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gankylosaurus

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  1. The issue I'm still wrestling with is that this "detox" will end at the end of June if I go the full 90 days. Then I go back to school in August and I'll have less time. It almost makes more sense to just milk the time I have left until then and when I'm back in school, cut back again. For now, I'll keep up with it. I've been talked back from the edge. Day 32 Got my writing done, went for a run, did the dishes. Now I have to leave for work shortly and I get off at 10, so I don't have much time left for anything else today. Now I'm tired. Gonna go set a timer and try to get a nap in before work.
  2. This isn't my official update for the day, just wanted to vent a dilemma. You can treat this as my real 30 day update, I suppose, largely because I'm sober and more focused now. So I bought a game because it was one I'd had my eye on and it was on sale for really cheap. Figured I could buy it now so I could play it after the 90 days. Steam has a very specific refund policy, though (I think you have to do it within two weeks of purchase and before you've logged two hours in the game) so I gave myself thirty minutes to decide if I want to keep it or refund it. I think I'm gonna keep it. But I started thinking that maybe I don't want to go the full 90 days. I've been writing every day for almost a whole month now, and that was my main goal. But I decided to step back and do a closer look at what's actually different (or not). What I like I've written for thirty minutes a day for the past four weeks straight. I plan on keeping this up.I've gotten some things cleaned up that were bugging me.I've saved money.I find it easier to read for hours at a time.What I don't like and still need to change I'm fat. (215 lbs whereas I was 205 during my last journal on GQ)I stopped working out until I realized the above fact, then went for a run. I plan on running again today. After I eat and write. But I still want to get a consistent schedule going.I haven't kept the apartment as clean as I'd have liked. The past few days with the fiancee barely around we haven't used many dishes, but over time the sink has filled up and we're out of clean cups. There are other things that are still bugging me as well.I rely too much on Youtube sometimes to pass the time.I relapsed on quitting porn after a couple weeks and I relapsed pretty hard. It just needs to stop.I drink too much.What I want my life to be like after all this Okay, here's where I do the visualization. A typical day for me, whether starting in the morning or whenever I get home from work (pending whenever that may be) would consist of getting the place clean, working out, and writing. Maybe in that order, because cleaning and exercising would be a good time for me to think about what I'm going to write later. Then, after all that, with the place clean, my writing done, and my exercise complete, I can jump into whatever entertainment I feel like consuming at the time. I don't want to set required time limits on reading, because that makes me anxious and I don't like it. I prefer getting immersed in a book until I forget what day it is. Some books do this better than others; some just drag. All of this has been about creating time to do all these other things. Quitting games wasn't about quitting games. It was about cutting out an unnecessary time block to give me time to do the things I needed to do. To put my priorities before anything else. To go back to where I was in Fall 2014 where I wrote all my daily requirements down and got them done before I could do anything for me. When I've tried going back to that notebook idea, things tended to get in the way, probably largely because I prefer doing them alone, and my fiancee was in college at the time. That meant that I was more productive when she wasn't around. I don't want to clean around her, mostly because I don't want her to feel guilty for not helping. She works a lot (especially lately) and I can take more of the workload than her. Other times, I just ended up sleeping. I think this was largely a depression thing, which is worse in the winter. Well, the weather has improved and I started taking fish oil which seems to be helping. Hell, after last week's early shift, I tried to take an afternoon nap and actually found I wasn't tired enough. Must mean something's working. I also discovered that with porn addiction, as I've mentioned before, keeping a counter to log how long it's been since the last slip-up is counter-intuitive. I tried setting up a chains.cc chain for it, and every time I went to add a link, I ended up thinking about porn, and that led to relapse again. That's why I said it just needs to stop. No 30-day or 90-day celebrations, no anniversary of the last time I watched porn, none of that. It just needs to end and that theme in the story of my life has to come to a close. This isn't ending a chapter, it's starting a sequel. Beer is pretty damn fattening. But wine and liquor aren't much better, and are probably in the long term more damaging. I try to set limits on my drinking and tend to fail miserably. It's pretty embarrassing when I go to make myself a drink and realize that there's only enough for like two or three more, and in the meantime my fiancee has only had a few drinks from that bottle. It's embarrassing and selfish. So, in short, a day for me, working around my work schedule, should end up looking like this: Work out and clean first, in either order.Write for at least thirty minutes. On days off from work, amp this up to an hour minimum. If there is literally no time to do anything else, writing takes priority over even exercising and cleaning.Deal with errands early.Watch no porn. Don't even think about it. What porn? I see no porn here. Exactly.Once everything is clean, all my exercise is done, and I have a clear head, I can read or play games or watch a movie.I can drink on weekends, but beer is for special occasions only.I feel like this is how responsible people behave anyway. The Real Dilemma I like you guys. That's the dilemma. I like the people here and the sense of community. It's not like Reddit where the signal-to-noise ratio is off the charts. You get buried on Reddit without responses. This has also been a very consistent community. For instance, the last time I went to /r/NoFap I ran into a lot of Red Pill ideals, people saying "you can do it, pussy!" which I just don't cotton to, and a whole buncha dogma. That dogma was always there, though, probably perpetuated by people who expected great things to happen by achieving 90 days in NoFap. After certain ideas gained more and more traction, the community started to feel kind of cult-like. But there are no Super Powers. There is only self-control. So, I kind of wish this community was about more than just quitting games. Or, at least I wish that wasn't its primary focus sometimes. Because I want to quit other things, and improve myself in other areas. I've already proven to myself that I can pick something and do it with no excuses, even though some days are harder than others. Cam pointed out on my previous journal that I need to reverse the way I think about time management. Instead of thinking I'll do the things that are important to me "if I have time," I should do the things that are important to me and then use the time I have left to do anything else. So I almost have this down. I definitely have it down for writing. Now I just need to do it for everything else. Only then will I feel comfortable adding gaming back to my tertiary activities list. I guess that's about all I wanted to say. The main gist of it is that I don't plan on quitting games forever, and that I'm making progress, but I sometimes wish that I could play games and still have this community for support in other areas. I'll be back later with my real daily update.
