Whims: Who gets to tinker with my NaNo?

Whims are funny. This morning I had the whim to sew myself a new shirt to teach myself how to do properly-oriented darts. Earlier this week I had other whims.  

Whims happen to me a lot.  

One whim was about changing my Mainstream Fiction NaNoWriMo novel to science fiction by dropping in “a fraternal alien-twin for one main character and a liberal sprinkling of the word ‘ovipositor.’”  I decided to resist this one.  

That whim was followed by the one where I invited you lovely people to suggest something outrageous to drop into the novel instead.  Here were my seed ideas:

• A blender
• A pair of handcuffs
• Some Ceilidh dancers
• Three guys named Baldy
• A nose-picking stiltwalker with eczema 

In various forums, several of you had suggestions.

Patrick: “I say you throw in a swarm of bees and some lemonade shaved ice.”

Mmmm. Buzzzzz. I have a scene with ice cream cones right now.  BAM! I’ll change it to lemonade shaved ice.

Cass: “How about they open up a dvd cover and get sucked into another alternative dystopian world? A little Alice in Wonderland meets Pan’s Labyrinth meets Hot Tub Time Machine.”

Snort. I *do* love John Cusack.  Hmmm…

Cab: “I was thinking that maybe Carlos was obsessed with prime numbers and/or had the world’s largest collection of Hello Kitty paraphenalia, but those are just character quirks, not outrageous scenarios.”

Ha. Hello Kitty.  I’ve actually been looking for a funny inside joke between Carlos (one main character) and his best friend.  I could have Best Friend give Carlos Hello Kitty stuff all the time.  His bedroom could have oddball Hello Kitty stuff here and there.

Maria: “Set it on fire.”

Heh heh.  In particular she suggested setting fire to a boring party scene. The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire. Ok, nothing is on fire yet.  But I always keep this one in my back pocket in case things get boring.  I had someone throw up in the middle of the party instead. I know, sort of mundane, right? Fire might be better.  

EVF: “You need a massage and a steam bath.”

Oh wait, I think she meant that for ME.

Beth and Clownfysh approved the liberal sprinkling of tweets through the novel, which, because the story is set in the mid-nineties, led to the suggestion of Time Travel in the novel, which connects it back to Cass’s Hot Tub Time Machine suggestion.  Twitter party in the Hot Tub! 

You’re all really fabulous, you know that?  

I don’t REALLY want to change to science fiction right now.  Or maybe ever.  I love to read Science Fiction, but haven’t ever written it.  While I think that NaNoWriMo is an excellent opportunity to push boundaries and boldly go where I haven’t gone before as a writer, I’m just not there yet.  BUT! The story is set mainly in a video store.  Opportunities for allusion to SciFi classics abound!

What do you think about stilt-walking Ceilidh dancers taking over the video store to have a lemonade-shaved-ice party with John Cusack, except that the party is ruined when Hello Kitty lets loose 13,931 bees in the store, and when everyone rushes out in a panic, one stilt walker trips on an electrical cord and sets fire to the life-sized cardboard cut-out of the White Rabbit?

Oh yes, and my word count right now is 35471. Not prime, but pretty sweet.

I was bored in the van yesterday, a photo essay from my NaNo-mushed brain

I ended up waiting for a little while in the van. With the camera. Here are some of my snaps. Don’t worry, I wasn’t driving when I took these photos.  

This sticker has been covering the center badge of the steering wheel for about seven years. It came from a bank in Pennsylvania. Sonar X10 put it there back when he was Sonar X3.

The steering wheel of our van with an old battered sticker over the center badge

Clowns to the left of me…

The view to my left as I sit in the driver’s seat of the van

…jokers to the right.

The view to my right as I sit in the driver’s seat of the van

Does anyone ever clean this van?  Ooh! Look! A piece of paper for scribbling random thoughts.  

The van floor between the front four seats (the second row faces backward)

Sonar X10 changes the sticky note messages seasonally. He’s due for a change, I think.  I could steal those papers for scribblings.  

