It’s been a long… long weekend.

Yeah… I’m currently feeling like I’m in a vicious circle. Ironically, it originally started on Thursday, right before what should have been a nice restful long weekend.

No luck for me.

The good thing was that both my CPs sent back their crits of the new Doorways revision, so I was super excited to start.

And therewith began the problem.

See… it started like this. The origin of my problem was on Monday already, when I caught a cold from my mom (again). Once again, it means that I have a lovely little cough because of a post-nasal drip.

Which means that at night, when I turn, I go into these charming ten minute coughing fits. I get up and down some cough medicine. And then it sort of stops.

Except I’m awake.

And I got my crits back on Thursday.

So guess what my mind does instead of go into beta mode.

Yep.

So this is what my “restful” weekend looked like.

Thursday: Went to sleep at 10 p.m.

Friday: Wake up at 4 a.m. from a cough. Revision occurs to me. Spends rest of morning until 6 a.m. trying to sleep while phrasing and rephrasing a new chapter in my head.

Goes to sleep at 11 p.m.

Saturday: Wake up at 4 a.m. after another cough. Tries to sleep. Fails and gives up by 5 a.m. Starts adding new chapters.

Goes to sleep at midnight.

Sunday: Wake up at 2.30 a.m. after a car’s gasket blows about 20 yards from my (open) window. In case you’re wondering. It’s a seriously odd noise. And after the recent break in, all odd noises wake me up. I have the wonderful joy of meeting my cousin/sort-of-adopted-brother in the corridor just as he’s about to go sleep. I continue editing.

Go to sleep at 11 p.m.

Monday: Wake up at 4:30 a.m. Too tired to even think of editing.

So yeah. I don’t even want to know how mothers with babies survive writing. Just a few days vaguely similar to some very good times with newborns, and I’m screaming at my computer screen like a maniac.

On the upside, I’m approximately half way through my edits.

How was your weekend?

hmmm… why I shouldn’t blog soon after waking up

I just reread my blog from this morning and decided I should always drink coffee before I touch the key board.

I do have half an excuse. When I cut into sleep time, I get so tired that I can’t fall asleep. Sleep eventually comes, but my dreams are so vivid, that they take on an almost nightmarish intensity.

That happened to me last night and I woke up tired and very, very grouchy. I took myself waaaaaay too seriously. I apologize sincerely for any irritation caused.

As the sun rose and my thoughts cleared, I realized that part of me, the part that didn’t feel lie writing is natural, knew that I didn’t have to write for the next few days. My creative side is wrung out a little from my recent marathon writing stint. My mind is sapped of energy thanks to late nights, early mornings, huge imagination, investment management and 24.

Creative writing is not high on the agenda for today. And you know what? That’s fine. So what if I can’t be at least remotely as productive as last week? Like I tried to illustrate in the previous post, writing means a lot to me.

It means so much that I won’t let myself lose my love for it by forcing myself to write. I write when I feel like it. Right now, the only thing I feel like writing at the moment is this post. My mind is working out what it wants me to write down next. When it’s ready, I’ll just hear my muse calling and start again.

Judging by that part of me that still wants to get down to getting on with the story, I don’t doubt that this will happen within the next week.

It’s a strange thing. The realization just hit me that right now that I don’t crave to write. I crave the euphoria I experienced. This fact is actually an exciting prospect. If I’m so euphoric after a few chapters, imagine how it will be when I finish and/or publish a book… Can’t wait.

Interesting realizations

What happens when you keep blogging and only check if you get followers? You forget to check for comments. So… I sort of only replied to my comments today. Very very sorry.

But… that was far from my only realization since my last blog…

On checking with my gran (the author, for those that didn’t read my earlier posts), that the generally accepted word count for a standard format novel is between forty and eighty thousand words. My western falls in that category. 

The reason why this is so profound is that I recently wrote nine thousand words of the western in one day. So the book that is my sideline and thing to do when my epic stalls might turn out to be the one that is submitted first. 

So, the reader may ask, how did that happen? 

In short: I have no damn idea. I just decided I needed to write that afternoon. The western called me more that my epic, so I decided to write one chapter. At the end of the chapter I wanted to see what happens next, so I wrote another. And another. And another. And… you get the point. 

It was such a productive and fun writing session that I’m almost scared to face the disappointment when I can’t repeat it. Maybe I sound silly, but it’s true. I spent eight hours non-stop typing (well except for sustenance and… you know… those breaks.). No discipline was involved, since I never felt like I had to force myself to write something.

Luckily I know that if I keep working at it, my muse will smile down on me and I will get to go through it again. 

Of course, there was this tiny detail that I was supposed to spend seven of those hours studying. 

My reaction to coming out of the story at midnight? Panic? Distress? Regret? None of the above. I grinned at my miraculous achievement, brushed my teeth and went to sleep. I haven’t written anything except the blog since and that was OK, because my creative side was purring. It ended up creating extra time for me to study although it did cut into my sleep. And…

If I did badly, I got sixty percent, but I have this sneaking suspicion that I have a distinction coming my way. So Yay! 

So the biggest realization I leapt to was that life falls right regardless of whether you worry about it or not. Just don’t forget to study ;-P

What I did on three hours’ sleep.

So… I finished my essay before the deadline and it came out surprisingly well. Phew.

Unfortunately I finished my essay at two in the morning and had to wake up a five.

Up to now, I’ve packed my luggage without forgetting anything (but maybe I forgot that I forgot). I’ve driven in morning traffic without falling asleep or causing a crash. I’ve attended a class and didn’t fall asleep. I almost did, but since I think sitting in class where the lecturer can see me and sleeping is rude. So… knowing that I wasn’t getting anything out of it, I pretended to take notes and wrote an interesting if somewhat dark poem instead.

I must say that it surprised me when I reread it. All of by tethered cynicism seemed to break loose and ran wild on my page. Maybe the sleep deprivation muted my internal censor or something. Or perhaps the poem was my contemplation of what I would enter into the Notes from the Underground Contest, if i decided to write.

Who knows? But I have to wonder if I could do it again…