The follies of the past week

1) I signed up for NaNoWriMo

There’s plenty of folks among my circle of friends who do this every year, but for me it’ll be the first attempt at the nano-madness in seven or eight eight years. I primarily signed up because I miss the rigor of the public daily wordcount and it’ll be nice to have somewhere to put one without boring the hell out of everyone reading the blog. Should you be interested in watching me change the totals on a wordcount meter I can be found under the name PeterMBall on the nano site. I also promise there will be minimal wordcount updating on this here blog. Honest.

2) I started writing short stories again

And it’s been a while, I tell you. I took a break from short fiction around the middle of the year with the goal of getting a novel drafted. After that I took a break in order to focus on getting the draft of Claw done. And after that, I stayed on a break while focusing on getting the novella that replaced Claw done. And now it’s October and I’m looking at the pile of unfinished, awkward stories and wondering if maybe it’s time I get back to them. ‘Cause, at the very least, when writing short stories I can pretend I know what I’m doing.

3) I paid off my credit card debt

And for a breif, glorious period I allowed myself to feel happy and at peace with the world. Then, five minutes later, I did the math on how I’m going to buy groceries and pay bills over the coming month and the giddy high of being free of the soul-crushing debt wore off. So it goes, folks, in the lands of unemployed writerdom. Please don’t try this at home 🙂

4) I started reading the collected works of HP Lovecraft*

After years of playing the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game, revelling in the critical commentary that surrounds his work, and collecting more Lovecraft anthologies than you poke a stick at, I finally broke down and started reading the short stories of Lovecraft in what I hope is their entirety.

5) Write Club Returned after a long haitus

There was merriment . And wordcount. And chocolate.

* For those who may be curious: the Lovecraft reading will be the third male writer I’ve read since asking for recommendations for female writers a few months back and the first that’s not work-related. This puts my reading total at about 4 books by male writers to 38 books by women over a period of three months. And I’m working on another blog-post about that project once I’ve got some free time in my schedule.