Ku: Mountain Over Wind: Work on What has Been Spoiled
Monday, November 20th, 2006 10:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flwydI was planning on giving up on NaNoWriMo today, since I've written 5,000 words in 20 days. But then I got an idea.
When I signed up, most of the things I wanted to write were not novels (including musing about the word count algorithm and a 50,000 identifier program). I picked an idea with a guiding structure, but my heart wasn't really in it. It was a novel I could write to prove I could, but it wasn't what I really wanted to write.
So with ten days left, I did what a good project manager would do. Shelve the floundering Borges-inspired project and start fresh on something better structured to writing 5,000 words a day.
The I Ching provides eight convenient characters: Heaven, Earth, Thunder, Wind, Water, Fire, Mountain, and Lake. It also provides context for all sixty four possible combinations of those characters. If I write 64 short stories of 782 words, I hit the magical mark. And I think writing eight short pieces a day is more manageable than writing 45,000 words of a novel in ten days. Plus I can "cheat" by starting each "chapter" with the translated text for each hexagram.
It's time for I. Wish me Chin.
Update: 963 words in an hour and a half; only 76 from cheating. If I can keep that pace up for the balance of the month, I win.
When I signed up, most of the things I wanted to write were not novels (including musing about the word count algorithm and a 50,000 identifier program). I picked an idea with a guiding structure, but my heart wasn't really in it. It was a novel I could write to prove I could, but it wasn't what I really wanted to write.
So with ten days left, I did what a good project manager would do. Shelve the floundering Borges-inspired project and start fresh on something better structured to writing 5,000 words a day.
The I Ching provides eight convenient characters: Heaven, Earth, Thunder, Wind, Water, Fire, Mountain, and Lake. It also provides context for all sixty four possible combinations of those characters. If I write 64 short stories of 782 words, I hit the magical mark. And I think writing eight short pieces a day is more manageable than writing 45,000 words of a novel in ten days. Plus I can "cheat" by starting each "chapter" with the translated text for each hexagram.
It's time for I. Wish me Chin.
Update: 963 words in an hour and a half; only 76 from cheating. If I can keep that pace up for the balance of the month, I win.
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Wow.
Date: 2006-11-21 05:56 am (UTC)Re: Wow.
Date: 2006-11-23 12:34 am (UTC)I've linked to your post from the Daily Pep Talk thread (http://www.nanowrimo.org/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=19234) in the Colorodo::Boulder forum. You may find the rest of the troops coming in and telling you how much you rock.
Re: Wow.
Date: 2006-11-23 03:37 am (UTC)WAY cool! I love the I Ching.
In fact, now that I'm writing and thinking at the same time. (Oh my...) I just realized that my main character *has* to consult oracles!!! Why didn't I think of that?
See, my story is just a fictionalized memoir that I haven't finished as memoir yet, although I figure I will eventually do both. (See www.annojohnson.wordpress.com if you're interested)
THANK YOU!!!
Stacy
aka anastacia42
Re: Wow.
Date: 2006-11-23 03:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-21 08:09 am (UTC)