Novembook – From the Desk of CJD

Right. It is the first day of the eleventh month and it is time to put ass to chair and write a novel in thirty days.

I am procrastinating. Not my fault really, just dealing with some life issues here such as legal issues, potential new career and a family member flying down here for the week.

30,000 words in thirty days to develop a rough draft for this new novel. No fussing over function, grammar or missteaks. That is what the writing software, Ulysses, lives for. He just looooves to remind me about those punctuation marks being in the wrong place, or being completely ignored altogether. He red-flagged that “missteaks” mistake too. Damn, nothing gets by him.

Did I tell myself I was going to wean off of the soda this month? Did I tell myself that I had not and will continue to suck those down frequently? At least until December 1st anyway.

The sun is almost up, the body has been cleansed, the soda is on the desk so I am out of excuses.

Let’s write this thing.

P.S. Ulysses missed a comma that I intentionally left out. I win.

About a month ago, I was reminded that November is approaching and to sign up again for NANOWRIMO (National Novel Writing Month.) Do I really want to dedicate an entire month to cranking out the minimum requirement of 50,000 words for that month? Having bouts of inspiration for the past year seemed to encourage me to go ahead and register again

Two days out from the start of the event and all is quiet on their website, almost a ghost town. After researching this, I discovered the organization has a few scandalous issues coming from it, so I decided I was done with NANOWRIMO forever. Well, still encouraged by those inspirational bouts, I have decided to press on next month, but go my own way.

I have christened this challenge as “Novembook.” A thirty-day challenge to myself to write a 30,000 word draft for the new novel. That is 1,000 words a day, and more realistic than that organization’s 50,000 standard.

I know the title is cheesy, but it was better than “Novelmber”. Reminds me of my 31-day blog posting for the month of “Blaugust.” That was a fun, successful challenge!

Why do I do this to myself? Because I lack discipline and require prompts to keep it going. Not to mention, time and opportunity is running out, and this book won’t write itself.