Do the Math:

[writingvixen.livejournal.com]

Just did the math:

November: 721 hours
Sleep: 240 hours
------
Leaving: 481 hours

So:

November: 481 hours
Eating/Hygiene: 45 hours
------
Leaving: 436 hours

So:

November: 436 hours
Work/School: 160 hours
------
Leaving: 276 hours

So:

November: 276 hours
Life: 36 hours
------
Leaving: 240 hours

So:

November: 240 hours

What are you going to do with those 240 hours? That's 8 hours* a day. You can use those to figure out how he met his mother, to play on the computer, obsess over your glitch, or farmville.

Or:

You could write a novel.

I choose plan B. How about you?

*On average. Again, it's different for everyone, but still it's jarring just how much time we really DO have when you break it down.

Comments

[hodisemajani.livejournal.com]

GLITCH! Duh! (JK...although)

[garnigal.livejournal.com]

I got more like 220 hours for work/communting (22 days x 9 hours a day). Canadian, so no Thanksgiving :(

That puts me at 180 hours, or 278 words per hour.

[writingvixen.livejournal.com]

I did an average of a 40 hour work week for 4 weeks. So there might be some approximations that aren't perfect, but still 278 words per hour! You can do this thing! I don't even know how many words this has, but I'm sure it's closer to 50 and I'm not even spending a minute on it :D You'll get 'er done! Actually 64! Whoo! (Now 67)

[meketserqet.livejournal.com]

ugh, i feel you on the commuting, i'm at about 10.5 - 11 hours a day with my commuting tacked on.

at least theres one stat holiday to break the month up a little (yay Canada!).

[garnigal.livejournal.com]

You must be not in Ontario. We don't get Remembrance Day, we're just supposed to be all maudlin and thoughtful about the past generations sacrifice on our own time. :)

[meketserqet.livejournal.com]

whaaaaaaaaaaaaat? seriously? no, i'm in BC, we're encouraged to go to one of the provincial celebrations and stuff... though most of us just sleep in. *shame*

[luxurious.livejournal.com]

Ontario doesn't get Remembrance Day?? Boooooo!!!! I'm in Alberta, so like meketserqet we're encouraged to go to provincial celebrations, too (even if it is snowing and below zero like it is now). Do you guys get Daylight Savings Time? Ours is this Sunday. An hour is something I 'spose! :)

[meketserqet.livejournal.com]

eeek DST! holy wow, totally forgot about that. thanks for the reminder!

[gtodt.livejournal.com]

inspired!

[writingvixen.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to hear it!

[meketserqet.livejournal.com]

i tried this out for giggles, approximating my own numbers... and hey, look at that! 6 hours a day! most of that is weekend time, really, because unless i'm bending time and space i'm not getting those 6 hours in after work, but... it's really encouraging! and makes the whole process seem considerably less intimidating :D

[writingvixen.livejournal.com]

Exactly! When we break down what we have to do, we're often surprised with just how much time remains! We just have to make a choice on what we want to do with it :)

[meketserqet.livejournal.com]

We just have to make a choice on what we want to do with it :)

and remind ourselves that the choice should not be "VIDEO GAMES!" or "CRAPPY MOVIE MARATHON" or "STARE BLANKLY AT THE WALL"!! *laughs*

though the latter is how i spend most of Nano anyway...

[writingvixen.livejournal.com]

Me? It's mainly 'organizing' things that don't need organized but I convince myself that NEED TO BE DONE AT THAT EXACT MOMENT.

Sigh.

[meketserqet.livejournal.com]

ooooh yes, the organizing.

last year i went digging in my many folders of MP3s for a particular song that, for some reason, i HAD TO LISTEN TO for one certain scene.

five hours or so later i was done reorganizing my entire collection of MP3s, as well as editing all of the ID3 tags.

and i never did find that song.

[zarkia.livejournal.com]

This is such a cool way of breaking it down. I'd broken it into pages (at an average of 250 words per page) and this really helps me see how many pages I have to write per hour. Thank you.

[pinkphoenix1985.livejournal.com]

Plan B with RL thrown in of course ;)

[romani-blood.livejournal.com]

Plan B, mixed with RL and a bit of Diablo 3. ;)

[femme-slash-fan.livejournal.com]

Plan B with added Dr Who!

[lorataprose.livejournal.com]

I tell people who are starting NaNoWriMo to take the week before and mark down all the time they spend doing things that aren't absolutely essential. Unless they have small children, it's almost always a surprisingly large amount of time. That's your point of no return; after that, any other reasons are nothing but excuses. ;)

[ohfiyera.livejournal.com]

721 hours in November.
I require about 8 hours of sleep per night to function normally, so 240 hours of sleep is pretty accurate.

That leaves 481 hours.

I estimate my eating/hygiene to take about 1 hour per day (taking into consideration that I do not waste time cooking meals during November)

451 hours.

I work 50 hours per week.

230 hours (approx) remaining

I have class 10 hours a week.

190 hours remaining.

Homework?

150 hours remaining.

I spend 2 hours in commute to work and class each day.

90 hours remain.

555 words per free hour or I have to start sacrificing sleep.

Yeah, I can still do it. Somehow...

[mutive.livejournal.com]

That's not undoable, but it is difficult. 555 w/hr. is <10 wpm. I'd be surprised if you type less quickly than 30 wpm.

(Of course, the challenge is using all 90 hours for writing.)

[mutive.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking it more in terms of hours free.

On my average week day, I have about an hour of writing in the morning + 1 in the evening. This first week isn't going to have that (thanks to a house guest + a trip), but we'll see what I can get in despite the disruption. There's also Thanksgiving, which is going to scrub at least a few days from my life.

Still, let's say that I have 3 weeks of writing to get a novel done in, at 2 hours a day...

That brings me to needing to write about 1,200 words an hour. Which is a fair amount, but not undoable. It works out to 20 wpm, and I type around 100 wpm. So I've got a fair amount of distance between my hands typing and my brain producing output.

Of course, this does mean that I will need to work at writing for 2 hours every day, three weeks out of the month. (That I can't just fiddle around with Facebook during that time.) But I got ~1,700 words done this morning (in an hour), so I'm quite sure I'm capable of it. (And maybe be able to squeeze in three or so hours on the weekends.)