Lots of bloggers have been writing about their plans to participate in National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo this November. Alas, I will not be among them.
I tried to do NaNoWriMo five years ago. I naively thought 1,500 words a day was doable for me. Trouble is I spent the first few days watching TV for inspiration and began 7,500 words in the hole. I never climbed back out.
But then Jen from Sips of Jen and Tonic–The Greatest Blog on Earth™–gave me an idea. Or rather I stole her idea and hope she’s okay with it. Instead of writing a novel that no one, including myself, would want to read, why not try to do a post a day?
Jen is full of good ideas at all times.
Back during the Civil War when I began this blog, I did write a post a day–sometimes two! And then I petered out and spent my time constructing a mythical land created entirely out of potato peels.
But I think I can do it. Like that little engine who thought it could get up that hill, and then was sucked into a seedy underbelly of drugs and debauchery. I may be confusing it with Charlie Sheen.
I will admit, there will be blog posts that will have more tags than actual words in the post such as this:
Monday!
-Or-
Post!
These count.
As will posts of random clip art.
And there’s a 99.99999% chance I will just reblog whatever Jen writes every day because she’s ridiculously funny, and I ran out of ideas after “Post!”
It is going to be a long month.
Speaker7 
Speaker7,
First: Kudos on proclaiming Jen’s blog as The Greatest Blog on Earth™. It’s pretty much my opinion.
Two: Kudos for using my trademarked™ Trademark™ symbol.
Three: One post a day. I’m scared… It’s quite the challenge. You’re a very talented blogger, perhaps you will be the exception… Perhaps will like all of your “Monday” posts. Perhaps™.
Le Clown
Le Clown™,
Thanks for the encouragement. I am very fond of the trademark symbol–so fond that I’m going to trademark this sentence™. I’m also a fan of the registered trademark®. And this ζ because I don’t what it is or why I would use it, only that it is Magnificent™. There is a good chance that I will post once in November and spend the rest of the month in hibernation. But maybe this November will be different.
In Trademark™,
Speaker7™
Speaker7,
You are my favourite person in the world… after all the other ones™.
Le Clown
Le Clown,
😯
That is the nicest thing ever written–after all those other sentences were written™.
™
Le Clown has trademarked™ the whole English language. We better get started on his Canadian French stuff. Sacre-bleu™!
Speaker7,
™.
Le Clown
Le Clown,
🙄 😈
I know how much you love these: 🙂
I’m thinking that whoever came up with the idea of writing 1500 words per day, every day for the month of November might not have been an American. I know for a fact that I will be spending at least two days that month doing nothing but cooking (give me an your address and I can send you enough potato peels to build a parallel universe). I’ll also be spending at least one day digesting. To complicate November just a little more, I’ll be cleaning up pumpkin corpses from the yard the very first day, and may be trying to get toilet paper out of the holly tree or dried eggs off the side of the garage, depending how demonic the neighborhood kids are this year.
As the holiday season is already frought with angst, disappointment and regret, the last thing I need is to add being 7500 words in the hole to my emotional baggage.
My mission for November is to read at least one blog a day. That’s plenty -all that turkey is gonna to make me drowsy.
Ah yes, post-Halloween and Thanksgiving. I had not considered either my chocolate-hangover or my gravy-hangover when I took on this quest. The Thanksgiving post might just have to be a greasy handprint. Heck, they might all be that.
It sounds great, Speaker7. I will gladly read you every day. I promise never to roll my eyes and even think “OH LORD, SPEAKER7 POSTED AGAIN?”
I would love to try to write a novel in a month. I love the idea of the forced discipline. But with the election, the euphoria I plan to experience in the days after election day, and guests arriving for Thanksgiving, well, November is going to be a quiet month for my keyboard. Maybe next year. (My husband is thinking of doing it, though actually, so I will have plenty of blogging time!)
Elyse,
If the election does not go as anticipated, my posts will likely be an elongated scream from Nov. 7 through ??.
Yes, mine will be a similar primal scream until Ire-locate myself in New Zealand.
Yes, my posts for November may be one long bitch-fest about Romney / Ryan. The horror.
Hopefully NOT! At least not beginning November 7!
