NaNoWriMo

I love NaNoWriMo.  I’ve participated every year since 2007.  I even schedule several days of vacation from the Evil Day Job — especially early in the month — to ensure I set myself up for a fast start.

I’m not feeling the love this year.

My grandpa passed away this morning.  Emotionally, we’re all handling in fairly well, because we had the chance to say goodbye Monday night.  I’m afraid it’ll catch up with me, though, especially during services this weekend.  We’ll be on the road Sunday for the funeral and visiting family.

I’m *this close* to finishing the big project at work I mentioned.  There are a few things still not working, but the bulk of my tasks for the project are done to the point where the other programmer isn’t stuck waiting on me to supply the data.  I promised to check email in the morning and see if I can finish the last few things still outstanding and I might call in for an update meeting.

So while I’m technically “on vacation” until Tuesday…. I might actually be logging in several times.  The joys of working from home where “showing up for work” is way too easy.

And yeah, I still have to get the monsters up for school at 6 AM.  Not feeling the “stay up all night to write” love then.

With all the long hours and stress this past week, I don’t know that I can even stay up until midnight tonight, let alone get my first 1666 words right out of the gate.  I haven’t touched Sig’s file in days — and I have to finish him before I can start anything else.

Needless to say, I’m starting with several handicaps, both emotionally and physically.  But I still want to try.  I’m hoping the love and energy will lift me up and keep me going when my tank is already running low.

We shall see.  The first task is whether I can actually stay up until midnight tonight as I originally planned.