  3. For me, this challenge was never to see if I can do it or not. There was no curiosity involved. It was more so that I needed to get back to what was really important to me, and I had to take out the most disruptive thing in my life, at least for a time. I have other things I need to quit as well, but for good. I don't know if gaming is one of those just yet. I'll go the full 90 days to make that decision... mostly because of the state of my computer. But that's details. It's the fact that I'm doing it at all that counts, right? Day 31 Today was longer than expected. I had to deal with some truck repairs, which meant I had to take my truck to my dad's place. He's a mechanic by trade so it's pretty easy for him usually. This fix dragged out a little more because it was kind of a pain in the ass, but it's done now. Mid-way through, though, my grandma called my dad and asked him to take her to the ER, so we took a couple hours off to do that. It ended up being nothing, so don't worry, Grandma's okay and at home already. Didn't get to work out today, but that's fine. I think jumping right into running and resistance training all at once was a bit too much, too fast, too soon. I need to strengthen up my running before I get back into anything else. The running is probably what was keeping those five pounds off, actually. I'll worry about lifting myself up off the ground when I weigh less. In the meantime, I made a conscious choice to sort of stick to my diet by getting a chicken sandwich instead of a burger when Dad wanted to stop for McDonald's on the way back from the hospital. Got my writing done just a little bit ago. I took another look at the outline and decided act 2 starts a bit later than I thought, because a lot of the scenes occur over the course of a single day and night. That's act 1 on its own. I keep getting discouraged by the pacing of this one. Ideally I want the word count for act 1 to hit somewhere between 20 and 25k. It's at 10k right now, and I have about five more scenes left to write, though that's only because I moved a lot of act 2 scenes up. We'll see how it plays out. Every time I get discouraged, though, I just remind myself that problems can be fixed in post. It might result in a lot of rewriting, but hey, that's what I signed up for and I know it.
  4. Day 31 Kinda almost didn't feel like posting at all. I'm tired and ready to go lie down because my feet hurt like hell. But today I went for a run and got my writing done. Before work this time. Yay.
  5. Very true, Cam. Thanks for that reminder. Day 30 I feel like day 30 is supposed to be some momentous thing. Like, it's a third of the way through. You're not just 30 out of 90, you're 1 out of 3. That's how close you are. Like, that shit you just did? Do it twice more and you're done. But today was a bit of an interesting ordeal. Where should I start? I'm a little drunk right now. I'll start there. But rewind to four in the morning when I got up. I went to work and had a fairly standard day at work. The boss found a new crusade to go off on regarding a stench in the office, so when I had an excess of lifeguards, I was able to put them on autopilot while I did more supervisorly shit. I'm one of the head guards if I haven't mentioned that before. Yet after all this, after barely eating save for some scraps I found around the office, after having half a sub when I got home, I couldn't nap. The only caffeine I had today was from one of those MiO energy things that you mix with water and they taste like radioactive Kool-Aid. Yet I wasn't tired for some reason. Still aren't. Amn't. Hm. This is why "ain't" exists, ain't it. Moving on, I realized that today being day 30, I had to take stock of this challenge. I want to add to this challenge now. I'd been saying it's less about what I'm not doing and more about what I am doing. So I started with cleaning, writing, and working out. Writing won the battle for dominance and the others took a backseat. So now I need to get exercise back in there, because we've gotten the apartment to be pretty manageable by now, and last night, I realized that I'm getting kinda fat. I believe I mentioned before I'd always been pretty skinny. Helped that I was tall. Also helped (though it wasn't healthy) that I forgot to eat when I was gaming for hours on end. Even after that with a healthy diet, and even overeating, I stayed about the same. Then I hit 25 and my metabolism must have relieved a huge sigh and been like "fuck this I'm out." I was on a swim team in high school. That and gym class (which was only for half of each year) was the only time I got any exercise in high school, up until I was about 20, when I started to build up some muscle. Even then, I didn't gain any weight that was unaccounted for until I was about 23, and that was easy to keep at bay. Now I'm a walking cautionary tale. Because last night, I was my fiancee's date to a presentation she wanted to go to. I grabbed the jeans I normally wear (the one of six pairs of jeans that still fit me) and had trouble getting them on. I struggled with the button while she laughed at me and told me she didn't think these were the same jeans as usual. Turns out they were in the end, but I had to fight them sonsabitches onto my gut. I stepped on the scale and discovered I'd put on another five pounds. I dunno how. But that was my motivation for starting a diet and exercise plan. Basically, I'm planning on eating mostly fruits and vegetables. On a related note, I almost stopped for burger king on the way home. Got Subway instead. Anyway, there's another thing from today that I need to bring up after 30 days. I need to mention that I cheated a little bit. Early on, like in the first week, I downloaded and played the demo of a game that had just come out. I was just curious, and the demo had just been announced as being available. I didn't expect the game to be very good, but I wanted to know if I was being cynical and there was something I just wasn't seeing. I've concluded that my original assessment was correct. And