This gets me so excited to read your blog every day! Wahoo! I also will not be participating in NaNoWriMo, since I can barely write one shopping list a week because C is now crawling. Roller Giraffe said it best: “Crawling is fun, but it is bullshit.”
Roller Giraffe is full of wisdom. This is also true: Walking is fun, but it is a bullshit. So is climbing and being able to throw oneself on the floor when it’s time to go to swimming lesson.
I’m with you. I like the “Post!” post idea. For days when you just can’t get off the couch.
The Post! is for my more active days. The couch-days will be this: P!
You should also try Tracy Fulk’s “repost” idea – I used it too! It’s always good to recycle, you know?
Kudos Speaker 7 for giving this a shot. I have trouble doing one a week and recognize my limitations but I am more than willing to read you every day.
Thank you. I can barely do two posts a week so this should be good. I also don’t know what “good” means.
you have just given the world a gift… and it is not crabs…
xxooxx, sweetmom. The world might rather have received crabs after the month is up.
lol.
You go, girl. Maybe a huge stash of Twix will help you along? get you all hyped up and ready to blog your brains out??
Yes. That is what all the athletes eat to succeed, and so I will also make the sacrifice.
NaNoWriMo sounds like an event which is sure to create mountains of hideous literary drivel. Write when you feel it, don’t when you don’t.
I commend your post a day challenge though. This will be hilarious. Heads up – I will mock you if they are horrible….
Then you can come mock me.
I know NaNoWriMo was like that for me…some really good novelesque stinkturds that no human eyes should ever see.
And get ready to write a daily mocking post because these are going to be…um….you know? that word? It’s gonna be that.
It will still be better than anything E.L. James could shit out. Even if all you write is “Post!” each day.
I’m on the fence about the NaNo. It seems like a good idea for me but worry about falling behind. What then? You’re an utter failure?! I hadn’t even considered Thanksgiving. Yikes!! Doing a post a day is a great idea. I look forward to it!
Once you miss one day it becomes insurmountable–at least for me it was, and I started out missing about 4 or 5.
I’m getting to the point where I’m excited if I post more than once a month. If you can manage one a day, I bow down to you. Even if they say “Post.”
Thank you. By the way, they will. Some might just say Po because I peter out before I can type the st.
Post. Simple, yet effective.
I participated in NaNoWriMo last year. I titled my novel “The Critical Eye of the Legless Hooker.” I loved maiming and destroying my protagonist, but failed to finish the story because I became bored with her salvation. *Yawn* Happy endings are for massage parlors.
I think about finishing the story and self-publishing the drivel just to see that book title out in the world. It would be the worst-selling book in history, aside from the Fifty Shades of Shat dribbles.
Oh wait…
The Critical Eye of the Legless Hooker seems like the latest book that will cause women to fall in love with male main character and wish they were legless prostitutes. This sounds money to me and by money, I mean you will make money.
surely you will find a turd for each day of november?
Yes. Sadly, yes.
Redneckonize is now part of my vocabulary. If I use it in an interview, I’ll be sure to credit you. If I use it as sexy talk to Le Clown, I will claim it as my own.
Please don’t give me the credit. All the credit goes to the star of Honey Boo Boo Child.
Wait, really? REALLY? I can’t decide if I’m appalled or impressed.
I think it’s appropriate to feel both.
(1) The title of this post made me spit out my coffee. It’s a good thing I only drink the cheap shit.
(2) Your name for my blog really is fitting. I’ve been meaning to tell you guys for some time that I have most glorious blog, but it’s more authentic coming from others.
(3) I appreciate you showing me in my furriest state. I don’t want new followers to get the impression that I shave my facial hair on a regular basis.
(4) Are you taking topic suggestions, or are you going to just be creative and brilliant as always? Bitch.
(5) I had to unfollow and refollow. WordPress has quite literally stopped e-mailing me (or making them visible in my reader) posts from my favorite blogs.
(1) You had me at (1)
(2) Your blog is The Greatest Blog on Earth™. Period. I read that somewhere.
(3) Three days ago, my son said “Mama has mustache” when my husband was trying to get him to say “I love mama.”
(4) I will mainly be reblogging you.
