Right now, our region is 201st in total word count (774081) but 442nd in average word count (8063).
If everyone could get their word counts up to where they should be by the end of the 11th (18333 words), we'd have a million more words, and we'd be in the top 100 worldwide.
Tomorrow is a holiday for most of us. Let's use that time to get our word counts up and take our rightful place in the top 100. We certainly have more concentrated brain power than the entire states of Montana (82nd) and Alaska (88th). Let's show them!
----------
50,311 / 50,000
Nov 10, 2009 - 17 37
Now that is what I call a motivational speech, Damn those Alaskans and Montanans and let's get typing!!!!!!
Me too, I am a little behind and will not rest until I have caught up and passed the daily goals.
Thanks again to our fearless leaders.
50,156 / 50,000
Nov 10, 2009 - 18 29
I have never liked those Alaskans and Montanans. They hoard way too many four wheelers that could better be used here. This will be our moment of shining glory! Words Ahoy!
----------50,156 / 50,000
Nov 10, 2009 - 18 42
Okay, I did it. What else?
----------50,533 / 50,000
Nov 10, 2009 - 20 52
I will do my very best ... BUT ... I've got Cub Scout obligations after the Veteran's Day parade (please, all, come to the flag retirement ceremony if you're at the parade!) AND it's our anniversary so we're trying to celebrate 9 years, AND we've got one last class for a thing we're doing at church. Ack! That's busy even for us. (But it all goes toward my word count!)
So I am going to try to close the gap tonight just in case I have to take tomorrow off. I'll be sure to post a total tomorrow though, wherever I get to.
Where can you find those worldwide stats and all?
----------Proud Member of the Trebuchet Club!
51,007 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 06 51
Realtime worldwide stats are here:
http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/wordcount_stats
We're closing in on the top 200. We need another 4K to get ahead of the Norfolk, England, and another 2K after that to get ahead of Canberra, Australia. Those worthless writers of Birmingham are 150000 words ahead of us. We should at least be better than them.
So, today's the day. Get your words down. They don't have to be coherent. They don't have to be perfect. They don't even have to be real words. Just get them down. And, for Pete's sake, update your word count.
Let's make a statement.
51,007 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 10 54
I'm at 15K and I will be on back on track to win this thing by the 15th.
Get your word counts in today. We need an extra 3000 words to overtake those Brits from Norfolk. They're in our sights. Run up the colors. We're gaining on them. WE. ARE. GAINING. ON. THEM.
CHALLENGE
Write and extra 500 words right now about a time in your life or your character's life when you or they grabbed victory from the jaws of defeat. How you or your character had been down in the count, then just managed to pull ahead at the last second and got the win. That's how it will feel on the 30th when we've beaten our "friends" to the south and coasted into the top 100 worldwide.
And for Pete's sake, update your word counts.
50,156 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 16 26
Okay. I made my word goal for today. Now I'm going to take on collanderbolt's challenge and go for the extra 500 - my new goal for today is 21194.
----------I wish you all luck in achieving your goals today.
50,156 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 17 13
Did it!
----------51,007 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 19 06
We are in 200th place! We are climbing the total word count board, despite a still low average word count. Our average word count is about half of what it should be. If you know any local nanowrimos, do what you can to get them to update their word counts. Beg. Threaten them at the write-ins. Hold their lawn gnomes for ransom.
I see another ship on the horizon. Its colors are the blue and orange of the University of Florida. Gainesville is ahead of us by 16000 words (Is there anything that Tebow kid can't do?) I can see their crew through the spyglass. They're all doing the gator chomp. I want that ship.
Bama fans, do you really want us to end up behind these bozos? Auburn fans, do you really want the Bama fans to write more than you? Good, I can feel your anger. Use your aggressive feelings. Let your hate flow through you.
Our average word count is 9688. It rises by one word for every 200 words you write. All of you, write an extra 200 words on 11/12 and get that average word count up.
50,798 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 19 15
I just uploaded my words for today. I'm ahead of the basic 1667 per day by almost a day's worth of words. I just keep plugging.
Hope to see some of you tomorrow night at ABC. :-)
----------Marilyn
www.writingplayground.com
2008 Winner with Direct Deposit
50,891 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 21 31
I am trying to truck along. I am behind, but have made a 3,000 word progress just tonight. Been having a writer's block and it is FRUSTRATING! I need some motivation to get the juices flowing more.
