Day 194: Total hours for volumes 2 and 3 (so far)
Since I had so many non-working days, I decided to switch up how I'm tracking my writing. Instead of tracking how many days it takes me to work on a book, I'm going to track number of hours, since days can change depending on how many hours I work per day on my book.
So I went to my trusty Toggl report to figure out how many hours I've been working on volume 3. The time doesn't include the time I spent working on the entire series premise, but I'll post that also at a later date.
Lady Wynwood's Spies, volume 3 totals (so far, 2020):
Outlining: 8 hours, 40 minutes
Blocking: 29 hours, 33 minutes
Writing: 25 hours, 13 minutes
Editing: 10 hours, 39 minutes
For reference, I also looked up the total amount of time I spent on Lady Wynwood's Spies, volume 2, which is (mostly) completed. I started writing this book around the tail end of my bad bouts of writer’s block, so my writing speed wasn't all that fast. Also, while I did some work on the book late last year (which are included in these totals), I ended up almost completely rewriting the little that I wrote because I had stopped work on it in order to outline the entire series, and so there was a lot I needed to add and subtract.
Lady Wynwood's Spies, volume 2 totals:
Outlining: 26 hours, 13 minutes
Blocking: 48 hours, 49 minutes
Writing: 84 hours, 44 minutes
Editing: 33 hours, 30 minutes
Comparing the numbers for the two books is really helpful because I can guess that I need about 20 more hours for blocking volume 3. It's kind of nice that I can break the task down into a measurable amount like that.
What also kind of shocked me was that the total number of hours, minus the outlining, is 168, which calculates to about 34 days of 5 hours of work a day to finish writing the book. If I did 6 hours of work a day, that's 28 days. That's awesome!
And even just 4 hours a day has me finishing the book in 42 days. That's totally doable, and also pretty low stress.
Ideally, I'd like to build up to a consistent 5-6 hours of work a day, so that I could finish a book in 5-6 weeks (assuming I don't have meltdown days). It's the "5-6 hours a day" that's been eluding me, because of distractions (social media and home chores, mostly) and procrastination (retail, mostly). I really want to become more self-disciplined!
Yesterday I wasted too much time during my breaks, so today I'm going to try listening to an audiobook when I get up from my sitting desk. It might keep me from going onto social media and wasting time there.
***
I think the audiobook worked pretty well, at least for this first break. I did house chores while listening.
I got back to my desk and started a monster on 4thewords.com to force myself to get back to work quickly. I'm going to try for 2 hours of blocking before I take another break.
***
I worked for 2 hours and actually got another scene blocked, and I ended up tossing a scene that was unnecessary. Now I think I'll go for a walk and listen to an audiobook to help refill the creative well.
Before going, I started a 6 hour monster on 4thewords so that I'll get back to work on time.
***
Ugh, I got really bad hypoglycemia on my walk! Even after coming back and eating, my body still feels tired. I think I'll go nap since my brain is so sluggish.
***
I woke up from my nap with a bad sinus headache, so I took medicine and went back to bed (I’m posting this on Saturday). I'm disappointed I didn't get more work done—I had been hoping for at least 2 more hours of blocking. I'm close to finishing the blocking on volume 3.
Blocking: time spent: 2 hours, 11 minutes (volume 3)
Editing: Time spent: 1 hour, 1 minute (Spinster Spy)
Writing: Time spent: 0 (although I did a lot of writing when editing Spinster Spy, since the original draft had been with dictation)
Writing: Total number of words: 0
Writing: Average speed: 0
Time spent doing other writing-related business: 56 minutes
My takeaway for today: It’s rather nice to see my totals broken down by hours, and to see exactly how many hours I needed for volume 2 so I can try to guess how much longer volume 3 will take me.
So I went to my trusty Toggl report to figure out how many hours I've been working on volume 3. The time doesn't include the time I spent working on the entire series premise, but I'll post that also at a later date.
Lady Wynwood's Spies, volume 3 totals (so far, 2020):
Outlining: 8 hours, 40 minutes
Blocking: 29 hours, 33 minutes
Writing: 25 hours, 13 minutes
Editing: 10 hours, 39 minutes
For reference, I also looked up the total amount of time I spent on Lady Wynwood's Spies, volume 2, which is (mostly) completed. I started writing this book around the tail end of my bad bouts of writer’s block, so my writing speed wasn't all that fast. Also, while I did some work on the book late last year (which are included in these totals), I ended up almost completely rewriting the little that I wrote because I had stopped work on it in order to outline the entire series, and so there was a lot I needed to add and subtract.
Lady Wynwood's Spies, volume 2 totals:
Outlining: 26 hours, 13 minutes
Blocking: 48 hours, 49 minutes
Writing: 84 hours, 44 minutes
Editing: 33 hours, 30 minutes
Comparing the numbers for the two books is really helpful because I can guess that I need about 20 more hours for blocking volume 3. It's kind of nice that I can break the task down into a measurable amount like that.
What also kind of shocked me was that the total number of hours, minus the outlining, is 168, which calculates to about 34 days of 5 hours of work a day to finish writing the book. If I did 6 hours of work a day, that's 28 days. That's awesome!
And even just 4 hours a day has me finishing the book in 42 days. That's totally doable, and also pretty low stress.
Ideally, I'd like to build up to a consistent 5-6 hours of work a day, so that I could finish a book in 5-6 weeks (assuming I don't have meltdown days). It's the "5-6 hours a day" that's been eluding me, because of distractions (social media and home chores, mostly) and procrastination (retail, mostly). I really want to become more self-disciplined!
Yesterday I wasted too much time during my breaks, so today I'm going to try listening to an audiobook when I get up from my sitting desk. It might keep me from going onto social media and wasting time there.
***
I think the audiobook worked pretty well, at least for this first break. I did house chores while listening.
I got back to my desk and started a monster on 4thewords.com to force myself to get back to work quickly. I'm going to try for 2 hours of blocking before I take another break.
***
I worked for 2 hours and actually got another scene blocked, and I ended up tossing a scene that was unnecessary. Now I think I'll go for a walk and listen to an audiobook to help refill the creative well.
Before going, I started a 6 hour monster on 4thewords so that I'll get back to work on time.
***
Ugh, I got really bad hypoglycemia on my walk! Even after coming back and eating, my body still feels tired. I think I'll go nap since my brain is so sluggish.
***
I woke up from my nap with a bad sinus headache, so I took medicine and went back to bed (I’m posting this on Saturday). I'm disappointed I didn't get more work done—I had been hoping for at least 2 more hours of blocking. I'm close to finishing the blocking on volume 3.
Blocking: time spent: 2 hours, 11 minutes (volume 3)
Editing: Time spent: 1 hour, 1 minute (Spinster Spy)
Writing: Time spent: 0 (although I did a lot of writing when editing Spinster Spy, since the original draft had been with dictation)
Writing: Total number of words: 0
Writing: Average speed: 0
Time spent doing other writing-related business: 56 minutes
My takeaway for today: It’s rather nice to see my totals broken down by hours, and to see exactly how many hours I needed for volume 2 so I can try to guess how much longer volume 3 will take me.
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