crisis

less words this week, mostly due to an existential crisis. I think i burned myself out writing about 20,000 words. I have a decent plan to finish. Part I to be finished in November. About 30k words. Part II to be finished 10 days into December. 10k words.

Existential Crisis

I forgot to mention that this week's focus is humility. This is looking for the good in others as this will help remind me that everyone is better than me at some things. I thought I was good at this. I started thinking that this trait should lead to an appreciation of other people. Of course, I am well aware of how much I dislike most other people on this planet. I then realised that the two thoughts are mutually exclusive.

Apparently, these inconsistencies iron themselves out by the time you reach 50 something...

total word count: 20.6k

it's only words

and i have only managed 1000 words today. very slack of me recently. at least today i was actually working (after getting up at noon). I don't think i'll be done in November at this rate. I'm hoping one day this week I just bash out 5000 top top quality words. Don't hold your breath though.

total count: 19.9k
current status: it's 3:24am. I am tired.

post office

i constantly miss letters that the post office deliver. It's like they wait for me to be out and then send the post man/woman/child round to deliver. and they don't seem to like trying to leave the packages with the neighbours. This means that i have to go to the post office depot to pick up my packages.
i did however notice an oddity when I tried to present my ID.
If you show your passport, which contains your name, picture, and no address, that is ok (this is you. address unknown)
If you show a utility bill, which shows your name, no picture and address, that is also ok (correct address, human unknown)
If you show a driving licence, with the wrong address because you didn't change it since you just moved, this has the correct name and picture, but wrong address. This is unacceptable to the post office. They say that it is not me, and I cannot pick up the package.

I would however argue that the drivers licence is more stringent as a test for who you are then the utility bill. It is on the same level as a passport. In fact, you need a passport to make your drivers licence. It has your name and recent picture on it. Like a passport.

These days, I do all my bills online. I have a 2 month old council tax bill from when I first moved in - payments for this are also all now done online. I will not receive any more bills by post for as long as i live here, and as utility bills have to be recent i will only be able to use my passport to pick up future letters. This seems like overkill. If I'm in Europe, I don't even need a passport to go across borders, but the post office need me to show it to get a letter.

word count: 19k
plan: almost completed. been through all i have written. last few pieces of plot to be put together tomorrow.
then 1 day off.
from sunday: 2k per day for last 8 days of month for 35k total words.

this week's focus

cleanliness
this is quite a self explanatory one. i don't think there's nothing wrong with dressing down. looking casual is fine. obviously if you have an example to set, such as the US president, you probably should wear shirts for interviews rather than polo neck t shirts, but maybe that's just my thinking.

being clean, on the other hand, is not something up for debate. this includes clothes as well as at home. hopefully, i do not have much of a problem with this. I think i am a bit lazy with cleaning some things like my fridge, so it's a good excuse to do something small each day this week.

word count: 18.9k
after about 1 hour of work I ended up cutting more than i added. I've noticed it's tougher to have a time goal than a word count goal. Happily, I have but one more day of time goal and editing before I get back to writing.

kindness is magic

i think the saddest thing about society is that people constantly judge others. they seek to put down other people for anything and everything that they do differently. i guess most of it comes back to making themselves feel better. it is a shame they use other people for their yardsticks, rather than concentrating on doing the best that they can do. if others aren't hurting you (or anyone else), then there is no reason to even be concerned with what other people are doing. just be happy for them. there is an infinite amount of happiness to go around. and life is too short to be wasted on hating other people.

word count: 19k
on target to go through everything i have done so far, and reorganise it to make it easier for me to write, and complete a sensible plan. This semi break is totally not in the spirit of writing a book in november, but i have to do it this way to make sure i can complete it, and not have a complete piece of shit. just a semi piece. who knows, if all goes well this week, then i might be able to do 2k words a day next week and get close to 40k words. if i work a bit hard the next couple of days i could even start writing again properly from friday!