since that was just one half-hour jaunt off the path, I didn't and don't feel set back by it. Then again, even though I unsubbed a lot of YT gaming channels, I keep getting drawn back into different ones for various reasons. Mostly it's because it's a different format, or it's because of the people playing. Recently, though, a well-known group started playing one of my favorite games of all time. And I watched it. It was nostalgic and it was funny to hear people lovingly poke at its silliness and enjoy some of its concepts that were quite advanced for the 90s. In the end, it made me feel happy. But I shared it with a friend because he had no experience with the game despite being a big fan of other entries in the series. He and I started talking about it and he brought up let's playing and mentioned that he kinda wished I was still doing it. I was pretty good at it, or at the very least I got much better at it. I pointed out that it took a lot of time to do, and I always felt like I should be writing instead. Then I realized, though, that so long as I kept up with my 30 minutes a day of writing, it wouldn't be so bad. As long as I write, work out, and make sure the apartment is clean, then I could LP to my heart's content, especially because I've grown a lot and I realize now what it is to be a creator, and to do something just for the love of it, not for the attention or the money. And it's become a real dilemma. I'm in no real danger of suddenly up and quitting over this, though, because my desktop computer is busted and the motherboard it needs is no longer easy to come by like it was six years ago when I got it. And the laptop has its own issues and I don't want to deal with trying to use that for such a power-intensive hobby. But argh, it's gotten me fired up. I even took that laptop apart to clean out the fan to try to speed it up. Turns out the fan was fucking pristine, though, and I just spent two hours taking apart and reassembling one of the most complicated laptops I've ever come into contact with. Which is why I didn't get my writing done until after nine. Odds are, I'm going to wait until I start school and get my financial aid to fix my computer. Then I would be able to decide whether or not I want to get back into it. Honestly I think I was good at it and a couple of my series had a pretty good following. Part of the idea I had with my friend was that some people might come to my channel to watch to get more of the story because the guys playing the game together talk over a lot of things but sum things up. They also kinda screw up a lot of really simple things, whereas I'm really knowledgeable about it. So, it might actually be a good market ploy if I were to launch a series right now and out-pace those guys for people who want to experience more of the game and don't really care who's playing it. Let's playing is oddly like self-publishing in some regards. I'd go on about that, but this post is getting long and I'm not getting any sobererer.
  6. Day 29 Oh my god such a bad writing day. Got about 600 words done before the chapter ended. Which really sucks because my notes for this chapter made it seem like it was going to be longer. I realized the issue, though. It only has one character in it. I thought about doing something about it then and there, but nah. This chapter still gets the ball rolling, and it's just an opportunity to add more development leading up to the pivotal moment in post. I ended up fleshing out a character's background a little bit. Not every day can be a win. This is proof of that. Still got my 30 minutes done, thanks to that character development.
  7. Day 28 Almost forgot to post. I'll only be a minute. Got my writing done. Around 1400 I think. Finished the chapter I was working on, and jotted down some notes. One of the character needs his background figured out, and he also needs another scene that will add to the story. Which will likely lead to more scenes. Which is just fine by me. Pretty uneventful day otherwise. All my cleaning yesterday inspired my fiancee to use her day off to clean a bunch today so things are getting nice and organized now. We even have a place to put coats other than the backs of chairs!
  8. Thanks for all your words of encouragement, especially these. It's so easy as a writer to look down the path and see the light at the end of the tunnel, then realize you're looking through a telescope and it's actually much farther than you thought, and give up. I've been there far too many times. Now, though, I realize that it will pay off. When is the question, but it's also kind of the answer. I feel like I'm waxing poetic or some shit right now, but I'm probably just really tired and actually sound really high and incoherent. Day 27 I just realized how close I am to day 30. Almost a third of the way there. I'll have to do some kind of status report on day 30. I'd do it now while it's on my mind but as I said above, I'm really tired. Got another third of this chapter done. Before that, I started cleaning a lot. We had a lot of shit in the closet I wanted to get rid of, and it's mostly gone now. Just gotta get the fiancee to sort through some stuff when she gets home to decide what to keep and where things go. There's also a set of plastic drawers I emptied and she told me not to get rid of them right away. So we've got some work to do yet. So because of all that cleaning, I'm really tired (Tired Mention Combo x3!). I really wanted to keep going on this chapter, but I really need a nap now. Started nodding off a little while writing. At least the words came easy, although I could have done without jumping back and editing/adding stuff in. That's against my mantra, normally. But I also know that if there are little things that I know need to be mentioned in the scene, I won't remember to add them in during editing. Better to find a good place for them in the heat of it. Because of that I didn't quite hit 1,000 words in 30 minutes (934 for the day) but I feel like the story is coming along well now.
