I just looked at when my last post was. 23 October?! Yikes!

So what have I been up to? Well, it was November, so my long time readers know exactly what that means for me: National Novel Writing Month. It managed to successfully eat my life pretty much all month, and now I am 70,060 words towards a first draft of a gothic horror/thriller novel. And I think that I might have found what I should be writing. Of course there is still a ton to do before this story ever sees the light of day, especially since the first draft isn’t even finished yet.

Still, I had some massive writing days (in excess of 6,000 words) and I sat down and pounded out a few thousand nearly every day. I hit 50,000 words (the NaNoWriMo “finish line”) at the end of the 14th. There were only a few days where I didn’t sit down and write something.

As always, this year was a bit of an experiment. In addition to writing in a different genre (yet again), I also used a different writing tool. It was still my trusty MacBook, but rather than using a word processor, I used Journler. Each day I started a new entry and tagged it as part of NaNoWriMo 2008. I had a smart folder that collected all of those entries so that I could spit the whole thing out as a single file. But each day I sat down to a blank page. At the bottom it gave me the word count for that entry, which meant that I knew immediately whether I had met my daily goal or not. And because I could not easily go back and reread work from previous days, it kept me from continually checking what I had previously written. While it might not work for some projects, for NaNoWriMo it was perfection (or close to it).

In addition to being Novel Writing Month, November is also National Solo Album Month. The goal is to write and record roughly a half hour of music during November with no outside help. I had heard about it a few years ago and have been wanting to give it a try. I thought that it might be a good excuse to finally write that goth album I have wanted to write for the past twenty or more years. In the end, though, I ended up with about 20-25 minutes of sketches and demos which will mostly wind up on the second Maniac Art Pond album, once I have reworked them. I know that I have still to wrap up Winter Colors, but these fit the theme that I had been planning on for the second album. I am hoping to make significant progress on both over the next two months. It would be fantastic to be able to release them both next autumn.

I think that this might be the last year for both NaNoWriMo and NaSoAlMo for me, at least for a few years. I have so much raw material to go through and polish that I think I could use with a break. There are a few other challenges that I would like to do, though. Feburary Album Writing Month, with the goal of writing fourteen songs in twenty-eight days is, not so surprisingly, in February. April is now Script Frenzy, and I think that it might work out well for me now that they have significantly reworked the rules. Of course, I may simply sit down and work on the scripts that have been on the back burner for the past few years without the help of the challenge.

First comes the holidays, though, and all of the work leading up to those. My stomach knots just thinking everything that I want to have done before I see my family again.

Tschuess.

Lots of news.

Winter Colors is still not wrapped up. I am starting to think that it is just one of these things that will be done when it is done. No real deadline. I will probably be happier with the final product with that approach. And that will also mean that I will be able to gather winter footage for the accompanying film. I am still going to keep working on it, but this makes me feel better already.

One of the things that helped me decide to stop pushing so hard—other than my current hatred for so some of my latest pieces—is my desire to write a goth album during October or November. Originally I was definitely going to do it during November as part of National Solo Album Month (NaSoAlMo). Writing another novel during National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)—also November—is probably enough to have on my plate, so I am currently considering doing it during October. If I do, I will also allow myself to break other NaSoAlMo rules by doing things like pulling in guest vocalists.

Before I do that, though, I have an EP to finish up. A week ago, someone challenged me to write a few songs on a particular subject. I almost immediately had ideas for a dozen tracks. I pruned that down to four and have been working on them over the past week. My goal is to start releasing them as Timely Releases sometime during the next couple of weeks. Keep an eye out.

And if you already know the subject, please keep it to yourself until the release. I want it to be a surprise.

Also, next weekend Spandex Jellybeans is going to reconvene. I am not sure whether we will just be wrapping up existing tracks, writing new ones, recording vocals for other projects, or what. Whatever it is, I am sure that it will be a blast. Hopefully this session will result in a new release.

That is about all of the news that I can share right now.

Tschuess.

Well, the fellow who ran NaSoAlMo previously has decided to take a break this year. And since he does not have anything automated, I suppose that I can understand that. What this means is that there will not be a formal NaSoAlMo.

Will I record a new album during November anyway? A few days ago I would have said “oh yeah!” Now I am not so sure. I have some other projects that I want to work on in addition to writing that novel. And it would be nice to get to be somewhat social, see Kristi, sleep. We will see how this month goes and whether I am being far too optimistic in my self-estimation.

Tschuess.