I'll have my usual, please

I'd like to take this opportunity to shamelessly plug the wonderful Nanowrimo, or National Novel-writing Month. I've signed up again this year - I've never actually made it past the finishing line, but I'm determined to this time around.

Here's a brief spiel, although the website describes it better - the idea is to write a 50,000 word novel in one month, finishing at midnight on 30 November. As you can imagine, this method values quantity over quality, but it's a great kick-start. It forces you to switch off your self-critical side (and crap-o-meter), take risks and create without editing or stressing out wondering 'is it any good'? At the end of the month, you will inevitably have a Shitty First Draft. But a SFD leads to a Passably Good Second Draft and a Good Third Draft and a Nobel-Prize-Winning Fourth Draft (maybe). It gives you something to work with. And it's fun. And you'll be able to tell people you wrote a novel in 2008.

There are different ways of doing it. I'm cheating (although I like to think of it as 'being a Maverick') because I'm using the month to work on a novel I have already started, but which has been on the back-burner for a long time. I'm combining Nanowrimo with my experiment of writing from an outline - we'll see how it goes. Nanowrimo recommends just starting the novel without any outline or plan at all, as this is much less likely to drive you completely insane, but I (Maverick, remember) think my spiralling into insanity will be, at the least, very amusing to watch (and since I am going crazy anyway waiting to hear from agents, at least this will channel the madness into a different area). But if you sign up and decide to do it entirely off the cuff, I will be filled with admiration.

It's always more fun doing something borderline insane like this when you can suck people in to your little vortex of craziness, and this is my attempt to suck you in (metaphorically). If you sign up, you can add other participants as writing buddies. Be my buddy! My username is theluckyblackcat.

Anyway, back to work.

Edited to add: I'm so sorry for the delay, but I have responded to all comments now. I really appreciate you taking the time to leave them, and I always reply, even if sometimes it takes a couple of days! I'm also a bit late in catching up on all your blogs (blame my post-holiday brain and busy-ness), but I will stop by over the weekend and see what you have all been up to. It always brightens up my day.