Psyching Myself Up

The key to success in NaNo, I think, is to say "fuck you" to every single doubt that runs through your head, to every instance of imperfection that crosses your eyes.

Of course it's going to be crap. But that's what editing is for, going through the details with a fine toothed comb, bouncing ideas off of people you trust, people who understand the material you're dealing with.

I'm going to do this, I swear. There's a goddamn market for it, after all. I will live the dream.

And So It Begins

OMFG THERE ARE FLURRIES OUTSIDE MY WINDOW.

NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!

This is... really deterring me from taking out the trash and heading out for some grocery shopping.

It's Too Early For This!

-1 degree Celcius tonight? Really??

God, autumn in Canada sure is depressing sometimes.

(Oh god, apparently it's snowing downtown right now. Nooooooo.)

Misadventures In Cooking

Or would that technically be "Misadventures in Baking"? Ah well, it was a misadventure in any case. ;P

Here's the story. A few weeks ago I was watching the Food Network and I saw someone do the following:

- melt a saucepan full of sugar
- add red wine and let it boil off a little
- add some kind of herb
- add olive oil and butter
- cook leeks the resulting mixture

I thought it was an interesting concept and wanted to mold it to my own preferences today. I would melt the sugar, add the red wine, add in some ground cardamom, add the olive oil and butter margarine, and cook sliced pears in the resulting mixture. No problem, right?

BUZZT! WRONG. Hahahahaha.

I guess when I added the red wine to the sugar, the sugar hadn't completely melted yet, and the red wine was room temperature and caused the sugar to solidify. To my saucepan. Also, the sugar had been gradually melting at an even keel but when the red wine hit the pan it started bubbling in a rather violent way. So I had to take the whole thing off the heat to prevent the red wine from going crazy. But that meant I was stuck with big chunks of solid, slightly caramelized sugar sitting in the pan. In the end, some vigorous stirring at low heat kept the red wine happy and the sugar eventually melted. Eventually. After eons of stirring.

Adding the olive oil and margarine made the concoction easier to deal with, but I realized I had put a tad too much red wine into the concoction; I wanted to sear the pears, not poach them. But it was too late to change that, unfortunately. Also, by this point I was stressing a wee bit and did not have the patience to grind down some cardamom, so I went a different route: imitation vanilla. After adding the vanilla I just let the damn thing simmer for long time. In the end, it didn't taste too bad. The combination of red wine and vanilla was great. But the pears were indeed poached and not seared; I didn't get that touch of caramelization I was looking for. Next time, I will probably start with a smaller amount of the wine (a white one so that the pears don't look weirdly coloured) and add in less sugar as the wine heats up, cause damn that liquid was insanely sweet. And I'll use both cardamom and vanilla to flavour.

Here's to hoping my next attempt won't be so hilariously chaotic.

Sample Novel Structure

1. 5,000 words: Teaser and exposition. Introduce the protagonist and why they are as they are.

2. 2,000 words: Catalyst event. Introduce the second protagonist.

3. 9,000 words: Exploration of the story world; new characters and nuggets of information. Things are still going well, but introduce the villain(s).

4. 18,000 words: Things fall apart! The story becomes bigger than the characters. Things happen, they get saved, things get worse, repeat, repeat, repeat.

5. 6,000 words: Reveal bigger quest.

6. 6,000 words: Challenges are defeated. Things are learned. Characters change.

7. 6,000 words: Resolve any leftover issues. Epilogue.

How To Succeed At NaNo

Straight from the forum itself. I need to save this for posterity...

1. Buy yourself 6 treats, one for the start and one for each 10,000 word mark!

2. Join the Newbies forum. People go there and give them all kinds of encouragement and tips.

3. Plan to be in the word wars game with others who will competitively inspire you to do your best and keep striving for the win. Find the crew that is motivating and return there each day or every other day to talk with others who want to make it to the end as well.

4. Buy yourself a poster and let yourself be rewarded for every 500 mark you cross. Get some stars or stickers or a stamp and give it to yourself as you cross those mini-marks. Perhaps you work off an immediate reward system so approach it that way.

5. Make sure you have a story you like and characters you like. Plan them out to the fullest extent possible. Or if you were fully planned out all the other times, maybe now is the time to try flying by the seat of your pants and just writing off the top of your head.

6. Understand that there may be points at which you hate your story. But don't worry about that. Keep writing because chances are, you just might change your mind and like it in the end. Press for the mark. Keep your daily word goals despite the fact that you think it might not be working. Remember that the only way to reach 50 K is to write 50 K. And the only way to edit what you've written is to first write it! So, make a commitment to yourself to finish come hell or high water!!!

Running Out Of Steam

Haven't really been planning much for my novel in the past week or so. I've been distracted by other creative outlets.

There's a section in my planned novel that's kind of... elastic. In the sense that... if I finish the novel and I haven't met my quota of 50,000 words, this is the place where I can pad the story with additional events and dialogue and drama.

I've also promised my sister that I would include a talking laddoo in the story somewhere. Don't ask, it's a Simpsons thing. Anyway, the only way a talking laddoo would fit into the story is through some sort of dream or hallucination. I'm currently leaning towards hallucination. But I still have no idea where to fit such a ridiculous element into the story, especially in historical fiction. LOL, what have I gotten myself into?!

Quick Link

What's the Matter With Canada? - How the world's nicest country turned mean. A take on our country's politics by an outsider.

Third Time's A Charm

I've decided to do NaNoWriMo this year. I tried back in 2005 and 2006, failed both times. In 2005 I tried a fantasy plot that basically went "a young couple falls in love... insert angry deity". Didn't get very far with it; I wrote very seat-of-my-pants and didn't even know how the story was supposed to end.

In 2006 I switched to urban sci-fi. It was about a woman living in the near-distant future where government sponsored super-soldiers had revolted against their handlers and planned on enslaving regular people. And the super-soldier that was leading the attack was the woman's younger sister. I got a lot further with that story than the previous year (almost 10,000 words) but again I had no idea how the story was going to end. Mostly though... I was bored of my story. Bored of writing it, bored of the characters, bored of the setting, bored of it all. My patience for writing one piece over an extended period of time is very limited, you see. It's my fatal flaw.

After my two miserable failures I decided that NaNo was not for me and abstained in 2007. I have no idea why I've changed my mind this year. Maybe because I'm not currently working and the thought of having so much extra time is increasing my confidence.

I figured that I ought to do something different this year so I'm outlining my entire story, chapter by chapter, scene by scene. Hopefully it will help. At least I'll have a plan and I'll know how the story ends. And thus far it looks like I'll be able to surpass the required 50,000 if things work out properly. My story this year will be historical fiction, taking place in 14th century India. I know I'll eventually get bored so I'm trying to figure out beforehand how I can alleviate that. I really want to win for once.