Europe :: England :: Brighton

Word War Sign-Ups

SheBit — Mon, 3 Nov 2008 03:22:12 -0800

If you wish to take part in the War you should reply ONCE and ONLY ONCE to this thread saying so - the organisers will use this thread to set us up in the Word War.

Word War sign-up closes on the 10th, so make sure that you make yourself known here before then if you want your wordcount to be included in the war.

You can back out at any time, but you can't opt in after the 10th, so if in doubt just go for it - you can always opt out later if you're struggling and think you might pull our average down.
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Buddies

SheBit — Fri, 7 Nov 2008 02:44:58 -0800

This is the not official but sort of official 'Buddies' sign up post.

Some people find it easier to write if they have a partner to get them through the writers block and the end of the month slump/exhaustion. It's all about mutual goading.

If you want a wing man to call your own, sign up here and you'll find/be found one.
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Word War Rules

SheBit — Mon, 3 Nov 2008 03:13:50 -0800

Eligibility

You must live within the UK or Ireland, and be relatively close to the city or region you
wish to represent.

Sign-ups

Your ML will provide a "Word War Sign Up” thread on your local forum to track word
count. Participants will post ONCE in the Word War Sign Up thread by 8pm on 10th
November stating that they wish to participate.

The Regional Word War

You must update your word count every two days, on the even numbered days of the
month, by 8pm. If you are unable to update your count, contact your ML.

During the last partial week (26th –– 29th Nov), you must update your word count daily, by 8pm. If this isn't possible, contact your ML immediately.

If you do not update your word count on four consecutive occasions it will be assumed that you have given up and you will be removed from the war (unless you already have more than 50k) If you know that you’re going to be away and won’t be able to update, let your ML know so that we can prevent this.

You must input your final (verified) word count by midnight on 30th November. After
midnight, you will no longer be able to update your count.

Scoring

You may drop out of the Regional Word War at any time up to 8pm on 20th November without affecting your region's count. If you do not drop out by messaging either myself or your ML, you will be in for the remainder of the competition, NO MATTER WHAT!
During the Regional Word War there will be a regularly updated leader board on an external web site. I'll post a link to this board to each competing region as soon as I've confirmed it myself!

Only the official word count from the "Word War Sign Up" threads on the NaNoWriMo web site will be considered when computing the final score.
After midnight on 30th November, I will ask the other MLs from competing regions (or their designated representatives) to verify the figures before declaring a winner.

Results

There will be two prizes:
The city/region with the highest average word count.
The city/region with the highest proportion of winners from the starting participants.
The MLs will compare results, and when all regions agree, the results will be posted on the NaNo boards.

Banter

Participants are encouraged to engage in good natured banter with participants from other regions in the various Word War Banter threads. Banter should remain good natured and within the bounds of good sportsmanship. The use of 'smileys' in messages is actively encouraged.

Our God-like powers

MLs decide what "good sportsmanship" means.
We reserve the right to remove folks from the competition for any violation of the rules and guidelines listed above.

MLs are the final authority in any dispute or question about the rules.

Trophies

To be determined...
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

TGIO apologies, and request for pics

chromomancer — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 03:18:27 -0800

I'm just now getting over what was the worst cold I've had for years. I had a fever for three days (Thursday thru Saturday), headache etc. and no energy, although I think my temperature is now back to near normal, and my brain is now almost working again. With impeccable timing this happened just after I got my purple bar, so I gave up on my personal 60K target - I spent most of the time trying to sleep it off.[*] I did spent twenty minutes writing a post on Thursday, and then forgot to click "Submit" - this indicated my brain state, and was the point I decided that not only would I stop nanoing, but also I was fit only to slump in a heap and mumble, "Wurgh!" at intervals!

I am not yet ready to resume normal operations (still have a sore throat etc.) so, I'm going to skip tomorrow's TGIO this year - even if it is not the "three week" bug which is going around, there's no point in risking setting myself back (and it would be a bit anti-social to spread it around, even though Googling says you are not infectious two to four days after symptoms appear. I'm not entirely convinced that's always true.)

