NaNoWriMo | The Salamander's Quill

Great Merciful Blood-Stained Gods!

Being just this side of a beta test, I suppose I should be a bit more understanding. Crashes are occurring pretty nearly two per session now. Trying to figure out what is going on has pretty much eaten away at any of my early morning writing session’s productivity. I am hoping I can narrow it down to cause and with the help of the Scrivener Forums for Windows, I suspect it has to do with importing Word documents.

I must admit a bit of surprise at this considering nearly all users of the Windows version of Scrivener will, at first anyway, be importing from MSWord, WordPerfect, OpenOffice. and the like. Having to convert files to Notepad before successful importration and losing all formatting, as well as single quote, double quote, dash and elipse marks in the process (which must be reentered ‘by hand’ as the question-mark symbol that replaces them is not sensitive to whether it represents an ellipse or a quotation mark) is less than a glowing endorsement for the program.

Ah, well…Carpe Diem and Nemo Ver Est!

Originally posted in The Salamander’s Quill 1.0 now deleted.

I’m not necessarily late, but I’m dragging. I’m so tired of being tired. I’m having a hard time clearing my head of work related business having just come off grading and finalizing marks for first quarter. Today is an early-release day for the kids, but staff has a collaborative day ahead and a “Leadership Team” meeting afterward for those fortunate enough to belong to it—yep, I’m fortunate enough…sigh. Before that however, student council is hosting a lunchtime activity, tug-o-war, I believe, so lunch will be short. Tomorrow is a minimum day, but that evening is parent-teacher conference and the Student Council Tri-tip Sandwich sale. I should roll in home around 21:00 or 22:00. Friday is another minimum day, this one fairly guilt free with nothing required (at this point in time) but to pack up and head home for a much deserved weekend. These things would really be easily handled if it were not for how tired I am. Something is wrong I suppose. It could be that I’m just too restive. Since discovering my writing stride, I sit far, far too long in front of the computer. This summer was one of little exercise and I can tell something changed because of it. I also believe I’m mentally exhausted from thinking on my spiritual well-being and the financial situation with the mortgage and the house. Since mid-September and finishing the first draft of The Kevodran’s main storyline and compiling the follow up outline, I’ve allowed “Creep” to occur. Add to this prepping myself for the NaNoWriMo and I’ve pretty much sent my Muse packing. She’s gonna be hard to entice back.

Orrja needs a POV in this story; I just know it. I’m reluctant to start as it will be both challenging and it will force a change to The Kevodran as written. This is precisely why it needs to be done. My very reluctance speaks volumes about how I’m in love with the draft and that’s a serious problem. Writing and inserting Orrja’s story will force me to change things up and get back into the groove. I’ll need time to consider Selt’s story and how I want to handle that. I think it is important, but I’m not sure what happened to him and am struggling with how to present his story. Then there are Efrahm’s inspiring hero-tales which are his source of information and inspiration on his journey. As I plan to use excerpts for chapter headings, I need to get on that.

Tomorrow morning I’ll begin with Orrja’s story. I’ll meditate on it today, maybe take some notes while I pretend to listen in staff meeting, and just “dooo-it” in the morning.

Originally posted in The Salamander’s Quill 1.0 now deleted.