my milestones (like touching my toes for the first time in many years!), but often I caught myself thinking "how the hell is her head touching her knees?" when you could drive a bus through the space between mine.  Therein lies the delight and torment of yoga - you constantly see improvement, but someone else can always go longer, deeper, wider, flatter, twistier...

I clearly have very tight hips.  So much so that one teacher looked slightly incredulous when I had to sit on two blocks where most other yogis were managing without any.  One morning class where I was the only one to show up, the teacher and I spent an entire 60 minutes doing hip opening exercises.  I still have a long way to go...

A few proud moments were (obviously) touching my toes for the first time and achieving my first headstand (yes!) without using the wall.

I received so much support from the girls at Yoga Movement.  Yun and Coral were incredibly encouraging, offering advice or encouragement and a friendly face first thing in the morning.  If you're in Singapore I definitely recommend the studio.  It's just as great for the hard core yogis as it is for the weekend (and week day) warriors like me.  

A word of advice:  if you're just getting back into it, or just starting out, leave Alisha's classes until you're a bit more confident.  She's very good, but she loves the physical challenge of pushing limits and I often found myself frustrated in her classes. One 'basic yoga' class with her I actually felt myself getting angry - "how can this be a basic class when I'm trying to bind myself up like a pretzel... and failing miserably?"  I think my anger was more a reflection on myself more than anything else.  Still, it wasn't a very fun class that one...

A whole month of yoga was a fabulous way to get back into it, giving me the progress I needed to stick with it during the 'I can't touch my toes' phase.  I feel much stronger, especially in my core and arms. I'll definitely keep it up, but realistically maybe twice a week, and I'm really looking forward to getting back to my boot camp in October!

October's challenge is going gluten-free.  This one is going to be interesting (in the same way that dairy-free was 'interesting' given the amount of support I get at home for these things...) but more on that later!

Image from Yoga Movement

September 30-Day Challenge: Daily Yoga Day 4

Thank god for Yoga Zen.  Battling a cough, a runny nose and streaming eyes, Monday morning Yoga Power on Day 3 was pure struggle.  I spent the who class just trying to get through to the end.  Not feeling much better today (Day 4) I decided to give my body a break and opted for Yoga Zen which is described as a yoga chill pill.

Bliss is how I can describe it in my slightly frazzled state.  60 minutes of deep, slow stretching, mostly sitting or lying on the mat was heaven for my tired muscles which are still trying to adapt to the strength required for Yoga Power and keeping my head above my heart for most of the class avoided stuffed and dripping sinuses.

I'm sure one of the worst things you can do in a yoga class is compare yourself to your fellow yogis, but I can't really help it from my back-of-the-room position.  Man I have a long way to go!  Three years of basically only running for exercise has taken a very clear toll on my glutes and hamstrings.  As I can't even keep my legs at a 90 degree angle lying flat on my back I'm barely able to manage some of the beginner postures and can only watch enviously as my neighbours contort themselves into positions I was attempting three years ago.

I'm trying to keep in mind that yoga is not a competitive sport, and that my finger tips' journey towards my toes is a marathon, not a sprint.

My favourite posture for today was Lion's Pose.  If this can't shake you out of a down mood, I don't know what will.  Essentially you take in a deep breath and shoot it out with a loud "blah!!!" as you roll your eyes to the ceiling and stick your tongue out as far as possible.  Brilliant!

Corpse Pose

Image from www.prevention.com

September 30-Day Challenge: Daily Yoga Day 1

It's been three years since I've touched my toes... September is going to finish with my palms flat on the ground.

I've got my monthly unlimited pass for Yoga Movement, and day one got under way with hot yoga power.

Yoga Movement is a great little studio recently opened in Singapore.  Their philosophy is all inclusive, and non-binding.  Everyone is welcome, but you'll find no automatic payments or yearly contracts.  Simply pay as you go, or buy a multi-class bundle and show up.  The clean and minimalistic studio has two rooms - Biggie and Smalls (hot) - and is tucked away on Carpenter Road in Clark Quay.

Remembering how overwhelming my first few classes of Bikram were in New Zealand, I wanted to take it easy when getting back into it.  Hot yoga classes allow you to push harder and further than you'd usually be able to because your body is already so warm from the ambient temperature and I didn't want an injury on my first day!  Man, I'm glad I followed my own advice (doesn't always happen) - there were several moments where I took 'time out' on the mat with wobbly arms and tired legs.  I felt great afterwards though, even after so long, but man did  I sweat!  Even my shins were sweating, and I'm not sure that's possible.

Starting with the basics - downward dog

Need ideas for your own 30-day challenge?  Click here for my list.

August 30-Day Challenge: Dairy-Free Days

It's amazing how much easier a monthly challenge is with full support (and visa versa).  Dairy-free August ended up being much more difficult than I anticipated while I was at home - while travelling it was much easier - mostly because of Sander.

As he didn't view dairy-free as a proper challenge, he was... how can I put this... rather less than supportive. Any time my dairy-free-ness interfered with his plans he became pretty angry for long periods of time.  He even tried to bribe me to eat dairy early on saying "I won't tell anyone"!

