A2Z, Z, CampNaNo 20190430

Zero to 51,365 in thirty days. CampNaNo has been fun for me this month. I love it when characters and story seem to be using me as the typist. Most of the time with this latest novel that was how it was. Just type as fast as the story comes to me. It was like reading a book in that I didn’t know what was happening next until the muse told me.

The hardest part of this month was the A-to-Z Challenge and combining it with my story. And even that was okay until the first Sunday when the challenge wasn’t in effect. That made the writing harder. Only because I did want them to reflect each other. The rhythm of the writing got a bit of a hiccup. So for that reason, I don’t think I will combine them again.

In fact, I think I won’t do it in April ever again. I will do my own rebel challenge in February. At day twenty-six I will be done and save the last two or three for something else, who knows.

As for the writing, I am determined to keep working on my novel from this month, editing and lining it up with the rest of the series (that also needs editing), But I think I will keep writing. I don’t know what. I just know that this habit of writing 1,667 words a day is so helpful and mostly fun when I stay with it. It is horrid when I have to reestablish the habit. But I say this every time. Let’s see if I can maintain. I will probably report here my word count or in some way use this to keep me honest with myself. I guess this will be a journal of the writing and other parts of my day. I write my reviews because I needed to keep track of what I read and what I thought about the read, and what I was doing at the time that influenced how I felt about the read. Well, this will be the same, just for writing. That was my original thought about blogging.

When I had four children using up my day I found lists were not only unproductive but depressing. At the end of the day, when I was so tired from adulting and parenting, I would look at a list and think, I didn’t do a thing all day! My husband would come into the home after work and see me exhausted and the house a mess. He, too, wanted to know what I did with the day. I decided to keep a journal of what I did. Surprise, surprise I wasn’t sitting and watching soaps and eating bonbons! That list went on and on. My husband’s day ended when he left work. I never left work. Anyway, listing what I’ve done has always helped me feel better. Accomplishment is what it is all about. If organizing by the future works for you, good. I just need to keep working and it shows in the long run without extra stuff done, I don’t need to do.

You know the neatest part about zero? If you put then next to any other number it grows or shrinks. I hope I’m on the right side.

A2Z, Y, CampNaNo 2190429

Yarn is fun whether telling or knitting/crocheting. My yarn telling is pretty well finished. If you take yWriter’s word for it I ended with 50,584. If you take Word’s word for it I ended with 51,336. The validating machine must be broken because neither amount sent me to the winners’ circle. I only need 50K darn it!  Maybe too many are hitting that validator at the same time, though I’ve never had this problem any of the 10-16 times I’ve finished novels on NaNo or CampNaNo. I wrote to the company to see what’s up but they say they don’t get back to you for 2 business days. Well, that takes me past the final date for this NaNo. Well, at least it took my fact page to the finality with the arrow in the target at 100, all the graphs stating I made it, so…I’m satisfied. I will try to write a bit more tomorrow and see if the machine is working.

Though I haven’t stopped knitting during this month, I have done far less than normal. I have a lot of stuffed bodies and body parts that need to be stuffed and sewn together. I finished several little baby hats that need those last bits sewn closed and labeled to go to the people who need them. I’ll try to post the pics as I finish a few. The leader of the Hugger Hats group told me to make more of the dolls as she has a doctor who wants to give them to stroke patients as they are helpful tactile comforts for them.

I’ve been happy with the story I was able to write this month and feel encouraged to get all the books in the series up and edited to the best of my abilities. As much as I read, I think I am feeling accomplished with my stories It feels different enough to not feel like the same ole story as what’s out there, yet the energy I feel as I read them make me want to read them again. Does that make sense? I’m not trying to brag. Not at all. I’m trying to review with the same kind of eye as when I read other books. I am so grateful to have these characters growing and dictating to my struggling fingers the pictures they give me. I hope as I edit the more poetic words or phrases will appear as I know that writing fast leave my vocabulary and grammar wanting.

Did anyone else do CampNaNo how’d it go for you? How did you like doing the A-to-Z Challenge? I will put my thoughts on that on tomorrows post? As I am picking up and looking around think of me as waving to all of you. What’s happening in your life while I was buried in wordage?

Escapist Coloring Club 2190428

Sorry, again to be late to the party but I’m here! Thank you Linda G. Hill for the fun of the Escapist Coloring Club! Below is the picture for this month before coloring. This is a two-headed dragon with a head at each end.

Here’s the finished product:

 

I did try the baby oil for blending and shading. It does work nicely except check out my next picture on the other side of the above page. Oil spots! Ugh!

Wish I didn’t do this at night when there are so many shadows! Still, it’s fun and playing with crayons, pencils, and a couple of pens makes a fun adventure.

SoCS, XP, A2Z, X, CampNaNo 20190427

According to Linda here’s how Stream of Consciousness Saturday works:

Friday’s here, and I’m late for your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt. I’m sorry. 😦 Explanation to follow–and no, it’s not that I forgot about you. During the month of April, I’ll use the appropriate letter of the day to correspond with the A to Z Challenge so anyone who’s participating in both challenges can do so at the same time. Here’s your prompt:

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “xp.” Use it as a word, or find a word with “xp” in it. As always, use any way you’d like. Enjoy!

