First day of Nano meets Craigslist

July 1st - a beautiful summer day. The start of the summer for many people. One of the busiest days at the airport.

For writers, the day that hell begins. Or, as hell prefers to be named, “nano camp”.

Can anyone in the world remind me why I signed up to do this?

I kind of forget about camp already, until late yesterday evening. And immediately, I decided to make some changes to my plan.

50,000 words? Not going to happen my friend. My goal is to write every single day, but to not pressure myself into a word count. Between blogging, reviewing, reading and subediting, I will not have enough time to reach the goal I wanted to reach. So I just want to motivate myself to write every single day, no matter how tired I am.

So today I continued working on a short story I made up with a friend. The prompt? Looking at Craigslist and making a story out of some of their ads. Here’s a little preview of what I’m working on.

He really shouldn’t have eaten that chicken masala before calling her. Flashbacks of 6th grade Indian Day go through his mind as he tries to not think about the stench of the restroom facilities after he quietly snuck out. He doesn’t really know what her job description entails, but he can make a safe bet that he doesn’t have enough money to make her clean up his poopy-pants. 

Poopy-pants? Really? You still think about poopy-pants, but yet you got yourself in this situation? Right, his situation. That needs sorting rather quickly, judging by the look on her face.

What was her name again

“Sorry, what was your name again? It slipped my mind,” he almost went for an innocent face, but then remembered the situation he was in. Innocent was definitely not appropriate here. Or was it?

“Honeybuns, you can call me whatever you want. Candy, Paulina, Victoria - if you’re into uptight Victorian shit.”

“Right, so.. Candy.”

Is it random? Definitely, but then what do you expect from Craigslist? Anyone else ever tried a prompt like this? How did it work out?

Reading classic novels and brain activity

Research has shown that people who read a classic novel in a “focused, literary” way use more brain activity than when the same people read a classic in a casual, relaxing way.

The book used to prove this was Mansfield Park by Jane Austen and the “people” in the experiment were PhD students.

Are the results shocking? Not really - I’m pretty sure that if you are focused on something, you always use more brain activity. But the interesting fact of the study is that, when focusing on a text, a person uses several different brain functions - more than are usually used when you focus on a task.

Do I understand the details of this? No, I’m no neuroscientist. 

However, it does make me wonder what goes on in my brain while I read a classic. I don’t have a PhD in literature, but I have followed several literature classes at college, so I have a basic knowledge of the components of literature. But, as I said before, I struggle with fully delving into classic novels - I feel like I never enter the “casual, relaxing” reading and am constantly forced to focus and analyse.

I assume that using more brain activity means that you get tired from reading classics easily. So I’m putting it to the test. In the last week, I finished We Were Liars and How To Be A Heroine. I finished We Were Liars in about 1 day (amazing book, I can’t wait to write the review on this one!) and How To Be A Heroine in 4 days (it took me a bit to get into the book). However, there was never any limit on how much of the book I could read every day.

So anyone up for testing the reading classics/getting tired combination? I’m started Jane Eyre today, a classic that I always wanted to read, but was never motivated to read. It sounds like it should be a book I love, so I’m excited. How long will it take me to finish the book?

And on a completely unrelated topic, for those asking about the newsletter, this week there will be no newsletter. I love my things to be perfect and this newsletter just isn’t perfect yet. However, this just means that you have more time to pick up your classic and do this experiment with me: Does it take you longer to read classics?

Is it called Nanwrimo or amonthinhell?

After what I did today, I had to question my own sanity. Which is a nice Catch-22, because I'm sure that if you are insane, you don't know it. So does that mean that if I question my sanity, I'm automatically sane?

Insanity, according to law.com means: n. mental illness of such a severe nature that a person cannot distinguish fantasy from reality, cannot conduct her/his affairs due to psychosis, or is subject to uncontrollable impulsive behavior.

Which means that I am probably insane. 

I signed up for Nanowrimo camp. 50,000 words - 1 month - 1 me. I've done it before, so it's not exactly a fantasy. But I'm pretty sure I suppressed all the memories of my emotional breakdowns during those months (ask the people I lived with at the time, it wasn't pretty at all). Thankfully, right after I signed up, I remember those long November nights filled with the pain of finding the word I'm looking for. 50,000 times in a row. 

A 2012 calendar, made by someone who actually survived nano and was able to create something afterwards. Call me impressed.

So it was a fantasy - something "fun" "to blog about". Yeah, right. As if I'll want to write blogs after writing 1666 words a day (yes, I still remember how many words are needed to finish the challenge. I doubt I'll ever forget that). And it's summer now - the sun is out so I'll want to be out. Not behind a computer, right?

Added to that, I'm pretty sure that I can't conduct my own affairs, because if I could, I would have taken a step back and realised that so many words in one month is crazy. Oh and due to my leg surgery, I'll also have to learn how to walk again that month - no biggie.

And do I really even have to explain the uncontrollable impulsive behaviour? I don't think so.

Like I said 50,000 words - 1 month - 1 me.

What did I get myself in to?