----------A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. ~Thomas Mann, Essays of Three Decades, 1947
50,088 / 50,000
Nov 11, 2009 - 22 14
Well, I tried for the extra word challenge but I only saw it at 11:50 after I put in my words for the day. I wrote but only got about 250 over what I already had. But that's not too bad for 9 minutes of writing (I stopped so I could update so the words would count for today (yesterday now, i guess.)) It was a good challenge though. My mc did something he didn't think he could do and had failed at before. So that wasn't exactly the challenge but it's how it played out. He feels better now. He was getting a bit depressed in the last scene. ;)
50,156 / 50,000
Nov 12, 2009 - 04 09
Okay, Colly. You made some good points.
I am concerned about our "average word count." My main concern is that some of us may have given up. First of all - don't stop writing. I heard it decreed, and the info may have gotten lost in all the pomp and circumstance of Veterans Day which rightly showed up NaNo, but the decree was that more important than making 50000 is Never Give Up. Just Keep Writing. Even 50 words a day will do so much in expanding your creativity. You will be grateful to yourself if you Just Keep Writing during November.
That being said, if you're really not going to write, or if you've already done your 50 words today, maybe you can serve your North Alabama WriMomates by going to Gainesville and distracting some Gators. I hear their easy to distract. An episode of The Young and the Restless or an impromptu lecture on carcinogens found in sunscreens should keep them from writing for days while they try to make sense of it all.
----------51,183 / 50,000
Nov 12, 2009 - 08 57
Just thought I'd point this out for those who try to get their words in by midnight: they update on eastern time, so if you update your words after 11, they get counted on the next day.
^_^
----------5
| 2009 The Devil you don't
| 2007 The Orchid's Respite [incomplete]
| 2006 Of Tulips and Dancing Boys [win]
50,088 / 50,000
Nov 12, 2009 - 09 38
Just thought I'd point this out for those who try to get their words in by midnight: they update on eastern time, so if you update your words after 11, they get counted on the next day.
^_^
5
If this is happening you need to reset your local time zone. I reset mine after the first day when I realized, because the time change landed on the 1st, it was off by an hour.
51,183 / 50,000
Nov 12, 2009 - 11 47
If this is happening you need to reset your local time zone. I reset mine after the first day when I realized, because the time change landed on the 1st, it was off by an hour.
I knew I had done this, but I double-checked and you're right! It had changed/reset/something. Huh. Well, I feel like I just gained another hour of writing time. Thanks! That can't be a bad thing...
^_^
----------5
| 2009 The Devil you don't
| 2007 The Orchid's Respite [incomplete]
| 2006 Of Tulips and Dancing Boys [win]
51,007 / 50,000
Nov 12, 2009 - 15 36
Ok, Thursday night write-in time. Write like crazy. Post your word counts. Let's get one million words in RIGHT NOW!!!
60,563 / 50,000
Nov 12, 2009 - 17 11
I'm writing like crazy but my word count seems to be climbing at a snail's pace. I have made it my goal this whole time to write a chapter every time I sit down to write but this particular chapter feels like a labor not of the love persuasion. At least I have two more hours to write before I have to leave it for the night and update my count before bed.
Here is a challenge for everyone: describe a wild sea at night covered in a thick fog. I am not a water person but I need to describe a voyage across the sea in a small ship with three passengers. Sailing vocabulary earns you fictional bonus points. :D
----------51,007 / 50,000
Nov 13, 2009 - 18 31
Good news everyone!
We are firmly in the top 200, and we're not even at the midpoint! We have left the gators in our wake! Now, we are a few measly thousands of words away from out-writing the entire country of Italy. Our merry band of rocketeers and non-rocketeers are surpassing entire countries. By the end of this thing, we'll be out-writing continents.
Pats on the back all around! Take a few minutes tonight to boost that word count for the weekend. To celebrate our inevitable victory, take a look at your manuscript. Is there a secondary character in your novel that you could make into a lethargic illiterate Italian? Maybe someone here speaks Italian and could post some choice insults we could add to our novels. Something we can always remember them by as we pass them on the way to victory.
See you all at the write-in Saturday at BAM.
51,007 / 50,000
Nov 14, 2009 - 18 27
Update! We have written more words than the entire country of Italy!
Congratulations. Get those word counts up to 25K on 11/15. You can do it!