Sonar X10’s Window in the van, covered with blue sticky notes that spelled ‘Happy Halloween’

More dust, on the radio. But the music was good.  

I was listening to 94.7FM on the radio

When you live on the coast, sand ends up in your car. Universal truth. 

The sandy floor mat of the van under the driver’s feet

When we went to the beach last week, the lovely Carrie handed me this crab shell. It was whole when she gave it to me, and as fragile as a potato chip.  It’s actually about the size of a large potato chip too.  I put it on the dash board to keep it safe.  It was safe from human poking, but the heat of the sun on the car dash pulverized it in a few days.  

The dashboard of the van in front of the passenger seat, holding a crumbling crab shell. And a lot of dust.

I bet y’all can’t wait for all this NaNo business to be finished, huh?  

It's a good thing I don't have a long driving commute, a Random WriMo Wrednesday

If I did, I would have to have some kind of voice recording device.  Otherwise I would be a total traffic nuisance, jotting down random ideas every few minutes on whatever scrap of paper (old parking pass, raffle ticket, window flyer, kleenex) I could find.  I drove into Corpus Christi this morning, and by the time I got to my first stop, I had a piece of paper (old parking pass) that looked like this (click to embiggen):

The front passenger seat of my van, with a scrap of paper and pen

A closer view of the front passenger seat of my van, with a scrap of paper and a pen

A close view of the piece of paper on the front seat of my van

I’ll decode that for you, with an explication of each entry, shall I?  I shall.  When I turned on the radio, it was tuned (miraculously) the the local public radio station, which was transitioning from Morning Edition to First Hour (local classical music), with a stopover at Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac.  Got that?  

1. “Sesame Street”  One of Keillor’s entries noted that today is the anniversary from 1969 of the first broadcast of Sesame Street.  In particular Keillor discussed the audience testing the show did on children to determine that conversations between people and muppets held children’s attention the longest, and so those conversations became a main feature of the show.  Later studies also determined that children who watched Sesame Street did better on standardized tests.  Happy Birthday Sesame Street. 

2. On First Hour, the host began by wishing Happy Birthday to the United States Marine Corps, which is a little older than Sesame Street.  Then he played a rousing rendition of “Semper Fidelis.” Happy Birthday Marine Corps. Which led me to remember that…

3. Tomorrow is Veteran’s Day here in the U.S.  “Love you Bro/Fam” I’ve been posting 25 Days of Thanks on my Facebook page (you’ll see it here later this month).  I decided tomorrow’s thanks should clearly go to veterans, but in particular I wanted to post some love to veterans I’m connected to on Facebook.  Like Partner (Air Force), my brother (Army Reserve) and others (Navy, Coast Guard, Army).  And to those of you out there who are veterans of the armed services of the United States, a hearty thank you for the commitment and sacrifices you made to serve.  The payback does not always justify what you gave/give, but for this day, I hope we can do right by you, and remind society and government to do right by you always.   

4. “donut!” Um, I didn’t want to forget to get myself a donut.  Which I planned to eat when I met my NaNoWriMo writing goal for today.  I couldn’t decide between Pumpkin Spice Cake Donut and Chocolate Cake Donut, so I bought both.  I ate the pumpkin spice after I’d written 2100 words, but was starving.  A short while ago, I made my 2500 word goal for today, and thus crossed the halfway point of NaNo.  My total word count is now 25,139. Hence the donut celebration.  I shall soon consume the chocolate (now that I’ve remembered it).

5. “lean of bike on crosstown” I had a short crush on the guy on the motorcycle who was behind me almost the entire trip across town.  He drove the bike in such a confident and relaxed and non-jackassy way.  In particular I was totally in love with the way that the bike leaned over to the left on the rising curve of the exit from Crosstown Expressway to SPID (that’s South Padre Island Drive for you non-Texas-Coastal-Benders).  Is there anything sexier than that lean, that just looks so dangerous and yet holds itself together?  