plans are good ummkay

so i did write another few hundred words the other day and then crashed and was lost in what i was writing.
yesterday i evaluated what i've been doing and need to change the structure of the book. i was jumping about in time, which i like, only i have found it difficult to know what is going on! so i have instead decided to write it sensibly (ie chronologically). this will make it easier to make it make sense to me. when i'm done i may mix around the times a little bit, as i think nearly on it makes the story better. perhaps not. i will get my editor to decide that.
for now, i am going over the whole thing again, and making sure my writing isn't lazy. this morning, i had 17000 words of mess. i have been through about 1/4 of it, and it's now 18000 words, and slightly less of a mess. i will finishing going through it by the end of the week, aiming for about 20-25k words done.
then, there will be about 7 days of writing i have left, to get it up to about 40k words and a complete story. i am now less worried about the word count, and making sure that the story is good and complete. The november writing will be used mostly as a motivator to make sure i write for at least 2 hours each day.

that is all.

a new low

today's count: 1195 words
I'm beginning to not like what i'm writing. This is quite a problem. I may have to get someone to read it who can honestly tell me whether i should bother carrying on. I very much want to quit right now. I think i may try and do 300 words to at least hit today's target.
total count: 15753

this writing malarkey

malarkey is a lovely word.
writing however, is becoming arduous. I hope I will break out of this funk shortly. I almost quit today, but managed to soldier on. My reward of a twirl definitely did the trick. The glucose hit probably helped my brain if not my water retention.
Yesterday I went out and only got home after 10, finishing writing after 1am. At least I am done now.

last two days: 3157
total word count: 14558 (442 behind target)

this week

this week, the focus is decisiveness

deliberate
decide
act

this can again obviously be honed on the poker felt and then applied to real life. you weigh up your options based on opponents, and betting patterns. You decide what your best course of action to take is. and then you do it. In poker you have the timer to force you into action. in the real world you don't have one, so need to make sure you remember to act. the balance between thinking long enough about doing something, and just doing it is quite key. the most important thing is to be aware of the results of your actions and remain aware and flexible to change your actions to receive the desired outcome.

these processes can then become internalised so that in similar situations you have an almost reflex like ability to understand the situation and how to respond. this can only be done when you are familiar with the situations!

it is important to note that results based thinking, while sometimes the only way to interpret actions, is not always the right way. as any poker player knows, it's about making sure that the decisions you take are the correct ones, rather than the outcomes that follow which are not in your control. being aware of this is something that i think poker players learn much quicker than the rest of the population.

in other news, the weekend was a bit farcical for writing. My day off spanned almost the entire weekend. I've almost caught up but am now too tired to do anything meaningful so will have to go to sleep. I will do 1600 minimum per night for the rest of the week to catch up.

words since last count: 2307
current total: 11,401 (599 behind target)

day 6

today, i have run out of words.

todays word count: 1588
total words: 9094

search results

i haven't checked these in a while. traffic has died recently so there are no good ones of late. However, when i checked all time search terms that people used to arrive at my site, i found some previously untouched gold:

"although i served him with section 8 and section 21 notices and obtained a court order for possession of the property, he was reluctant to move out or pay any of the rent arrears.county court bailiffs got him evicted and his total debt to date is £1,263. (quite much)."
-to that i agree. it is a lot.

"followed by ghosts"
-not sure i've ever offered advice for this problem.

a bad dancer is always impeded by his own balls
-must explain why i am so bad at dancing, and why no women are bad dancers.

chihuahua swallowed whole clove of garlic
-perhaps they were looking for yakshi

i just ate a whole clove of garlic
-perhaps not, and blaming the dog was a first attempt at hiding their shame, but now they're so ill they admit the truth! (or maybe it's a different person)


what is odd is that i didn't add the quote marks, so how did the first term get anything as a response, let alone reach my blog?

