Crocs!

My new profile pic is only temporary. But, I had to stick something new in to replace the Nano Logo. I failed to win Nano, but next year...

This particular picture is an appropriate replacement for several reasons. One of the projects I am working on is the crocodile survey portal*. And as there is no budget to charge regular office hours to I will therefore be working on it in my free time ( A.K.A. my writing time) I feel justified in mentioning it on my personal blog.
The data for the portal was collected as part of Daniela's masters dissertation, and will be up on the web in a few short weeks. The picture, to come around full circle, is the work of Marco- Daniela's other half and great eco and scoio-politically concious artist. Marco was also the man behind the latest Paddington Bear excursion through london.


And while still on the subject of crocs- one of the evenings when I should have been writing I saw a preview showing of
A documentary on the plight of the gharial". A very well produced little documentary, but really depressing - film showing just how precarious life can be for other species sharing the planet with us humans.

Watch it here And please do watch it. Awareness, people, it really is the first step and not to be underestimated.

*The name has not been signed off yet.

Non NaNoWriMo writing

Well not exactly NaNo word count but I finally managed to submit an 'article' to Associated Content. It is an on-line publisher of, well pretty much anything really.
And for Americans at least they pay small amounts for each article that their user base churns out. Sadly living in England I am unable to earn up front payments for content I submit. There is one way non US submitters can earn money: by being popular – you could earn an amazing $1.50 per thousand views. So yeah not exactly a get rich quick scheme and I don’t even foresee getting that lofty target of not quite enough for a coffee, but if you want to read my badly framed argument for aquaria as a way to instil awareness and basic concepts of ecology (or if you just want to help me avoid getting RSI by logging some of those 1000 clicks for me) then:

May I present:
Aquaria as an Introduction to Nature

Ten percent!

I spent the whole day thinking about how much writing I would have to do today to catch up, or even get close to catching up to my daily target. And I kept having to ramp up my estimates as I factored in the kinds of daily output I could expect next week based on last weeks dismal daily word production attempts.

That is right youv'e got it. I spent all day assessing the amount of work I would have to do, and not actually starting any of that work. So how is it all looking?

It is not looking very good. In fact it was looking so bad that I lost hope, and now I can't find her little sister motivation anywhere either.

I did manage to get the words flowing though. Flowing like sewage thick, black, untreated, sewage, clotted with gnarly clumps of hair matted together with chunks of the eviler, more solid, of the two most common human waste products we excrete. I apologise I got carried away there.

I am very close to a thousand words now though and I just wanted to mark my first decent milestone: 5 000 words!

5,000 / 50,000 (10.0%)

I feel sure the last 45 000 words (God writing that number is disheartening) will be much easi.. Oh what the hell, who am I kidding. Back to the white screen (of Death) before I run out of time completely.

Read 'em and weep

5 words last night . Five!

I surprise even myself at this prodigious output.  Jeeze This weekend is going to have to develop extra hours...

I did go to the Cambridge fireworks- my first proper 'Guy Fawkes' night in England. And they were pretty impressive.  I might link a pic or two once a certain someone uploads them.  

The dog ate my notebook....

Well I tried I really did. Managed just under 1000 words last night, which puts me at nearly 2500 words behind. And it is only day 5! This weekend I am going to have to shackle myself to my desk.

Good news I am zeroing in on a title. Not there yet but I do have a title which has the right ideas associated with it and I am going to update the working title from Untitled to something slightly less embarrassing but still fairly generic and 'not quite right'.

Working title: 'Right through the cracks'.

To be referenced in this blog from now on as simply 'The cracks'

I think I could post up a plot synopsis or teaser. But 1. I need to get to work and 2. At less than 10% into the damn thing I don't want to be overly presumptuous.

I would be very interested in hearing from any of you whether the you find the title intruiging. Or not.  And more importantly I would like to hear what you, simply from the title, think the story will be about? What impression does the title give? 

 

Rolling and flailing in the mire, but the limbs are moving

I am not quite out of that first sucking pit yet, but I did manage a decent effort last night (and a few words this morning) espacially considering I spent two hours over time at work yesterday.  Even if I am still below target minimum, if I can just get my those writers legs poiting in a straight line I think I can catch up to target level today. 

There be dragons

He received many warning from wrinkly old sages and bleached skeletons of past failures but our would-be hero had nothing but scorn for the Dragon. He could handle anything. 

But he barely got out of the quaint little village nestled in the green green hills before being run down by a cart, witha  heavy load. Strapped down in the back were several  barrels full of procrastination (They look just like barrels of rum but they weigh a lot more). One of the barrels got loose and landed squarely on his head as the last pair of wheels jolted over the meaty speed hump that was his body. It hurt. It hurt more when he woke up. Worse , somehow, while apparently unconscious he had crawled off the side of the road, and found himself wallowing in a pit of, worryingly premature, plot failure. 

I made it to 2 000 words people, but according to my target I should be much closer to double that. Can I make up for it tonight? I can say with a great deal of enthusiasm, that I positively do not feel able.