A question for grown ups.

well my age suggests that I'm a grown up, but my mentality ???

Full time job and full time mom.
+reading alot and watching a lot of movies.

Yes I do it all, I'm supermom! NOT!

You have to make the time. You have to commit X hours a day (or word count) and do it. Maybe it will be early in the morning before the kids awaken, or late at night when they are asleep. Stick to the plan, do not deviate. If the kids are older and you can send them to the movies or whatever on Saturday, so it. Yes laundry may pile up, the bathroom may not be as clean as it usually is, but you can catch up on that in December.

When did watching cartoons become a chore? It's usually how I end my day before bedtime.

Well, Purple Ink Pen, I'm not sure whether I'm classed as a grown-up; only this morning my housemate referred to me as "more annoying than a barrel full of monkeys", but I am 31 and a full time Office Manager, so I guess I'll let you decide.

I haven't entered Nano before, so can't really argue it as a committment, but I do enter various other writing competitions throughtout the year, practise Tae Kwon-do, archery, piano and still find the time to work on book 2, so I'd have to say that yes, it is possible to juggle, even if there are no balls involved.

I'm a grown-up - technically anyway, mentally... don't ask. I've got a full time job, 9-5 kind of deal five days a week. I don't have kids, but still have to fit in all the usual life stuff, gym, shopping etc and write. I do this all year round, so I know it can be done. It can certainly be done for a month! it means sacrificing some things, for sure. TV time, net surfing time, going out to the pub time, etc. Not everyone is prepared to do that long term, but most people can manage it for a month.

Even a fairly slow typist can get the 1667 words in a couple of hours. In Chris Baty's No Plot? No problem! book he advises you note down everything you did all day, and then find where you have activities you can lose or curtail for November at least. Or you'll figure out things to do like, instead of snoozing in front of the TV till late, go to bed early and then get up early and write before everyone else gets up. Looking with a critical eye at how you spend your time can show you all sorts of solutions to the finding time dilemma.

I'm 21-going-on-22, does that make me a grown-up? I'm starting a new job tomorrow (my second since graduating from university in July but hopefully will last longer than my last one.) It'll be full time work - not 9-5, but shift work which will make my NaNoing life interesting.

I live at home with my parents who seem to think that now I'm back living at home I want to spend half my free time talking to them. I don't. I love them but just no. And guarenteed that everytime I'm in the middle of a word war mum'll walk in for a chat, which will inevitably start with "What are you doing?" "My novel, Mum, remember?" "Oh okay. How's that going?" *headdesk*

I'll be juggling life at home, work, a social life (sort of), NaNo, and a long distance relationship. It's going to be a tough month, this November but with the help of hot chocolate, my 10th anniversary NaNo T-Shirt, random goodies hidden around my room for me to find and the promise of a present when I finish, I'm going to get through this. In fact I'm aiming for 100K for the first time.

Bring on November!

Used to be ShadowedWhispers (2003-2007)
Imagination is the one weapon in the war against reality.

I'm 52 and here's my juggling schedule

40 hour per week job
2 neurotic sons - one umemployed and one bipolar,
a daughter-in-law who demands constant attention
1 2 yr-old granddaughter who wants to play in the sand box, in the swing, run, play ball
Rheumatoid arthiritis
chronic pain
migraine headaches
Church twice on Sunday (I could go two additional nights a week if I could stay awake long enough)
Cook meals 6 days a week.
Clean house, do dishes (no dishwasher) and do laundry on Saturdays

This is my third year and I won last year.

I don't know how I did it then nor how I will this year. But I plan on trying.

