So yeah, pushed myself too hard the first half of the month it seems.  The compounding goals are tough, especially when you have things to do too.  Taking a few days off from writing it to rejuvenate, then going to push through the story as I can.  No worries about the 50,000 words in November - too far behind to get that this year.  Well, I suppose I could, but that’s like 5,000 words just to catch up and yeah, pushing for that deadline is stressful enough that it’s hurting the creative process.

It was never really about the 50,000 words anyway.  A proper novel is around 100-150k apparently, and the rough sketches I have for A Game Called Murder will have it right around there or more just for the first draft.  Slow and steady wins the race, and all.  Who knows, I might even try to get published for real one day, once it’s done - this story is turning out too good to just drop or let fade away.  It’s a long road ahead, and continuing at this pace just for the nano deadline - especially when all the social stuff surrounding NaNoWriMo is null and void for me because my schedule is so different from what the rest of my city is doing in terms of meetups and such - is just bad.  Bad for me mentally, bad for Mikhail and Jill, and bad for developing writing as my newest habit, the stated goal of NaNoWriMo.

And that’s ultimately the point.

I think I’m in a place where I want to keep forging ahead, keep writing, keep telling my story, without the added pressure of NaNo.  It just wasn’t fun anymore.  I think I’ve found an online community of writers that may prove to be just the sort of creative energy I need to keep it going throughout the year.  They plan on watching all of Alfred Hitchcock’s corpus over the next year for inspiration, enough said.  Plenty of classics in there I haven’t seen.  Maybe next year when I’m in Houston I’ll revisit actually doing nanowrimo.  For now?  I’ll just take it easy.  Take some time to do forensics, read the book that apparently is waiting for me in the office overnight because Amazon decided a $10 paperback was signature required, possibly go out and get one of the new Pokémon games releasing imminently just to keep up my ties to popular culture, but of course, only play it when I’m out somewhere like on campus - no locking myself up in the house to play games!

Honestly, I just need a sort of mental reset after the election and this tough semester.  And so that’s what I’ll do.  I’m hesitant to get a game, yes; anyone who’s been around here for a while knows my struggles with that.  I’ll be keeping a close eye on it, to be sure.  And of course, I’ll keep y’all updated with things too.  Easiest way to stay accountable is to talk about it, right?