Anyway, I hope, since I won't be there, some of you will take some pics and upload them. Mith did a sterling job last year (or was it a dollar job?) but I think he's a little too far away, and this is the first year I've seen no pics. OTOH, I haven't looked for about four days...

Chro.
[*] On the plus side, despite spending most of the time in bed or slumped in a chair, I ate so little I'm expecting to have lost a surplus pound or two in weight. There's always a silver lining, if only a tiny one. However, I don't recommend this as a dieting technique.

----------
"Life's a beach, and then you dry."
"They also surf, who only stand and wade."

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Purple

chromomancer — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 17:03:34 -0800

I noticed a couple of posts from a purple Telute this evening.

Mega congrats going from gangrene to bruise... (is that what it means?)

Any other purple people ought to post here,so us lesser mortals can envy them! (And those of a less envious disposition can grit their teeth and post "congrats" messages.)

But only until we, too, transform from envious green to imperial purple.

Seriously, purple is the new green. Go for it! :)

Chro.

----------
"Life's a beach, and then you dry."
"They also surf, who only stand and wade."

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Regional Word War Leader Table Update

Loriba — Wed, 5 Nov 2008 04:46:40 -0800

Hi,

Thought I'd start a new thread for posting when updates have taken place as it's easier to just cross-post across all the participating forums.

The results from the 4th November have been calculated and can be found here:

http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/node/3095947#comment-3239799

If anyone sees any mistakes (and there were several in the last one) please PM me to let me know. :)
----------
*Hugs*
Lottie
ML for Europe::England:: Cambridge
http://www.nanowrimo.org/mlcontact
2005: Dreaming of Jack - 83k+; 2006: An Ordinary World - 84k+; 2007: Rising Angels, Falling Apes - 121k; 2008 - White Shadows - ??.

Europe :: England :: Brighton

TGIO

SheBit — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 15:31:36 -0800

We hope to see everyone at the TGIO party tomorrow night, whether you won or not. We've all written a lot and deserve to say 'thank God it's over!'

If you're feeling brave you can even bring a few printed excerpts from your NaNo novels to entertain the masses.

So come along to the George to drink and make merry and celebrate surviving NaNovember - we all deserve a bit of a party!

Your MLs
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Desperate last gasps!

Beancounter — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 02:10:36 -0800

So, here I am down to the last two days with still 10k to do! (but this is still a lot better picture than a few days ago when I was over 20k behind schedule). 5k a day is definitely do-able.

I don't think I have ever been this far behind, but with two years of successes behind me, I am determined to get there this year too. If I could just get over all the displacement activities....

So for all of you still out there not on Green or Purple (and there do seem to be a lot of those this year - congratulations to you all!) let's get to it - anyone want a race to the line?

...and how about a last minute challenge to inspire us...
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Word War

SheBit — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 05:38:09 -0700

For those who are new to NaNo and don't know about the Word War, it does exactly what is says on the tin - it's a war between the regions where the only weapon is word count.

There's one official war between all regions who want to fight (a Word World War, if you will), but there are also often little inter-regional wars (skirmishes, perhaps).

I'm sorry to say that Brighton usually does, well, not amazingly - we generally try to be as far from last as possible - but that's because we have an all are welcome in the War policy. Most of the high ranked regions will only accept Word War soldiers with a proven record of getting well in excess of 50k. We're here for the fun, not so much the ultra-competitive winning, so all we ask of our combatants is that they're fairly certain they will at least get close to 50k.

So, who's up for a war? We can rattle sabres and blow them all to hades with our wit and word count.

Come on, you draft dodgers - Brighton needs you! Sign up for the war effort!

Of those who want to meet the enemy on the field of literary battle, would many be interested in challenging some British regions to private battles?

Come join the Brighton Word Army and make our region proud!
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Novel swaps?

Victoria Hume — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 09:51:50 -0800

just thought i'd post this here whilst we're all fanatically checking the forums in bid to procrastinate from writing, but i know it's probably too early for most people to think about.

Would anyone be interested in swapping novels - or novel excerpts and gaining feedback after they've had a chance to edit them?

