NaNoWriMo--kinda

November is National Novel Writing Month, where you can sign up to write a 50,000-word novel in a month. Do the math. If you write about 1,667 words per day for 30 days in a row, you have written the equivalent of a short novel (or maybe even an actual short novel: set-up, build, crisis, denouement, the whole shebang).

Well, I already have nearly 50,000 words of a novel that I've been writing for, oh, years now. Since before I met Jeff! I work on it in earnest for a week or three at a time, and then I just obsess over how I'm not working on it for months--sometimes years--at a time. The characters haunt me in my sleep for a while, and then they just give up in disgust. Since Jeff recently polished off a nearly 600-page novel in a matter of months, I'm feeling a tad chagrined at my literary laziness.

So, while I'm not going to sign up for NaNoWriMo, I am going to try to jump-start the rest of my novel by following its precepts. Well, kinda.

Here's what I pledge to do:

Work on the manuscript every day for the next thirty days, starting today.

Aim for a minimum of 1,000 words per day, without setting an upper limit. (When you're in the zone, you're in the zone.)

And that's it.

Fingers crossed that by December 1, I'll be pushing 80,000 words total, and it will be so close to done that I can actually have a ghost of chance of crossing off that perpetual New Year's Resolution.

Oh, by the way, my count for today, November 1, is 1,049 words. I made it--just barely!