Hi!
Well, yesterday’s writing went…okay, I guess. 1108 words in 32 minutes. Then I got a little bit stuck, and spent the rest of my writing time working on edits and the outline. I might have gotten more done, but had a prior “let’s go to the zoo!” commitment with my daughter.
Note: so far the outline is of dubious value. I did speed up for a couple of days after creating it, and by nearly 50%, which was great. But it also took time (a full day!) to write the outline, and I’ve since slowed down again. OTOH, when I slowed down I’d veered off from the outline (already??) and hadn’t updated it. So, maybe my fault. We’ll see what happens now that I’ve updated it again. And veered off again, and I should find some time to update it again today. (This does make sense…right?) (Maybe.)
In the past I’ve been able to get somewhere around 2700 words per day via typing on my Neo in four Pomodoros. If you’re not familiar with those, it’s basically just using a timer…I worked for 25 minutes, then took a 5-minute break. In theory after four sessions you’d take a longer break, but at that point I generally called it a day. After two hours, my brain was pretty dead. I didn’t want it to be, but that’s how it was…I’d type away without being able to read any of my text, and get weirdly good results. Never did figure that out, but it was a good thing. What I disliked about that, and I disliked it a lot, was that it only really worked if I did it first thing in the morning, and it meant missing out on family time. I know what you’re thinking: would I like some cheese with that whine? But really…I had to kind of hide in a room, had to be by myself, and could only maintain that pace if I did it every single day, before I did anything else. Could I have split that up into two groups of Pomodoros, with one coming later? I have no idea. I figured out what worked, and kept doing it, and wrote a couple of novels in not a lot of time…writing time, that is. Elapsed time was far greater, because I frankly didn’t enjoy doing things that way and it’d take me a while to get the momentum up. More whining, yes, I realize.
So: would Pomodoros help with dictation? I have no idea. I do have this notion that what I want to do is dictate a chapter per session. I also want to get to the point where that happens in about 30 minutes. Where do these ideas come from? Beats me. But let’s assume there’s some sort of reason to think that way…and I’m already trying to do two hours of dictation…and, you see? If I set the time to 35 minutes per session, and finish the chapter however I can (including things like “insert scene with lots of fighting and bleeding here” if necessary), and do four Pomodoros…hmm. Maybe.
I didn’t do that for this morning’s session (48 minutes), which was my only session for the day since it’s a weekend. And I probably won’t try it tomorrow either. Maybe Monday? It’d be interesting to know in advance that I’d get through four chapters. I mean, sort of get through them. But it’s kind of funny how little time editing takes, once there’s something in place.
Just a thought.
Have fun out there!
Yesterday’s dictation count: 1108 words
Time spent dictating: 32 minutes, 1 session
Week to date: 10,346 words (some via the Neo)
Total words since 1/22/18: 17,822
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