51,007 / 50,000
Nov 18, 2009 - 07 19
As of yesterday, we're firmly in the Top 200 and gaining. We have overtaken Chapel Hill and those smarmy Tarheels as well as Nottingham, England (I guess the sheriff was preoccupied).
Our nemesis to the south, Alabama :: Birmingham, is now in sight, only a few thousand words ahead of us. I can't describe to you how much I want our region to pull ahead of those knuckleheads. I mean, half of them can't even read... how are they beating us in total word count?
We've written more words than China (too busy making our stuff), Switzerland (too much chocolate), Scranton (who loves The Office??), Moscow (too much vodka, comrade), Manhattan (Kansas), and every other region in Alabama except one.
If we work together and push ourselves, we can beat the Birminghamians and be the best writers in the state.
Everyone, write an extra 500 words today. Make one of your characters travel to a place we've already beaten on the Word Count scoreboard. Make your character laugh at how absurd the place is, and how illiterate the countrymen seem to be. Let your character feel mentally superior to these yokels.
And for Pete's sake, get your word count updated. Let's conquer this state!
50,156 / 50,000
Nov 18, 2009 - 07 32
Hehe. I am picturing a North Alabama WriMo who "preoccupies" the sheriff of Nottingham by sending him to Birmingham where he and all the Birmingham WriMos assigned to show the sheriff a good time end up spending the day studying the history of Vulcan.
Sorry, but a Rocketship can beat a Vulcan any day.
Tally Ho!
----------50,533 / 50,000
Nov 18, 2009 - 14 37
What happens when we run out of words at 50K and they all catch up again?
Sorry, blue today...
----------Proud Member of the Trebuchet Club!
55,180 / 50,000
Nov 18, 2009 - 20 53
I had an 11k word weekend lol!! How did I do it? I kept writing!!
I go to the write-ins and I see that some people are just trying too hard to make it perfect. Relax and let your fingers do the typing. If you've ever had the case where your fingers get ahead of your thoughts, that's because you're consciously trying to make everything fit together while your fingers are typing straight from the imagination (don't quote me on that. I made it up at the spur of the moment).
60,563 / 50,000
Nov 19, 2009 - 05 42
We are #183 now! Great job everyone!
I agree about trying too hard to think about what you write instead of writing. Last night, I had 2 hours only for writing and I had a terrible time getting started. Once I finally stopped worrying about how to fit the parts I had together, I managed to squeeze out 4500 words in about an hour and a half. Not too shabby I think. If I hadn't screwed around for the first half hour, I might have been able to push almost 6k out last night. /sigh
Anyways, everyone keep up the great work!
----------50,533 / 50,000
Nov 19, 2009 - 14 00
Oh, trust me, I am not worried about how everything fits together. What has plot got to do with it? LOL.
This is my fifth year. I know me, and I know my brain fizzles at 50K. It's just kind of depressing to think that I can push hard and fast (and am doing so), but then ultimately my help in attaining our lead will fizzle as I fizzle out at 50K. (And, physically and mentally speaking, I can't push past 50K this year ... as in other years, it's taking too much of a toll to get this far.)
Sorry, just me being depressing. Bad day. Ignore.
----------Proud Member of the Trebuchet Club!
60,563 / 50,000
Nov 19, 2009 - 17 40
/hug and even more important /coffee to you Kristen. I am completely feeling you. I have finally come to terms with the fact that my novel will not actually be finished come November 30th. Oh, I'll have met the 50k word goal, that is for sure (hellooooo Thanksgiving Break!). My novel just will not be done. I'm looking at something like 150k...maybe. The whole idea is daunting. And I thought 50k sounded impossible. But, I'm going to keep writing until this damned story is out of my head and on the computer. I think you are allowed to have bad days. I certainly won't hate you for it. <3
----------50,798 / 50,000
Nov 19, 2009 - 19 30
I just emailed some friends I know are writing this month but who may not be on the NaNo site. I appealed to their geographic sense of loyalty. LOL!
We'll see if they register and upload their words.
----------Marilyn
www.writingplayground.com
2008 Winner with Direct Deposit
51,879 / 50,000
Nov 19, 2009 - 21 50
That is great. I hope that some of the folks I wrote to will also sign up for our Region as their Home Region
Bryan
5,588 / 50,000
Nov 20, 2009 - 09 46
I am hopelessly behind at this point, but would gladly change my home region to Alaska or Montana (or whoever's ahead of us) if it would help to boost North Alabama's ranking. ;)