So, today was the first day that I was home when I would have been teaching, so I view it as my first official day employed primarily as a writer. Here’s how it went:
10:00 AM–Up! Excited to be able to sleep until a decent hour finally. Checked KDP to see how my books were selling. Noted that some of the numbers had gone up a little. Did not add the numbers up yet, because I’ve discovered that if I do this less often, it makes me feel like I’ve sold more. Assured myself I was on track to 500 sales this month, which would translate into making up the difference from November money, meaning I’d be able to pay my bills in April, after the money I’ve saved dries up.
10:15 AM–Made goals for the day. Decided I should be able to plot out Toil and Trouble #2 and get a few thousand words on it.
11:00 AM–Working on plot outline for Toil and Trouble #2. Long detour searching wikipedia for information on maenads.
11:30 AM–Conclude maenad information is completely useless. Begin thinking about lunch.
12:00 PM–Heat up leftovers. Begin wondering why it is taking so long to make this darned plot outline. (Although, arguably, it’s taken me days before, but that was when I was only working for a few hours in the evenings.)
12:10 PM–Lunch over. Continue working on plot outline. Feeling discouraged, so whip out Holly Lisle’s Create-A-Plot Clinic. Continue working.
1:00 PM–Making slooow progress on plot outline. Feeling even more discouraged.
2:00 PM–Decide to take a break and read the kindle boards. Everyone there is talking about KDP Select and why it’s either the best thing since sliced peaches or the spawn of Satan.
3:00 PM–Determine that I’m just not trying hard enough. Make more progress on plot outline.
5:00 PM–Need twelve more scenes. Decide to make dinner and then try free writing to see if I can jog my muse loose. Feeling pretty disgusted that I’ve been working on this darned outline since 10:00 and still am not finished. Make dinner. It’s chick pea tacos. I have no onions, since yesterday, while making dinner, a roach crawled into my dinner and I had to throw it all away. Darned roaches. And now I will be living in this apartment for a very long time, since I will never be able to get a loan as a self-employed person. The tacos are dry and disgusting, and even Aaron agrees with me, and he always likes my cooking.
5:15 PM–Wash dishes.
5:30 PM–Do free writing exercise. What comes out is nothing about the book or the subplots, but ten minutes of me FREAKING OUT because I quit my job, and I have no idea if I’m going to be able to make this work or not. Also, my inner critic chimes in to tell me what an awful book the first Toil and Trilogy was, how I write really choppy sentences, and how the book was just a bunch of boring action scenes with not nearly enough romance.
5:45 PM–Now understand that I’m having trouble writing because I’m terrified of what’s going to happen in my life. Attempt to soothe myself, but mostly just end up delivering a diatribe to Aaron on the subject. He informs me that it’s only the first day I’ve tried this and that I have no right to worry about it yet.
No right.
5:50 PM–Spend a good ten minutes silently seething at Aaron for telling me I had no right to feel the way I do. Then realize he was actually trying to make me feel better, and the person I’m actually mad at is myself, for not being more positive.
6:00 PM–Attempt to figure plot outline.
6:03 PM–Decide I don’t have to work on this stupid plot outline anymore, because what I really want to do is work on the idea I had on Friday for a series that I’m currently calling: Harry Potter meets X-Men from the point of view of a teacher, as if Alan Moore had written it (the way he was writing in the 80s, anyway).
7:00 PM–Super excited about new book idea. Decide to try to hunt down some Generation X comics to read for ideas on plot and general feel. Hunt is largely unsuccessful.
7:30 PM–Look for books written from the point of view of a teacher. Download Up the Down Stairs. Read until taking a break to write this blog post.
9:27 PM–Finish this blog post. Still feel terrified but also excited. Attribute style of blog post to an infiltration of Up the Down Stairs in my brain. Plan to continue reading it, as it’s actually pretty funny and accurate–although the poor lady had it WAAY worse than me. 223 students in one day??? Aggh… Tomorrow is another day, during which I will finish the plot outline of Toil and Trouble #2.