  9. Day 26 Got a sunburn from being out in the woods all day today. Sucks. But it was nice camping for the first time with my fiancee. It was less nice because we were with her parents, but that's just how it goes. Oh, and seeing my dog in a tent for the first time was kind of funny and maybe even a little sad. I think she freaked out a little because she couldn't find the door, and at one point started to try to dig her way out. We went on a hike, so hey I exercised. Sure. Let's call it that. Anyway, got home and spent only about 20 minutes unwinding after my shower before I had to get my writing in. And though I didn't hit 1,000 in thirty minutes today, I'm at least to a point where my hope that later chapters will turn out longer is coming through nicely. I'm only about a third of the way through this chapter's notes. That doesn't necessarily mean that this chapter will end up being close to 3,000 words, but it could. And I was thinking today. After my chat with my friend about this story, I came up with an idea if this one ends up really short. First off I can at least use it as a guide for how much planning I need to get the length of the story where I need it to be. Then I can write the second book. He did say he was more excited for the second book because of the end of this one than this one itself, and maybe I can use that. If I can tailor book 2 to be a good book 1, then I could use this one as a prequel and offer it for free via my mailing list (Note: Mailing list coming soon). It's been done before. Okay, maybe not in the same way, but still, plenty of self-pubbed authors offer a prequel to a current series as a benefit to signing up for a mailing list. It's a good business strategy, really. I'm hoping that's not what it comes to, to be honest. My job is to make this book awesome and as long as it needs to be. But it's never a bad idea to have a contingency plan, right? All right enough outta me. It's been a long day. Time to start laundry and recline.
  10. Woo! I appreciate it, @WorkInProgress. It'll probably be done in a couple months if I keep up my current pace. Then I'll have to edit it and decide where I want to go from there. The biggest hurdle is going to be buying a book cover. Also debating on whether I can afford/it's worth it to pay a developmental editor to look at the story as well as a copy editor and such. I'm pretty good at proofreading and grammar and all that, but it's nice to have an extra eye. Plus, a developmental editor will be able to pick apart the story better than I could, but they're expensive. Day 25 True to form I got 1100 words done today on this new chapter. If I keep this up the book's gonna end up at 33,000 words, which is not good. But I'm holding out hope that this is just the nature of the opening chapters. In fact, this chapter had the potential of being a lot shorter, since it's primarily one character in pursuit of another. Once I get into bits with more dialogue and more varied actions, more words will likely be necessary. I don't like getting bogged down in description, so I try to stick with just enough to give readers an idea of the setting so they can fill in the rest. This is how I like to read books, so this is how I stick with writing them. Can't tell you how infuriating it is to have someone pull a bait-and-switch, though. Like, they give you the bare minimum, and I get an idea of the character in my head. Then it turns out the person I've been imagining looking like Severus Snape all along ends up looking closer to Lucius Malfoy because the author just out of the blue decided to be like "Oh yeah, they also have long blonde hair," but didn't decide to tell anyone until the latter third of the novel. But I digress. One of the friends I gave the outline to read through it and generally seemed to like it. He started with criticisms first, which actually helped, and I tried to clarify my justification for the magic system and I think we came to an agreement there. He thinks it might be a bit anticlimactic but I disagree, and he acknowledges that it might play out better fully written out. I know it might end up falling flat as well, but I'll do my best to make sure that doesn't happen. We both know it's not going to be a masterpiece but that's not the point - it's the story I wanted to write. Ultimately, he said that the outline I gave him made him more excited for book 2 than the current one lol. I can see what he means, too, because there's a lot of fallout at the end of this one that will have to be dealt with in the next book, including the enemy of this one becoming an ally. Plus, isn't it a good thing if a book makes you want to read the next one, even if that means the first one wasn't the strongest entry in the series? I mean, it has to be strong enough to stand on its own and attract readers to start with, but that excitement for the next installment is a great thing to have. So all I can do for now is try to tell this story the best way I can and go from there. I have a lot of confidence in this one - so long, of course, as I can get the word counts up. Otherwise I'm going to have to add in way more scenes.
