So, as of midnight tonight, writing at the bare-minimum of 1667 words per day, your word count should be at 16,670.
That is the one third mark. 10 days down, 20 days left.
Don't get too discouraged if you aren't quite at 33 1/3% done -- THERE IS STILL TIME! You can get back on track. It might mean an extra 200 words per day, maybe you need to put in a couple of power sessions over the weekend, or perhaps you need to find Frodo and help him get the ring back to Mt. Doom...
Whatever it is, remember, NaNo wouldn't be NaNo if it wasn't a challenge...that's why you signed up in the first place, right? You wanted something to stretch you as a writer. You might feel like you're going to snap, but I believe in you, you CAN do it, so quit reading through posts here. Employ the BIC method (Butt In Chair), turn off the distractions, and write.
And once you've done that for a while, come back here and post a word count update -- otherwise I'll start harassing you... 
I plan to be ahead.
The bad part is that for all my talk about absurdisms and crazy Ya-Ya pants mixed story bag, I've been writing a real story.
It's disturbing.
I've got an MC, main plot, Antogonist, side quest that leads to more disasters that may lead back to the actual plot.
The craziest thing so far, is the my Antagonist has no form and is named The Evil.
1.) Way behind on my story, since I spent all of last weekend (when I should have been writing extra) trying (in vain) to fix it.
2.) Without a laptop to use, making it much more difficult for me to keep up.
3.) In the rather uncomfortable position of having to go into my boss and explain to him that I broke his laptop. I still haven't done this, but I'll have to at some point.
All that having been said, I neglected a lot of other things that I should have been doing today and managed to get back up to around 16,045 words, which is still behind but not as far as I was yesterday. I'm still determined to finish this thing, even though tonight I managed to break the aforementioned pen drive, which isn't going to help me either.
(Anybody got a used laptop hard drive they want to get rid of? :])
I'm at 17,181 as of last night. I've killed off 1 and a half characters, kidnapped another, and sent one on a wild goose chase. It's fun!
Mary, Glad to hear your word count is going well. Just curious how you managed to kill off half a character... 
Siamese twins and only one died? Multiple personailty disorder and one of them "died"? Got halfway through the act of killing said character and then decided to call it a night?
On the other hand, guessing at how to kill only half a person is almost as much fun as knowing how you did it...
Killed the body, but not the soul? Killed the soul but not the body? Substitute soul with mind in last two examples? Maybe you only killed a giant (a single person who is the equivalent of 1 1/2 people)? Hmmmm...
I'm at 16,744. Two characters dead, but both of them were minor -- not even named before I knocked 'em off. The family has been split up, and I still haven't decided if the husband is going to make it back to his wife before he dies. And the whole thing is the worst garbage I have written since that last overnight research paper in seminary.
Besides, writing garbage now, means you will be less likely to write garbage in the future. It is all about practice and learning an growing. Every garden needs some fertilizer to help things grow, writing isn't much different.
*******************
And now for a little challenge. Friends, Hatrackers and NaNoites, lend me your ears.
Tuesday is November 15, the official halfway point for NaNoWriMo. BUT! we've got this great little weekend right before that.
So here is the challenge: Can YOU make it to the halfway mark by midnight on Sunday? Are you up for it? Think you can make 25,000 words by Sunday night? Get a couple of days ahead?
Think about it. Give it a try. What do you have to lose?
So there! The gauntlet has officially been thrown down. Gonna pick it up?
[This message has been edited by Robyn_Hood (edited November 11, 2005).]
quote:
Killed the soul but not the body?
That's pretty much it. One of my characters swallowed the soul of another and then slipped into his skin. So the half-dead guy has a seriously unpleasant person cruising around pretending to be him.
[This message has been edited by MaryRobinette (edited November 11, 2005).]
One day I was a couple hundred words short. The next, it was a thousand short of goal. Then we had last friday I had caught up nicely. Sunday, I was about 1k behind. Somewhere around the middle of the week, that became 2k behind.
Yesterday and today I've managed to stay at 4k behind. I'm writing and the number is going up, but it seems like no matter what, the math shows me at a progressive loss.
