Category: Musings

The real Universe is against me

Third day of NaNoWriMo and I and doing well. I hope you all are too.

My first day of Nanowrimo was a slow day, I didn’t think I was going to make my first 1600 words, much less the extra 500 I challenged myself. I know I won’t be able to write every day, for the next 30 days, I only have 25 days to win. My personal word count was adjusted to 2100 a day.

I made the 1667 word count and got the badge. I stopped writing on the project for that day at 1760, 20 minutes after midnight. I was tired and happy not close to my personal goal but better than my previous first days. In fact, I don’t think I have ever updated my word count on the first day of Nanowrimo. So happy dances all around.

Late nights for me these days, lead to late mornings, November 2nd in New York City was a cloudy day. I heard that is the day of the dead, for those that follow that culture. It was also Election day. The media was focused on Virginia. I live in New York City and we have a new mayor. My plans were to catch up on my word count.

I set up my area to start writing, getting into the story has been difficult. I was also preparing a meal to eat for brunch, an Amy’s vegetarian frozen dinner. While sipping a coffee, and reading what I wrote earlier that morning. Then the oven, the lights and the fridge all shut down. At first, I thought it was a breaker for the kitchen only. But then I realized as I moved around the house, the modems in the living room were off as well, so no internet or phone service. The house was completely dark and eerily quiet. I used my cellphone’s flashlight to check the breaker in the basement. There was nothing I can do there. At the time, I had limited service on my cell, I had to find some free wi-fi just to make a phone call. I was totally cut off from everyone and the feeling was odd. I would have been fine if I knew what was going on.

I was able to turn my cellphone into a hotspot. However nothing was reported in the news or the Con Edison website. I found out that this problem was not only in my house. The neighbors were suffering as well. There were no traffic lights at a major streets. Businessess had to shut down b/c their computers were not working. I empathize with the people who were washing their clothes at the laundromat. The lights were on but the machines were dead. The service was gone for four hours. I was looking around my house for flashlights, candles etc. What I learned was that we were not prepared for any real emergency. It was sobering realization, especially when other disaster have happened, warning those who are save to get prepared. Once the service was back on and stayed on, I mellowed out enough to write. I am still under my personal goal but that is okay.

I had enough time and mental energy to relate this story and keep my goals to post 4 days a week. I know that later on this month it might be more difficult. but I will persist. Because there will always be something attempting to hinder me from writing. The 3rd day official word count is 5001, my goal is 6300. I am hopeful that at the end of the day I will be closer to 6000. Good luck to everyone that is participating, officially or unofficially.

Go, Writers Go!

End.

Short reviews and sundry

A good part of today is that this post was published. It means I am consistent. Something will be posted here, every Wednesday and alternate Mondays.

This is supposed to be a review post. I am going to try to give brief thoughts on a few things I have watched.

I saw the Hulu original series, Only Murders in the Building, starring Selena Gomez, Martin Short, and Steve Martin. It was a fun cozy mystery, with a clever cliffhanger. It ensured that we audiences would want a second season.

The next series I watched till the end was Titans on HBOMax. I have never done a deep dive on the show, like read articles about what the showrunner, directors, or writers have to say about the show. I will say they take a lot of potential and do things I didn’t expect. The paths they are taking with the characters and their story arcs are interesting. I used to be more upset because I have since changed my mind on the subject. DC corporate gives the okay to everything the Titans creators put in the stream. The actors do what is in the script. Why am I cringing about someone else’s intellectual property, when I have IP and characters of my own?

The books I’ve read are Vows in Name Only and Secrets of a One Night Stand: A pregnant by the billionaire romance both books are by Naima Simone. The books are from Harlequin and part of the Billionaires of Boston Series. Book 3 is titled the Perfect Fake Date, it will be released at the end of December. When I started to have trouble with the romance story that I am writing. I watched some YT videos on writing. I took a few classes on writing romance offered on Skillshare. Then I started to read or listen to contemporary romances. They have helped me put my work in perspective. There are some things in the manuscript I need to clarify and some things will have to be changed in the revisions. Overall it was a good thing that I took time to read these books and listen to others.

Those are some of the things I have been watching or reading. In the future, I will write about some brief thoughts on some anime and K-dramas. I hope the week has been good so far and continued to get better.

End.