Dixiegirl
"May you be captured by a dozen ideas that you quickly convert to a good story."
2008:

Well, it's up to him if he wants to make the commitment really. But yes, it can be done.
This is my 2nd nano and I'm working both a FT & a PT job (FT is 55 hours a week and PT is about 5-8 hours weekly), workout regularly, am working on other writing projects, and have three birds to take care of. Not to mention anything else that life throws my way... anyway, ANYONE can do this, they just have to want to. :)

~Shannon Chenoweth
My writing blog

Although I don't have a paying job, I am a full time mom of 4 ages 8,4,4,2. I homeschool them so we definitely have work during the day. Not to mention we have speech class on Mondays for the middle 2, gymnastics on Tuesdays and Thursdays for all 4 of them, a group meeting on Wednesdays, and Fridays we have to go to the grocery store or we starve for the next week. We are on the go a lot. I am still not 100% sure how I am going to figure out where to work Nano in on my schedule, but I am willing to at least give it a go this year.

jenn-

Hi I'm 39 years old and I have a full time job working in a hospital as a C.N.A. 12 hrs. a day three days a week, and by the time I get home I'm so tired that all I wanna do is sit on the couch and veg. Iam married and my husband does the same thing that I do. We have no kids, but we do have 5 cats, and all of them can be a handful. Hubby and I bought a trailer a couple of years ago and we're slowly working on it. In other words we're very very busy.

I have a full time job right now (40+ hours a week). This year I'm also busy preparing to move to Japan (and improving my Japanese as much as I can before I go). I'm also a municipal liaison, so I have to be concerned about how all my Wrimos's novels are going as well as my own and schedule meetings/write-ins and generally pretend I have it all together.

This is my 7th year doing NaNo (and hopefully a 7th win), and there have been some crazy busy years in there. My first year especially. It was my last year in college (with an overloaded schedule), I was working part time, and I was directing one play and acting in another. And I somehow managed to finish my novel without my roommate ever knowing that I was doing anything out of the ordinary (although why I didn't tell her is lost to me now).

Yes, it can sometimes be hard to fit it in when you're busy. But then again, I've found that when I get all dedicated and force myself to concentrate, it doesn't really take that much time to get my writing for the day done.

He should definitely go for it! Better to make a go of it and have a chance at winning than not even try.

This is how you do it: you sit down at the keyboard and you put one word after another until it's done. It's that easy, and that hard. - Neil Gaiman

At present, none of those, though I sincerely hope I've a job before Nano starts.

I am a 47 year old mother of three, an 18 year old, 15 year old, and 6 year old, all with special needs. We homeschool. I work full time outside the home at a college. I run an entertainment business for my husband (we book performers) and I'm also an ordained minister and perform wedding ceremonies on weekends. I am the head of a local write-in group, and I am also the moderator of an every-other-week discussion group that meets at a book store. I am owner/moderator of a NanoWriters yahoo list, as well as a moderator of several other lists that require my attention. I am webmistress, secretary, and kids' coordinator for a spiritual event that happens every June that keeps me in a meeting at least once a month, and I do several professional web pages for my husband's entertainment business, my brother's blacksmith shop, and my other brother's home repair business. I maintain four regular blogs as well as writing articles for two tech blogs (a combined four articles a week for those - I get paid for them). I also have care responsibilities for my aging parents, a chore I share with my two brothers.

This is my sixth year for doing Nano. I have won every year with books well over 70K. Three are published, last year's Nano is getting ready to hit Lulu by the end of this month. And no one in the house goes hungry, or has to wear dirty clothes or doesn't get the attention from me they need or doesn't get to their activities. I still manage to get it all done AND write.

If I can do it, so can your friend!

"Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia." ~E.L. Doctorow
Visit the NanoWriter's group!
Celestial Chicken Blog

I have a full time job plus a part time job, but I have to say, a lot of the doability of Nano (or any similar endeavor) has less to do with the number of hours a week you have formally committed to work/school/whatever, and more what you have in the way of a support system to handle the rest of life. A college student may have to spend a lot of time a week in classes and doing coursework, but they typically don't have to cook, clean (beyond the bare basics of cleaning their room, if they decide to), care for dependents, meet community obligations (like an ongoing volunteer commitment), fix a broken window or shower head or furnace, etc. If you don't have a support system like that, nano's going to be a lot more challenging.

