Option: Failure

I have declared failure on NaNoWriMo for this year. I didn't even get close, By not even close, I mean I've written less than 16,000 words.

Life in November sucked. Instead of putting in extra hours writing, I had to put in extra hours at the day job. So many hours that I actually bumped into my upper limit (crazy timekeeping system won't let a "part-time" person record more than 40 hours in a week). Funny, but the only "extra" time I got to myself to write was on the days where I came to work late so that I wouldn't accidentally work too long and end up volunteering my time. The job is important for a variety of reasons, but I won't do it for free. There were a couple of other issues around the house that sapped all the creative energy right out of me during much of the time I wasn't at work.

By the time Thanksgiving came around, I was at about 13,000 words. I was off work all week because my oldest gets an entire week off from school every Thanksgiving. I could have made the decision to plop her in front of the computer, the TV, the Wii, or sent her to play Barbies for several hours each day so I could write. Instead, I let my mom-guilt decide for me and not only had a 6-year old home with me, but her (very active and tricksy) 3-year old brother too. We had a great time going to the St. Louis Science Center, and I got the kids to help clean house (honestly, I did...Grandma's visits makes for great motivation). We hosted T-day dinner at our house and I got to spend a day in the kitchen happily cooking with my Mom and baby sister for company (and for extra hands with either the food or the kiddos). The week was really quite nice, as long as I ignored the whining from my characters about why I wasn't spending any quality time with *them*.
 
I haven't yet put my two manuscript pieces together (my NaNo work was in a separate file for record-keeping), but I think I am at around 30-40,000 words total on that book (out of a projected 90-120k words...yep, it's a long one, by design). Not bad for a yearly total, especially as I wrote 25,000 of my contemporary manuscript this year and did a massive editing job on my sci fi. And I have fragments of other stuff in progress (including a "short" story that might end up as a full manuscript at the rate it's going).
2010 won't have been a total failure as far as writing goes. Not by a long shot. It was just November that kicked my butt.