may be a bit less bloggy, temporarily...

 

Am actually editing my novel.

Shocking, I know.

Have no idea why this started back up today,

but it just felt like the thing to do.

Maybe spring, and today's flood of sunshine, are making me

energetic and foolishly optimistic (which really helps). =)

Or, maybe I just miss it.

Either way, I hope you are well, enjoying nature,

and I vow to id the flowers from last week's Mumday

before too scandalously long.

=)

bb

P.S. Probably a needless post. The month I actually wrote the novel, last November, I posted 46 times, so... babble, babble, babble, babble, babble, babble....

Hot dang!

 

Yeah, baby!

bb

tiny ice skating rinks ...

 
on top of the chickens' water bowls. I broke through them, fearless chicken defender that I am, refilled with warm water, then gave everyone sunflower seeds (shelled), tomatoes, and pak choi for breakfast. It's officially cold!

One error I did make was pouring one chicken's watering bowl contents onto her porch. Ooops, now it's probably frozen... a summer time habit. Sorry, Fanny!

Still thousands of words behind schedule (NaNoWriMo, and might I add, arf!), but here's a very handsome duck from the SD zoo. Do click and zoom--I saved it extra large so you can enjoy his spectacular and finely detailed beauty. Yowsa!

xobb

oh, so behind...

 
Hey, gang. On the road and as of this minute (wrote nothing yesterday or today so far) am 4,370 words behind NaNoWriMo schedule, SO will be posting little 'till December (9 days) and writing more more more on this little novel thingy.

However, I did get an a-MA-zing big city YMCA (San Diego) workout that was fairly spectacular today, then got to eat hazelnut-encrusted salmon with garlic spinach and garden veggies for lunch.

WOW.

Oh, and the drive down, post rainstorm was spec-TAC-ular INCLUDING the full moon-lit night, low clouds hugging the hills, etc. STUNNING.

So, I hope you all have a great next several days, I'm sure I'll be back, but for now must shut my babbling mouth and type, type, type instead. =)

I'll wave to the Pacific for ya!

xoxo

biobabbler

This feels apt, while trying to write a novel in 30 days...

 
And it's one of the most useful movie quotes of all time, IMHO.

bb

eek! 9.2 lbs of tomatoes? On November 4th?

 
Decided that since I am a) totally sore everywhere and b) hoping to stem a produce panic (no pun intended) and c) SO not at my word count for the day, I will NOT go to the gym today (after 3 days in a row).

Laundry, dishes, maybe some pasta sauce, but def. lots of WRITING!!

Anyhow, harvested these pups today:

Aren't they adorable?

And weighed them. On the people scale, as it maxed out the cooking scale. 9.2 lbs.

And that's not counting the dozen on our counter, the dozens MORE in the garden, the 4 pumpkins I bought, and the 7 winter squash we grew.

Take a long, slow, deep breath...

... and there's the dried blue corn I have to figure out how to mill...

=) Everyone should have this problem. Too much fresh food.

So, here's a shot from the outside of the garden looking in.

You can see a) tomatoes looking like prisoners in a line up, and b) some of the tomato plants still green and happy, c) my chrysanthemums blooming (the purple and pink 'neath the middle of the railing).

The flowers tipped over 'cause I got them, the straggly creatures, at the $1 sale at the nursery. And I probably SHOULD cut the flowers and bring them inside, but the bees are so happy they're there, and the cats would probably just eat them, so they just lay out there, looking beautiful and forlorn.

So: the tomato sauce recipe in Joy of Cooking calls for 2.5 lbs of tomatoes. Guess I'm trippling that puppy. AFTER I figure out how in the world I'll fit everything into the already stuffed fridge.

Maybe tomorrow is tomato sauce day. I'm tired just thinking about it.

And I've still got to get the words out.

Happily, today I thought of something that will be a fun device. I think someone in the story will be a blogger. Then I can have blog posts within the book! OMG, HOW FUN!

Anyhow.

=) yes, bowl of cereal, brush teeth, then back at the keyboard.

xobb

NaNoWriMo... invitation and heads up

 
1. National Novel Writing Month is next month (November). See this post for details.. Right when I signed up I was nervous. Then it abated. Now, it's back.

If you write 50,000 words in 30 days, you win. What you win is a draft novel. =)

And bragging rights ("Well, dahling, before I wrote my novel, I'd never even been to Africa, if you can believe it...").

2. Geek's approach to huge writing task

Quantify, quantify, and cite references:

# wds needed: 50,000
ave # wds/day: 1666.7
ave # wds/page (published novel): 250.0
ave pages/day: 6.7

And research: I'm headed to novel's main location this month, and asked friend who lives there for books I should read. You're allowed to do research, character sketches, etc. before November, but not write the actual text.

3. So, anyone interested in joining me?

This took is appropriate for SO many reasons: title, frightened person looking at giant ogre of a task, etc. =)

I've got one sister-in-law and one niece (my niece successfully completed this LAST year--woah!) who are signed up, and one cousin who isn't, but is already into her novel. Guess we're wordy people.

NaNoWriMo realize people have lives and jobs, so they anticipate a peak in coffee sales that month. Any interest? None? Been there, done that? DO tell.

4. The heads up: I am anticipating a blogging stoppage.

[the masses clasp their heads in their hands and shriek, "Noooooooooooo!"]

Don't know if it will be full stop, but it's possible this blog may have to take a vaca [vay'-kay] all of November.

I'm tempted to chronicle the process if I have any typing ability left during that month. We'll see. I really have NO idea what it'll be like. Never tried anything like this. I have NO feel for the workload.


ANYhow, lemmeno if you are interested, if you've ever thought about writing a novel/book, if you've heard of this, etc., or if you've ALREADY published a novel/book, and what it was like. =)

xoxobiobabbler

NaNoWriMo... gulp!

  
I signed up.

It's not for 5 months.

I'm already nervous.

In case you've not heard of it, NaNoWriMo, a.k.a. National Novel Writing Month, is an event one can sign up for (at www.nanowrimo.org) and attempt to write a 50,000-word novel in one month. If you accomplish that # of words in a novel-like form by the deadline, it's nothing you've already written (save plot sketching, research, etc.), you did it all by yourself, and it's not one word 50,000 times, you are a winner.

What you win is your draft novel.

Part of their point is that SO many people think that "one day" they will write a novel. For most people, that one day never arrives. You have to MAKE it happen.

So, yeah.

All I'm committed to is receiving their e-mails between now and then, but I have had an idea for a story in my mind for a while now, so this may be what I need to get it done. At least TRY.

I've even planned a trip in October to do research...

=)

So, anyone else wanna join me on this NaNoWriMo adventure?

the biobabbler