  11. Day 24 One of these days I won't have a shitty work schedule that results in me sleeping away part of the afternoon because of lack of sleep and/or a lack of a regular sleep pattern. It's one thing if I were to work at 4:30 Mon-Fri, but once a week makes it pretty hard to recover, especially when I have to work the next morning. Plus side to being super-tired after not having coffee all day though: Coffee actually woke me up pretty easily. Anyway, just got my writing done. My body still feels half-asleep, but my mind's up and running. That said, it wasn't the best writing day. Ended up getting 1400 words done, which is decent, and the writing wasn't bad (I think) but I realized something. Average novel length is about 90-100,000 words. I try to aim for 90k and I managed that for the first time on my last project. I looked at my outline for this one and I have to have an average chapter length of 3,000 words to meet that number in this project. I'm currently averaging a little over 1100 words per chapter. Hopefully this is just because these first chapters don't have a lot of detail in the planning notes. The later chapter summaries are a bit more verbose, meaning they should have plenty of content in them. I expect that means I'll hit at least 70k, which means I'd be better off taking this one the self-pub route. Which isn't bad, actually, because it's a fantasy novel and it's really hard to sell fantasy to the big houses nowadays from what I've seen. It's just that, if it's not commercial length, it's not going to be easy to sell to the commercial market. Plus, I've been thinking that as soon as I get published, I'm going to become a lot more prolific. I want to put out at least three books a year after I get published, and then if I end up making enough to be a full-time author, I'll try to put out even more. So, as soon as I'm published, no matter how it goes down, it's on. I was hoping to be a hybrid author anyway (as in, one who publishes traditionally through a publishing house and also self-publishes) but I kind of wanted my first published piece to go traditional. There are a few reasons for this: First, it's hard to market yourself and while through a traditional publisher I might not out-sell my first print run, it would at least get my name out there. Second, I could use any advances or royalties I get from the first published novel to pay for editors and book cover designers on books I want to self-publish. Finally, in relation to the first point, continuing to self-publish gets my name out even more, and people may be more likely to pick up that first traditionally-published novel, eventually selling out the first print run, which gets me more credit with the publishing house. I believe that's called the long tail of publishing. The advent of eReaders has had both positive and negative effects on publishing. I personally love my Kindle and it's dumb to assume that publishing hasn't been doing well because people are reading less. If nothing else, they're reading more because of eReaders. The issue right now is that there are a lot of popular self-published authors selling their content for fairly cheap and making a decent amount of money because the royalties are better. Booksellers aren't doing too well outside of B&N and Amazon. So the issue with publishing traditionally these days is that there are only a few big ones left (five, if I remember correctly) and they can each only publish so many new books a year. With all that in mind, I'm really glad I've done a lot of research on publishing these past couple of years. I used to entertain the idea of going into the publishing industry itself, but I wouldn't dream of it now. I'm going to stick with doing what I love and try to make it on my own however I can.
  12. Hmm... not sure I can help you much there, @gresa. You seem to be doing fine, and the more you practice the better you'll get at it. If you keep reading in English you'll start to pick things up naturally, too. I know English is one of the hardest languages to learn, though. I have a friend from Austria who speaks it fluently, but I think he was learning from a young age. Day 23 The apartment's a mess. And I had the early shift today, so what I planned on being maybe a one-hour nap ended up being more like four hours. Got some reading done after my "nap" then picked up some groceries. It could be worse. It's mostly just dishes. From there it's not hard to pick up the rest of the apartment, and my fiancee made the bed so I barely have to touch the bedroom. I'll get the dishes done after I'm done writing this and call it a night. Got my writing done just now, too. I'm still in the part where I'm rewriting old chapters, which is both a good and bad thing. I made myself not re-read the original versions. I have reasons for this that I can't articulate well. I think it's because I don't want to be too heavily influenced by the old version, or I don't want to realize that the old version was actually awesome and it doesn't need re-written. But anyway, with re-writing old chapters, I already have a clearer idea in my head of how things play out, and I'm able to improve things about them that I thought were weak. Then after I'm done with them I can go back through the old versions and see if there are any hidden gems in there I'd like to work into the new versions somehow. The bad thing is that it doesn't feel like I'm writing anything new. Sure they're new versions but it's not new to me. It feels like I'm playing catch-up. But I don't want to just repurpose the old chapters to get to the new ones, mainly because it's been so long since I wrote this one that I think my writing style may have changed a bit. I'd rather be consistent in that regard and besides, this time I have everything planned out so I don't have to embellish as much as I did the first time.
  13. Oh, absolutely, @Cam Adair. Don't worry I'm not really self-minimizing so much as I'm just pointing out that I don't feel all that different. I didn't expect to feel different, mind you, and I think I've already made plenty of references to ways I actually am different already. Like the conversation between coworkers about gaming that annoyed me. At this point I want to go the full 90 days partly to prove that I can. Then I'll assess how I feel and decide if I can be more responsible about gaming's role in my life. Gaming is another form of entertainment to me. I'll just need to decide if it's worth leaving it as an option, or if I should stick with reading. I admit, though, that when my fiancee has the TV on all day, it's been pretty tempting to pull up a game on the laptop to play while she watches. It's hard to read with that kind of background noise going at the same time. Day 22 We spent the morning driving around. Had to fill a prescription and get a new tag for my dog's collar. We're going camping this weekend and the information on the tag was all out of date, so if she were to get away, someone would be calling a phone line that doesn't exist (or belongs to someone else now). It's actually been worrying me for a long time. The address being out of date was no big deal because I never expected someone to come knocking on my door with my dog in tow, but that phone number has been out of date for more than two years. And today I started the real writing on this project. Tried to minimize the amount of time spent before writing (because reviewing notes is technically part of my writing time) but I needed to make sure I had enough things in mind so I could embellish as I wrote. Especially because I started with a prologue, which are often skippable but still add something to the story. Mine is relevant but happens quite a bit before the story starts. It's sort of just some insight into the antagonist. But yeah, blah blah vague descriptions of what I wrote. It's done. About 950 words long, and I think it's quite a bit better than the original version, which I wrote before fully developing this story.
  14. Day 21 Three weeks. Doesn't feel that significant. I'll keep going. I finished my outline today. Ended up printing it out and sending a copy to a couple of trusted friends. I only expect one of them to actually get around to reading it, but it would be nice if I get feedback from both. Regardless of what either of them say, I'll be starting with the story tomorrow. The only reason I sent them the outline was to see if there were any things about it that seemed off. I mentioned to one of them that I may have forgotten to add in some scenes to tie in two characters added in as the story required them, but what I have for them might be fine. Right now, my concern is that the chapters for the third act are so fleshed out that it's going to be really long compared to the first two acts, which could cause an imbalance. I'm sure it'll be fine, but I can't worry about it right now. Just gotta write it. Then I can worry about cutting or adding. Only took 11 days to get that outline finished. You know, plus all the time I put in about a year ago when I first came up with the idea.
