The final stretch of NaNoWriMo

Tip of the Day: if you've ever participated in NaNoWriMo or just like to hear people talk about it since it motivates you to write during the month of November, think about making a small donation to the cause. According to an email they sent to participants, they need some more donations to consider continuing the program next year and beyond.

My rush to type 50,000 words this month during NaNoWriMo has completely failed (no surprise to me). About half way through the month, I decided about 20,000 words would be more appropriate since I really only wanted to push myself to get writing and wasn't too concerned about actually finishing a book.

Now with only four days left to write in the month, I'm about 10,000 words away from my goal. This could actually be accomplished fairly easily if I sit down to work the next few nights instead of reading, watching TV, or going to Old Navy to use my 40 percent off coupon.

I'm a huge procrastinator and in school I never finished my homework until about 2 am on the day the assignment was due. I found there are two types of people in life: those that get stuff done as soon as they have time and then the rest of us that goof off, spend too much time browsing the Internet, and then finally get around to actually accomplishing our goals.

I'm quite content being in that second group, since getting stuff done in a timely manner sounds completely boring to me. If I did that, then I'd have no time for fun, since I'd constantly be working on projects. I've been told by some non-procrastinators that they still have time for fun, since they get all their work done in a timely manner and can relax during their "down" time. But I'm really not convinced of that, since I've never seen it work out in my own life. Until that time comes, I'm perfectly content to wait until the last minute to complete my goals.

To get my work done, I've already stocked up on Mountain Dew and gotten a bit of chocolate to make the writing process much easier.

If anyone else is close to meeting their writing goals this month, this post is just meant to encourage you to keep going. Because if you are like me and procrastinate until the last minute, there is still plenty of time to get words written in the next few days. Let me break it down for you--even if you needed to write the entire 50,000 words in four days and you want to take a break and sleep for 8 hours a night, you'd only need to write 13 words a minute (if my math is right--which is a huge IF). So see, it's very doable! You should easily be able to type faster than 13 words a minute.

Good luck for anyone else who is finishing NaNoWriMo!

--Emily, Miss Querylicious