No No! NaNoWriMo!!

Across the fruited plain, and really, way beyond, writers are hunkering down today to meet the challenge of NaNoWriMo! Their goal: write 50,000 words in one month! During a slightly delusional moment when I considered joining the hoards, I broke it down; it came to 1,667 words per day. If you decide to take off weekends, that takes 8 days out of the mix and adds those to the 22 days left in your writer's workweek/month. In that case, you'll be churning out 606 words per day for a total of 2273.

Okay, so on a great day I can totally do that-and more. But who has 22 to 30 totally great days in a row?! Egads!! Still, if I made the commitment I would do my best and truly, I'd end up with most of a hopefully good, new manuscript at the end of the month.

Truly, I was tempted. Then I was reminded-it's NOVEMBER! What, am I nuts?! Holidays are coming, shopping to be done (before kids are out of school-if you have that concern), relatives coming for Turkey dinners-Turkey dinners! There's at least ONE Thursday I couldn't write and another 606 words I'd have to squeak in somewhere.

Honestly, I'm as good a procrastinator as the next writer, but as you can clearly see, I've got some points. Which leads me to wonder...

Why November, NaNoWritMo!? Why not...February? In February I'll be stuck inside with hot beverages avoiding shoveling and, as we know, no one does anything. Just ask that dang groundhog; he peeks out of his hole-almost always determines there are 6 more weeks of winter to go-and pops back inside, not to be seen again until spring. Maybe he's writing a good book!