On Sunday, November 1, we turn the clocks back by one hour, which is definitely going to give me the edge I need to start NaNoWriMo that day. With my procrastination skills, that extra hour should mean a whole 10 or 11 extra words on my count.
I haven’t been preparing at all outside of contemplating some ideas. I’m doing the literary equivalent of freeballing. It’s the diametric opposite from how I usually approach a writing project, but then those tend to be screenplays and I have no idea what this is going to be. Hopefully a 50,000-word mess, but if I wind up with a 20,000-word lump that doesn’t win…well, I’m just not going to kick myself over it. (Not too hard, anyway.)
I hope to bring you some guest posts on Mondays in November, since I don’t expect to have a lot of energy left over for blogging. I’ve asked some interesting people to share their perspectives on a variety of topics. On Fridays, and put down your drink so you don’t do a spit-take out of excitement, I’ll be posting excerpts from the novel. I’m planning to pick the worst and/or most bizarre segments from that week, so with any luck it’ll be at least mildly entertaining, and possibly even awkward and embarrassing! One can but dream.
Good luck to all you other November crazy fuckers! And happy Halloween too, by the way. I send you off with the most obvious possible video.
I never wanted to get married. Not to say I had anything against the institution, I just didn’t see myself as a wife. This was a pretty good situation when I met this guy almost seven years ago. I hadn’t grown up anxious to fulfill my role as a bride nor casting around for a groom. So I didn’t harbor any doubts, when Paul proposed to me in front of Space Mountain, about my mad desire to say “yes,” or that he was my one.
I try not to Zenbaw on this blog too much (/wave at forumites), but it’s true that the past five years have been the most difficult period of my life. Many awesome things did happen, but meanwhile the speed and energy with which I was used to going through life slowed, eventually down to a trickle, due to circumstances over which I had absolutely no control. This isn’t, unfortunately, that uncommon of a story, and in these stories relationships frequently unravel as well.
Paul, however, has stood by me through all of this, as boyfriend, fiancé, and husband. And through all this I understand how incredibly lucky I am that with everything I’ve lost, I’ve kept the most important thing in my life, and he is by my side every day. Tomorrow it will be two years since we got married and if I believed in a god, I would be thanking him for giving me such a wonderful friend to be my husband.
So instead I will thank my husband for giving himself to me. I love you, Paul.
Continuing the WoW theme from Monday, there are some days when you cut a swath through your foes and bards write epic poems about you to be sung in every tavern in Azeroth. And then there are those days when you can’t hit the (extremely) broad side of Princess Theradras with a dart gun, and you’ve made so many trips to the Spirit Healer she’s starting to charge you rent.
The last few days have been the second kind for me. My body’s gone on a frontal assault against its imaginary enemies again; I appreciate its patriotism but I enjoy the truce periods so much more. So I’m not going to push it, since I’m saving my energy for a little celebration next week. I’ll just send you off here with probably my favorite video on the Internet, an incredible animation called “Doll Face” by Andrew Huang that goes beautifully with VNV Nation‘s haunting song “Illusion.” (Here’s the movie with the original soundtrack.)
