A new goal for December

I've set aside today to be a full-length, full-blown day of word explosions *BAM* Yesterday I decided to finish my novel's first draft at the end of this month. It's my personal goal to enter 2015 with a giant stack of paper that I can call my book!

So today the fires of NaNo will reignite. If December was marked as another writing month called "NaNoFinMo", today's par would be:
13,333 new words!

Add that to the 50k from NaNo, that should put us around 63k today (no pressure Vals!)

Since November finished, I've brought my new word count to a beautiful 8,471 new words. It will be child's play to bring myself back up to par with a full day of writing, crazy madness that I shall summon from the deepest parts of my mind!

Or the empty bottom of my Lego coffee cup :D

My latest writing technique has changed over the last week. My mornings have now started with cuddling on the couch with a blanket and coffee, looking through various blogs on my iPad. As I'm too buggered to move after thirty minutes, I've pulled up my note app and just started typing out the next set of notes for my novel. The last couple times I've done this, I've typed at least 800 - 1000 words. When I finally feel the urge to rejuvenate my caffeine levels, I email my notes to myself. Get up, grab another cup of coffee, and sit down at the computer to extend my notes into dialog and descriptions.

Today was no different - except the notes I took were for a rewrite. The scene I ended with yesterday didn't make any sense. Why would a character that wanted to earn your trust suddenly attack you and then say "hah just kidding." Nooooo not a good idea. So my Monday will thus begin with CUTTING words out, but I'm confident the scene will be better in the end.

Word count for the day:  8490  words....
(*Update* lol at my funny arrow comment: <--- this will be so huge and awesome. just wait for it!)
I'm too guilty to highlight the numbers. Maybe people will gloss over this updated word count and not realize that it's only like 20 extra words from what I had before. I guess that's what I get for deleting almost 1000 words today. Ewww - I just couldn't stand the thought of yet another strikeout paragraph is my doc.

EXCERPT

So....characters are chilling in their room for the night. But the excitement is not over yet!

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The last couple hours blurred in Isaac’s mind. The events passed too quickly for him to catch one and remember what really happened. He had almost convinced himself this whole day was a dream until Jason bolted up from the couch and stared at the door. No one moved. Jason took a single step and brought up his wrist with the new watch. Then with a single action he waved his right hand forward and used his left to grapple it. “Expand!”

Gold mist escaped his lips and floated down to his arms. The watch untangled itself and straightened out of its spiral, a golden sword falling heavily into his left hand. Jason grasped it and swung it forward, ready to strike.

Shiri yelped and caught her foot on the edge of the giant mattress, falling out of the bed. “What’s going on, you guys?” she sputtered.

Isaac scrambled up from his seat, almost tying his angle in the strap from his rifle. He stumbled forward onto one knee, but still managed to cram the gun into the indent of his left shoulder. He squinted with one eye and lined up his sights along the muzzle, pointing toward the door.

Clearly noticing the commotion for the first time, Jason twitched and turned around to see his comrades sprawled out on the floor. He frowned and gripped the hilt of his sword with both hands. “Isaac, why are you pointing a gun at me?”

                “Get out of the way! If there’s a monster coming through, I wanna hit it between the eyes!”

                 “Monster – you mean a daemon is out there?” Shiri cried out. “You can’t be serious. Not again!”

                “Whoa, really? How can you tell?” Jason asked, but got into a solid stance.

                “Isn’t that why you took your sword out? “ Isaac asked

                “No, I was just testing something.”

A drop of sweat ran down from Isaac’s forehead. He held his gun steady, but glanced up at Jason studying him. “So, there’s no impending attack behind the door?” Isaac asked.

                “Uh, not that I know of.”

Isaac relaxed his grip and set the gun back down on the floor, followed by a long breath of air. Shiri finally crawled out from under the bed. “Seriously, both of you almost gave me a heart attack,” she yelled. “What was that all about?”

                “I just wanted to test out some theories about how these elemental weapons work. I figured if you could use a single word to shrink it into something else, the opposite word would return it to normal. Looks like I was right!” Jason grinned triumphantly. He hiked his sword up a little to prove his point.

Isaac threw his gun onto the floor and stood up making weird sound effects with his tongue. “Of all the…gah…Jay! Have a heart man!” Isaac complained, flailing his arms around to emphasize his words. “After what we’ve been through, you can’t start swinging a magical sword around all of the sudden! “

                “I can assure you, there’s nothing magical about it – “

                “Whatever,” Isaac cut him off. “I just want to live through the rest of this day. Hopefully when it’s over, I’ll just wake up from this bad dream, lying in my bed at home and not remember anything about beasties trying to chop my head off.” 

Out of the corner of his eye, Isaac saw Shiri shuffling around on the ground. He turned to see what she was doing. Her right hand was covered in a blue fabric glove with electric pulses dancing across the tops of her knuckles. She had a curious look on her face. She stared at her glove and took a deep breath.

                “Shiri! Didn’t you hear what I just – ”

A big blue bubble of electricity expanded into the room, enveloping Isaac by the ankles and dragging him into the air by one foot. Half of him floated near the ceiling like a balloon, while his hair barely brushed the floor. He reached for the legs of the couch to pull himself down, but ended swinging side to side like a pendulum. Shiri ran forward help, but she couldn’t touch him through the bubble. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean for it to do that!” she exclaimed.

                “I don’t care if you’re sorry, just get me down from here!” Isaac cried.

Shiri whimpered and repeatedly mashed different buttons on her glove. Instead of helping, the barrier only grew larger. Soon it caught one of the stadium chairs, sucking it into the bubble. It circled around Isaac’s waist like a deadly satellite.

She burst forth another stream of apologies and ducked out of the way before the bubble sucked her in too. Jason jumped over the couch and cleared it as he landed next to Shiri. He grabbed her wrist and examined the small display on top of the glove.  

                “Just try to calm down and use the same word to shrink the glove again,” Jason urged her.

                “I can’t remember what to say,” she spat, her lip trembling.

                “The word was ‘reduce.’ All you need to do is make it small again,” Jason clapped a hand on her shoulder. “You can do this.”

Shiri took another breath, but it stuck in her throat. She swallowed and thought yelling might be the best way to say it. “REDUCE!”

The bubble waivered and finally popped into blue sprays of confetti that disintegrated before it hit the floor. Isaac’s ankle was released and his shoulders hit the floor first in a loud crunch. Shiri ran over to him first and fell to her knees. She reached out both hands to help him up, but Isaac swatted her away in one swipe. “I just got done saying don’t DO things like that!” he gave an angry huff. “Does nobody listen to me?!”

                “I said was sorry like ten times already,” Shiri pouted. She rubbed one finger over the aquamarine ring on her middle finger. “I just…wanted to see if my glove would respond the same way as Jason’s weapon did.”

                “It’s definitely interesting the way the element reacts to both of us,” Jason started and looked over at his sister. His eyes sparkled. “How did you activate it?”

                “Seriously? I almost got brutally injured and all you want to know is how she did it?” Isaac rolled onto his belly and pushed himself up into a sitting position. He turned away from them, rubbing the lower muscles in his back. “You guys are heartless.”

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