I did have two slip ups - one unintentional very early on, and one on the second to last day for the sake of my relationship.  On almost the very first day we stopped in at our local cinema to get takeaway popcorn for a DVD that night, and I devoured it (love movie popcorn!) completely forgetting butter is dairy.  Oh well, back on the wagon.  Two nights ago Sander was cooking dinner, and yet again, forgot/chose to ignore my dairy-free challenge to cook a curry with yoghurt.  When I gently reminded him I was on my last two days of dairy-free I could see an explosion stirring just below the surface, so when he curtly snapped "can't you just eat it?" I decided to go along with it.  The things we do...

I noticed a few things during my dairy-free days.  My appreciation of cafes that serve soy milk increased, my lack of foresight in requesting dairy-free airline meals on business trips meant I was often disappointed (especially with a particularly strong cheese and crackers craving one flight between Hong Kong and Singapore), and I realised how much I love yoghurt after being forced to go without for the whole of August.  My breakfasts just weren't the same.

During the month I reread The Blood Type Diet, which advises Type A's (the original vegetarian gatherers) to avoid dairy (except yoghurt - yay!).  Having gone without for a month, I notice a flatter belly, but that could also be credited to absence of all chocolate except 85% Lindt, movie popcorn, and many curries during my week in Mumbai.  I'm going to continue to drink almond milk though, as I love the nutty taste, but I welcomed back my yoghurt this morning with open arms.

Does anyone else have suggestions for great dairy substitutes?  Or does anyone follow The Blood Type Diet?  I'm quite curious to learn more about it...

September's challenge is a big one - daily yoga!  Getting back into it after three years is going to be a huge challenge - bring it on!

Make Your Own Almond Milk

Recipe from She Knows (here)

Image from She Knows

Makes 3 1/2 - 4 cups

Ingredients

1C freshly roasted almonds

4C water

Optional: splash of vanilla essence and/or honey

Method

1.  In a jar, cover almonds with water.  

2.  Store in the fridge for 24 hours, jar tightly sealed.

3.  Puree together until smooth

4.  Strain through a cheesecloth, squeezing out all liquid

5.  Whisk in vanilla and honey if using

Ready!

July 30-Day Challenge: Recaffeinated

Oh I how I have missed my (sometimes twice or thrice) daily double shot macchiato.  It's great to be back!

I actually fared a lot better than I expected - no headaches, no sleepiness, just an extreme jealousy whenever I saw someone drinking a cup of joe.

Initially I didn't actually think I felt/saw any benefits of my caffeine-free month, but after digging a little deeper perhaps I did.  I certainly slept well in July.  I fell asleep quickly, and slept deeply, but that could also be because I was travelling and working so much that I was exhausted.  I didn't notice reduced anxiety (was I anxious before?), but my energy levels were pretty high and I didn't succumb to afternoon sugar cravings as often.

But aside from tasting damned good, my daily coffee is improving my memory, warding off Alzheimer's and helping me recover from my morning boot camp sessions.  Sounds like three pretty good reasons to stick to my double mac.

August's challenge is to go dairy-free.  One week in and I'm missing my breakfast yoghurt and have had to painfully pass up two delicious meals involving buffalo mozzarella - one of my favs.

July 30-Day Challenge: A Month Without Caffeine?

Coffee... that wonderful, wonderful legal stimulant.  

Coffee has an almost ritualistic place in my life.  I come alive in the morning with the smell of it brewing, I down a chilled one before heading to boot camp sessions, it’s a reason to get up from my desk and stretch my legs, or a crutch after not enough sleep and it’s an endless search for a decent cup in Singapore.  You can imagine my trepidation about going without it for a month – it’s not as simple as just switching to decaf, because that still contains caffeine, just a lot less.

Turns out I was completely over dramatising my caffeine dependence as I haven’t had the expected headaches and I’ve managed to get through hangovers, jet lag and going back to work with surprising ease.  I do miss the taste of coffee, the ritual aspect, and how comforting a strong, milky cup of tea can be.  I’ve been substituting in herbal tea – green, peppermint or fresh mint, rooibos with milk and current fav ginger and lemon with a bit of honey (I have a sore throat).

With two weeks to go, I have plenty of time to try new flavours – any suggestions?  I’d love a real ‘pick me up’ combo to have in the mornings with breakfast.

What challenge are you doing for July?

May 30-Day Challenge - Get Flossing

For the past five weeks I’ve been saying to myself “when things calm down a bit I’ll be better with my blog”.  Well, guess what?  Things haven’t calmed down, but it’s amazing what eight hours of radio silence on a day flight can achieve!  

I owe you all so many updates – travel, food, challenges...  I’ve had three fabulous weeks travelling, eating myself silly, and two challenges have finished without a proper update – let’s change that.

Ok, May’s challenge – flossing daily.