  15. Day 20 Still going strong. Played a game with my fiancée last night, which is well within the parameters of my challenge. She kicked my ass. Writing may have hit a slight snag. I started going back through the outline and was going to flesh some things out, tie up some loose ends, all that stuff. Then I realized I need to read back through my character and plot arcs to refresh myself on what I may have left out, which led to updating some of those descriptions and writing out some setting stuff. Plus, I had finally come up with a description for a very important setting in the story, so I wrote that out. It's all good, though. I'm getting things all set up to be the most prepared I can be for writing this story. Hell, it's like the story's already written now. I just need to "write" it, if that makes sense. Otherwise, had a long shift today, came home and promptly fell asleep on the recliner. Next on my list is dishes.
  16. Glad to know you enjoyed my site, @gresa. Just wish I kept it up more. It's hard to really find a subject to write about consistently. Are there any specific writing issues you think I should tackle? Like, things you struggle with personally?
  17. Getting out of the house was a good idea. Nothing creates cravings more than being home alone with nothing to do. In those times, you have to find other things to do around the house - the more productive the better. It's better to read than aimlessly click around on YouTube, for instance. As for hobbies, pick something that you want to master. I might be wrong, but it seems like what you chose to day (such as Origami) will help for a little while, but will quickly need to be replaced. Think about other things you actually want to do that will be more than a passing fancy. Like, learning magic tricks seems like a side-hobby unless you're planning on really using it one day. Of course, you could always turn the Origami into a much larger art project. That could be cool, like something to show off as a result of addressing your gaming addiction. Best of luck. You're doing well so far. Keep it up!
  18. The first few days of quitting anything are the hardest. Especially when you're counting it day to day. It's so much easier to keep it up for three days and say "fuck it, I'm bored, I'll begin again tomorrow." Believe me, though, every time that happens, you feel worse. Good on you for joining the community. The people here are a great resource. Stay strong!
  19. Day 19 Holy shit, so many new people I almost ended up on the second page. Good for GQ getting popularity! So today I finished the first draft of my outline. Only the last chapter's outline reflects all the new things I added to the story. Tomorrow I'll go through and add in necessary elements to tie everything together. So it seems that the day after that I might be ready to start writing it. Kinda want to share it with a friend for his insight first, though. I'll keep this short because I ended up writing a new entry today on my personal blog. It's about writing. Surprise.
  20. Day 18 We were up late, so we slept in late. Had people over last night for board games and beer. Good times all around. Sleepy day otherwise. Got my writing done just now (day 13) and boy am I tired. As I was writing, I realized that I thought I had added notes for other characters that were supposed to be there, until I remembered that those notes were in the character summaries. I was going to add them in, then I remembered I was taking the write first, edit later approach on this and realized that I can go back and add those other notes in when I go back through. I'm working on the third act right now, and I'll probably be ready to go back through the outline again tomorrow. There was a conversation at work the other night that made me think of this challenge, by the way, and how much it's already affected me. There were two high schoolers working and they started talking about games. One of them mentioned that they tried a certain game the other had recommended and didn't like it, and then they had a back and forth about competitive games and about how "you just have to practice." One of them mentioned that they probably have over 100 hours in each of the games they play regularly, and one of them had put 600 hours into one game according to his Xbox stats or something. And I'm there thinking, it's like they're competing over who has less of a life. Kinda sad, when you think about it. Especially that whole thing about "practicing." Like, shouldn't you be worrying about things that matter more than video games? I feel like I could have justified it for them before this, but now it just sounds like a waste. Especially the kinds of games they were talking about--basically all those games that come to mind when you hear the word eSports. I almost felt like a hypocrite for criticizing them even in my head, but at the same time, I'm just glad to be out of that stuff right now. I remember thinking I had to practice games to get better at them so I could win more matches and enjoy the game more, but I really, really don't miss it.