I was thinking we could swap a chapter each and get a bit of impartial perspective on our work, I probably wouldn't have the time to look at someone's whole novel but if they wanted to swap a couple of thousand words that would be cool.

V
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Favourite pep talk so far?

Victoria Hume — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 13:16:25 -0800

So what is everyone's favourite?

I think mine would have to be Philip Pullman's talk. Just because he was probably the author that I respected and new the most about. Plus it was very early on when I was all geared up and in the first exhillarating stage of NaNo

I found what he had to say about how it was better to just keep going rather than leave the story for a few days and lose your course particularly helpful.

So what's the best advice you've heard so far?

v
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Gritty bits in the FINAL PUSH!!

Mizpod — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 04:47:01 -0800

Just curious, anyone else feeling the pressure of tying up the loose floppy story they've got going on there?

i know it doesn't need to be a perfectly rounded novel by next sunday, its just the word count that counts, but i feel a personal pressure to at least write a finishing scene for it all, at least hem it in with a start and an end. i can't hand in some 50k ramble, with no foreseeable destiny for my characters. they'll all be floating out there in literature space, wondering why i didnt give them any moon boots to ground them. (a puny metaphor for a Novel Ending, ie, something to give them closure.)

garghh argh arg ag i think i might need a break from writing now.

its a gritty thing trying to give my lovely MC some end scenes to justify her struggles, i will have just killed off her brother too and sent her insane.

please someone stop me from writing 'and she woke up, and it was all a dream'.
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Challenge the Third

SheBit — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 15:34:01 -0800

I know, I know, it's a little late, but you're all planning on get thousands and thousands written this weekend, right? So a little challenge should help you along.

Post your excerpts here as you did last week, by monday afternoon.

The challenge is: a kiss.
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

What time (GMT) does the shutter go down?

Jana101 — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 11:09:00 -0800

I see that I will be writing right up to the last gong.

So, since the competition is set in US time, does anyone know what time (GMT) we officially have to submit our words into the system on Sunday 30th November in order to qualify?

This could be a make or break situation.

Jana
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Crazy Writing Weekend

Victoria Hume — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 14:22:04 -0800

Since i've been so slack the last few days and haven't written anything since Tuesday i'm going to have a mammoth writing session this weekend and was just wondering if anyone else is doing the same... who's with me?

I'm starting at 37.5k and hoping to touch 45k but i probably won't get that far. What's everyone else planning?

V
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

One MILLION words

Victoria Hume — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 08:27:41 -0800

Hi,

I just noticed that the total word count for Brighton hit the one million word count yesterday. How cool is that.

Maybe we can reach three million before the end of this

V
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

More shameless Self Promotion

Alabaster Crippens — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 07:21:52 -0800

It's that time again. Sorry for clogging, but just in case anyone needs a break, I can recommend no greater reward for a weekend of hard graft on the old keyboard than relaxing with a fine tawny port in the Spirits pub of the year with relaxing sounds soothing the woes of the weekend and making Monday seem a little further away.

Unfortunately, all that is happening is that me and the Hexagon (don't ask) are djing at the Great Eastern from about eight this evening. A mix of everything from hectic breakcore to obnoxious show tunes by way of some smooth lounge jazz, all presided over by two genuinely enthusiastic DJs (sure, those other djs may have talent, but they spend all their time looking miserable and pretentious. I assure you, I will only look pretentious.)

So, random mix of tunes to brighten a Sunday evening, in a pub with an obscene selection of bourbon (but no bourbons) and some fine ales.

Consider yourselves rudely promoted at.

Odds are we'll play the Chain by Fleetwood Mac at least eight times. You have been warned.
----------
--------
This was unlike the story
it was written to be
I was riding its back
when it used to ride me
- Joanna Newsom - Peach, Plum, Pear

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Procrastination Fun This Wkend!! Try this!

