IWSG Day and Library Out of Storage!

appy Insecure Writer's Support Group Day!

Today's question is: How do you find the time to write in your busy day?

The short answer is, I don't!

The long answer is, that when I'm drafting a new story, there's no question about finding time. Time just magically appears. I stay up late writing, and don't feel unrested. I scribble on napkins. I write notes to myself on my phone. I avoid social media because, hello!, there are characters to discover and exciting events happening. I hear conversations in my head while walking. Every image I see reminds me of the characters...

Then the story is done. It needs typing up, most of the time, from notebooks. That's okay, too. There's time in the morning if I get in to work early. There's time during the baby's nap. Slowly the crumpled already-typed pages pile up. Minor edits are done and missing scenes have been written.

And then there's a complete draft in Scrivener. Time to print and start editing!

This gets done, too. There may be a long train trip, a work event with a long break during which I can hole up and read. The manuscript is covered in scribbles.

And that's the stage I'm at with most of my stories -- a pile of printouts covered in scribbles. For some reason, entering those changes, really digging in to character motivation and story arcs, seems to be a sticking point for me. I just cannot find the motivation. And suddenly there's no time in the day. Work is extra busy. Lots of family events. Niggling chores. Many exciting books to read. And my own tales just get pushed to the wayside.

This is why I love doing NaNoWriMo -- an excuse to go back to the happy drafting stage!

But when will I edit?

Thank you to our co-hosts this month! C. Lee McKenzie, Rachel Pattison, Elizabeth Seckman, Stephanie Faris, Lori L MacLaughlin, and Elsie Amata.


I've got my photos together to share the day our storage stuff arrived:

47 bins, 12 boxes, and 4 wardrobe boxes!

(I ended up collating most of the photos because Blogger continues to turn half my photos upside down, and I just can't figure out why.)

I wanted to have all the storage stuff all organised as quickly as possible, and managed it in just a few days, with help from family.

For the first time, we have all our books out -- yes some are in cupboards and some (also for the first time, as I'd much rather have everything visible -- it's out of sight out of mind with me, and I forget a lot -- but there's just no space) are in the second layer on the shelf behind the first (to help my memory I tried to suggest their presence -- e.g. one big crime story hardcover is a clue that all the Agatha Christies are back there!), but there are no books in bins, hidden away!

Found the reply card that Julian Barnes sent me, when I had the temerity to answer his questionnaire at the end of Flaubert's Parrot. Wish I'd kept a copy of my answers to all those philosophical questions! 

There's the truck arriving... And a Delftware dish showing an absinthe drinker...

It begins...

Getting there...

A few piles to go...

Avalanches of books... and some school stuff in bins, to be kept in our storage space here in the apartment...

Done! All the Folio Society books are now together, for the first time!

Hmm, I didn't catch all the comic books in that first photo on the left... And there's one other shelf in another cupboard, for all the Paul Austers and Rose Tremains and many others. Plus the cookbooks in the kitchen!

Finally have all my MG and YA together!

Tolkien, Inklings, Canadiana, poetry, Celtic myths and legends,  art,  Bukowski, Stephen King, and Diana Gabaldon plus Forumites!

Tolkien shelfie!

Then there are the bins of books to give away -- that is also a first. I'm finally parting with a few books, especially some of the duplicates I've bought here and there at book fairs, not remembering I already owned them. Might even hold a contest here for some!

And, of course, this means they'll all have to be removed from the library catalogue!

But there are still items missing!

The movers were so quick and efficient that there wasn't time to arrange with family to have other items brought to the storage space and included in the packing, so we haven't got our records, or my coin collection, or a few scrapbooks, or the three bins at my sister's:

 

I'd forgotten which books were there; turns out there are many of the Turkish books in translation by Professor Joseph S. Jacobson that I reviewed, and all the Vonnegut, and more.

Or the 11 other Andrew Lang fairy books (I brought the Blue Fairy Book with us as a token), which are still at my parents' house:

RIP Sam

As a result of all this, I've instituted the third round of the Book Buying Ban, effective until Christmas -- at least!

Have you moved recently?

Did you throw out lots of stuff before you moved, or in your new space?

Or did you keep everything?