NaNoWriMo
Quick update on my efforts with NaNoWriMo, especially given what it seems to be showing as a status on over there to the right and down just a little bit here on the mephistos blog. I did kick off with some major kick butt writing on Saturday afternoon. I was not feeling well from the head cold that I have had, but spent some major effort in into things. Between huge coffee consumption, taking some pills, and drinking that icky thera-flu stuff, I managed to write a blog or two, put together some additional notes about the novel and keyed in 2019 words. I was very pleased with that amount of wordage for my starting point, especially given that I was not feeling the greatest during the time.
I had finished that up by 4:00pm or so and needed to get some laundry done prior to doing other things Saturday evening later. I however then went to the NaNoWriMo.org website, which I had been trying to access at various time through out the day. Knowing that I had the cool tool in place on my blog site that was suppose to show my word count on a daily basis throughout the month, I was anxious to get that update in there. Just as my luck had been with the rest of the day in regards to accessing the site, so too it was to continue, and actually get worse.
I spent from time onward until at least midnight, perhaps as late as 1:30 a.m. (Eastern Time, prior to the adjustment for the time change that occurred Saturday) trying to get that word count into the system. I managed to get logged in sometimes without a timing out, though most times I timed out prior to actually making a connection to the server for even that. I never managed to actually update my word count and finally just gave up, thinking maybe I would have an option to update word count with a date, and if not, I could at least be close by getting them into the system on Sunday morning.
True to form, even with the late hour of my going to bed, no need to be up, and even and extra hour in the morning, I was awake and up by no later then 7:00 a.m, maybe sooner. I started the morning by doing some additional writing and trying to get on the site again to do the update on the word count from the day before. I finally realized that the update button at the top of the front page was not even active at all, which was a bit of disappointment. Come on folks, if it is not working, do NOT display the button making us think it is working. Of course, I had presumed all day the day before that I was dropping connection and not getting the whole script due to the bandwidth issues of the server.
So realizing that, I recalled the way you had to do word count updates last year, by going to edit novel and putting in just the total count. I proceeded to do so and actually got what appeared to be an indication that it took my number and seemed to be in the system. I then went on with my writing for a bit and had planned on coming back to it later in the evening.
I got busy and did not get a chance to verify the number being stored or for more writing yesterday, so I did not input new information. I did go to check it this morning and add my additional words written. I see on my blog widget counter that it shows a red box for Saturday and nothing for Sunday. After fighting with the NaNo site for several minutes, it shows nothing in my word count. I am trying again, and finally get the 2019 words put in and it eventually, after more then one time out, takes the number as well. Still not showing an update on the widget here on the blog, but maybe that takes some time to generate, especially given the overload the servers must be having to deal with at the NaNo site right now.
So, if it sounds like a I am complaining just a little bit – well I guess I am. I understand the nature of what they are doing, but maybe a few notes about things not working, especially the script that is not there, but has the buttons showing, should be posted in BIG BOLD letters. I found the inability to get my word count in there, which I personally see as inspiration for what I have done and a measure of what I need to do better – well deflating. Which I am sure is not the intent of the NaNo folks, but it happened all the same. For the same reasons I find the lack of the widgets function similarly sending a negative message instead of the positive one.
I don’t know, guessing I am having issues when I look at the site and there are bulletins about podcasting/radio, speaking about participants over 50 and people using it is NaNo as a dating thing for similar bookish nerdy types. Both the dating aspect, if true, and the radio/podcasting is a potential major drain on the systems and certainly not necessary during this ramp up time when they know the systems are not able to handle the load.
