While living and working in Edinburgh in 2008 I set out to write one million words in 366 days... but only managed 800,737.

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Status Report: Week Twenty-Six

Week Twenty-Six – The Stats

Weekly Wordcount: 15,572 words

Average: 2,225 words per day (compared to 1,459 last week)

Most productive day: Saturday 28 June, 4,006 words

Least productive day: Wednesday 25 June, zero words

Year-to-date: 446,329 words (48,206 words behind target)

I plan to write a State of the Nation on Tuesday to commemorate reaching the halfway point of 2008, so today I’ll keep this brief.

Explanatory Notes:

1) The zero for Wednesday is due to a confluence of factors: I started training someone up at work that day, while still having to get through a swathe of my own work, which left me beat come five o’clock, then had to view a flat on the other side of town. When finally home and settled, watching Turkey vs Germany seemed a much more promising proposition that eking out a thousand words.

[Aside: I wanted to spell it “eeking”, but no, “eking” is correct (the gerund of “eke”). I must have been tainted by too much Eek! The Cat as a boy.]

2) The large slice attributed to poetry is due to a) procrastination (I had to two short story competitions to enter with deadlines of 30 June, so naturally, I couldn’t bring myself to work on short stories till the weekend), and b) a loose definition of poetry (writing a massive amount of words then trimming and trimming until something poetic emerges).

My writing bubble will be burst again next week when some Germans turn up on my doorstep and expect me to drive them around this fair nation.

It’s a hard life.

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