#721 mini

[phoenixkratos]

Home from Summer Camp

So I finished Camp NaNo this Sunday! Coming up with three or four different ideas per day was a lot more work than I thought it'd be, although I don't doubt someone less scatterbrained and lazy would've had an easier time of it. Still, a whole one hundred new drabbles! Erm, well, maybe it's more like ninety-nine because one of the ones I wrote is going to replace an existing one (although I think the new one only takes it from "no one but me has any idea what's going on" to "I think some people other than me will have some idea what's going on but oops now it's kind of slightly extremely unsettling and I dunno how I feel about that"). And two of the properly new ones are actually going to end up replaced with edited versions of older drabbles I wrote for something else. So... ninety-seven... ish? I definitely wrote 10,000 words, anyway!

Full list + semi-reflective rambling under the cut:

Bulbasaur, Squirtle, Pidgey, Ekans, Nidoqueen, Nidoran M, Clefairy, Jigglypuff, Meowth, Golduck, Primeape, Growlithe, Alakazam, Machamp, Dodrio, Gastly, Haunter, Onix, Cubone, Kangaskhan, Mr. Mime, Magikarp, Eevee, Hoothoot, Noctowl, Pichu, Girafarig, Scizor, Remoraid, Houndour, Houndoom, Kingdra, Donphan, Smeargle, Ho-Oh, Beautifly, Wingull, Ralts, Slaking, Whismur, Exploud, Skitty, Electrike, Gulpin, Camerupt, Spoink, Flygon, Swablu, Wynaut, Spheal, Walrein, Monferno, Burmy, Cherrim, Drifloon, Lopunny, Stunky, Bronzong, Bonsly, Spiritomb, Munchlax, Lucario, Electivire, Yanmega, Arceus, Emboar, Watchog, Stoutland, Pansage, Pansear, Panpour, Darumaka, Garbodor, Vanillite, Vanillish, Vanilluxe, Karrablast, Jellicent, Galvantula, Axew, Haxorus, Golurk, Bouffalant, Rufflet, Braviary, Kyurem, Bunnelby, Diggersby, Swirlix, Heliolisk, Tyrantrum, Dedenne, Trevenant, Pumpkaboo, Litten, Charjabug, Rockruff, Cutiefly, Mimikyu, Bounsweet

Cubone is the one that's replacing an existing drabble; kangaskhan and emboar are new but will be replaced with other, older stories I like better. I... actually don't like how a lot of these turned out, haha, although as I only have the two "spare drabbles" to fudge in here I guess I've gotta fix the rest the old-fashioned way. :V

Dissatisfied or no, I think this is actually the first time I've ever ended a NaNo with a completed draft (such as it is for an ongoing collection of drabbles). I've hit my word goal every year save the first, but those fifty thousand words (or twenty thousand this past April) never went from the beginning to the end of the fic or project or whatever. It's usually more like it somehow takes me fifty thousand words to get through, like, five chapters' worth of story. This time all of the stories are actually complete, and I can even post some of them! Not all of them—like I said, I'm not happy with quite a few, and some of them are Gen VII so oops spoilers—but some of them will probably go up on Altered Origin soonish. :D

I'm not really sure why I was initially under the impression that all of them would be postable right after I was done, though. Yeah, fewer words to worry about per day, a different format from all my other NaNos, but... it's still NaNo, self? Of course most of them are going to be terrible. It doesn't help that I'm still not very good at telling really effective stories in so small a space. The fact that half(?) of them are decent as they are, or at least close-enough-to-decent-if-you-squint as they are that I don't mind putting them up and hoping someone can offer some critique, is probably a small miracle.

Regardless! Things Were Accomplished! I can really appreciate how restricting myself to one hundred words makes me aware of passive voice and waffling and over-explaining that doesn't need to be in my longer stories, either! And I'm 100-ish drabbles closer to being... done? Criminy, I'm not even at 200 yet, and we're only going to have 721 total for a few months longer. Still, it's one hundred more pokémon that I have at least a baseline for, and isn't ending the month with more than you started with the point of the whole thing? I can only hope that I can maintain even a fraction of this momentum going forward. (Spoilers: ahahahahahaha, no.)

So now all that's left is combing through the list again and deciding which ones I can queue up for AO. Maybe now that this is done I can finally pay more attention to the text adventure idea that's been nagging me for a while. Not gonna be able to enter it into the game jam I was hoping to shoot for, but it's callin' to me, man. (No promises about that, either.)

[phoenixkratos]

in other news, Halfway through Camp NaNo

This month, rather than writing all/part of a longer piece of fiction, I’m trying to make some serious headway on my 721 mini drabble project. You know, before it becomes “871 mini” or however many we end up with this November. Right now my goal is 100 drabbles—unfortunately that’s still going to leave me under 200 total by the end of the year, so I’ll still have a ways to go—and I’m about halfway there.

-I only need to write 300 or 400 words per day, but coming up with three distinct, self-contained ideas per day is pretty hard for me! Especially when I’m distracted by a bunch of other things... I’ve been behind on a few days here or there, and then I’ve had to write six+ separate stories in a day. Ouch. I dunno that I’m gonna try this again in the future, although on the other hand it is making the “one per day all year” that I keep telling myself I want to do look a lot more reasonable. Maybe I’ll actually be able to keep that up after camp ends. (I’m not holding my breath.)

-Technically I shouldn’t be writing any drabbles for SuMo pokémon yet but oops now there are three of those. Ah, well, they’ll just get posted later than the others.

-I’m pretty sure almost all of these are some flavor of awful and I may not post them all right away. :D On the other hand, terrible or not, I’m rather proud of the nonsense I was able to pull off for jigglypuff, bouffalant, lucario and rufflet/braviary. Dedenne’s is probably awkward, but I guess at least it let me vent about how dedenne is The Worst Fairy. Dodrio’s is probably also awkward, but imo the concept was clever and will hopefully be good with some tweaking. I think drifloon’s turned out pretty sweet, and bronzong’s is kinda interesting. And cutiefly’s is great because gratuitous bad poetry.

-I could post (some of) them here if anyone is curious, although I’m too lazy to do so without being prompted. All the serviceable ones will be up on Altered Origin shortly after the end of the month anyway!

-Also, I’m always up for suggestions! (Including Gen 7 pokémon if you want me to try those, granted that we don’t know much about them yet!) Can’t guarantee that I’ll get to them during camp or that anything you suggest beyond the species will make it into the finished drabble—dedenne was a suggestion, and the resulting story had jack squat to do with the initial context I was given—but obviously I need to do every pokémon sooner or later, so I don’t mind other people suggesting priorities!