2 Months In

Admittedly, the year is not off to a spectacular start. Only 300 words or so in January and not really any this month. But, I'm determined to make the 200k wordcount goal this year. Camp and NaNo itself should help with that,but I need to get back to daily writing.

Still adjusting to the prosthetic. Wend to a clinic run by two former Paraolympians. They informed me that it's approximately 500k steps to be fully comfortable with the leg, which should normally take about 3 years. As of today (I've had the leg since Dec. 1,) I'm at about 88k, so a little ahead of schedule. I don't mind walking, in fact, I would like to get to running, possibly doing a 5k. I realize that is quite a ways off, but it's a goal. And, as I've learned since the amputation, goals are very important.  So, the plodding onward on all fronts continues.

Sad Times

Well, I have to make a sad announcement. With all the crap this year, I've had to trash the plans for 200k words this year.  I will attempt it again next year, and I will be doing NaNoWriMo in November this year. I've lost over 3 months so far this year, so it's kind of a pipe dream to try and do 200k at this point.

The two biggest obstacles I've faced this year are the closing of my job, and an amputation. Both kind of hit at the same time, making it a double whammy and doubly hard to deal with. The job required me to work from home (wasn't an option,) move to Wilmington (glad I didn't with the Florence thing..) or take severance. I took the $$$, and they are paying my insurance for a few months. That worked out as I had a major health crisis in June that resulted in a below the knee amputation of my left leg on June 26.

I am currently still in the healing process. I spent two months in rehab, getting physical and occupational therapy. None of which really prepared me for life when I was sent home by the insurance company. Getting to the bathroom requires crawling, they did not teach me to cook or perform other daily tasks. I am pretty sure they assumed I would have someone around me 24 hours a day. In reality, I'm alone 8-10 hours a day, making life very complicated. I'm managing to adjust, but I just want my damn leg. After the doctor visit today, the prosthetist made it clear I still have a bit of healing to do before we can put me in the prosthetic. Luckily, the insurance has already approved the leg, so they can build it and just hold on to it until I'm good enough to use it. Using it too early can have some ugly consequences, including losing more of the leg, so I will wait until they determine it is time. All in all, a shitty year, but we plod on. It has to get better eventually, right?

ROUGH YEAR

Pretty sure I'm not going to make the 200k for this year.  In late June, my left leg was amputated below the knee. I've been in a rehab facility since, working towards getting my prosthetic. It's not a quick or easy process. In fact, at the beginning, it's extremely painful. But, I'm through the worst of it and may be going home soon (thanks to insurance having zero concept of what is involved.) I do not have my leg yet, and won't for a while. Yet, I am to go home and function with one leg. It will definitely be a challenge.

In addition to the leg, my employer closed our call center at the end of June. I did get a severance package, so not totally a loss. I'm going to take a month or two after I get home to get my head on straight and decide what course I want my life to take next. Along with that, I hope to get back to writing. Granted, I believe the 200k is out of my reach this year, I will still write as much as I can. Next year I will hit the 200k!!  Enough of the sad stuff, on to much better things!!

The Wastelands

I feel like I'm trapped in a wasteland. Ever since they announced our call center was closing, I've felt like I'm in limbo.  I decided to take severance, and it is really weird coming into work knowing there's an end date. Most of my coworkers have transferred or gone to home based (HBA.) There are very few of us left that decided to take the $$$ and run. It's been nine years, so I think it may be time to move on.

My writing has not progressed (obviously.) That needs to change. I am taking two months off after I get severance, so the goal is to get back into writing. I have a couple trips planned, but I should be able to write during those as well. It's just been difficult with the job thing, and my health issues are not being resolved as fast as I would like. I may, in fact, be going back into the hospital if things don't improve. The fluid buildup will just not go away, and the doctor is not 100% sure what is causing it. We've upped the water pills again, so we'll see if that makes a difference. At least the blood clots did not come back, and he took me off the blood thinners. That's a step in the right direction. Also, a huge relief. The blood thinners caused so many things to be dangerous that I was tired of always worrying about it.

So the plan for this summer is to take my fiancee to meet my family in Nebraska. Then later we may go the the D Day reenactment in Ohio. That is definitely on my bucket list. It will be nice to have a couple months of no stress, no job worries, etc. Just doing what I want, when I want for a few weeks will be a nice break. Pretty sure when I go to look, I won't have much trouble finding a job. Also, going to get a new desktop and maybe a Surface laptop (for write ins) The Surface has kickass battery life, and I won't have to worry about getting a place to plug in at writing get togethers for NaNo. Plus, it won't have games or anything on it but productivity tools for writing. That will be a big help, kind of like the distraction free Alplasmarts.