I think I'm just not writing as fast now.
I've been told by one person that it's "Stupid week two mojo".
I'm hoping when I get my MC on the road, things will pick up again. *crosses fingers*
Tomorrow, write 2667 words instead of 1667, and by then you'll only be 2000 words behind. Sunday, do the same and you'll almost be caught up. Then add an extra 200 words per day and by next Friday you'll be all caught up.
If you get stuck, kill somebody off! (Or only half a someone 
).
If you find an extra 1000 words to be too daunting right now, write an average of 1955 words per day starting tomorrow and by the 30th you will 50,000. That's only a 288 word increase. If you are already maintaining the gap, what's an extra couple hundred words each day to help you catch up?
While it is nice to think we can all write at a consistent pace, it just doesn't always happen that way. Some parts of your story you "know" better than others, so you can write them faster and with more detail. Other areas are a bit hazy -- they eat up more time and can be easier to just gloss over. If you know a developed section is coming up soon, don't worry so much, you'll be able to make up some of the time.
If you are getting desperate, check to see if you have written "alright" or "alot" anywhere, then use your word processor's "Find/Replace" function to substitute in "all right" and "a lot". (You can do the same thing for contractions: "don't" to "do not"; "it's" to "it is"; etc.).
quote:
The craziest thing so far, is the my Antagonist has no form and is named The Evil.
All right, if you are stuck, take some time and write an entire chapter devoted to your antagonist. Flesh him out, give him a form, introduce him in all his dastardly glory. In the end, you don't have to keep the chapter, but it will serve at least two purposes:
1) It will keep your word count up
and
2) It will help define the antagonist in your mind. Once you have a clearer picture of him, you will be more free to use him to create conflict and it is conflict which drives your plot so keeping your word count going should be easier.
I ended up having a friend IM me a word war. I pulled another 468 words, which gave me the push to get of the 15k, and now I'm only 3k behind.
At this rate, seven 10 min word wars would get me on par.
Word wars are good.
I do like your idea better than my friend's idea of how to get through a slow spot.
He said to insert a sex scene.
I immediately pictured the current scene, my MC and this grandma in a kitchen with one of her grandchildren doing dishes.
I had to tell my friend no. There's some things I can't do with and still be able to sleep at night.
Good luck for the weekend.
But I have a long weekend ahead of me .
[This message has been edited by cvgurau (edited November 12, 2005).]
Oh, I don't know if I said this before, but my username on the NaNo boards is Brittany. Just in case you wanted to check up on me--I need all the accountability I can get. 
(EDIT: because you never see those pesky little typos until seconds after it's too late.)
[This message has been edited by Jaina (edited November 12, 2005).]
This story is really turning out to be a serious novel. Badly written, but with a plot and real characters and everything.
Plot points are falling together like automated puzzle pieces and it's all terribly logical.
My latest character, the traitor who doesn't know it, is apparently my MC's dad. I started this whole thing about him remembering the child (the MC) being taken away by 'the city'. When I went back to the begining of the story to see if I had mentioned anything of my MC's past, so I could add that if needed, I discovered to my surprised I had already set up my MC as having lived in an orphage.
Crazy.
Edited to add:
I made it!
25017 words
[This message has been edited by JmariC (edited November 13, 2005).]
I only reached 20,212 but I got slammed with a chest cold on Friday. I also forgot that we had plans yesterday which meant I wrote no words at all.
Given that the half-way mark TECHNICALLY isn't 'till Tueday, I'm going to see if I can't get 25K by midnight tonight.
Wish me luck.
Lots and lots and lots of luck.
It's great when you discover things about your characters, especially when it contributes to your plot Way to go on the word count, too! So now, you aren't behind - at all! - and you are ahead of the game. Great work, now go write some more
No rest for the wicked and the righteous don't need it.
Everyone else, hope you all had good weekends, even those with the colds (ick, that makes it hard to sit at the computer all day and focus. If you can write anything in that state, you're a trooper).
Keep pushing on. The halfway point isn't until 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday. Good luck!
But if it makes you feel better, it wasn't a real cold, anyway. All I had was a stuffy nose and propensity for sneezing. That's like, cold light, isn't it?