  21. Day 17 We have people coming over tonight so we got the whole apartment clean over the last two days. Just gotta take care of the dishes and we'll be done. Thankfully there aren't many. After working that late shift and getting home around 4:30 in the morning, I slept in until almost 1. I read for a bit, cleaned, had lunch, back to cleaning, and then realized I need to get my writing done before people come over. I'm not going to make people sit around for a half hour while I sit there jamming on the keyboard. One great thing about this writechain thing is that it's actually become harder not to write than it is to write. It's the one thing I must do every day. And I know why I must and it's not simply because of the challenge. Practically speaking, whenever I space out the writing of a particular story over a long period of time with weeks or even months without writing, the quality suffers. Moreover, I begin to forget my own timeline of how the story's going. I forget little details that are important to get right for continuity's sake, and there's a weird little psychological phenomenon where the parts I wrote over a long period of time seem more drawn out in my head, whereas other parts that I wrote at a breakneck pace seem like they must have been rushed. At least, I think that's all in my head. I won't know until I read through this last draft. For now, though, I'm focused on getting this outline done. There's a newer school of thought when it comes to writing, where the point is to get the first draft done quick so that you can edit it into something great. Finish it, then edit; no editing as you go. The idea of the writer is often romanticized as one who painstakingly thinks over every word they put on the page, but that image is a thing of the past (if it ever truly was a thing to begin with). Now, if you can't finish something, you don't get paid. You just have to finish, and then you can painstakingly edit. I'm doing the same thing with this outline. I've been building it up bit by bit, but now that I'm at the part where I'm fleshing it out, I'm able to embellish more story details and take a more free-write approach to it, which often leads to unexpected new avenues to follow. It also leads to me realizing I should probably follow up on something, like what about that enemy soldier they captured and questioned? They didn't kill him, and his guards fled, so he should probably escape and report back with information. Yes, perfect. So once I'm done with this outline, I can look through and easily see where it gets off track and needs an extra scene or two to connect some details, and things that need to be moved around because my original outline changed the order of when this character does this or that (or when I end up using a different character altogether). Sometimes "character learns the truth of what's happening" leads to me asking myself, "okay, how?" Most likely because I wrote that note thinking I'd remember what I meant later. (Hint: I always forget) Oh, and for those keeping track, I'm on day 12 of writing 30+ Minutes a day.
  22. Day 16 At first glance, I probably look like I had the day off. But I actually have to work at 10:30 tonight, and this event is scheduled to go until 4:30 in the morning (though it rarely goes that late). So, we got a lot of cleaning done today. And we still have some things to take care of tomorrow before we have people come over. I ended up getting pretty tired, so I took a nap and failed to get around to working out. Got my writing done and this process is both discouraging and encouraging at the same time. It's a weird situation. On the one hand, I'm making forward progress day by day. Each of my outlined chapters is getting fleshed out with a few paragraphs each, which will help me write the full chapter. Not only that, but it makes it easier to see where I'm lacking in content. I'm able to see where a chapter needs even more fleshing out, and here is where I can bring in neglected characters and have them do something (or die, either heroically or tragically). And when I add these extra threads and look at other threads in place, I see even more ways to make this story seem more cohesive with better scenes to set up great revelations and such. But at the same time this process is actually pretty slow. To be honest, once I'm in the thick of it, I think I can jam out this novel in two to three months as long as long as I stick with my 30 minutes a day rule. But planning a story is the hard part. It's the part where you conjure something from nothing and play God. But you can't just throw down some characters and have them just be there and do things. They have to encounter conflict. Interesting conflict that advances the story or reveals something about the setting or characters. Most importantly, the tension has to always be rising as more revelations are brought into play. One of the biggest issues I had when learning to write was including conflict. I unwittingly discovered that the secret to creating conflict is to create good characters. After my first failed attempt at writing a novel, I drew up some characters that were adequately different from each other. A drunk soldier, a studious girl, her angsty brother, and a spunky kid who knows a lot more about the world than people expect. Then I wrote the outline (using the old bullet point method--a method of outlining I now hate with every fiber of my being because of its unforgiving rigidity) and set about writing it. It took me two years, from the time I was 17 until I was 19, but I wrote it. It's not great, but I think I accidentally created my first good (okay, decent) novel because I started with interesting characters. My focus on that story was on effective characterization, and that made all the difference. I didn't actually have to think about conflict too much because it was built into the characters to clash, to have different ideas of how to advance the plot. You may have heard some writers claim that their characters write themselves. This was never more true for me than in that novel, where the characters had better ideas than I did. I let them take the reins and the effect was beautiful. After that, I thought that I had successfully learned the art of characterization and could move onto other things while thinking less about the characters, because that part should be innate by now. Boy was I wrong. I definitely worked hard to ensure that I had more than enough conflict in later works, but they seemed manufactured. Like when I was writing the plot, I just realized that these characters need some conflict, so I had to invent it, mainly because the characters all seemed to agree with each other all the time. There were a few strokes of genius in there, but they seemed accidental. So now I'm back to focusing more on characters while also trying to ratchet up the tension with more conflict. The effect this time around shouldn't feel manufactured. Or, at least, at the times when I realize there isn't enough conflict, I have a suitable cast of characters which should be able to inject that extra tension in a believable way. This is another benefit of the way I'm plotting this current project, because more than once now I've gone to end a chapter summary only to realize nothing really happened or that everything seemed to go the character's way a bit too easily. There's one thing I can't stand more than a book where the characters are dictated by the plot more than the plot is driven by the characters. If you want an extreme example, check out Mainspring by Jay Lake. The main character is literally told to do this and go there the entire time. I got about two-thirds of the way through before I realized I was wasting my time. Sure, every chapter had plenty of conflict, but it all seemed so random. In the very beginning he loses his job but his boss gives him money to help him make his own way. Then the boss's son beats him up and takes the money claiming he stole it in the very next scene and the main character doesn't do a damn thing about it. He just accepts it and moves on. If that was an attempt at making a sympathetic character then it was a failure, because it just made him pathetic, despite supposedly being the hero of the story. Okay, I'm getting carried away now. I can go on and on about writing if you let me. So... until tomorrow.
