NaNoWiMo

I posted on The B Side last week about "National Novel Writing Month," which is this November. The organization behind it is conventionally known as NaNoWiMo (Nano Rimo, roughly) and their hope is that aspiring writers will put 50,000 words under their belt in November.

That's a lot of words. But it's a good excuse for me to get on the ol' novel-writing horse. In high school and college I finished a novel roughly every 18 months, which is crazy to think about looking back on it. The last one I finished was in 2002.

Once I entered the working world, though, the creative writing I used to do all the time just stopped, nearly cold. I couldn't do it anymore. I think I needed a period of adjustment to a whole new way of life (you mean, I can't just set my dishes on a conveyor belt and have them go into the dining hall kitchen anymore!).

The other side of it is that I've written enough memos, reports, business plans, etc, that I sometimes wonder if the dull writing I have to do at work has impacted my creative writing.

So this year I've gotten a little better. I wrote a 5 minute script for the 72-Hour Film Competition. I wrote a 10-minute script for the Double Shot theater festival just a few weeks after that. So now I'll try a novel under pressure.

I have a pretty good idea for a cat-and-mouse cop chasing a serial killer potboiler. I think I could pump out 50,000 words of it in a month.

I'll be meeting with a writer's group Tuesday nights in November at Suite133. We'll get started between 5:30 and 6:00 and write our heads off until we get hungry.

Send me an e-mail if you might want to join me!