Chance meeting: a good sign?

Today was our school choir's annual pilgrimage into Sydney Town Hall to participate in the Celebration Concert, raising money for children's charities. Basically, I help escort the (very well-behaved) students into the CBD on a bus, fill in time shopping while they rehearse with the rest of a 1000-voice choir, then take them to their dinner break, and back to enjoy the concert. Not a terribly difficult set of tasks.

As we were getting off the bus, there was my good friend, Jean Prouvaire, on his way to the annual Sydney kick-off meeting of 2007's NaNoWriMo, the (Inter)National Novel Writing Month at Books Kinokuniya.

Was I on my way to the meeting?, he wondered aloud.

How fortuitous! I'd received an official email about NaNoWriMo, but I hadn't made a note of the date; last year these two annual events didn't clash. I had a few hours to kill while the students rehearsed, so I was able to meet up with him at the coffee shop (which had no coffee; their machine was broken. Sigh.) Also at the meeting were my Star Trek Meet-up buddies, the_real_adamj (who went to the kick-off with us last year) and KillRaven (whom we didn't actually know as a fellow Trek fan in 2006), plus about 40 others. KillRaven deserves extra kudos: he finished his novel last November!

Once again, we are supposed to produce about four typed pages daily to achieve the goal of a whole novel manuscript completed during November 2007. Wish me more luck than I had last year; at least this time I have no report cards to write in November!

Of the 400 or so Sydneysiders who attempted NaNoWriMo last year, about 40 supposedly achieved their goal. Not bad odds, I guess, although that may also mean that statistics say that only an average of four people at today's meeting will achieve their word count. (Or maybe all 40 were at today's meeting? Nah; wishful thinking.)

The concert was great, too, by the way. The finale was a medley of Peter Allen songs. "Tenterfield Saddler" gets me in the tear ducts every time! It really is one of those special Australian songs. If I could only capture some of that nostalgic emotion for my NaNoWriMo manuscript...

Sunday's magic number: 92.2 - back up again. I thought I was doing well, too. Damned fund-raising cake days. (What's that point about muscles having a heavier mass than fat?)

The counter halts...

Well, NaNoWriMo, the (Inter)National Novel Writing Month, finishes up in this timezone in a matter of minutes - and I've been what is best described as a dismal failure.

I have written a lot this month: school reports, book reviews, emails, blog entries, a report on my student teacher, but - on the first two days of November - only some small chunks of a new novel.

As I said at the beginning of November, procrastination is alive and well. I'd have been more successful growing a moustache for a different charity event, Movember. Nah, scratch that. My moustache is all-grey these days...

Oh well, I understand that for people whose other careers interfere too much in November, there's also JaNoWriMo, January Novel Writing Month. Ah, a second bite at the cherry! Wish me more success, and less procrastination.

My Sassy friends

In November 1993, I was invited by Selwa Anthony, literary agent extraordinaire, to attend an all-day seminar and gala dinner for her little band of authors, and soon-to-be-published authors, at the Novatel Hotel in Brighton-le-Sands. It was called "Succeed Some More in '94" (and was a follow-up to a very successful dinner the previous year, "Succeed With Me in '93", named for a book she'd just written with Jimmy Thomson).

At the time, I was deep into my proposal-and-sample-chapters for a book on the social history of the Aussie soap opera, Number 96, and the wonderfully encouraging Selwa was going to agent it for me. While that project did the rounds of the publishers - twice - and gathered a lovely collection of encouraging rejection slips, it was eventually seemingly accepted by Allen & Uwin (for two weeks) in 1995, who then declined to offer a contract on it after all. Sigh.

So, rather than try to self-publish the thing instead, I launched the briefest of details as a website and started working on some other book ideas. Despite the fact that, so far, I haven't earned Selwa any percentages, she keeps inviting me back. Yesterday was "Succeed, it's Heaven in 2007".

Selwa has faith in me that I'll eventually get my act together and complete something both literate and commercial! I did get an article published in a "Starlog" magazine for Star Trek: The Next Generation (an interview with actor Leonard John Crofoot, who played Data's little gold android offspring). Mind you, I have incorporated a lot of skills learned at "Succeed with Me" seminars into my daily life, and it's paid off in so many other ways than just financial and literary ones. There has been advice I've used to tighten my book reviews for Scan, improve my mental health and feng shui, lose many kilograms, and how to use visual clues to tell when people are telling the truth. I've also been part of Selwa's unique brand of networking, helping out numerous other authors with their various writing projects. And I knew all the right answers when being interviewed for my editing position at Scan.

From November 1995, when Selwa added her annual Sassy Awards to the night's entertainment, it really added some glitz and glamour to the nighttime activities. Ten or so trophies are given out each year, to Selwa's most successful authors or editors. (Feeling a bit like the ultimate phony, as Selwa's longest-attending "author" who's never actually earnt her any $$$$, I even received a Sassy myself, in 2000, for my "Positive Attitude", from that year's Sassy presenter, Harry M Miller.) Last night, Toni Lamond was back, along with Maria Venuti (this year's Sassy presenter), Jeanne Little, science fantasy author Ian Irvine, Jennifer Green, Barb Angell, Tara Moss... And so many more.

The most amazing thing about this year's seminar was the first sentence uttered in the first presentation. Helen Hope, an astrologer who has written 2007's twelve "Daily Horoscope" guides for Hinkler Books, asked for a show of hands as to who were the Sagittarians. Had we noticed that we Sagittarians seemed to have lost some of our magic in recent years? We all nodded "Yes".

It seems that yesterday, 25th November 2006, marked the return of Jupiter into the sign of Sagittarius! Pluto has been in Sagittarius since 1995, coincidentally(?) the year my "Number 96" book was rejected. Now, thanks to Jupiter, "a big year" is coming my way: one that "may forever see as crucial". My ruling planet of Jupiter returning is cause for great celebration - and Pluto's exit from Sagittarius makes 2007 "crunch time". (Notice how it ties in to my news a few days ago that I'm back in the school library next year?) Thanks Helen!

Time to kick in my "Positive Attitude" again - and finally redeem myself and earn that Sassy!

Ah, well, back to the manuscript...

Fast week

I realised yesterday it was a week since my last entry. Where did that week go?

Today, two TrekBBS pals, Jean Prouvaire and the_real_adamj, and I attended the Sydney Kick-Off Meeting for NaNoWriMo, the (Inter)National Novel Writing Month at Books Kinokuniya. There were about forty enthusiastic people there, many of whom were back for their second, third and fourth attempt in the annual endeavour. I think I may have been the eldest. (Sigh...)

It seems we each have to produce about four typed pages daily to achieve the goal of a novel manuscript completed during November 2006. Mmmm. It might have been a fast week, but I fear that November will be a slow month. Or perhaps not? Wish us luck!

Coincidentally, when Jean contacted me about the project, I'd just bought a very cool "imagination" blue turquentine gemstone bracelet from Dreamworld, while I was away on vacation. The green "success" adventurine gemstone necklace I once wore certainly worked: days after buying it, I found out I'd succeeded in getting a job as editor of a professional journal. (When the leather lanyard broke four years later, it was perhaps a harbinger that my highly-coveted job was about to end.) I pray that my new "imagination" bracelet lasts at least the month. A little extra imagination will come in handy. (Or do they resemble worry beads too much?)



Captain's Log: Supplemental. Curiously, a rival company with similar gemstone jewellery, associates blue turquentine with "success", not "imagination", and green adventurine with "fortune". I really don't care if I get imagination, success or fortune, just so long as the gems do their bit!