  23. Sorry, man, I just wanted to vent. That's all. We ended up apologizing to each other later, her for being useless (her words, promise! Said in a joking tone of course), and me for getting upset about an unpreventable situation. She actually knows about my efforts at self-improvement and has helped immensely. We agreed to only drink together, for one, and to cut out beer except for on special occasions. Beer is pretty bad at maintaining a sexy midsection. And for someone who's been pretty skinny their whole life, this whole "having a belly" thing is quite new. But I'm getting off-topic. Everything about our relationship is pretty great, even when we argue. It's just that sometimes I have to be more forward about my sacred writing time, like tonight. Bought Chinese food, then she said let's watch Survivor and go to bed and I was like, you're kidding, right? Turns out she's pretty tired. So she agreed to watch an episode of a show she... likes? Long story. Anyway, she's finishing it up now just as I finished up my 30 minutes of writing. And I'm well-versed in Nice Guy Syndrome, though I haven't read that book. I acknowledge that I used to be among those ranks and am embarrassed at how long it took me to realize it. Anyway... Day 15 Got my writing done. Before that, had sort of a date night with Chinese food and Survivor on the couch. But now we're going to bed and I had an eight hour shift before all that, so no cleaning and no exercise. Got all day tomorrow, though. Until next time.
  24. I understand that. The issue that I've run into the past few days is that whenever I want to do my own thing, she gets sad because I'm not on the couch cuddling with her. Today was a lot better, and it seemed like a conscious decision on her part. I don't want to work out in front of her unless she's working out, just as she works out only when I'm not home. So it's not about anything being "on her." It's more that it just adds to the pile. Like, look at yesterday. When I summed up my post-work dash to make dinner and exercise at the same time, I left out some details. She'd messaged me at work saying that she'd like a root beer float because it would make her throat feel better. Then we bounced around ideas for dinner, and we came up with something in the freezer that took fifty minutes to make. I got home with root beer and ice cream and she wanted me to make dinner, and she knew I wanted to run, so she asked how long I'd be. I said forty minutes. I read the directions and she said that she didn't want to do it because she was worried about falling asleep and missing the 35-minute mark when you take it out and spoon the sauce over it. I suggested that I just start after my run, and she said that would be too late. I didn't want to go running later, when the sun was going down or worse. So I gathered my things together and put the food in the oven, then turned it on (hoping that would buy me some time) so I could deal with it when I got home. I got home, started boiling water for spaghetti and took a really quick shower. So, I'm trying to keep up with my own things while also dealing with her. None of that was on her. But it should all be on me, either. Of course I love her and I do what I can to help. But it would be just so much easier and refreshing to just be lazy on the couch with her. Sure, she's sick now, but she wasn't sick Sunday, and that was still a lazy on the couch TV day. And I'm trying to get myself to not be that person, just as I'm trying my damnedest not to look like a dick. It's just bad timing is all. She's off again tomorrow (this'll be day five) so hopefully she'll get better then because her Friday shift should be good money. And then next week should be back to normal. Maybe I should have just forgone all of these other things in order to take care of her and be lazy with her (aside from my 30 minute writing break). Maybe I'd be less stressed. But the place would be even messier than it already is and I wouldn't have worked out at all. I know that it's not up to her for me to stay committed, but hopefully you see the pressure she puts me under in these situations. I end up being the one to do everything, so I have to take up the work of two people, doing all the cooking and cleaning, and I have to get my own things done, and add on top of that an eight hour work shift. It's not the best situation for anyone.
  25. Day 14 And now, a real update: Writing: Done Cleaning: Dishes done, kitchen cleaned, laundry put away, workspace organized and picked up. Exercise: Fuggedaboutit Wow, two weeks. You know, I'm pretty sure I had a dream recently about playing video games. I know I had some pretty vivid dreams about other things like moving into a new apartment (which is something we were talking about doing). I think I had a porn dream, too, and woke up feeling ashamed of myself. Weird shit. I gotta say, this new method of writing is working out a lot better than expected. Fiancee ended up taking a long nap, so I wrote about an hour or so. I printed out my old outline and used that for ideas, but branched out a bit more. And now that I'm able to see the chapters in the Scrivener binder, I can make sure I'm generally hitting that 25-50-25 rule of thumb easily. It presented an interesting challenge, too. Once I had in all the main points, it was obvious I didn't have enough for a story. So I looked at my subplots, checked for characters who were being neglected, and figured out extra scenes to flesh out the story. But I made sure they weren't just fluff. Those new scenes are either setup for later scenes or revelations related to the plot or setting. I started writing out paragraphs for each chapter to describe further what's going to happen, but then my fiancee woke up. So while I sketch an idea for a book cover for my last finished project, I'm going to watch something on TV with her. There's a new episode of a show we follow on Hulu. I should keep one of those feelings journals or something. I mean, I don't actually plan on doing that... but it would be interesting. Every time I finish writing (or editing, plotting, whatever) I feel really good. It's not the biggest challenge of my day, but it's the one thing that I care the most about getting done every day. And it's been going well for nine days now, and those efforts are really showing, much more than the old days when I would write whenever the mood struck. Hell, if I stick to my minimum of 30 minutes a day, then in six days I will have done the work of a three hour day. I've done those days, and they suck, and they're usually followed by a week of no work at all. Oh yeah, and I'll run again tomorrow. Was going to work out if my fiancee was still napping when I got done writing. It's all good, though. I still feel like I'm headed in the right direction.
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