today's word count: 1470
total word count: 7506

exercise

i kinda peaked during my weight gaining, and had to concentrate on losing weight as i'd added way too much fat. I'm back to a much more pleasing 12% fat or so, and would still like to lose a couple of % from that. I also think i need to add some strength, without adding too much weight although a kilo or two wouldn't hurt.

my current regime is following the 4 hour body plan.
it is hilariously easy. i wonder if it will work at all. it begins with a 4 week conditioning program. which is solely walking 3 times a week for 15 minutes. lol. so i will walk 3 times a week, as fast as i can, aiming to walk slightly further each time. however, as i am not an american obese man, I will only do this for about a week and a half.

after these 2 weeks, the strength building will begin, with more hilariously short training exercises. they take less than an hour, with about 90% of it being resting (i.e. doing nothing). after 4 weeks of that, i'll see how i feel. I may need to go to a gym for this. I hate the gyms with a passion. There are many people who act rather entitled. I may try to find someone to go with as the boredom of gyms is also detrimental to pushing oneself further.

There are many things I seem to be doing on a daily basis now. learning a language, writing this terrible novel, reading more and learning some useful computing things like MySQL and building databases. I think not having a job is the best thing i've done in a long time. Once i get into these routines, sadly, I'll have to start looking for some more work.

Writing was pretty tough going today. I have made some plans for forthcoming plot and chapters so it's not all bad. It was just tough to motivate myself. Luckily the excess I wrote yesterday helped. I think i will take one day off each week otherwise I might burn out. This will mean that in November I will only be writing a total of 39k words. However, I will be pleased with that as a first draft.

Today's Word Count: 1170
Total Word Count: 6036

cheat post

i totally forgot to say how the focus of order relates to poker (although it's obvious). simply put, it's don't multitask while playing. Don't read the internet, play with your phone, talk to people, or anything else that distracts you from what you need to concentrate on.
playing multitables requires enough working memory at times that you can't do anything else. and when you feel like you have spare brain power, it should be used on focusing on your opponents and their play. I forget who said it, but there is always something to focus on at the table. Working out what players have for each hand, during the hand, and comparing the range you give them with what they show up with, will fill all your time at the table.

also, hopefully no one will notice that this is really one post that could have gone yesterday split into two, so there is something for today.

today's word count: 1854
total word count: 4866

day 2

when i write day 2, i always say it in my head in a geordie accent. I only ever watched some of series 1 of big brother and it is ingrained in my head forever, it seems. Though i did also watch dead set, perhaps that is what fused it in the wires in my head forever.

This week's focus is going to be order. To me, this will mean two things. One doing, putting first things first, in order, and at the right time. Not trying to do too much at once. This then follows on to mean focusing on the things I am doing. Concentrating on what I know I should be doing instead of thinking about the wrong things and the wrong time.
This will be much tougher for me than some of the other ones, so I hope to remember to think about this during the week.

Happily, I have already done my writing for the day. Both days I have enjoyed the first 750-1000 words, and found it tough thereafter. I hope this improves with time....

Day 2 word count: 1373
Total Count: 3012

movember

that famous month when everyone writes a book. I've tried this before and failed. This time I am more prepared. I have a vague plan, and less fear. RULE: I will document each day after completion of my 1500 word count minimum. I will include word count, and self rating of work.
RULE: Days only end when I go to sleep.
I simply need to remember to write the words before bedtime.
RULE: rollover words count. So if i write 3000 one day, I can do 0 the next day. I can get ahead of the limit, but must never fall behind.
30 days of this will lead to a 45,000 word book. That will do nicely. I don't need to write a 7 book series a la game of thrones. Just something light hearted and funny and thoughtful. More hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. Obviously it won't be that good. Perhaps I should find a rubbish book to compare my literary work of nonsense to, thus dampening everyones frame of reference before I talk to them. If you know a light hearted rubbish book, please let me know in the comments. Thanks.

Day 1 word count: 1639
Total word count: 1639