Have you noticed I’ve been quiet?
No? Damn…
Just about to start tech week for My Fair Lady right now, so my brain has been in “acting mode” and not “creating literary crap known as Cordoverse” mode. I have done some writing, not a terrible amount, but enough to make me say “Damn, I suck when distracted”.
So my question to those out there is this: what distracts you, and what do you do to try to work your way past said distractions?
Jason Córdova 
One thing I found recently at Forward Motion (www.fmwriters.com — I’ve been a member there for seven years) was that if you write just 100 words a day — just 100 — on the same manuscript, you’ll have 36,500 words at the end of the year, or enough for a novella. And if you write that again the next year, you’ll have 36,500 more words, and you’ll have (barely) enough for a novel. (Though it’d have to be astonishingly well written at 73,000 words for most publishers, _or_ you’d have to have another story in the same universe to help balance it out a bit. Preferably a story that’s at least 10K words long.)
I really get frustrated sometimes, Jason, so reading this (which was by Lazette Gifford, site owner, editor and writer) was very helpful. I know I average out to more than 3,000 words in a month even in a very _bad_ month.
Oh, yes. Editing — looking over your MS — counts. Planning counts, and any research you do that you write down at all counts as well.
The goal, y’see, is to keep on keepin’ on, and if we do that — no matter how many fits and starts we may have — we will be victorious in meeting our goals. (As I said — goal is 36,500 words per year. I know I’ve already written 25,000 this year. I figure I’m well on my way to this. And so, my friend, are you.)
Barb
Eric Flint once told me that if I could write 1,000 words a day, in three months I’d have a completed novel. Well, told a lot of people that, but it felt (at the time) to be directed specifically at me. I took those words to heart and, when I’m writing, actually have a file of accountability where I have dates and how many words I’ve written. It’s amazing just how fast I was writing when I actually made myself keep track and try to do something during a day.
I wonder where that file went… may be needing it soon.