NaNoWriMo 2009: An Orgy Of Words – The Halfway Point Review (3)
Act III: Raising The Plot
It was after this point of having 8 days worth (about 22K words) of yammering back and forth that I decided to try and pull the earlier abandoned plot together. I had a few ideas sparked from Robbe Law’s challenges forum post and I wanted to get that out of the way so on day 9 that is what I set out to do. I decided to draw a line under that chapter and I started chapter 3. I ended day nine not having acheived my plot goal but I did manage to add 3130 words to take me to the half way goal of 25,000 after 9 days of writing.
So I tried to reintroduce the battered blue suitcase, but that seemed to lead onto something else before I could manage it:
“Colonel, are you okay?” “Prefectly, old boy. Perfectly.” The Colonel gazed at the turkerys still running around their miniature running track. They were getting better, getting better all the time, Jonn had to admit, some of them even had lap times in the low teens and if there were such a thing as the miniature wafer thin turkey Olympic Games he would seriously consider entering the cream of the crop, (or may be even the cream of the turkey soup), into the Games. Though he did wonder where they would get five thousand wafer think turkey condoms for the Olympic village because he didn’t want his charges to get bird flu or worse due to unprotected and ill advised and most probably drunken gobbling with other the other poultry present. He realised that they could use intestines of some smaller animals, perhaps flies or some other flying creature that was like a fly but easier to catch and not as squashable. Or may be they could be larger animals and the user could be wrapped up as turkey sausages for the winner to eat on the car ride back to Bratislava (because deep down Jonn knew that the Russians would be a tough opponent to beat and would come into the games as the clear favourite, though with the right training Jonn could place a few choice bets spread evenly between Bet Fred and Stan James, so as not to arouse the suspicions of the Olympic Officials, and really clean up without the aid of a mop and bucket). Wait, what was Jonn thinking. Did turkeys have Penises any way? Did any one who didn’t spend their free hours in tweed and wellington boots really know? Did any one who cared read that sentence? Is this the end of a series of questions without an answer? The answer to that last one is, of course no. Or yes, if you like to move on. It’s a bit like a poor man’s Choose your own adventure but without all that pesky page turning to follow what happens next. “I should say.” The Colonel began. “Then why don’t you?” “Put the wafer thin turkeys away, will you old chap. I wouldn’t want hem catching their death out here.” Colonel Andre DuBois paused as he wiped the spittle away from the corner of his mouth with the knuckle from his left hand. “From the cold, you understand.” The Colonel nodded as though it would make him believe his own lies. “From the cold.” “Sure,” Jonn agreed, “from the cold. I’ll just pop them back in the heated refrigerator then” He picked up the silver serving tray that was the base for the turkeys make shift enclosure (who said that amidst all the rubbish they weren’t classy?) and padded over the kitchen area of the apartment. “You want another drink from the hot box, while I’m here?” he was looking at the wafer thin turkeys while he said it, but he was clearly addressing the Colonel even though Jonn had his back to him. “Just make sure that it has plenty of ice in it,” The Colonel shouted across the apartment to his host. Some where in the back of the apartment a bedroom door was flung open. “Shut the fuck up,” came the familiar mantra from Stacey’s boyfriend. The door slammed immediately after the words stopped. The Colonel seemed taken aback from the unexpected outburst. “Well, someone got up on the wrong side of the bed.” He said to Jonn but quieter than his last statement, to indicate he was at least aware that he may be punched, kicked or worse if the volume of his voice stayed consistently loud. He tippy toed over to Jonn’s location in the kitchen and took another glass of water from his obliging host. “Merci.” He toasted his host, who wasn’t feeling that much like being toasted but afterwards he felt all warm and a bit overdone on one side. Jonn Baldmur placed the silver service tray back into the refrigerator and pored himself another water. There was no ice. No in the refrigerator at least, Jonn was convinced that there was some ice somewhere in the world (maybe the north pole or the south pole, he couldn’t quite remember), but he was sure that it was a little far to travel to chisel off a bit to fit into his drinks glass. Maybe if he were to take a champagne bucket with him, then again, maybe not. He closed the door to the refrigerator and foolowed thr Colonel back to the living room area. They stood facing one another sipping that their iceless water nervously for a few minutes as though someone had just thrown a whole load of car keys in a bowl. “So,” Colonel Andre DuBois said, shifting from one foot to the other, notr wanting to stand still and not really knowing the reason why. “So,” Jonn Baldmur repeated back to the Colonel as though all conversation had been sucked out of the room and replaced with a giant vacuum, without that pesky body turning inside out and exploding due to the pressures exerted on them. Stuxk for something else to say, Jonn said the first thing that came into his head. “Have you watched, So You Think You Can Dance? On the Fox Network?” The Colonel shook his head. “I will only watch Fox News.” “For the news?” Jonn Baldmur asked. “No, for papa bear,” the Colonel said. Jon shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t believe that this line of enquiry is getting us any where.” Colonel Andre DuBois eyed him suspiciously. “Are you a cop, because leggally and legally, the first one is like the law but in tiny short shorts, you have to tell me if you are. It’s like a rule