Captain's Log, Stardate: Tuesday
Dec. 28th, 2010 11:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexandraerinNews For Today
Business
Well, I'm very excited about the mounting evidence that I've nailed down what (and how long) it takes for me to produce a chapter of Tales of MU. Allotting five hours in a day seems to do it. That's only two hours of writing... which is what I've always thought it took... but it includes an equal amount of time for planning/brainstorming/daydreaming and an hour for overage, clean-up, figuring out what to call the dang thing, and other "miscellaneous" things.
If I'd figured this out a couple years ago, who knows where the story would be up to now... but because the "brain" stage of writing had never been a deliberate part of the process, it had always just sort of happened during the boring hours of work, I never factored it in. Five hours of trying to straight up write doesn't produce nearly as much as I can get done in four hours with the proper mental preparations.
And I should add that during each of the chapters I've produced in a single day in five hours of work has happened when things are going on around me that require (or ensnare) my attention during the designated time blocks. So this isn't something that will require perfect ideal conditions to complete. It doesn't even require that the five hours be contiguous.
I'm going to keep doing "practice runs" this way until I've got it down, and then... with a realistic idea of how much time and energy and attention it takes me to produce Tales of MU on a set schedule... I'll look at how to fit the other stories I want to do in around it.
Personal
Illness abounds, though it's missed me. Jack is sick, back in Maryland. My housemate![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bryirfox is sick here in Nebraska, though not contagious.
I'm working on weaning myself off of soda as a dietary staple and switching to coffee, for reasons of health and economy. I've discovered that making coffee via infusion instead of dripping it through a paper filter into a heated carafe leaves it tasting good enough that I don't need to add sugar or milk or sweetened flavored dairy product to it to make it drinkable, which is awesome.
Personal Assessment
Still on the sleep of streaking... oh dear God, I'm going to have to preserve that for posterity... the streak of sleeping without pills. My nose is less stuffy. Brain feels sharp. Legs are a little stiff.
Plans For Today
Do what I did yesterday: write a chapter of Tales of MU in five hours of designated work time. This chapter won't go up today, it'll go up tomorrow. My plan for the week is to have three updates, Monday-Wednesday-Friday... my larger goals, though, are to lock in this work schedule that lets me accomplish that and to get used to working ahead.
With chapters being produced in basically two chunks in a single day, my "magic under construction" posts are going to need some re-working to be worthwhile or interesting to readers... yesterday you got half the story and then I was done so there were no further updates to the construction post. So I think that if things continue the way they have been I'm going to have to bite the bullet and make the construction post have the meta-data at the top and then a link to the Google Doc where I'm doing the writing.
Yes, you're going to get to watch me writing. Yes, that makes me incredibly nervous. I'm not going to be doing it just yet. I want to have at least a full week of the five hour schedule and then be starting into the next week, so I know it's not a fluke. (I don't think it is, though.)
Business
Well, I'm very excited about the mounting evidence that I've nailed down what (and how long) it takes for me to produce a chapter of Tales of MU. Allotting five hours in a day seems to do it. That's only two hours of writing... which is what I've always thought it took... but it includes an equal amount of time for planning/brainstorming/daydreaming and an hour for overage, clean-up, figuring out what to call the dang thing, and other "miscellaneous" things.
If I'd figured this out a couple years ago, who knows where the story would be up to now... but because the "brain" stage of writing had never been a deliberate part of the process, it had always just sort of happened during the boring hours of work, I never factored it in. Five hours of trying to straight up write doesn't produce nearly as much as I can get done in four hours with the proper mental preparations.
And I should add that during each of the chapters I've produced in a single day in five hours of work has happened when things are going on around me that require (or ensnare) my attention during the designated time blocks. So this isn't something that will require perfect ideal conditions to complete. It doesn't even require that the five hours be contiguous.
I'm going to keep doing "practice runs" this way until I've got it down, and then... with a realistic idea of how much time and energy and attention it takes me to produce Tales of MU on a set schedule... I'll look at how to fit the other stories I want to do in around it.
Personal
Illness abounds, though it's missed me. Jack is sick, back in Maryland. My housemate
bryirfox is sick here in Nebraska, though not contagious.I'm working on weaning myself off of soda as a dietary staple and switching to coffee, for reasons of health and economy. I've discovered that making coffee via infusion instead of dripping it through a paper filter into a heated carafe leaves it tasting good enough that I don't need to add sugar or milk or sweetened flavored dairy product to it to make it drinkable, which is awesome.
Personal Assessment
Still on the sleep of streaking... oh dear God, I'm going to have to preserve that for posterity... the streak of sleeping without pills. My nose is less stuffy. Brain feels sharp. Legs are a little stiff.
Plans For Today
Do what I did yesterday: write a chapter of Tales of MU in five hours of designated work time. This chapter won't go up today, it'll go up tomorrow. My plan for the week is to have three updates, Monday-Wednesday-Friday... my larger goals, though, are to lock in this work schedule that lets me accomplish that and to get used to working ahead.
With chapters being produced in basically two chunks in a single day, my "magic under construction" posts are going to need some re-working to be worthwhile or interesting to readers... yesterday you got half the story and then I was done so there were no further updates to the construction post. So I think that if things continue the way they have been I'm going to have to bite the bullet and make the construction post have the meta-data at the top and then a link to the Google Doc where I'm doing the writing.
Yes, you're going to get to watch me writing. Yes, that makes me incredibly nervous. I'm not going to be doing it just yet. I want to have at least a full week of the five hour schedule and then be starting into the next week, so I know it's not a fluke. (I don't think it is, though.)
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Coffee
on 2010-12-29 05:39 am (UTC)Re: Coffee
on 2010-12-29 06:04 am (UTC)no subject
on 2010-12-29 03:27 pm (UTC)I just started reading Tales of Mu recently, and got hooked. While reading "More Tales of Mu", I was reminded of my own field bio labs. You're making me want to take a course just for fun, even though I don't have the time or energy! :)
Mind if I add you?
no subject
on 2010-12-29 03:46 pm (UTC)