Finally finished the first draft! I’d been putting it off, not wanting it to end, knowing that Samuel, Lou Dan and Ciss would be parting company in various ways. That along with family duties, scrimshaw, work, etc.

The novella ballooned from my target of 42,000 words to 54,322 before edits. I pushed the NaNoWriMo meter up to the default 50,000 words, and I’m still beyond it by 9%.

So what now? Time to print it out, double spaced and put it in the drawer. It actually feels good finally; it’s been a long haul. It also means a decision: should I pick up and start writing the next in the series timeline or step back to the badger’s beginnings to tell of Samuel’s childhood and youth? I have three more books sketched out with a possible fourth in the series.  I think a break and some consulting with “Chuck” are in order, wherever she is.  Last time she was caretaking a mansion donning a full mohawk. Now? Who knows.  About nine emails and a few more skype or facetime messages in rapid succession may tease her out again, she’s been awfully quiet.

Another thing that spurred me on was an email from someone on Librarything (librarything.com). They kindly mentioned they were still waiting for their copy of Samuel’s first adventure. Oops! I had bookmarked the site and gone back there after the contest and didn’t find the area where people would have responded, figuring there were other books people were more interested in and shrugged, carrying on with writing his next adventure, going on my own and didn’t give it another thought.  As it turns out there are ten people patiently waiting to read Samuel’s adventure in The Meadow. With books on their way here for a short stop before reaching their final destination, I’ve written them to reassure them they have not been forgotten.

Been awhile since I sat down and wrote, as carnivals and other things have taken my time away. The setting seems idyllic except for a nagging suspicion that Dan has when he sees Atkins watching “Buddy” (Lou).  Just realized Samuel is out of the picture completely in this section, but that may just be the way it is – he’ll probably find someplace to snooze.

At 49,816, about 900 words per hour.

Also started to fashion a mechanism for puppets/automata to allow for eyes not only to move left and right, but orbit around, too.  A real off the cuff video can be seen at https://plus.google.com/115933060867614274453/posts/1x2stGymCKz

Also finished the how-to for scrimshaw that is an exclusive to the newsletter readers at scrimshaw.com.

That took awhile! We’ll see how it holds up to editing. It’s the longest section I’ve written so far coming in at over 3,000 words. Four more sections to go, though they may expand out to six.

At 47,934 words between assisting my daughter, taking the dog out for a walk, applying meds, etc.

Samuel, Lou, Dan and Ciss get a ride out of the city, their hovel decimated by the zombies and the geemo chihuahuas (can’t believe I finally spelled that right). “The troll” makes another appearance and Samuel’s secret weapon saves the day (or night, as it was).  Had a lot more dialog was in my mind which may get back into the story, but we’re in the “vomit onto the keyboard” phase, which is the longest hurl I’ve ever had.  We may reach 50,000 words on this one, but that’s not really the point: the point is telling the story.

Been away from writing here with business on other blogs, it felt good to get back to writing for an hour.  Now it’s time to do battle with the ailing sump-pump – digging up the line and finding out where it failed.  Hoping for coolish weather as I grab my shovel.

It’s looking like the first draft is going to exceed the 42,000 word goal I’d set myself.  I was busy busy, with work, home, schooling, scrimshaw and more taking my time from writing, hitting The Dip that Seth Godin speaks of, avoiding committing to writing a couple of scenes yet knowing they had to be done.  As the weekend loomed closer I worked into the night, using the pomodoro timer and sticking with it, moving from writing to cooking dinner, writing to answering emails, writing to writing the scrimshaw.com newsletter, to experimenting with a couple of audio files of the “Survivalist Log” (preliminary mp3 here – or you can read it here).

Sometimes I think I take the “Idle hands” proverb a little too far, between parenting, writing, scrimshaw, work, garden and house, I don’t have idle hands unless I’m asleep.

The scenes I was in the dip about were several actions scenes right in a row, toward the end of the book, although there is one more ~5,000 word chapter to go before it gets put in a drawer for a few weeks and C.D. and I plot out the beats for the next book or two or three.

We’re at 41,888 words, averaging 1,000 words per hour with some minor interruptions.