or something.” Jonn tried to pat DuBois on the shoulder, but he moved out of the way as though he were afraid that Jonn was going to slap the cuffs on him. “How long have you known me?” “Not long enough, Marty, not long enough.” The Colonel checkled (a sort of half chuckle, half heckle) to himself. “Marty. If that is your real name.” Jonn Baldmur scratched his nose and through weary eyes looked at the Colonel, his vision slightly blurred because of the late hour. “You know it isn’t.” Colonel Andre DuBois paced the living room area of the apartment with his hands on his hips muttering to himself and to those around him who would listen, in this case one Jonn Baldmur. “I knew it,” he tutted to himself, “I just knew it. You think you can trust someone and then they turn around and turn around again in a big circle then touch their toes and before you realise that they did that to distract you from your original thought that they are nothing but a low down dirty narc.” He wagged an accusing finger at his assistant. “A Narc. A narc is what you are.” Jonn Baldmur looked at his employer. “Are you going to leave.” The Colonel glanced that the coffee table and the half filled, he was an optimist after all, glass of water that he had to go. “I will after I finish my water.” The Colonel adjusted his jacket and sat down behind the coffee table. Why the Colonel didn’t sit on the chair was anybody’s guess and while the only anybody in the room was Jonn Baldmur, he decided to give it a shot. “Why don’t you sit on the chair?” The Colonel nodded in acknowledgement at his assistant’s question and instead of a verbal answer, the Colonel stood and then deposited himself on the chair. He picked up an old copy of a newspaper from the coffee table and flicked trough to the horoscopes section. Jonn just stood and stared. He couldn’t think why this was happening. He just wanted the damn Colonel to get up and leave and here he was checking his horoscope. “What does it say?” He asked. The Colonel folded the paper and looked at the date on the front. “It’s a little old isn’t it?” “The newspaper?” Jonn took the paper from the Colonel and almost immediately got black ink on his hands. “November Twenty Second Nineteen Sixty Three.” He handed the printed paper back to his employer and tried to rub some of the ink from his palms. “I guess you’re right. Iyt must have been her a long time. I heard that one of the tenants a couple of leases ago was a shut in, and the last few couldn’t bear to throw anything out.” “Where as you?” Jonn placed his inky fingers on his hips in as macho a way as the Barney print on his long johns would allow. “Us? Oh, we’re just lazy.” He paused for a second before continuing: “What did your Horoscope say?” The Colonel closed his eyes and leaned back his head over the in the chair as he recited what he had read earlier. “Gemini.” He said, making sure to enunciate each syllable. “Stay indoors, or if you can’t stay indoors stay away from Dallas, especially while travelling in a convertible.” “Wow. That sounds completely made up. Nothing like that could or has happened.” Jonn commented.
It took me until the end of day 10 to get the suitcase mentioned and here it is:
“The suitcase.” Jonn repeated, slowly. “What did you bring it for?” He looked at the Colonel in the eye. The Colonel held his gaze for a moment or two before searching for more lint on his jacket lapel. The Colonel licked his lips and inched forward in his chair. “You know why.” DuBois touched his finger tips together and gazed over the steeple at his assistant. Jonn moved forward into the apartment from the corner and cleared the coffee table of obstacles before placed the blue suitcase on top and unlatching the locks. “What have you done this time?” The Colonel took great delight in building the anticipation for the big reveal despite the locks on the case already being unlatched. “Open it,” he said. Jonn Baldmur cracked his knuckles and then stretched his hamstring as though he were aboutto dead lift the samsonite suitcase above his head. The took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. The Colonel didn’t take his eye off his assistant. “Go on, open it.” He stood and walked around the back of Jonn so he was stood behind him looking over his shoulder. “What is going to happen?” A bead of perspiration dripped down from jonn’s forehead. He wiped his brow with the back of his hand. The Colonel placed a hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “well, if you keep that up, you’ll probably sweat all over it and it won’t work.” Jonn Baldmur turned his head to the left. “This isn’t going to be like the time you tried to build that nuclear bomb.” Colonel Andre DuBois gave Jonn’s shoulder a furtive squeeze. “It’s pronounced nukular,” the Colonel began “and any way, I didn’t try.” He raised his finger in the air to indicate triumph. “ I succeeded.” He added in a raised tone, but he quickly shot a look over to the bedroom door of Stacey’s room lest her boyfriend emerge and beat six and a half shades of shit out of the inventive old man. “No.” Jonn shook hid head and the Colonel felt awkward enough to remove his hand from Jonn’s shoulder. He could feel the muscle strain under Jonn’s skin. “It is pronounced nu clear. Nuclear. And that wasn’t what you ended up doing.” The Colonel animatedly walked back around to the other side of the coffee table so that he was facing his assistant. “That’s were you’re wrong, Marty.” He said. “What I did was even better!” He nodded his head in agreement with his own statement, as though that was all it was going to take to convince Jonn. Just in case that wasn’t enough he added the exclamation point as though it were the most important thing in the world and hadn’t been devalued by all the uses of LOL in the world on these new fangly interwebby things of the faceless masses (where they don’t upload a profile pic, whatever one of those is.) “Yes, what I did was so good. It has all the strength of a nu clear, am I saying that right?” Jonn nodded. “Okay, so it has all