La Vie Boheme

Music, routine, and rambling

Crossed the 10,000 word mark today on the actual novel manuscript. I'm starting to think I might actually have enough story in mind to make this thing long enough. Yay me! It was another slow start day. I stared at the screen and wriggled and growled and generally was frustrated until about 10:30 or so. Part of this is because I started a new chapter, and I hate starting new scenes and chapters cold. Even worse, it wasn't a chapter where I originally saw anything particularly exciting happening. Instead, it was supposed to be more of a "lull before the storm" chapter where we see the main characters going through their usual lives before it all gets turned upside down.

Finally I got started and... whoops. One of my characters insisted on being somewhere I hadn't planned for him to be, resulting in two characters meeting that I hadn't planned to have meet yet. Yes, there is ordinary life happening here, but the world has already started its inevitable flip. It turned out well, and it feels right. Once again, my characters know better than I what should be happening in the story and when.

In case I haven't mentioned it, I've become a creature of frighteningly regular habit, at least where writing is concerned. I'm usually in front of the computer ready to write by 9 or 9:30 each morning, and I try to work until at least noon, depending on how much I get done. It's almost become a ritual. There are several things I have to have to settle in and work. First and foremost, a cup of coffee at my left hand. Not just any cup of coffee, but my gigantic Starbucks ceramic mug of coffee filled with hazelnut coffee creamer and sugar. Next, music. Here's where I really get anal. I used to set up MP3 playlists for each piece I was working on and listen to the appropriate one. However, my MP3s are unavailable at the moment, so I've gone back to using the CD changer on my stereo. The list of CDs I can actually listen to while writing, however, is very limited. Each morning, I pick any three of the following, put them in, and hit random play:

• A Slight Case of Overbombing, Sisters of Mercy
• Changeling: The Seattle Chronicles, a mix CD I made for my Changeling game, which contains various bits of classical music, classic rock, and Celtic-ish bits I used at various points in the chronicles
• Twenty-Five, Sweet Honey in the Rock
• Rites of Passage, Indigo Girls
• Parallel Dreams, Loreena McKennitt
• The Cross of Changes, Enigma
• Into the Labyrinth, Dead Can Dance
• Tribe 8: Children of Prophecy, another mix CD, this one for the Tribe 8 game I keep wanting to run. Also has bits of classical mixed with other things, but is edgier than the Changeling CD, with more goth-industrial type stuff thrown in.

There's even a pattern to what gets picked. There has to be at least one hard CD, one softer one, and something in the middle. Today, for example, was Sisters of Mercy, the Changeling CD, and the Tribe 8 CD. I actually tried putting a new CD in the rotation the other morning, and I was so distracted by the novelty of it I couldn't concentrate. I know, I'm weird. This has been going on for almost three weeks now though, and I can't argue with the results.

Right now I'm actually shooting for about 1500 words of new manuscript a day. If I follow through with that, and actually write seven days a week (which I haven't managed yet), then I should finish the first draft by Labor Day. That's right. Six weeks from now, approximately. I'm a little awed and scared by that.