Never enough hours in the day

About a year ago Dryden informed me I'd be writing a novel about him. He just turned up one day, nameless and superior and amused by his current situation, in media res, and left me to work out the rest for myself. I wrote a few of the scenes that laid out his character best, but 2013 was a fairly tumultuous year for me, and I simply didn't have the time or concentration to actually write the full thing for quite some months.

Then November came along. I've been a fan of National Novel Writing Month for years, and actually managed to make the 50-thousand-words-in-30-days requirement to win in both 2011 and 2012, though both those projects were abandoned promptly on the 1st December, eternally unfinished. For 2013, I decided I'd up the ante, and aim for 75 thousand words in 30 days. 75k, I hoped, would be enough to actually get through Dryden's plot, from beginning to end, to put down one last full stop and declare the thing finished.

Finished is a magic word. One I haven't had much opportunity to use. I get distracted by other things, lose confidence in whatever it is I'm writing, and generally sigh and give up and go back to writing all the random little bits and pieces that never go anywhere, or try to get a proper job again.

I finished (cue gasps!) Dryden's first draft at 74k on the 30th of November, wrote another 1k to make it past both my targets for the month, and put it aside to start editing soon (and went off to start buying Christmas presents).

Things have been a bit busy since then. I've not just had Christmas and New Year, but been up and down the country fairly non-stop (it feels like it, at least). And there's a lot coming up too:

If I get Dryden edited in time and think it would help, there's this at the end of February. (Though it costs to enter, and that's an inhibiting factor for me right now.) (EDIT: Yeah, that didn't happen. Dryden isn't ready and I had too much on to get it there.)

I must, absolutely must, find the time to do my final proofreading/copy-editing exam and send it back to the sfep approved group who did my training course last March, within the one year deadline from said course date. (Though this requires my brain to be functioning at full capacity.) (EDIT: Did it, managed it, with a day or two to spare. Now I never have to think of it again.)

If I find time to write that steampunk short story I've had in my head for a long time now, there's this anthology (or two) which it fits nicely, to which I need to submit ideally by March 15th. (EDIT: Yup, managed that, just waiting to hear now.)

If I find time to finish up that other LGBT fantasy short story, there's also this rather nice edition of the BFS journal which I need to get to before May 5th. (EDIT: Of course, I went and worked on that one first, and finished a first draft of the thing just shy of the 5k upper limit at about half past midnight on what's now the 15th Feb. Oh well. It's all progress, I suppose. And I think it's quite cute. EDIT AGAIN: And it's submitted now, late on the 25th Feb, so we'll see what happens.)

Oh, and I'm currently ill, for the first time in about 18 months. Yay!

So here we go. Busy, busy, and a blog to boot. Wish me luck.