12 November 2007

NaNoWriMo, Day 11: Seeds Sown for Future Endeavors?

I pounded out about a thousand words in the middle of the night last night, which would be a great thing, except that I did it while sitting next to just about the draftiest window in the house. By this morning I had a sore throat. I've been taking Airborne all day and drinking lots of tea in hopes of thwarting the cold. What I probably shoudl really be doing is getting some sleep, right? So I'll keep this entry short.

My day hours today were spent doing those typically suburban things: Piper declared today "family pancake day" (as she has declared every Sunday for the past several weeks), and I fulfilled my fatherly duties by making the bestest buttermilk pancakes ever, period. This afternoon was spent raking leaves in our backyard — a job that will need to be repeated in a week's time, since the trees are not nearly done giving up their foliage. Still needed to get one round of this in, in case a snow comes in the next several days and makes such endeavors impossible.

The thing that was really enjoyable about the leaves today was that the girls played in them for a lot of the time I was out there, jumping in my leaf piles, throwing them at each other . . . It's the first year that this has happened.

Watching the two of them, I wanted to write a new novel, one with both of them as the main characters. But I'm not sure I have the talent to make a story like that not sound too . . . precious . . . treacly . . . not sure what word I'm looking for here, but I'm betting I would have had no problem finding it twenty-four hours ago.

The funny thing about this noveling thing (at least the thing today) is that since I've started work on this novel, I've come up with ideas for two more. One is a bit of a seat-of-your-pants thriller. The other is a much more introspective piece. I've made a couple of notes on them in new Scrivener projects, in case they amount to anything. It's weird to think that I might be doing this again.

More to the point with this novel: When I got my hair cut on Saturday, the guy who cuts it agreed to do my hair (and his wife my makeup) for my photo shoot for the picture on the back cover of my novel when it's published. He also agreed to accompany me to NYC when I appear on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. I told him he wasn't thinking big enough for my needs: I was going to encourage him to sell the salon and just come on full time as my "hair boy." He's game.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm impressed at how by participating in NaNoWriMo, you are also participating in NaNoBloMo.

But that feat aside, it's been really fun following along... between you and me, I've had friends do this thing before, but not so often are they friends about whom I think, "Hey, I'd really like to read what s/he comes up with!" If you know what I'm saying. So keep it up, and defeat all cold and flu bugs that stand in your way, and good luck!

Marck Bailey said...

E, my dear, how nice of you to drop in and visit.

Yeah, I didn't originally have any intention of posting every day about this. But I've discovered that it's a great way to end my day. The blog posts take no time at all for me to write, because I'm approaching with the same "don't look back" "fuck my inner editor" approach that I've just spent the last two hours doing. So I'm sure it's crap quality, but at least a few people are enjoying following along.

I think you've invoked a NEW fear in me: that people whose writing I so deeply respect may one day read this thing . . . and discover that my month of blog postings were only sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Luckily, I know you know me well enough to forgive me . . . .