6. “traffic nuisance”  That would be me, with the pen and scrap of paper. 

7. “glassy bay” That would be the incredibly still water around Corpus Christi’s North Beach when I drove into the city.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen the water so still and smooth and bright.  Beautiful.

On the return trip, I added lyrics from two songs that I wanted to look up (not pictured), “Gulf Coast Romance” and “when she rocks she rocks.”  I haven’t looked up either of them yet.  Feel free to enlighten me in the comments if you know them.  

You Can Change My NaNoWriMo Novel, or Watch Me Be Irrational About My Writing

My total word count as of yesterday is 20,028. I wrote almost 4,000 words yesterday.  Which was great for yesterday, but my brain has turned to mush today.  

Last night I had the urge to take this piece of Mainstream Fiction and drop in a fraternal alien-twin for one main character and a liberal sprinkling of the word ‘ovipositor.’  Is this my subconscious telling me I want to write science fiction?  Or is 4,000 words too many for one brain in one day?

I was disappointed to receive absolutely no additional suggestions to yesterday’s 10 Things You Can Drop Into Your NaNo Novel post.  Giddy, I suppose, and unmotivated to write according to the plot I scratched out on this sheet of graph paper in front of me, I’ve decided to shake things up a bit.  

Here is the really boring short synopsis of my novel:

Jill and Carlos work at the same busy video store. They’re friends, but only at work. They don’t get married, or date, or even like each other That Way. But sometimes they talk to each other about the important stuff.

I’ll admit it, my original suggestions yesterday for things to drop into your NaNo were pretty tame.  In the spirit of generating creative absurdity, I will consider all suggestions for throwing wrenches into a NaNoWriMo novel from now until the weekend.  Whichever one I think is the most outrageous will go into MY NaNo.  I have no prizes to offer.  If I choose your outrageous suggestions, you’ll have the satisfaction of know you have f—ahem, um, TINKERED with my creative process.  

Only Rule: No Brutality.

Do your weirdest.

10 Things: To Throw into Your NaNo Novel (A Special NaNoWriMo 10 Things)

I am totally breaking my own rules today by blogging before meeting my writing and editing goals.  In fact, I’m not sure a day has passed that I didn’t break that rule in one way or another.  Naughty.

The first week of National Novel Writing Month has ended.  If you’ve been keeping up with the minimum daily goal of 1,667 words, you should have finished the weekend with nearly 12,000 words.  Don’t worry if you’re not there.  The pressure of the deadline can often inspire a burst of words.  So can getting through the beginning and figuring out where your story is going (if you hadn’t worked that out already, ahem.)

The trouble with the end of the first week, of course, is that the Euphoria of Starting is wearing off, and now we’re all realizing that this is going to be a bit of a slog to get through the murky middle and hit 50,000 words anytime in the next year.  Such is writing.  

One way that we can try to keep the excitement alive is by throwing surprises into the novel now and again.  Call them Challenges, call them tossing Wrenches into the works.  Last night I suggested to @Bego that she set fire to something in her novel.  She giddily reported burning a field.  I love how this can work!

Here are 10 Things you could throw into your novel to shake things up and create interest for you the writer.  You never know, maybe they’ll also actually make your story better. 

These 10 Things were chosen at random from the Tim Horton’s Coffee Can, so you know there is a universal wisdom to them.  Seek not to question the Tim Horton’s Coffee Can.  

10 Things To Toss into Your NaNoWriMo Novel:

1.  Something red

2. A sticky doorknob

3. Someone driving too slow

4. A kiss

5.  A mention of temperature

6. Something/someone smashed (or have a character smash something, Hulk-style)

7. A toenail

8. A game of tug-o-war

9. A Parade

10. A jar of pickles

Bonus: A cup of coffee.  No, wait, maybe that should go in the Writer, not the Novel.

Write hard friends.  I’m at 16,235.  Sound off your count or your favorite Challenge/Wrench in the comments.