I’VE WRITTEN 50,000 WORDS THIS MONTH, which means that I’ve successfully fulfilled the goal of JuNoWriMo.
But wait, there’s more!
I’ve only just begun Chapter Nine of twelve planned chapters, so I’ll be writing on into July, until I reach my ultimate goal of 72,000 words.
Milestone self-congratulations in the form of frozen yogurt are in order, I think.
*
Also, hooray poster:
Read about its design and other amusing WriMo-related news at the OLL blog.
Upon making the happy discovery that there were three brown bananas in the back of my refrigerator, I took the opportunity to make muffins. Depending on the size of the bananas or muffin tin, this recipe can yield 12-18 servings, if you hold the foolish belief that a serving is a single muffin. I used three medium bananas this time and came out with fifteen muffins, which sounds like six or seven servings to me.
Wish I had pictures, but you know what muffins look like, right?
Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (or whole wheat flour)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
3 large bananas, mashed
3/4 cup white sugar (or half white and half brown sugar)
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/3 cup butter, melted
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare muffin tins with non-stick spray or paper liners, or, in my case, half of each, since apparently I need more paper muffin cups.
1a. Mash 3-4 very ripe bananas with a potato masher or fork. I leave the bananas just a little bit chunky. Melt butter in a little dish in the microwave.
2. Combine bananas, sugar, egg, vanilla and butter in a mixing bowl. (Tip: Allow the melted butter to cool a little so as not to cook the egg, or add them separately. Live and learn.) Also, half the time I forget to add the vanilla, but I’ve found it makes little difference.
3. Add flour, powder, soda, and salt. Stir by hand until just combined. (Tip: Stirring too much makes them extremely dense.) Add chocolate chips or 1 tsp. cinnamon or both. You will probably need to taste some chocolate chips to ensure their quality.
4. Bake for 25-30 minutes, though in my current oven, they are done in 23 minutes. The original recipe says, “Muffins will spring back when lightly tapped,” but I have never found this to be true, despite having tapped at least one muffin in every batch. Perhaps I am still over-stirring. Springy muffins make me apprehensive anyway.
These muffins taste good hot, though the banana flavor comes out more the following day. They also freeze nicely and reheat in the microwave in 25 seconds, making them a minute and five seconds faster than oatmeal for breakfast. I call this a win.
WORD COUNT: 48,650
By 5 pm, my writing day is essentially over, so I don’t feel too guilty about reading for pleasure this evening. Besides, teaching the same lesson four times is suprisingly wearing (though I’m sure I’ll get better at it).
Lamentation for the Abandoned Schedule
Current WORD COUNT: 42,544
I intend to write 2000 words today, so my current word count will increase. I’m in the middle of Chapter Eight, which features a splendid explosion, as well as an anomalous white hole.
Normal NaNoWriMo WORD COUNT: 36,674
Having fallen now two days behind my intended word count for this month, I add the typical word count goal here merely to encourage myself. I’ll certainly reach 50,000 before June 30, which is a successful NaNoWriMo to me; but my novel won’t be finished until I write 72,000 words. This will occur by mid-July.
Wishful Thinking Super-NaNoWriMo WORD COUNT: 48,000
Alas, that I had been able to stay on track! Having once this month already written a 4000-word day, I know that with work (finally!) picking up, I won’t be able to catch up twice. Woe to the super-charged writing schedule: I drink a cup of tea in memoriam.
Recipe for falling a day behind in Camp NaNoWriMo:
Yesterday’s WORD COUNT: 38,358
I’ve begun Chapter Seven, which is called “Zort” after a scientific research company but secretly after one of Pinky’s favorite expressions from Pinky and the Brain. Perhaps “Narf” will feature later in the series. It sounds like the name for secret police or a narcotic.
*edit*
WORD COUNT: 40,420
Apartment Woes; or, adventures in freezing a ferret
When we returned from our apartment search, with its numerous frustrations (but its final success), we were hot and tired, as we’d been out for five hours in the hundred-degree Texas summer. As soon as we came inside, we noticed something important: it wasn’t any cooler.
Now ferrets, hailing as they do from Russia and other northern climes, ought not be exposed to temperatures above eighty-five degrees. It was ninety in our apartment.
So we fiddled with the air conditioner controls, shut all the doors, closed the blinds, and turned off the lights we could live without. The A/C was still blowing warm air, and our ferret was extremely sluggish. If it’s possible for a ferret to look at once grumpy and disgruntled, ours had mastered the expression. Anastasia drank her fill of the ice water we gave her and crawled under the couch, stretched out her full length with her hind feet sticking out from under the side.
Clearly, something had to be done.
So my husband gently scooped her up, carried her to the kitchen, a room she is usually barred from exploring, and, cradling her in one hand, stuck Anastasia in the freezer.
She came around slowly, sniffing the ice maker and frozen hamburgers with greater and greater interest. Eventually she felt bold enough to venture onto the floor of the freezer itself, whose corners she investigated with a pink nose of contentment rather than a beige nose of displeasure. After a five-minute freezer revival, Anastasia was her old self again, though she did retreat to the couch when we returned her to the living room (according to her instinct, it is cooler underground, and our couch is her closest urban equivalent).
An hour later, we figured out the problem: a flipped breaker switch. Although it was hilarious, I’m glad we didn’t have to freeze the ferret any more than once.
Dear Fiction Editor(s),
Please find attached my scintillating short story, “Most Poignant Title Ever,” of about 4,000 words, or whatever your ideal story length is. My main character, a flawed but sympathetic scientist, makes the discovery of her lifetime when, by deducing her actual parentage, she grows a microbe under her fingernail that will cure the Claz’kon Plague, but not before her little sister succumbs to the disease. Did I mention it was sad but also beautiful? You will probably cry.
I recently graduated with a M.A. in Creative Writing, for which I wrote a thesis that astounded and moved my professors so much that one of them won the Worldwide Book Award, one of them retired to raise goats, and one of them has been institutionalized. My previous professional publications include none, but if you publish my story, I’ll have something to say here next time, won’t I?
This story is a simultaneous submission because I can’t wait ten weeks each times ten magazines for someone to decide to buy it. Thank you for your consideration, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Best,
~K
P.S. Today my WORD COUNT for my novel-in-progress is 32,430. Admit it. That impresses you a little bit.
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