(5) WordPress has wounded me deeply
For three years, I’ve been asked about by NaNoWriMo plans; and for three years, I keep referring everyone to this piece:
http://raginggail.wordpress.com/2009/11/07/going-on-the-account-nanowrimo-no-no/
The plan you and Jen came up with, however, sounds damn tempting. I may mull it over a bit, see it we can turn this into a pyramid scheme- no, wait, I meant to type “movement,” yeah…
DO IT!!!!!! (god bless peer pressure)
OK, OK, you win:
http://raginggail.wordpress.com/2012/10/27/going-on-the-account-blogtober/
HUZZAH!
This will be the greatest pyramid sche–er… movement in the history of movements and I am also including bowel movements.
Yes, Jen is funny, but so are you. Don’t sell yourself short. I would look forward to 30 days of funny posts from you as well as from Jen. 🙂
^^^ What she said!
Aw shucks, guys. You actually made me feel an emotion. Thanks. It’s been awhile.
Watching TV? Damn, girl. I’m sure you could’ve dug in the archive of your brain to get inspiration. You just wanted to watch TV. Nothing wrong with that. Hell, I like a good sitcom and a reality show here and there myself. I tried NaNo last year and I don’t think I made it past 300 words. I won’t try it again. I’d have probably ended up writing a buncha garbage had I made it through anyway.
Watching TV is like using my brain. That is a sad, sad sentence I just wrote.
I can relate. Sadly. 🙂
I couldn’t do NaNoWriMo either. It’s a recipe for shitty writing. I can’t even commit to a blog post a day so my hat goes off to you. November is gonna be a busy month for me with work so I can barely commit to reading a blog post a day. I do look forward to reading you days of the week posts. They’ll help me keep track
I think my daily blog post will also be a recipe for really shitty blogging, but we shall see. . . unless Hurricane Sandy knocks out my power for the next three weeks.
Speaker 7,
Argh. I will feel bad about leaving you dumb comments, but I suspect the more you post, the less I will be able to keep up. I will try though, as there’s nothing more depressing than watching each post get less comments than the post before. I suspect by the end of the month, you will be writing “Post” and I will be commenting with “Comment”…
I am looking forward to the day you comment “Comment” after I post “Post.” Something about that seems really poetic to me.
You probably shouldn’t encourage me…
Comment!
I like your idea. I did NaNo last year and loved it but I’m not sure I can pull it off two years in a row. My children were writer’s orphans last year… But a post a day sounds like a manageable (or more manageable project. Good idea!
*commanding voice* DO IT WITH US!!!
Come on, everybody’s doing it. You don’t want to be the only one.*
*said by every antagonist in every after-school special
I did Nano three times. I “won” twice, though I’m not sure what I won. Crap, though still better crap than James can crap. Anyway, no way am I doing it this year after the “fun times with pneumonias” thing. You could write about finally get your freaking tonsils out, if that happens. Or about yanking them out yourself. It could be written in blood. Wouldn’t that be fun?
And here I just got out of writing a post a day because making a mythical land out of potato peels sounds better than collapsing from self-imposed stress. Sheesh, Jen, thanks a freaking lot! 😀
Oh, you could write about Honey-Boo-Boo. Her show has to be at least as fabulous as Bachelor Pad. I can easily invision her as a future contestant, considering her background of wearing inappropriate clothing and flouncing around provocatively at four.
Thank you for all the tips. I do need them. Do you think people will notice if I start recrapping Fifty Shats again only this time with potato peels?
I think they will love it. Watch out for Hugo though – I hear he gets insanely jealous of spuds.
You could also tell them it’s the next book. You can’t really tell the crappiness from one book to another . . .
As it doesn’t take much to convince me (I suck at potato peel mythical land construction – I’m in) http://aliceatwonderland.wordpress.com/2012/10/30/blogvemberfest/
Long month? Perhaps.
Entertaining month?
Definitely.
It already feels long and it hasn’t even begun. This is what my list of possible posts looks like:
Stuff
If anyone can do it, you can! These days I’m lucky if I get two posts up a week. And by posts I mean PowerPoint presentations.
How’s that workin’ out for ya? I never promise to do or not do or write or drink or resolve anything. EVER. What were you thinking?
As both you and Jen and Tonic call each other the best blogs every – I have to assume you’re both the best blogs and happily await a month of updates from you guys 🙂