Mizpod — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 08:28:31 -0800

Everyone try this when you've got the time, if you haven't done so already, it's funny. i needed some gits and shiggles, its been a long day.
In Microsoft Word, if you're using that, go to Tools, and Autosummarise, and then the bottom left hand little icon saying something like 'create a separate document and put the summary there', and then change the percentage in the window to reduce it to roughly 150 words, (1%, around that mark).
Then you have a freaky little summary of your novel!! it wont make sense, but Victoria showed me this, and i must say we did larf. Then you can all post your autosummaries, or the best excerpts from them, in reply to this thread, and we can all larf at each others.
here was mine, only 38 words long though;

If you like.
Bertha stared. “Cee.”
"Mel needed”. Nice!”
Bertha grinned. Bertha smiled. Well. Family time. Ah well.
Well! Boys.
“Cee! Challenging times.
* * * * *
well never mind. Cee?
Carly?
Faced. “right, im... im... off.

----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

the latest pep talk

Julia Collins — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 11:16:29 -0800

Brilliant from Janet Fitch. And so right for me right now.

Last night, my MC avoided a confrontation with the thorn in her side by running up to her bedroom and hiding when she saw her coming down the garden path. Instead the thorn left a message on the kitchen table.

Tonight, I'm going to rewrite, with the MC staying in the kitchen and the confrontation actually happening. Much more interesting. But a little scary to write. But lots more words!

----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

What did I pull out of the "Don't Panic" Jar?

luckykaa — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 07:59:39 -0800

Someone pulled a slip out of the don't panic jar and I offered to take custody of the resultant plot bunny.

Seem to have lost the slip since then. It was about meeting an angel on the underground but can't remember the specifics.

----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Anyone got any good jokes?

edgar_sinclair — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 02:16:19 -0800

Seriously. Have just added new character who's a hitman with pretensions to be a comedian. He tries out new material on victims just before he blows them. No pun is too cringey, no word play too lame to be considered - the worse the better really.
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Yippee!

edgar_sinclair — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 08:37:44 -0800

Today, at roughly 7.26 am I broke through the 10,000 word barrier!

Just wanted to start a thread where we can all jump up & down & boast of our accomplishments whether its achieving a literary milestone, solving a particularly troublesome plot point, or just feeling happy cos it's stopped raining.

Come on! Join me in an orgy of back slapping self-congratulation! (It's the only type of orgy I get invited to these days ...)
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Guilty writing secrets

edgar_sinclair — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 14:15:23 -0800

Just wondering if anyone else has anything they do whilst writing that they know they really shouldn't be doing ... Ever.

The other day I wrote a chapter whilst simultaneously air guitaring along to hirsuite German 80s spandex rock Gods The Scorpions. Frankly, I'm not sure it was my best work. Then again,

"Here I am (da da da da)
Rooooock you like a hurricane."
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Challenge the Second

SheBit — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 05:45:22 -0800

Your challenge this week, should you choose to accept it, and if you don't then what fun are you?, is to include in your novel a character waking up in unusual circumstances - maybe they simply wake up somewhere unexpected, or maybe it's something more sinister.

Post your excerpts (not too long, please - I have to read them all and write my own novel!) and let me know when you have done so. A prize will be awarded to the best (where 'best' means the one the MLs liked the most) at the next meet (on tuesday).

I failed to meet the first challenge, so maybe I'll manage this time. My entire story has only covered about an eighteen hour period so far, so there hasn't been a lot of waking up.
----------

Europe :: England :: Brighton

Help wanted

redmonk100 — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 16:08:11 -0800

I've got the story rolling along nicely now, but I've got something that I want to happen but am struggling with... thought I'd ask you lovely lot for some inspiration.

My MC is an author who writes murder mystery books. She's on a chat show and a caller has phoned up to get an explanation of what my MC meant with some obscure comment in one of the books written ages ago. the sentence leading up to this conversation in my tale is:

"The reference in question was from book eight and involved a conversation George had with one of the younger members of the murder mystery book club that he ran at the library."

George is the MC of my MC, and is intelligent and likes solving puzzles. Think Grissom but with Marple's social skills. My MC was really pleased with whatever comment it was that George made, but no-one ever got it. Except, it now turns out, this one person who's calling the chat show.

Anyone got any thoughts? Otherwise it's going to end up being something to do with Honey Badgers...
----------
Fairytales tell us that dragons can be killed