I spend (too many of) my working hours up to my eyeballs in oral care and trying to persuade people to take better care of their teeth (with our products J ).  I could list you five reasons off the top of my head why we should all be flossing, but I was a complete hypocrite because I barely ever did it.  Why?  I don’t know... I’m inherently lazy, it takes too much time, I haven’t really had too many issues so far...  fairly typical excuses.  I always have floss in my handbag, but that’s just in case something gets stuck in my teeth when I’m out and about (an all-consuming annoyance) and the only time I’d but in a half-baked effort was about a week before I went to the dentist.  

That has all changed.  Flossing is brilliant!  Wow, I can’t believe I actually said that out loud – what a nerd.

Hand on heart, I did not miss a single day, and after a week I was flossing almost twice a day.  I’m a total convert.  It only takes a minute after brushing (what’s a minute?) and my teeth felt cleaner and whiter, and that ‘just brushed’ feeling lasted longer.

I’m going to get down from my high horse in a moment, but let’s just say I’m feeling pretty smug about going to the dentist in a few weeks – he’d better notice!

Ok, seriously, I’m going to stop talking about flossing now... (get flossing people!)... ok, really, now I’m done.

Photo by Pink Sherbet Photography (FlickR)

Gone Postal - First Monthly Challenge Failure

I've been subdued... by a postcard, or rather by 30 days of postcards.  After five successful months of 30 Day Challenges, I've met my match with a daily letter.

The first week and a half were relatively easy as I was on holiday in Bali (more to come on that separately) and a moment or two stolen for lying in the sun, wandering around the shops, or trying to catch a wave wasn't difficult.  Back to reality in Singapore and my daily postcards were buried under lunch at my desk and late nights in the office.

The sad thing is that I really enjoyed writing them.  They felt more deliberate than an email and much more caring than a brief wall post or text message.  As the only snail mail I receive these days are bills or junk mail, with each postcard I wrote I included my postal address hoping that my surprise postcard might generate a return handwritten letter or postcard.  I was going to start a handwritten revolution! Sigh...

When I was a little girl, my Mum always said if you get bucked off the horse, the first thing you have to do is get back on again.  That's what I'm going to do.  There are only a few days left in June, but I'll approach my July challenge (caffeine-free) with renewed determination.  Boy, am I going to need it.

If you've only just joined my year of monthly challenges, this is how I got started (here).  I've been Facebook and sugar free, posted daily photos and written daily limericks, only to be undone by the simple postcard.  Oh well, better get back on that horse....

P.S. Wouldn't you know it - just as I was putting the finishing touches on this post I received an email from one of my postcard recipients thanking me for making her day with my surprise snail mail.  Hmmm... maybe I should resurrect this monthly challenge another time.  What do you think?

A Month of Daily Limericks

The daily limerick challenge was one of the toughest of my 30-Day Challenges this year - both creatively and in terms of discipline.  Sometimes they came in a flash of inspiration, like Romeo & Juliet, composed during intermission, other times it was hard graft.  Usually though, once I have two rhyming lines the rest flows freely.

These are my favourites - what are yours?

Romeo & Juliet, Tony Soprano, Pavement Rage, 8th Anniversary, Jono's Pirate Version

Photo by JuditK (FlickR)

Here's the complete month in case you missed a few.

Day 1: Utter butter nutter
(Photo by Robert S. Donovan (Flickr))

Day 2: Bus rage
(Photo from striatic (FlickR))

Day 3: Socially competitive

Day 4: Why it's called a 'push bike'
(Photo from Jan Tik (FlickR))

Day 5: Sparkling heels

Day 6: Start slow and ease back
(Photo by Jenny Downing (FlickR))

Day 7: Monkey Beach
(Photo by Carl Clasio (FlickR))

Day 8: Painful foot massage
(Photo by ThomasWanhoff (FlickR) )

Day 9: Post holiday blues
(Photo from 7 July (FlickR))

Day 10: Tropic thunder
(Photo by gyverchangphoto (FlickR) )

Day 11: Taxi!
(Photo by Geoff Penaluna (FlickR))

Day 12: In fair Verona...

Day 13: Friday night Glee
(Image from Wikipedia)

Day 14: Pavement rage
(Photo by JuditK (FlickR))

Day 15: Soulful weekend

Day 16:  Tony Soprano addict
(Image from onlyhdwallpapers.com)

Day 17:  Say it with flowers

Day 18: Say it with flowers

Day 19: Eight whole years!

Day 20: Bring on the weekend
(Image by Tim Geers (FlickR))

Day 21: Rugby in the blood
(Image from superxv.com)

Day 22: Mum and Dad - 34 years!

Day 23: Oh for a dish washer
(Photo by Miguel Pires da Rosa (FlickR) )

Day 24: My happy place

Day 25 & 26th:  Personal pirate-y request

 Day 27: Harry Potter fan-atic

Day 28:  Perfect weekend pancakes

Day 29: Shakespeare in the park

Day 30: A limerick break
(Image from Kevin Dooley (FlickR))

A month of daily limericks was a part of my year of 30-day challenges... 1st of June - I'm almost half way!