the power of a nukular bomb but with half the calories.” The Colonel did a little jig on the spot which looked a lot like a half hearted Macarena, according to Jonn’s less than high definition recollection, up until the part where they turn to the left any how. Although again, this may still be the Time Warp that he was thinking of. It was hard to say without the DVD player being on. “It’s perfect,” Colonel Andre DuBois continued, “perfect for the little dictator on a diet. Or,” he added as though he were getting a second wind of ideas that he cold use as a sales pitch, “the perfect gift for that dictator who is always on the go, because it fits in either a large carry on bag or in a suitcase.” Jonn Baldmur looked at him as though Andre DuBois wasn’t quite serious. But he knew the Colonel was being nothing but serious both on the surface or deep down under his skin. The Colonel held up his hands in mock surrender. “Okay, I’ll admit that for a nukular suitcase bomb it is a little heavy, but we offset that by making them glow in the dark. And,” he was about to add with a gleam in his eye, “it cuts down on the need for those expensive condoms.” Jonn Baldmur took an involuntary step back as though he could almost feel his swimmers going belly up. He instinctively cupped his testicles with his hands. The Colonel shook his head in disapproval. “That’s not use to you now. Not with all the radio active dust and aspestos that you have coated your hands in.” Jonn looked down at his palms andcould se a faint trace of yellow on the areas that were not covered by newspaper print. “Fuck.” It was the only word he could think of or indeed manage at that point, but it was succinct and completely appropriate, and according to the Colonel he could do that all he wanted now without the threat of unwanted procreation.
Day Twelve: A Short Detour, Hopefully
So soon after the introduction of the suitcase was done, and some of the fall out was explored on Day 11, my story took another turn on Day 12.
You’ll be pleased to know that there aren’t any extracts for this, but I will let you know that as of right now it does involve a case of word count increasing hiccups and the finding of a Nazi flag left by a previous tenant of the apartment and what happened when Super Dog died. It does strike me as odd as I write it, but that description is far more interesting than the extract that I could of posted.
Day Thirteen: Jason Comes To Town
Do I really have to explain it to you?
Day Fourteen: Lessons are learned
I write this on day 14 of NaNoWriMo and currently it is 7.46 in thevening (it isn't a typo, I come from Wigan). Most of my day has been spent writing this blog post, and if I were to do it again, not only would it take another day off my life, but I would plan better so that instead of writing this 11K word+ blog post (including extracts) all on one day, I would have written a quick summary at the end of each day then I could have actually gone to a write-in and got some novel writing done today. (Quick shout out to TheSpyGlass who smashed through the 19K barrier on day 14! Woo.)
I know that people may say that this blog post needn't have been written, and some people wished they hadn't read it, but I decided to write it because it was a challenge that I had set myself this year to document the NaNoWriMo event more.
Even though I had planned to to some sort of review I didn't really know what type of content that I wanted to include and it was only today as I wrote it that I figured that for my enjoyment at least, if nobody else's, that I should include some extracts from my novel.
Previous years' handwritten efforts are gathering dust somewhere deep dark and mysterious and I don't really have a clue what I did each day other than write at least 50K by the end of the month. So with this year, and indeed this blog post, I have a record of what I have done on each day and a little sample of the effluence that has flowed out of my head and onto the electronic page.
I know that NaNoWriMo is something that I'm proud of, even if I do end up writing crap for 30 straight days because it actually forces me to write more than at other times of the year because I'm under a dead line and in the end, that is the entire point of NaNoWriMo.
Regarding the writing of this review, was it worth it? As I type this now, the answer is no, but I hope that when this whole thing is over that I'll be really grateful that I did it. I can't know for sure. But hopefully I'll get a smile when I read this back in a few years time. Maybe other people will like it too.
When I look forward to the second half of NaNoWriMo, there are a few things that I want to accomplish. I want to write more and I'd like to concentrate a bit more on plot. In addition to the writing I do want to attend a couple more write-ins because in all honesty the Scribblepool gang are a great group of people. In other areas I'd also like to eat less while I'm writing or perhaps eat more healthily. I'm enjoying the eating of the sweets and cookies and chocolate, but it seems that my pants aren't.
So in conclusion at least at the halfway mark (time wise) I give myself 5/5 even though there is room for improvwment, unlike my pants.
Will I reach the goals that I have set for myself for the second half of NaNoWriMo? You'll have to tune in early December for review of the second half! Until then I'll just sit here eating an orange and rehydrating myself in readiness for the next two weeks.
Cheers,
Matt
Over 3 posts:
Total Words Written: 30,260 words
Words remaining unwritten: 19,740
Remembering to do a Spell Check: priceless.
If you enjoyed these blog posts, why not donate to Office Of Letters and Light, National Novel Writing Month's parent company, and help them continue running these events in the future.
PS. I am aware that this halfway review is a day early, but don't worry nothing exciting will happen on November 15th. And what I did early this time will be balanced out with the full review being extremely late.
Total blog post length: 11,448 words.
