Day 2: November 2

But failing that I still jumped ahead to nine pages, total. Go, go, go everyone!

balancing. such an important skill for writers to have. I think you have given me an idea for a blog post. :)

Break a leg, Sam! Glad you remembered! :)

all great places to get your characters talking. usually i just interrogate mine, with the one bare light, the dingy room, one table, uncomfortable chair...i'll try something less 'The Pillowman' next time. :)

great progress!

YAY!!! good for you! I know you have a lot going on and it's good to see you getting in here. :)

So I actually wrote 3 pages. I'm using the Richard Foreman technique of just writing stream of consciousness dialogue. I used to do it a lot and all my short plays started out that way as a very first rough draft. We'll see what this turns into. I just need to let myself know that I can write dialogue again. It's been so long...

Wow.

and you're just listening to your characters gabbling aimlessly...no plot, or too much, no purpose, just rambling along...no deep thoughts or complex construction here, just blah blah blah...As people do in pubs, one of the characters gets on the soap box and starts lecturing one and all sternly..the moral of the story, look HERE IS AN IMPORTANT FACT GATHERED IN MY RESEARCH I SHALL SAY IT LOUDLY HERE...

Six pages worth.

No doubt this mess can be boiled down to two pages with the appropriate editing. .

sigh.

But it's moving! Even in the pub, it's moving! Just clunky at the moment.

Hello, all. I very nearly forgot about Naplwrimo but nay! Here I am, about to sit down and begin work on my first play. Ever. I've got the basic idea, and it could be good...now I need to open up CeltX and do this thing. Very excited. Good luck to you all.

Sam

Had to balance the business of writing with the creativity of writing today. Not a bad job of it, I just had to get down to writing the instant I woke up this morning, which I'm not always good at.

Luckily, I'm spending the first week just brainstorming play ideas for the collection and seeing what dialogue comes about organically. 30 plays.... is a lot. This is such a great exercise for the brain though - I was in observation overload and felt those muscles were working really well!

I ended up with 4 hand written pages, with fragments of dialogue for three separate plays. A great place to start tomorrow....

I did as much writing as I could do at the moment without reading over my notes and another book I'm using for the play. Today was luke-warm as far as writing goes.

Something weird happened. I opened my script to make some minor changes to the stage directions, and bang! a few minutes later I had two extra pages. Way to go. Afterwards we had a nice café writing session with a friend who's doing NaNo.

Total of six pages today. Now I need some sleep.

Meant to check in yesterday. I might not finish, but I'll participate.

Yes computers are lovely gadgets...but they only do what they are told. Like saving. The stuff you just spent your lunch hour tippety tapping out. The stuff you spent another twenty minutes searching for in the OLB and temp and other mysterious swamps of the C drive...however, I am pleased to say that, although the bog sucked my shoes off, I was able to rescue my words from its maw.

And then I just about broke the keyboard hitting Ctrl + Save.

sigh.

Paper is slower but it does take more effort to misplace it.

More tonight.

Did five pages, left myself two more scenes to write at the next session. Good luck to all.

Got 9 pgs out yesterday, aiming to stick to my pace of four today. There's a temptation to blow out of the gate and write lots of pages early. I have to remember to stick to the pace, so I leave myself something to write the next session. Makes the blank page less intimidating.

I was really confused (it's 5 a.m. here in central time in the states) and I was like, DAY 2?!?!?!, but then I remembered THE INTERNATIONAL DATE LINE.

Sometimes I'm very slap happy this early in the morning. Even without caffiene.

Anyway, WOW, I have been seriously impressed by the volume people have been writing. 2.5 pages a day--WHATEVER. You guys are setting a seriously high bar! I feel embarassed. ;)

And I'm glad you are so excited about naplwrimo. I am too.

And I better get cracking!

OK, well day 2 is almost over here in New Zealand. I'm only writing on weekdays, so it's my first slice of Naplwrimo. I have 20 days for 75 pages - basically 4 per day. And hurray! I've got 4 typed in, and two more on paper.

So far, so good. Thanks everyone, Naplwrimo is just what I needed. It wonderful to share the experience. You guys rock!

Happy writing.