Saturday, December 08, 2012

Procrastination station...

I am in avoidance mode. I know I need to start refining and polishing "the novel."  This is where the discipline comes in and I have always been a slacker.  Fortunately NaNoWriMo has lots of lists and mentors and tons of other help to give you guidance and impetus.  The problem is, you have to do the rewriting, not them.

Actually, I have started the rewriting and I realize that I need to read a few more books in the genre.  So now I have to define the genre other than "general fiction." One of the suggestions on the list is to talk to booksellers (anyone seen a bookstore lately?)  and ask them what is selling? or what niche you would fill in a broad category.

They also say that you need to read the blogs of agents, writers, publishers etc, really anyone and everyone in the industry to get a feel for the process.

I also know that I need to read some "better" books to hone the ear to a more sophisticated cadence and maybe word choice - except that it can't be that sophisticated or you are in danger of losing your audience and/or spoiling the naturalness of the characters.

So given this "to do" list that's maybe longer than the Nile, what do I choose to do on the one Friday night of the year that my husband is out at his company's Christmas party. (They excluded spouses a few years ago for austerity reasons and never re-instated us.) The kids are out, the cats are asleep (do they ever wake up?), the big comfy chair is available, the computer is powered to the max, all I have to do is open up that 50,000 word document and begin.....


Well suddenly I realize that I haven't heard Jackie Evencho sing and I think that last year she had a Christmas album out, so maybe I should just listen to a song or two to see if I want to buy the album, if it's available this year.

And then I decided that while I'm on Youtube, I might as well see who else is there. I tried to watch an episode or two of CSI, but I'm in the wrong geographical zone.  I sense that Rogers a.k.a. Big Brother is controlling my computer access. My taste (if you can call it that) in music is eclectic.  I keyed in Newfoundland folk music.  A few songs came up, but nothing I wanted to waste time on.  Now if I am going to waste time, it has to be something special.  The Irish exhale folk music, so I keyed in "Irish Folk Songs" Almost too many came up. I did though hit upon a documentary of Irish Folk music from the 1930's to the present or early 2000's anyway.  It was 1.5 hours long. This would take up a good part of the evening and really it was something that just had to be seen - wasn't it?



After the video, I was so much into right brain mode that, it would have taken the rest of the evening to get back to left brain editing, so I just listened to John McDermott until 10:00 when my husband came home and filled me in on the dinner that I had missed.

At this point, I rationalized that it is always better to write in the morning :) and went to bed.

Have productive day!

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