WIP Challenge Check-in, Day 9 -- Monday

[linaewen]

Hope you're having a marvelous Monday to start the week off right!

Do you have anything amazing to report concerning writing from today?  Anything discouraging?  Have a look at the following and let us know what you managed today:

• I wrote
• I did some planning and/or research
• I edited
• I've sent my fic off to my beta
• I posted today!
• I'm taking a break
• I did something else that I'll talk about in a comment

For discussion:  Many of us were celebrating holidays these last couple of weeks, which might have been disruptive to the routine.  When your writing routine is disrupted, how do you get back on track?

Comments

[jagnikjen]

I was able to sneak in a tiny bit of editing this morning before getting my son up for school. I'm hoping I can continue on after dinner tonight. (Will have to come back and update later, I suppose.)

For me, it's fairly easy to return to the writing routine once life in general returns to normal. The problem for me is I haven't really had a writing routine for a while, so I'm actually trying to re-establish one. :)

[sleuth]

I managed to get some editing and analysis work done. I personally love doing character analysis because it will creep up on me and suddenly I find myself writing four pages worth of character meta. Or as I like to think of it, an analysis dedicated to a better understanding of the story and how the characters will deal with the situation(s) I've placed them in.

I am ever so grateful for 750words. It's been such a great tool into forcing me to write 3 pages a day. Even if most of those days consist of gobbledegook -- but! because I keep writing I know I won't succumb atrophy. :D

[luna_plath]

Today I wrote a little over a thousand words, but I hope I'll get more in before the day is over. Yesterday I did some MAJOR planning, and now I feel much more comfortable with where the story is going plot-wise. I like to have a plan. It takes a lot of the anxiety out of the writing process.

The holidays did kind of disrupt my normal writing pace, but since the new year started I've been able to catch up. I'm a college student so I've had a few weeks off that I've been using to write . . . and write and write. I don't get as much time as I'd prefer during the semester, so now I'm trying to get ahead.

[littlebutfierce]

900-ish words as I dusted off some of my mundane_bingo prompts (sobbbbb I really wish that comm hadn't died, though I hope to complete a bingo anyway).

I think the more of a writing routine I have, the more I miss it when I get thrown out of it, &... that missing it really helps pull me back on track! I've been doing 750 Words for 600 days now, or something like that. I don't always write fic in it, but when it's been too long of me just venting about my workday instead of doing fic, I do miss it. & sometimes that's enough to get me going.

[crowdog66]

I edited what I wrote yesterday and wrote 2000+ new words on (and finished!) Chapter 4 of "Solstice and Equinox" (Garak/Bashir, PG-13 so far). I went into it having no real idea where it was going (beyond a general notion of some things I wanted to get across to the reader), but as usual the "show, not tell" dictum paid off and the plot points I wanted to introduce came out in character interaction. I think it turned out rather well, and the ending gives me a strong springboard to Chapter 5.

When my writing routine is disrupted I let go of the days I can't work and trust that inspiration will strike again when I have more free time. I try to sneak in two or three hundred words here and there just to keep the pump primed in the meantime.

[lullabymoon]

Despite today being pick up new puppy day, I managed to sneak in 400 words of big bang in a spare half hour.

Re routine, I'll let you know once I figure it out. ;D

[lesandytomato]

I wrote tons today, and got out of a scene that I've been stuck on for a while. Hope I'll be able to keep it up.

[lacygrey]

I edited. I actually gave an hour of my 'best time' (between 9 and 11 - when Im most alert and optimistic) to editing a ficlet. I'd written the prose itself almost as stream of conciousness writing and remembered very little about it. I'd done it in three stints and then stuck it all in the same text file. There was about 2.5K in all. But once I'd got rid of the repetition (a surprising lot) and ridiculous bits, it was down to 1.5K. It had no form: As I'd imagined it as a glimpse into a situation, nothing more, I'd made no effort at imagining a shape for it. While editing, I found myself trying to give it a structure a postiori. I decided on three sections and wrote a new first and last line for each. Then I 'sewed' the ready-written bits into the sections. I hope my working method doesn't leave any evidence because it certainly wasn't very natural, however easy it was to write in the first place.

I certainly don't envy people who write a novel's worth like this and are then faced with such an edit on a gargantuan scale.

New Year's Resolution for writing - to post rather than keep things to myself. Not there yet.

[lacygrey]

Oops, that was yesterday's discussion topic, sorry.
The holidays weren't too much disruption fortunately, aside from a super-heavy workload that arrived at the same time. I knew is was coming and kept my writing almost solely to 750words. Now the pressures lightened I can get back to editing - and sorting out whatever I wrote on 750words in December.