Friday, October 31, 2008

It's the Night


Tonight at midnight Nanowrimo begins.  Good luck INKers and friends of INK!

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Check!

I got my first payment check yesterday for words I've written.  It's an amazing feeling.  So many years of practice, workshops, flattening my butt on at least a half dozen different computer chairs.  Novels, shorts, stories long since lost or abandoned, hundreds of thousands of words of fantasy that will never see the light of day because I needed that million words of crap before I could begin to make real progress.  Learning to connect with a reader.  Learning to find a balance between my internal editor and my dreams.  Learning to educate myself, because so much of the education of a writer happens either entirely from the inside or by deliberately, through an act of will and trust, separating the ego from the written word long enough to accept a professional opinion.  Learning who trust and when, especially myself (and when not to trust myself.)

The kewlest part of all this?  It's a beginning.  A long road to travel to begin, but that's the nature of this, and many other crafts.

Friday, October 24, 2008

NaNo Brainstorming Rocks!

Awesome evening spent at Kami's brainstorming and outlining our NaNo stories. Good food shared with good conversation in front of a warm, crackling fire (with good pet accompanyment) made for a great time! We made strong headway I think. If we don't watch out, we all just might have novels circulating out there sometime next year.

Thanks again Kami! Your downstairs library/study room is incredible and the vibe fantastic for writing.

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

INK sponsors an Open House for Nanowrimo

Come one, come all to the INK Open House for Nanowrimo!  Food, drinks, and fun!  October 24, 2008, 6pm, Kami's house.  If you need directions or other details, email kamila at easystreet dot net.  The plan is to discuss our Nano projects for this year, do a little outlining and brainstorming if necessary, and generally prepare to sit down, shut up and write.  Kami lives in the Columbia River Gorge not far from east Vancouver, WA.  If you want to learn about or participate in Nanowrimo, this is a good first step.

The Kickoff Party for Nanowrimo in Vancouver, WA is on the 27th.  See the Nanowrimo web page for details.  There are also lots of write-ins scheduled, including some for midnight when it officially becomes Nov. 1 (your local time.)  Kick off parties and write-ins are happening all over the world, so if you're not local to me, check out your region and see what's what.

Adrenaline is my friend

I had my first panicked OMG Nanowrimo is in single digit days moment.  I have an idea, a plan, and inspiration, but what I don't have is a lot of time.  I have to maintain 3000 words a day to make the goal for the month.  That's not a big word count, but that's a big daily word count, if that makes sense.  My writing schedule has been so disrupted I'm a bit worried that I may be out of practice of the daily writing thing.  

Which is one of the reasons why Nano is so awesome--daily writing habits are refreshed and reinforced.  If I didn't do this every year, I'm fairly certain I'd be a much lazier writer.  

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Flashed by Writer's Block

Steve and C.S. brought fun show and tell books to the Washougal library combined writers and Nano prep meeting.  They included two of the really kewl Writer's Block books and a book on 45 character archetypes.  I ended up making tons of notes on my Nanowrimo novel project and wrote a flash.  That's one heckuva productive meeting right there!

It was a good time to get out of the house, otherwise I probably would have gotten zilch done in writing today.  Unfortunately I'd miscalculated the time of the OryCon 30 meeting and missed it. 

In other news, I've had a story accepted for publication.  I'll post details when I'm cleared to do that.  Also, my honorable mention certificate arrived from Writers of the Future.  It's gorgeous and hand-signed.  Definitely something I'm going to frame for the office or maybe the I Love Me Wall in the stairwell.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Autumn INK Sightings.

WooHoo! INK meeting tonight. Wide assortment of topics to be discussed.

INK at Library Saturday with NaNoWriMo brainstorming immediately afterward.

INK meets again on the 24th. Prep for NaNo plus outlining/writing time and looking ahead toward OryCon 30 and beyond are topics.

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

A Farewell.

It is with great sorrow that INK bids goodbye to Carissa Reid, one of INK's founding members. We wish her the best of luck in all her future writing endeavors.