Camy's Writing Diary

Changed up the schedule I only did the bare minimum for my Japanese study last night before going to bed, and that felt kind of pathetic. So in keeping with what I blogged about yesterday, I decided to do my Japanese study first, before I started on my writing. I have to admit that it felt really good to get my Japanese study done first this morning. I felt fresh as I was doing it, and I remembered the flashcards better. Afterward, I had to start the meat marinating for dinner, but then my IBS started flaring up. I had to take about half an hour to get food in my stomach and take some drugs. But surprisingly I went straight to work when the pain subsided. I’m not sure if it’s because I did my Japanese study first and got into a “work mode” mindset, or if it’s just because I switched my schedule up a little today and that’s what enabled me to jump into work without procrastinating. iPad Mini and bluetooth keyboard I tried recreating the Alphasmart “experience” with a bluetoo...

Feeling mellow I had another bad IBS flareup this morning, which woke me up early so I didn’t get a full night’s rest. But I think I dealt with it a bit more quickly this time. I took my drugs and sat down to rest until they kicked in. The drugs make me tired, so I’m feeling pretty mellow right now. I was supposed to do an experiment to write at my Alphasmart at my standing desk today, but I’m too lazy to clean out my desk so I think I’ll just use the Alphasmart at my sitting desk. I’m only doing one 25-minute sprint. I’ll also try to do the editing in my Alphasmart to see how that goes. If my health remains good, I want to move immediately into blocking. If I’m disciplined enough today, I’ll get at least a couple hours done before lunch, and then a couple hours after lunch. Energy like candy I’m trying to be more aware (or feel the urgency?) of doing my writing work as soon as possible after I wake up, outside of any health issues that morning. I am hoping that doing my ...

Today I was going to use my Alphasmart at my standing desk to see if location helped me write faster, but my standing desk is a bit messy today, so instead I’m going with another experiment I wanted to do, which is using my Freewrite at my sitting desk. Right after my writing sprint, I’m also going to try self-editing the text with my Freewrite to see if I can get used to the navigation buttons. It could be that I have difficulty using the Freewrite simply because the navigation is unfamiliar to me. I’m only doing one 25 minute sprint. I’ll only be doing single sprints until I finish blocking book 4 and (hopefully) all the rest of the books in the series, so that I don’t run into the confusion I’m suffering from writing in one timeline and blocking in a future one. *** Evaluation of writing and editing on the Freewrite Traveler I actually wrote quite fast on the Freewrite today, but unfortunately the reason is because I copied almost word for word what I’d written in my blo...

Today I woke up a little early, so I didn’t get a full 8 hours of sleep, but I don’t feel tired right now. I might later, but I’ll hopefully get my writing work done before that happens. I’m continuing with my experiments. I’ll be doing my writing first, but only a 25 minute sprint. I’ll do a quick self-editing pass right after I finish writing. Today I’m not writing on my Freewrite, so I won’t need to pause to transfer the words to Scrivener before I edit them. Instead, I think I’m going to try my Alphasmart (see below). After the writing and editing, then I’ll spend 3-4 hours (hopefully) doing blocking on book 4. I am reducing the amount of time writing each day and then spending more time blocking. This is because I want to get the blocking for book 4 done quickly, and also do the blocking for the rest of the series. Yesterday (and some other times before), I would get confused about the timeline of the book I’m writing because I had blocked/outlined a future scene in the sa...

Clearing the decks: I woke up feeling okay-ish and had been planning to jump right into writing, but I found that I kind of need a little time to myself in the morning to wake up. I made tea, ate breakfast. I haven’t been feeling well enough to do my house chores lately. I have one house chore assigned to each day so that I eventually get to the entire house over the course if two or three weeks, with some chores repeating (such as cleaning the toilet). When I was feeling better, I would get my chore done before writing, because otherwise the thought of a chore left undone would nag at me while I was working. Also, I was less likely to get it done if I left it for later in the day. This morning, I was still feeling a little sleepy, and decided to do my house chore for today (mopping the kitchen floor), especially because it was bothering me that I hadn’t done it last week. It took all of 10 minutes, and I felt so much better after it had been done. Something about a clean house...

Health issues again I don’t know why, but I again woke up with an IBS flareup, and it took about an hour and a half this morning before I could deal with it and get the pain to settle down. I feel like I waste so much time getting my health under control every day. it’s very frustrating. But I also try to tell myself that actually my IBS is getting better, slowly, because I’m on this elimination diet. I’m starting to realize what foods I’m particularly sensitive to, and I’m making less mistakes in what I eat. Eating my “frogs” versus managing my energy I was thinking about how yesterday I had real issues managing my energy. I don’t like feeling so tired and having that dictate my productivity. I want to avoid situations like that. I talked before about eating my “frogs,” doing first thing in the morning the important things that I would otherwise never get around to doing if I left them for later in the day. My four “frogs” have been my Bible reading, exercise, house chores,...

Writing despite health issues:  I woke up with a terrible IBS flareup, and then just when it was feeling better a couple hours later, got a terrible sinus headache. I just can’t win! I realized this was my first experience with bad health issues since starting my streak, so I thought I’d figure out how to deal with it. I took drugs for my headache, even though they tend to make me tired, and did some steam aromatherapy to open my sinuses. My main goal was to do everything I could think of in order to feel well enough to write for at least 15 minutes. If I didn’t do anything else today, that would be okay with me. I feel better now, the headache is mostly gone, but I’m left with that fragile feeling in my head, like another headache could come on instantly if I sneezed wrong. Still, I’m glad I feel well enough to get on the computer. So, since I managed to wrangle the headache down, I’ll start writing. I’m not entirely sure how much I’ll get done today because I’m feeling...