Fade and Day 30

Prompt: Faded

Dear Wednesday,

As National Novel Writing Month 2016 fades into the sunset, which is a lot earlier than usual because of dang Daylight Savings Time…. I’m a weiner! That is, I won the challenge of uploading 50,000 to the Nano site before midnight, November 30.

This was my second most difficult attempt: The only more painful one was when I sat down with a bad idea but kept writing anyway. I lost interest and it took great effort do the wordage, which was consistently awful but I just wanted to get it done (and did).

Usually, Nano is challenging but also invigorating, and there is something liberating about concentrating on one thing, one activity, for an entire month. You eat, think, sleep and dream the novel. Then December 1 happens and you awake to reality. Reality is nice too!

In celebration, may I present three cartoons from young American cartoonist Matthew Diffee, whose quirky yet gentle humour and contemporary design sense are very appealing to me just now:

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December!

~FP

Culture and Day 29

Prompt: Culture

Culture is the prompt today. Hello, Culture, are you being a good word today? Are you colourful, fascinating, inclusive, ethical, inspiring, and spiritual? If not, go away.

Yes, I’m exhausted on Day 29 of NaNoWriMo. I will reach my wordcount goal, but not the main goal of having a coherent story to share.

Tomorrow when I officially upload my 50,000 words, the universe will rejoice. Or, no one will notice, and I will be disappointed that I didn’t accomplish what I wanted. And work a lot harder next time.

Thank you for all the amazing support and encouragement!

 

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• Image: Jimoh Buraimoh

Vigor and Day 28

Prompt: Vigor

You know who is filled with vigor? The young son of two intergalactic travellers, named Radical, the second child born on a distant planet. His parentage is somewhat of a mystery, as he gestated longer than normal human babies. Despite that, he is a curious and active child. What will life be like in this new civilization? Who and what is Radical?

Yes, I am eager to get back to my people, the people I write about here, once NaNoWriMo is done. Nano is a great challenge, and an exhausting one, and if anyone is interested I will put together the chapters I finish writing in some kind of order, ready for comments and suggestions. I think the story is interesting, but I have been wrong before.

The problem with the Nano novels is that after a month of concentration, you only want to be free of that particular plot and those particular characters for awhile. I want to get this one done, however, as a first finished attempt, or what’s the point?

At this stage in the process I just feel tired! I want cucumber slices on my eyes and a good neck massage. I want a clean house and stacks of clean fresh towels and laundry.

I can’t decide yet what kind of entity Radical will be, but I think his journey will be a lot of fun.

 

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• Image: Alastair Magnaldo

Pungent and Day 27

Prompt: Pungent

Red wine vinegar has a pungent smell, and so do gorgonzola cheese and cigar smoke. A back alley or urban tunnel can have pungent odors too, of garbage and piss. What else is pungent besides smell?

I don’t know. I only know that on Day 27 of my NaNoWriMo novel, I still don’t have the murder scene organized. That’s because I changed the identity of the person to finally be arrested and charged, and it relies on planted evidence. Also, the murder has changed from premeditated to somewhat spontaneous, and who takes a large knife on a walk in the park? I might have to change it back to premeditated, but I do want to hold onto some shred of sympathy for the murderer, and that’s hard when someone plans a bloody homicide.

My next Nano novel will be about unicorns and rainbows. …Pungent, gangster unicorns maybe, and rainbows made of acid rain drops. As you can tell I could use a dose of sweetness right about now.

 

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• Image: Art Smells

 

Liminal and Day 26

Prompt: Liminal

“She was very liminal.”

Ok, that’s the prompt out of the way, although it is an interesting word, and the base for the more common word “subliminal”. It means “threshold” or, a kind of transition from one psychological state to another. I spent a lot of time procrastinating (Nano) by looking up this word and trying to comprehend it properly. Seems like a left turn by the Holy Prompters.

Anyway, I have no time for liminals. I am writing a book, for pete’s sake, in 30 days. Today I powered up and made the goal almost possible. Four days to go.

Do you believe in God? Then why aren’t you praying for me?

Sated and Day 25

Prompt: Sated

I spend most of my NaNoWriMo days looking for ways to procrastinate. Why do I do that? It is a holy quest, a kind of Game of Thrones challenge, to figure out ways to avoid actually doing the writing that I am supposed to do.

I plan to win NaNoWriMo this time, as I always have, because I need to. You know how there are some things in your life that define you, even as they are not important to anyone but you?

Meanwhile, I am so missing all my people, the ones who populate my fiction on this site: Leep, Envy, Lily-Rose, Bernard… all of them. They are dying to tell their stories.

As for the daily prompt: I got nothing but the image.

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• Credit: Jon Paul Caponigro image.

Chaotic and Day 24

Prompt: Chaotic

I thought this illustration of chaos theory by momentica-one on the site Deviant Art was pretty cool. Please visit the site and let the artist know you like it too!

Meanwhile, back at NaNoWriMo, chaos still reigns, in the sense that I simply can not seem to focus and get the requisite number of words done per day in order to get to 50,000 words by midnight on November 30.

I used to work in advertising, where unreasonable deadlines were daily occurrences, so I am hoping my eleventh hour determination will kick in soon. Please? Kick in soon?

Anticipation and Day 23

Prompt: Anticipation

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Dear Wednesday,

I anticipate a failure for the fist time in  all my years of taking the NaNoWriMo challenge. But never mind that. I haven’t given up. Miracles happen. I only have 20,000 words to go, in seven days. Oh Jeez.

But join me in my denial of all things negative today and have a look at some of my favourite cartoons this week, the first one of which is a quirky take on theme of the daily prompt, anticipation:

 

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I don’t know why, but this ridiculous cartoon makes me feel better about my own failings:

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Ok, and this one is tricky to reproduce, but have a look, and see if it doesn’t click with you somehow, and make you feel kind of sweet and stupid:

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Happy Thanksgiving to my American friends, and Happy Midweek to everyone else!

~FP

Elicit and Day 22

Prompt: Elicit

Does the Daily Prompt word elicit mean the same thing as the word panic? If not, I’m not equipped to talk about elicit, except to say that as a string of letters, it has a nice, sexy sound.

The word panic sounds like what it is. Hard-edged, a bit raw, urgent, not very pretty.

I am almost at 30,000 words with my National Novel Writing Month 50,000 word opus, but you see it is November 22, and I should be at the 36k mark, at least.

Panic. Pancetta. Panini. Pachobel. Peace.

Note to self: Write the effing book!

Aromatic and Day 21

Prompt: Aromatic

There’s nothing like vintage, and in keeping with today’s prompt, here is a vintage New Yorker cartoon. Oh, so sublime.

Meanwhile, because of NaNoWriMo I am still concerned about bodies, clothes, and household becoming aromatic as I neglect everything in order to write 50,000 words in 30 days. There is progress: laundry is done, it just is in a heap ready to be folded.

And I hit my halfway mark today, 25,000 words. Very late, and very stressful, but I will carry on!