After you’ve written your Saturday post tomorrow, please link it here to this week’s prompt page and check to make sure it’s here in the comments so others can find it and see your awesome Stream of Consciousness post. Anyone can join in!

 

Since I have already written the ending of my novel and find I am not at the goal of 50,000 words I am needing prompts like crazy. When that happens I go to YouTube and find NaNoWriMo Virtual Write-Ins that have prompts and discussions that help inspire my writing. In today’s case, the prompt was the characters are having problems communicating. I got a lot of story out of that so I will only include the bit that fulfills the ‘xp’ requirement for Stream and A2Z.

_____

…

Even facial expressions were lost. The blobbies thought that smiles showing teeth meant aggression. They would smile and attack the other people. And with so many people they couldn’t tell who were the blobbies and who were the gene-popping humans.

The humans spoke to one another as they smiled and were attacked. “I think these guys think like monkeys. They don’t see a smile as friendly. Let’s try to just be calm with lips together and nod at each other.”

Hearing the voices, the blobby humans that they were being talked about so they were still feeling defensive,

The gene-popping humans started using telepathy to see if that helped. Can you hear me? Can you understand me? they said first to each other then to the blobby humans The gene-popping humans would nod and say yes. But the thoughts were still in English and so the blobbies didn’t understand what was in their heads. They held their hands up to each ear as if trying to get rid of the sounds in their heads.

Let’s try pictures.

_____

For those of you who are fans of the NaNo ‘sprompts’ and virtual write-ins, you might recognize the name of the fluffy stuffed dinosaur. He probably appears in a lot in NaNo stories. I will probably need to rename him and other beings but for now, just getting the writing done is the most important part. He’s kind of a mascot for us.

My blobbies are feathered with scales. As young ones, they look like chickens, but as adults, the scales and feathers make them rather messy dragon-like creatures.

Oh for those who are wondering, my word count should be at 45,009, But mine is at 45,143. Woo Hoo! I would like to get ahead so that I can take the time and do my Escapist Coloring Club entree. Maybe I’ll do that tomorrow while not having an A2Z letter prompt.

In case you hear a squee–my brother is finishing fixing my shower so that I don’t have to use the scary tub I have fallen in before. I can’t wait to have MY OWN SHOWER! Girls only!!!!! (But I guess I’ll have to share. –NOT AT THE SAME TIME!) You all have no idea how it is when you get old! You take showers for granted. I did. Imagine water streaming and cleaning you without making your back hurt or feeling like you are going to fall! Okay, all that is probably TMI. If so I hope you skipped it!

Happy last week-end of April! Hope you’re having a great one!

 

 

 

 

 

 

A2Z, W, CampNaNo (Are We There Yet?)

Why is Haven a human? What did she have in mind? When did she think she was going to achieve her goal? Who can help her? How will she make that goal come true? Would she be able to save the women, Beth, Anna, and Judy? Were they actually dead? She’d not dealt with actual dead as she at least could retain their souls. But why? Other planets let the souls recycle or whatever they did. Was it religion that painted that or just how it was. Did that chipmunk think about what happened to its cute personality after it died? Was that the end?

_________

As Ora/Haven attempted to sleep her first night on Xeno as a human these are the questions running through her head. Hey, a planet is no different than the rest of us in an unusual situation and given the letter W in an A-to-Z Challenge just before sleep!

I have to admit that I am longing to be done with CampNaNo. Latest count:  42713. Math is the thing you do in days of NaNo (or anything else but writing) that means I need only 629 words to reach today’s goal of 43,342. At which point I will need 6,658 to reach the month goal. The light at the end of the tunnel–hopefully that isn’t a train!

A2Z, V, CampNaNo 20190425

Verily I say unto you, I can’t wait to be finished with NaNo! I caught up yesterday and my last wordcount was 40,217. I still need about 1,450 to get in today’s words. Here are the first few paragraphs of the first scene of today. Again, sorry if it doesn’t make sense. I don’t know if it makes sense if I shared the whole thing, ya know—editing needs to happen big time!

_________

“Voicing my opinion is what I do.” Dusty laughed. The vein on her forehead bulging. It always happened when she got tickled.

Maggie laughed. “Your opinion is all that counts in my life.”

“But I still don’t want vegetables. Give them to the vegetarians. Since becoming a dragon, I find I prefer charred venison.” Dusty growled in echo to her tummy. They had entered the valley on the other side of Xeno. The small village tucked into the vegetation, the river running through it all and ending in a veil of white from the waterfalls created the visual Haven had embraced on her own world.

____

And back to the writing! Hope you all are having a great April. Our temps are now in the 70s in the day and no more dripping faucets overnight. Nearby cities are sometimes in the 80s! I like it right now!!!!! We don’t usually get Fall or Spring in our Outback of Oregon, so if I can I take a long time enjoying outside with Kali and walk around the yard so I can get up to longer walks. Chair Yoga started hurting my tailbone too much so I will need to find some other exercise out in the fresh air (pre-fire season). Look how much I write while trying to avoid the actual writing!

