I've been so tired lately. Even when I get plenty of rest and take care of myself, I'm tired. I feel a strong need to look over my life and priorities and reorganize accordingly. My mind is totally off of NaNo and Disasterstrike. At this point I am not throwing in the towel, but I feel like it may happen unless an attitude change comes soon. My heart just isn't in it right now.

Today is the first day of NaNo that more than 3 hours has passed without me hitting my daily quota. This means the pressure will be slightly increased for the rest of the month unless I happen to pump up around 4k in one day. It could happen, but I'm not banking on it.

A good way to increase your discipline in NaNo is to avoid having a blog. If you must blog, don't fill it with pictures of a stunning young man. I wish I had taken this advice.

There is obviously only so much you can do in this regard, but I believe you'll find your discipline in NaNo will be improved by minimizing the influence of negativity in your life. I try to avoid people who irk me, food I dislike, music that annoys me, anything at all, as much as possible (moreso than usual).

I really get way too into the "meta' elements of writing. Instead of focusing on word count or plot development, I'll instead fixate on something like "Oh man, this song would go so well with this scene." For example, I was just listening to Syringe by Emilie Autumn, and it clicked. That's totally Disasterstrike's theme song.

But since when did a novel need a theme song?

Nothing like trying to create a reasonably believable story to make you realize what you don't know. Case in point: music. I don't know anything about music aside from what I like and what I do not like. Take a look at the first couple of paragraphs. You can count the amount of music terms that I know on one hand. Thank god for english courses that taught me words like "cacophonous."

The fine people behind NaNoWriMo thankfully have a "Plot Realism" forum on their site. I have yet to run any of my own questions by them, but just reviewing the threads there is entertaining and enlightening. If you ever wanted to know about the personality of alpacas or a good cheap hotel rate, the NaNo forums have you covered.

There are many tricks to maintaining an ideal writing environment. It's largely an individual matter. For me, I like to play music that serves as a soundtrack to my story. If I'm writing a peaceful scene, I need peaceful music. If I'm writing an action scene, I need music that is appropriately frantic.

It can get very specific. If style or pace of a fight is chaotic, the music needs to match. Not just any old rock song will work.

For Disasterstrike, I'm finding that I draw the most from Diablo Swing Orchestra. Their music is appropriately heavy in a prog-metal sort of way, but that "swing" element also gives it a certain amount of pseudo-jazzy class that I hope carries over into my story. The best example will be in the character of Walter Indigo.

Walter is a man of his work, though his casual nature makes him appear less passionate than you'd expect. He enjoys the pleasures of life and living, yet he's very capable, bringing an intensity to his work that doesn't show in his personality.

Another artist I've been utilizing a lot is Emilie Autumn. Her work is very gothic and beautiful. A talented singer and musician both. Her stuff can be quite intense in a more haunting sort of way. When I think of "the tune," I think of Emilie Autumn. Her music really represents the soul of all the characters in Disasterstrike. Since I will be delving into the nature of KIt's soul in the future, I feel that this is an important translation, especially since music plays a role in the story as well as out.

Even though NaNoWriMo is focused on dynamically producing a story, there is something to be said for preparation. If I had given NaNo it's due pre-November thought, I wouldn't have such glaring plot holes (how did the police get involved in James and Kit's crime?) and Kit would have a last name by now. Hell, you might even get to know what he looks like.

In my future NaNo adventures, I will plan the stages of my story and my characters, while maintaining a philosophy of flexibility.