Month: November 2019

NaNoWriMo, Meds, and Project Updates

I’m thinking this year’s NaNoWriMo challenge is going to be a bust for me. I’m at 5672 words out of a 50k goal and the deadline is Saturday. However, I don’t consider this year’s challenge a failure. A lot of things happened this month and still continue. My new goal is to try and hit 7000 words by Saturday, with Black Friday and Small Business Saturday both taking place. (The part time job is for a small business.)

The meds situation is improved. For now I’m remaining at the 40mg Prozac and 150mg Wellbutrin. The depression side of things has lessened and the only complaint I have currently is concentration and focus are still off. We’re going to hold here for another month and see if I just need more time with the new med.

I’ve almost finished my Christmas Card image, which should appear here in the first week or so of December. The sketch and color work is done, and I just have a couple of design decisions to make. Then comes the less fun side of Christmas Cards, addressing and sending them.

One last note on the current word count. Those 5672 words represent a lot of structural story work. I’m building the story around the main story now.

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Water, Oxygen, and NaNoWriMo

This morning’s news feeds featured three stories with a future impact on the search for extraterrestrial life in our solar system and the eventual colonization of our solar system.

National Geographic.co.uk features an article with the title: “Mysterious oxygen spike seen on Mars puzzles scientists“. Nature.com has the news article “A whole new world: astronomers draw first global map of Titan“. And, Space,com features “The Weird Plumes of Jupiter’s Moon Europa Are Spewing Water Vapor” on its newsfeed.

If you’ve followed along with various bits of stories that have appeared in this blog, you know that, like many other scifi writers, I believe either out of necessity or curiosity, humanity will one day be a species existing on other space objects. The common thread in these three stories is the presence of oxygen or surface liquids in places that are not Earth. The implications of this are potentially huge.

We may be one step closer to finding life or being the life on these other solar system neighbors.

I’m still slowly making progress towards my NaNoWriMo goal of 50k words. I am currently at 4723 words. On a plus note, I’ve gotten two in-story groups to where they need to go for future story events.

Current Project Update

So… my current word count for NaNoWriMo is 3675. I know, I know, I’m way behind the 50k target total. According to my “word per day” calculator, I have to clear 3500 words a day to still hit the goal on time. That may not happen.

On a plus note, the med adjustment seems to have gone well. The depression and SAD aspect seems to be lessened, but my focus seems to have also been lessened. Of course, new distractions have also been picked up in the last week (mentioned in the last post). So anything more than 0 words in this most recent window is a win.

As mentioned before, I recently started a part-time job. The blogging, writing, and art isn’t producing a self-sustaining income, so something had to be added to keep the bills paid. On a plus note, I’m working in a hobby and craft shop. So, models, r/c hobbies, train sets, scratch-build supplies, craft supplies, and art supplies are around me daily and helping to fuel plenty of future projects once I get the focus part down. Plus, I get to find creative solutions to problems almost every day that I work.

And speaking of current projects, aside from the NaNoWriMo project, my new current project is designing a Christmas card for my wife and I to send out this year. That should appear soonish in the late November/early December timeframe.

And just so I don’t leave any followers, readers, or guests here empty handed, the above picture is my earliest picture of the USSC Aldrin in orbit over Themis. And as always, the DeviantArt link.

Distractions

Distractions are always a problem when writing. Sometimes it’s weather. Sometimes, it’s a new job. Sometimes it’s a new medication adjustment. The past few days have been all of the above. I am sitting at 3065 words out of the 50k target as of the moment. I’ve also discovered my latest distraction to add to those previously listed: Disney+.

For those waiting for a paycheck to subscribe, Disney+ is offering a 7-day free trial. So far Disney+ is amazing and the choice of things to watch is huge. For me, so far I’ve watched Star Wars (A New Hope) as a test of the service and I’ m stuck on watching the show Rebels.

For us, this is replacing Netflix for us and World of Warcraft for me. Though I’m starting to think this is going to be a much bigger distraction overall for me.