1-Liner Wednesday, A2Z, U, CampNaNo 20190424

“We understand time travel.” Paul was reflecting on how it all started for him and his elflike friends. He quoted from a long forgotten textbook in space-school: Understanding the universal units of upmost unpossiblities unites uncertain yet, unique modes without undermining the possibilities of space and time, and it uses only the smallest amount of our energies.

Take that! One-Liner Wednesday, A-to-Z Challenge, and within the first paragraph I wrote for CampNaNo!

A2Z, T, CampNaNo 20190423

This postcard tickled my creative chops to come out and play.

I named this lady Ora JaJa. Well, today I read the back of the card. Not the wonderful gift of love from a friend, but the print on the card. Now I feel bad as this lady has nearly three-quarters of a story dedicated to her. But this is what I learned as I read the bottom printed part: In The Freedom of Nature–Richard Riemerschmid 1895z I put that in my Google engine and found that picture. There is more water in the Googled picture than I see here. That would have changed the first scene of the novel.

Copyrights and the like are confusing to me. I don’t want to infringe. Since the picture inspired the story do I need to change? Do I look for another similar picture to use as my character picture? I doubt this picture will in any way be a part of the actual book as it was only for my creative jump start. What do you all think of this and what should I do?

Thank you ahead of time for your advice!

A2Z, S, CampNaNo 20190422

So, I think I am getting my stride back. Without losing a second, here are my first few paragraphs from the first scene I’m writing tonight.

____

Seeing their counterpart joining each other and singing, the dragons did the same. Screeching, squealing, nearly screaming would more define the sound of the dragons but their riders were delighted. They pretended to conduct the trio into harmonics most humans would never tolerate. But the girls were thrilled. They too started singing in the most dissonant way. They could feel the vibrations between the bubbles ripping. They could hear each other better and better. Soon they could run to each other and swing their bodies onto the backs of their dragon friends, and they soared skyward wishing to never see this beach ever again.

Looking down onto the people on the beach they realized they couldn’t leave. They still needed to help humans save their elfish spacemen. They figured if they took the creatures to Haven, they could actually bring the elves back to life. So each dragon picked up the dead and blinked to Haven.

The second they landed on Haven they realized their mistake. Haven still wasn’t in charge, and the cousins’ mothers were still as dead.

_____

Sorry to leave you on such a sad note. There is a promise that what we see isn’t so, but that needs to be worked out. Haven in 3D is the title and is a sequel of Haven the first book I wrote in 2001 and can be found on Wattpad.

I’m sorry if this is confusing. I know the story I’m telling, and even knowing the whole picture I am still working out the bits. Mostly I am trying to get out my 1,667 words a day to make it to 50K by the 30th of this month. I currently have 33,734. My goal is to hit today 36,652. CampNaNo is challenging to say the least!

The last few days have been horrid health-wise. My allergies and fibro are fighting for me to be sleeping 24/7 instead of having a working brain and tapping fingers. I’ve even started drinking coffee at night, and yet I sleep and not write!

Hopefully, you all had a good Holy Day/Easter. I have to admit that I’m glad I didn’t have eggs to boil and color or high energy kids jumping about. Been there, done that, t-shirt and all. Our neighbor’s chickens have been visiting lately so we have possible broods getting ready. I love his hens and the gorgeous rooster and our black and white speckled girls seem to like the company.

Look how much I wrote here! Why am I not getting that many words over in yWriter? (I’m doing okay. Just complaining. Sorry) Well, I won’t if I don’t get over there and continue typing! See ya all tomorrow!

Review: Oh, Nurse!: One Man’s Journey Through the Nursing Life, a Personal Account of the Highs and Lows by David Daniels

Oh, Nurse!: One Man’s Journey Through the Nursing Life, a Personal Account of the Highs and Lows by David Daniels
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

When the author asked me to review this book I stated that I mostly read books by females with strong female leads. But I took a moment and realized that this was a male nurse. He knew where I was coming from, and he’d proven himself. So I figured his book deserved my read.

It was good. If my feet and back could have handled it, I would have tried to be a doctor or a nurse. I was a candy striper with that aim. But not only couldn’t I handle it physically, when one of my patients died I found that to be too hard to take. Granted I was sixteen, not enough life experience to know people come and go from your life. But that little bit of experience made what I read in Oh, Nurse! ring even truer.

As I usually say when reviewing a biography or autobiography, this is someone’s life. It is hard to play judge and jury when watching them walk in their own shoes. I wish I would be able to say this book encourages future nurses. But, with medical marriage with insurance, I don’t think it is going to get better any time soon. The greatest profession should still be nursing. They are the patient advocate, or at least they should be. They are invaluable to doctors, at least they should be.

I have always loved shows like Greys Anatomy, ER, all those medical shows. They are there to give us all an eye into what is happening or can happen when personalities and money are involved in trying to take care of medical issues people present with.

I hope that in spite of his honest story of his life as a nurse, others will choose to go into that career. I hope his story opens the eyes of those in charge of our medical needs to how to make things right for all.

Good job, David Daniels!

View all my reviews