I see the way out of the Wasteland, I just need to begin the journey. It starts today. Anyone need a guide out of the wastelands? You're welcome to come along.

PRODUCTIONLESS MONTHS

So March and April have been basically zero production months on the writing front.  My  grandmother passed away, and they announced the building I work in will be closing. We have been offered options to move, go home based, or take severance. My finacee nannies a child she is very attatched to, so moving is out. Our apartment is too small to meet the requirements for home based, so severance is pretty much my only option. It's a nice amount of money, but I still need to find another job. To get the severance, I have to work through June 30, so job hunting right now won't accomplish much, as they would most likely want me to start before June 30.

This time has given me time to think about my writing quite a bit. So, ideas are floating for several projects, including the one I was already working on this year. I will start again May 1. I really hope for no more major distractions this year. I feel bad as I am the one that got people doing the 200k word thing this year, but life does tend to intervene at times.

Motivation Dropped

Well, as my wordcount shows, I have not been doing even close to what I should be doing. Had a lot on my plate, but trying to clear the decks and focus on this monster challenge I created. Going to head to work early for a while and try and get some serious wordcount in then. I really need to catch up. I'm still about 6k behind for the year, not horrible, but it looks daunting.

On the upside, I did finally get a car. A (new to me) 2014 Ford Fusion with leather and a lot of bells and whistles. Nicest car I've ever owned. It has 50k miles on it, but it seems to have been well taken care of (the seats don't even look like they were sat in,) so the miles don't worry me much. That's kind of break in mileage for a car that is well maintained. I find myself looking for excuses to drive. I've been without a car since mine was stolen in October, mainly due to foot surgery and recovery. But, I'm back at work and trying to get back to walking and using my Fitbit.  Getting back in shape is another goal for this year. I should be able to start back at the gym in a couple weeks.

January Ending

So, only a couple of days left in January, and my 200k Challenge for 2018 is already very far behind.  The cumulative word count for today is 12,374 and I have a paltry 7,024. Granted, there is a lot going on in my life right now. Since I proposed on Jan 1, there is wedding planning,  and I returned to work this month after an absence due to medical issues.  Getting back up to speed at a job that is constantly changing is no picnic, let me tell you.

My lacking word count disappoints me even more as I am the one that started this challenge and roped others into it as well. I should be at least keeping pace, and I plan to give my best effort to hit goal by Jan 31. This is not a good start, and I will overcome that and hit my goal for the year, as I'm sure others that have taken up this challenge will as well. I'm sitting here in Panera, working away at word count. I found an old novel I'd been working on stashed away on Google Docs. That bonus is that I'm rewriting it, which is going faster than writing from scratch. So, that may help me hit goal for the month. It's a novel I was sure I had lost all copies of, so finding it was an unexpected surprise of the first order. Maybe I can actually finish the damn thing now. It was a great idea, and I believe it still is. One of my better ideas, actually. And to find it when you believed it was gone forever and that you could never start over and have it be as good as it was is a good thing.

I have to tout a few of my favorite writing things here. Scrivener is the software for noveling that I wish I had been able to get my hands on years ago. It simplifies the process so much!  Yes, the learning curve is a bit daunting, but there is a book, Scrivener for Dummies, that really simplifies it to the point it's much easier to use without watching hours of tutorials on YouTube. A caution, be careful what flash drives you pick up online. I found an all metal flash drive (256MB) that was just too cool looking to pass up.  On the third use, my files disappeared. Looking at reviews online, that was not uncommon. It appears some foriegn companies are making these drives in 16 or 32GB format and using firmware that makes them read as much larger. They will eventually (apparently very quickly) fail, and you are in danger of losing your work. So, beware!  Finally, I got a rechargable Bluetooth keyboard to use with my tablet, and found it works well with my phone. Makes for a lot more portable if you want to write at the park or somewhere you don't want to lug the laptop to. I got an Anker from Amazon.  My fiancee liked it as well, but found one at WalMart she liked the layout and feel of a bit better. That one runs on AA batteries and was under $20, but she's been using it for a while now and loves it.