Productive Weekend
This past weekend was a productive one for me on the writing front. Saturday morning, after an early wake up from the hounds, I was doing some file clean up on my computer and got to digging around in my old hard drive. Like an archaeologist sifting through the debris of decades past, I found a treasure trove. 9 stories I had begun some time ago but had no hard copies of. Woohoo! I knew they were around somewhere but was having trouble piecing them back together just from memory. Given that a couple are nearly complete, I was exceptionally happy.
The dogs thought I was a bit weird for my little happy dance. Oh well. They're silly pups anyway. So I got started editing one complete story. Too bad I soon realize I hate editing. To me, the story's done... finished... out to the unsuspecting masses with it. But alas it is not ready for the world yet. That's when I started the rotation. Edit for a while. Write new stuff for a while. Transcribe long hand notes into the computer for a while. Rinse and repeat. And somehow it worked.
How well, you might ask... Well... 110 pages worth. Plus some long hand notes after I went to bed last night. Now that's call for a major happy dance. I celebrated by baking cookies.
That was enough that I wasn't even in a bad mood when I went to work this morning. All day, only a couple emails annoyed me and I didn't threaten to boot anyone. Major accomplishments for me... I have a love/hate thing with people. But I did set a few goals for my writing.
First, I will write something every day. This doesn't necessarily mean writing any of my fiction every day. It could be documentation for work. But I must write.
Second, I will spend at least two hours per week editing. I have to or I will never get anything into a good, consumable format. And the per week is because of my work schedule. If I can't make my brain work on editing during the week then the weekend it is.
Third, I will write at least 40 pages per week. Again the per week because of work. And I am not limiting myself to 40 pages of completely new off the top of my head material. I have stacks of notebooks with ideas and pieces of various stories in them. This includes stories already in my computer but I had ideas for when not at home. These need worked on just as much as new material... perhaps even more.
Think I can do it? I'd love to know what your goals are, writing or otherwise. This whole set goals thing is rather new to me. I'm more of a thrive on chaos kind of girl.
Keep reading.
SK
The dogs thought I was a bit weird for my little happy dance. Oh well. They're silly pups anyway. So I got started editing one complete story. Too bad I soon realize I hate editing. To me, the story's done... finished... out to the unsuspecting masses with it. But alas it is not ready for the world yet. That's when I started the rotation. Edit for a while. Write new stuff for a while. Transcribe long hand notes into the computer for a while. Rinse and repeat. And somehow it worked.
How well, you might ask... Well... 110 pages worth. Plus some long hand notes after I went to bed last night. Now that's call for a major happy dance. I celebrated by baking cookies.
That was enough that I wasn't even in a bad mood when I went to work this morning. All day, only a couple emails annoyed me and I didn't threaten to boot anyone. Major accomplishments for me... I have a love/hate thing with people. But I did set a few goals for my writing.
First, I will write something every day. This doesn't necessarily mean writing any of my fiction every day. It could be documentation for work. But I must write.
Second, I will spend at least two hours per week editing. I have to or I will never get anything into a good, consumable format. And the per week is because of my work schedule. If I can't make my brain work on editing during the week then the weekend it is.
Third, I will write at least 40 pages per week. Again the per week because of work. And I am not limiting myself to 40 pages of completely new off the top of my head material. I have stacks of notebooks with ideas and pieces of various stories in them. This includes stories already in my computer but I had ideas for when not at home. These need worked on just as much as new material... perhaps even more.
Think I can do it? I'd love to know what your goals are, writing or otherwise. This whole set goals thing is rather new to me. I'm more of a thrive on chaos kind of girl.
Keep reading.
SK
posted by Signy | 7:00 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home