Nanowrimo 2k10!

So, I may have made a questionable decision.



(This is the image that came up when I google image searched "questionable decision.")

 In fact, I KNOW I've made a questionable decision.

I signed up for NaNoWriMo.

Let's take a quick trip into a day in the life of Sara.

6:30am: Wake up. Feed animals, feed self, make lunch, clean litter box, wash dishes inevitably left over from last night's dinner, get dressed for work.

7:00  7:20am: Leave for work.  If it's a good day, I'm on time and I catch the train.  Train = reading, yay!  Or drive.  Driving = audiobooks, yay!

7:45am to 3:30pm: Day job with small children.

4:15: Arrive home.  Walk dog, pay attention to cats, catch up on email, start prepping dinner.

Then, things get interested.  If it's Monday, I'm off to the gym (ugh) for my hardcore rowing class.  Tuesdays means it's time to take the dog to school.  Wednesdays and Fridays means my second job, coaching swimming.

Oh yeah, we also just bought a house.  Did I mention that?

And now I've convinced myself that in the midst of all of this, I'm going to manage to pull 50,000 words out of thin air.

Sure.  Right.  No problem.

Riiiight.

I actually have completed NaNo twice: in 2003 and 2004, when I was in college.  I was pretty busy in college too--full course load, swim team, working two jobs.  But I also didn't have class until 10am and I used to take naps on an almost-daily basis.

But it feels important to do this.  Now, technically I'm cheating a little bit, since Nanowrimo is meant for people who are beginning a project on November 1st, and I'm in the middle of a novel.  But I say I'm only cheating a little bit, because I really only have the first part of my novel figured out, and I've written pretty much all of that, so what comes next is a big, foggy mystery.  So it's kind of like starting a new project because I'm moving into the phase of my story where I don't know what's going on.

To prep, I'm trying to plan out dinners and things for husband to make, so I'll have some more times in the evening to write.  I also went out and splurged on a whole bunch of new books, which I'll be reading along the way.  I find that reading books in my writing genre is v. helpful, and helps keep me in that epic fantasy mindset.  I purchased Erin Bow's Plain Kate, Leah Cypress's Mistwood, Cinda Williams Chima's  The Demon King, Janice Hardy's The Shifter and Diana Peterfreund's Rampant.  I'm currently reading Alison Goodman's Eon, and I have Tamora Pierce's Bloodhound and Ellen Jensen Abbott's Watersmeet on hand somewhere in TBR piles.

So.  That's me.

What about you?

Are any of you doing NaNoWrimo?

Do you have any other book suggestions for me?  My story is epic fantasy with a political plotline and a female protagonist, and that's what I'm looking to read right now.