Month Impossible: Day Thirty, This is the end

Ten in the morning, November 30. Fourteen hours to go, fifteen thousand words to go. I am cutting it really, really close.

 

 

 

UPDATE: 12:15pm: Now at 37,011 words, plus one more drawing completed. Time for lunch. Lunchtime entertainment: the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

UPDATE: 3:24pm: Up to 39,019 words. Need to increase the pace a little if I’m going to make it.

I’m doing other things during writing breaks: fielding calls from clients, working on our website portfolio, discussing a template design with Anthony. Every now and then I’m checking the most recent updates on the big news of the day, a hostage crisis at Senator Clinton’s campaign HQ in New Hampshire. I’m not feeling desperate enough to grab onto this event as fodder for my plot, fortunately. I hope the situation is resolved soon.

The last few thousand words I wrote are basically a tangent to the rest of the novel. I think they might work better as a short story, and once this is all over I will go back and extricate them, flesh the story out, and see what it looks like on its own.

UPDATE 4:40pm: I don’t think I can stomach any more coffee. Mom brought over some food for my dinner. Yeah Mom!

UPDATE 5:20pm: 40,000 words. Completely out of ideas. Time for dinner, with the hope that a new idea will pop up while I eat.

UPDATE 6:56pm: 41,033 words. No ideas, but still throwing words at the page, watching them stick.

UPDATE 7:56pm: 42,044 words. Also posted the drawings from the last few days and today to Flickr. Still four drawings to go. And of course about 8,000 words. Listening to an old Robert Palmer album (they are all old, yes, but this one is very old), "Sneaking Sally Through the Alley," which I think was produced by or features someone from Little Feat. Funky and bluesy, makes me want to dance.

UPDATE 8:55pm: 44,051 words.

UPDATE 9:20pm: 45,012 words. There are creases in my forearms where they rest on the laptop edge.

I’m listening to a CD called "In Loving Memory Of…." by a band called Big Wreck. I had seen a video by them late at night years back, liked the song, bought the CD without hearing any other songs, and for once liked the whole CD. I’ve never heard anything else by them since. Thanks to the miracle of YouTube, though, I can show you the video:

I remember now: the lead singer of Big Wreck = yummy.

And it looks like there are more videos — maybe they’re still making music? I’ll have to explore that … after I’m done with naNoWriMo.

UPDATE 10:19pm: 47,127 words.

UPDATE 10:46pm: 48,036 words. Closing in on the end.

UPDATE 11:36pm: 50,143 words and done!

The end was hairy, and although I meant to leave all the characters alive this year I ended up killing a bunch of them in the final hour. Very strange how that works. If I do more with this particular manuscript, I’m pretty sure the ending will change.

But for now, it is perfect. Now I have just four drawings to make to complete DrawMo on time. Excuse me.

UDATE: A bit after midnight: Drawings now finished and uploaded. DrawMo doesn’t have an official measuring device, so I confess I fudged a little and kept going past midnight. It’s still the same day if I haven’t gone to sleep yet, right?

I am one weary person — but a highly creative and dedicated weary person. I’ll write up some thoughts on the month over the weekend, when my hands don’t hurt so much and when I’m more alert.

I think I will continue with daily blogging through the end of the year. I’m enjoying the conversation, even if sometimes it seems I’m talking mostly to myself. My goal was to try and rediscover what I enjoyed about blogging, and that has been the most fulfilling goal I reached.

Thanks for coming along on this adventure with me!