This is how I NaNoWriMo. A large latte and an Egg McMuffin and I’m good for a three hour stint of writing at McDonalds. I was able to get my favorite booth, one where I can sit with my back to everyone else in the fast-food chain and look out the window. I can usually […]
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To NaNo, or not to NaNo–that is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous publishers, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles And put an end to them by not writing. . . ‘Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. (adapted from Hamlet’s monologue) […]
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Looking at those two deck chairs, which one is mine, and which one is reserved for my writing companion, my dog, Seamus? Last week I spent Monday through Friday at my nephew’s cottage at Lake St. James. (It’s a tough life, the life of a writer.) It was just what I needed to kick start […]
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A while back, Peter DeHahn posted in his blog about his experience with NaNoWriMo and the advantages of writing a book in one month. I agree with what he wrote. I wrote the first three books of my Dancing Through Life series in three consecutive years for NaNoWriMo. It was great fun, focusing on this […]
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New Year’s has come and gone and with it went my motivation. It didn’t help that I came down with some type of intestinal bug the night of January 2, robbing me of two days of productivity. The only benefit of such a bug is that it can help you shed some of those holiday […]
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The main criticism I’ve heard of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is that it encourages quantity over quality in writing. Writers are spurred on to spew out words as quickly as possible without regard for the value behind the words. And then, thanks to the ease of self-publishing, there is a glut of poorly written […]
Read MoreComing up is the great celebration of writing, National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo. Time for me to clear a writing space on the cluttered catch all table in my kitchen that I use during NaNoWriMo. NaNoWriMo started 17 years ago as an effort to encourage writing. Every November all are challenged to write a […]
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“I can’t do this anymore! I’m no business woman. I quit,” I said last week when receiving notice about a form I was supposed to have filed but hadn’t. Sometimes I just don’t know, what I don’t know, which leads to frustration. Over twenty years ago, as a lay woman running a Catholic Church, […]
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Sometimes life throws us a curve ball, sometimes more than one at a time. Three weeks ago, I came home from a brief retreat at my brother’s cottage to the sound of rushing water, coming from the depths of our house. It took ten days, and periods of shutting the water off, to finally find […]
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In the fourth book of the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, there is a maze that the students compete in that changes it’s pathways as you walk through it. This means that you can’t go back the way you came in because that way no longer exists. Driving my car […]
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