Last night I went over to my sister-in-law's house to do some hang'n out girl time and write on my novel. In the middle of eating a cupcake and drinking hot chocolate, I asked her:
"Why didn't you join Camp NaNoWriMo? You can totally reach 10k by the end of April," I smiled and wiggled my eyebrows. "you know that world building and plot notes totally count for your total word count, right?"
She stares at me with an apple wedge lodged in one side of her mouth. Her fingers started clicking on the laptop in front of her and I can barely make out the words, "Yeah, so how do you sign up?"
I was totally excited to have another member join our cabin and I was babbling about all the things you can do for the month of April. But then her next question struck me:
"I know you are continuing your novel from November, so how are you keeping track of the new words you're typing?"
Me, being totally ingenious and saying the first smart thing that comes to my mind, "Oh well I just copy/paste all the new words to a separate word document to keep track of the numbers. I still do my real writing in Scrivener."
Total lies!
What I've really been doing is just keeping a text document of my new numbers for each chapter and adding them up each day. Word count!
And thus, today, I decided to take my own advice: I copied all my new writing into a word document to better keep track of my word count numbers. Because, yah let's face it: sometimes I'm smart.
Totally not, because I can't count!
When I looked at my word doc, with all the copied words into it (even deleting bullet points and such), I had a new word count of OVER 6300 words!
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| Yes, even a muppet can count better than I can. |
I stare at my screen in disbelief. I must have copied over something I shouldn't have, I logically reason to myself. So instead I recount my numbers in my text doc.
Holy crap, they MATCH my word document.
I counted wrong this whole time.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Wait, I mean YAAAAAAH!
Lucky me, for surprising myself with more words than I thought. Go me, yeah!
So let this be a lesson to you guys, who might be bad with math: Don't try to add up a new word count with an old document!
See, when we work together, we can do magic. Like magically adding words to the count without even writing them :)
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I'm totally hyped by today's word sprint. They're mostly notes and descriptions of scenes that may happen, but I can see my story taking shape as I'm typing.
We DO make magic, don't we? I constantly talk to myself while I write, but there's just something better when someone else is listening. You inspire me!!
DeleteAnd honestly, I'm so thrilled that doing word sprints together made you so happy!
Don't you just love capturing the spark of your story? That moment when you get so excited and totally believe "wow, this could actually work!" It doesn't matter if that spark is on notecards, gullet points, notes, or dialogue: it's YOUR story and it had PROGRESS!
Keep it up girl, let's win Camp NaNoWriMo!!
Haha! Best. Mistake. Ever!! :D
ReplyDeleteMakes up for a great surprise! ^_^ You'll be done before you even know it, I mean, literally!! :P
Seriously tho, great job on that word count! ^_^
Welcome home Vals! The words are coming pretty easy this time around and participating in Camp NaNo has been the best idea I've this year (in the writing department anyway). The words flow so much easier if I don't judge every sentence as I write it.
DeleteMaybe we can get together later to write!