--Mel
The other shorthand trick, when I'm stalled, is to look at the character who is onstage and think, "What does she want?" It is easier to answer than "What is she going to do next?"
Last night I realized that I needed a chapter between 9 and 10. I knew it needed to be from Cassandra's POV but that was all I knew. I stared at the screen for about fifteen minutes trying to see plot before I remembered my trick. Big picture, Cassie wants her mom to pay attention to her. Little picture, she wants to go on the internet so she can complain to a friend. AH--so all I have to do to have a scene is to stop her from going online. Who stops her? Her mom! Ha, ha! The words leapt out of my fingers.
Hope everyone gets to 25,000 words by tonight...Don't forget, I'm watching! 
Oh, yeah. Let me just find my magic wand. 
Well, not entirely impossible, I suppose. At least, it's worth a shot.
I made it to 23,768, though, and hope to be all caught up within the next day or two.Edited to add that those are great suggestions, Mary. Thanks.
[This message has been edited by Minister (edited November 16, 2005).]
So, how much more do you have to write and how many words per day does it mean?
Words to write:
But, I'll be able to make up those missing 500 words easily. Today I've written 7 words. I'm so proud.
Robyn_Hood, as always, you are a great cheerleader.
Just thought I'd lighten up everyone's mood during this stressful period.
Way to go you guys. Just a bit more of this insanity and then you're free to goof off for a bit. Then back to writing.
Now back to NaNo. <cracks the whip again>
-Monolith-
I'm trying real hard to stay at or just above the daily word goal. I'm stopping tonight only 872 words away from reaching tomorrow's goal.
le sigh
I'm trying to avoid dropping out; it'd be a real shame to write 30K words and then not finish. But time's in short supply, and not getting any more plentiful as the season progresses.
This was my first NaNo. When's the next one?
No. But really, the idea is that you'd write a complete scene from your novel using the trigger. You only get an hour and a half, but you can enter more than one entry. Each would have to use the trigger in a different way.
Not sure if we will, but it's something we're thinking about.
I stalled at 25,543 words. I realized that my husband and I are moving in less than a month and that I needed to give myself permission to not hit the wordcount. So I'm going to try to get my remaining 25,000 words in January in a fifteen day spurt. Any other dropouts want to play then?
By the way, having made that decision, it has now become very difficult to not write on the novel.
I'm moving and I'm going to lose the net for like 3 weeks during January!! I might even lose my computer as well for that time... I need to buy a laptop!!!
*slinks off feeling inferior with his measly 30K words*
Well done to Jaina. Your story still needs an ending though
.Congrats Jaina! You can make it 60k now if you truly want to!
So, Jaina's already won; who else is still in this?
I have won 4 times. This year I went to Thailand instead. Good trade, I think.
This NaNovel may not have an ending, but it's getting 50k. By Sunday if I can, but no promises there.
quote:
screw nano. that is my informed opinion.
I have won 4 times. This year I went to Thailand instead. Good trade, I think
I find that funny. Well I suppose its not exactly hard to write 50,000 words in a few weeks as long as you can make time with it.
This NaNovel may not have an ending, but it's getting 50k. By Sunday if I can, but no promises there.
I'm getting a little worried.
So I went into the forums and signed up for a word war... and finished at 49,800. 200 words short. Then I *did* cry. Then I sat my but down and wrote a good 300 words because after everything I'd done that day, why the heck not? And then I screamed and scared my roommates and jumped up and down and gloated on the boards for the rest of the night.
There were a couple of other times that I wanted to stop that night, and I could not for the life of me think of a single thing that could happen next. But I found that doing word wars saved me, because I *had* to write, and it didn't matter if it was crap. If I wanted to win, the words were all that mattered. And, surprisingly enough, the word wars gave me some of my most interesting characters and my most exciting plot twists.
And obviously, judging by the length of this post, I haven't figured out yet how to cut the word count back down to something manageable. But I still have a lot of story to write, and I'm off to continue. Good luck to all who are still going--I know you can do it!
March is when a number of people who have finished their novels turn to editing.
Yeah!