That's not to say you shouldn't do it. Honestly, I'm not sure I understand why someone would dither about "should I, shouldn't I". If you think you can give it an honest hour a day, or an hour every other day, and you have something you want to write, and you want to partake of the energy that comes from a bunch of people struggling together to do the same thing, then I think you should do it. If your time is very limited, then no, you almost certainly won't write 50,000 words...but so what? I may be in the minority, but I don't do nano to win -- I don't expect that I will ever have the time that it would take. But the month of November becomes a month when I do the best I can and get some good work done on my novel. One day I'll finish it, and that's good enough for me.

Sweet I'm not the only CNA going at NaNo ^^. I'm in my mid-20s and I work as a CNA 8 hours 5-6 days a week. That's just pure physical exhaustion when I'm done not to mention the mental exhaustion that comes into play. I'm always thinking ahead to the end of my shift. I'm not married, I don't even date (thanks to my job), but I'll have two weekends I'm off and numerous days here and there off to write so it's not all that bad. I'm just hoping I can get over 25k this year, 50k be wonderful but I'm being honest with myself XD

~ Ri
NaNo 2007 ~ Untitled (lost :( )
NaNo 2008 ~ Darkness' Light (won!)

I have a full time job, and my son is now grown (and an Army Ranger). I've also won Nano 4 times in a row. A couple secrets: 1) leave home and write. Fewer distractions, less tempation. 2) Make the use of travelling time. I have a laptop, so I spend part of the 4 hour trip to my mom's for Turkey Day writing.

Deny the Impossible

2004: Cards of Change - won
2005: Blood and Asphalt - won
2006: Days of Death and Roses - won
2007: A Roll of the Dice - won
2008: Tricentennial

I'm 30, with 2 kids and a full time job. I just write at work.

2005 - Wilbur Fumble and the island of almost certain death (Winner)
2006 - Dark Side (23k)
2007 - Untitled (35k)
2008 - The Maze Within

Not exactly a grown up or a steady job or having done NaNo throughout it all but I figured I'd toss in my two cents.

Through out hte past summers and occasional spring I've worked as a horse trainer e.g. the day starts at 07:30 and then you can sit down for 20 minutes for coffee around 10 and another 40 minutes for lunch around noon and then you generally don't get to sit down until 8 or 9 at night at which point you're thoroughly beat, (30 horses is about the same amount of work as 5 kids or so I reckon) and then you stil have to shower, have dinner and unwind. I do/did that 7 days a week so you do the math on how many work hours went into my weeks then. And that's not even counting your midnight emergency break outs or your random vet visits or horse transports that still have ot be fixed. And then on TOP of all that still remain remotely social and do some evenings with friends and go to birthdays. Yet I wrote about 1000 words per day on average, sometimes a bit more or a bit less.

It's all a matter of wheter you WANT to do it. No one can make you, but if you enjoy writing and enjoy what you're writing it's not hard ot make/find time to write those 1667 words a day.

I'll fully admit I've never done any of that actually during NaNo when there's a deadline lurking, it's just to illustrate that busy days don't necessarily have to impose on your writing.

I'm 37 with a full-time job and a one-hour commute each way, for up to two hours stuck in my car per day, and then household stuff in the evenings. Weekdays are pretty much shot.

I write as much as I can during my lunch hour, then try to wrap up and hit my word count goal at home that night. I also try to make up for lost ground on the weekends.

It's not easy, but it's definitely doable!

NaNo 2005: Can't Go Back (won!)
NaNo 2006: In Between (won!)
Script Frenzy 2008: Trusted (won!)
Script Frenzy 2009: Caller Number Nine

I'm only nineteen, but I'm a full-time university student (my classes are three mornings a week) and I also work part-time. My schedule isn't crazy full, but it's full enough with essays and things like that.

Like everyone else has said, you just have to be willing to make NaNo a priority. You can do it, but it requires sacrifie. In No Plot? No Problem!, Chris says that the more you have to do during November, the better, because then NaNo is just one more thing you have to do. If all you have to do is write, there's an excellent chance you'll just keep putting it off. Which I do agree with.

NaNo 2006 = Cloudburst = 14k
NaNo 2007 = Redeeming Pandora's Curse - WINNER
NaNo 2008 = Borrowed Time - WINNER

My Writing Blogsite: Chibi Doucet

Well, I am technically an adult (only just), but I only work part time right now.
However! My father has participated (and won) Nanowrimo twice so far, while juggling full time work and taking care of three kids and a wife. Somehow he's been able to get through, even if he has had to write extra on the weekend to catch up some times.

The fact that the whole family also does NaNo might have something to do with it. It's one heck of a support group!

There are whole age-group forums here too, and reading through those might help him feel more at home.

Me, I've got two kids, we homeschool, and do all the usual family activities. I've won three Nanos. My husband works full time, and has also won a Nano. Coordinating our writing time, sharing the household responsibilities, and liberal use of the crockpot were very helpful.

I may not win this year due to health issues, but it CAN be done. :) You just have to be stubborn, sometimes, to make it work.

Proud Member of the Trebuchet Club!

I am 27 with a full-time job and a toddler (who I'm convinced works overtime to drive me crazy sometimes).
It's doable. It's all about making time to write.

[witty description and request for free coffee go here]

Hey, my mom and dad home schooled us too!
Good on ya! : )

I'm sort-of a grown up, but not really.

I'm in school full-time, and I teach part-time. I'm not sure where I'll find the time to do NaNo.

I'm almost sure it will involve neglecting school and work though.

"Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic to it. Begin it now." -- Goethe

Full-time job, part-time college student, with a really bizarre schedule and a minimum of a half-hour drive to work and an hour-plus drive to class.

This is my fifth year. I've won each year. It can be done; the trick is to find time in the nooks and crannies between things to write during. Or develop insomnia, that works too.

Grown-up here, by all basic standards.

I have...
1) full time job
2) 2 dogs, 4 cats, not children but they have a bigger schedule than I do
3) Husband (not third because he IS third, but just because that's what happened).
4) Sit on the executive board of THREE different community organization AND hold offices.
5) Planning a sorority reunion that is taking place (not by my design) in the middle of NaNoWriMo
6) Violin lessons/practice time required.
7) 1 dog from above is "special needs" and requires monthly, if not sometimes weekly, vet visits
8) Volunteer archaeologist
9) Own my own home (which anyone who owns a home knows that it's a time suck)

Basically, if I can find time, anyone can!

Whitney
***************
NaNoWriMo Virgin, 2007
10-90: The Life and Times of an American Bank Robber

NaNoWriMo "Pro", 2008
Title yet to be decided

I have two kids, ages 1 and 3. I'm a stay at home mom, alone with the kids 6 days a week, 12 hours a day. (Do we have a pull-your-hair-out smiley?)

My writing time is after they go to bed. You see, I'm the genius who set their bedtime at 7 pm. Mwah hahahaha! After they go to bed, I stay up for 3 or 4 hours writing. That is MORE than enough time to get the minimum hours done.

Oh, and I also say screw the housework. I have better things to do for one month.

I work full time, have 3 cats, have a craft group that I organize twice monthly meetings, November is a birthday heavy month for me too. I'm in the quilt guild but not as active in it as my sister. Taking yoga class twice a week thru work, Wii Fit step aerobic every morning...

I'm not married and I don't have human children, and I don't own my own home. But I'm still busy! :)

AND I still write. I love Nano.

%-]

~not all who wander are lost~
2008: Don't Blink

It can be done.

I have a full-time job, and am studying for a major professional exam (happens Dec 6) on the side.

And I'm still doing NaNo, or at least attempting to. But I'm pretty sure I'm crazy.