what is this sunday of which you speak

-Still slower than I’d like with the Ungodly Mountain of Notes, although the scrollbar position seems to indicate that I’m maybe a 5th of the way through? Oh god.

-Buuuuut I had a dramatic revelation about where I wanted to take the Canterbury Tales whatever whatever frame story! It’s still not perfect—the last thing I need to figure out is how to keep the core of my fancy idea without it limiting the types of stories people can tell—but I am super excited!!! Also I still have some more decisions to make about the stories themselves, but I know at least one I should be able to start on pretty easily. And I can just keep skimming a list of Aarne-Thompson folktale types for even more plots/themes to steal. Holy shit you guys I think I might actually write a fanfic what is this witchcraft

-Might’ve accidentally started a few articles about specific elements of fakemon design, whoops. Stuff like choosing/creating types and abilities and moves. We’ll see?

-Also this week: The short and argument/failure-to-plan-ahead–filled history of the Generic Medieval Europe Sandwich; how do I city-states; more places and important people have names now yesssss; it’s gonna be a whole lot easier to be friends with tentacle manaphy now that I finally know what its name is and what it looks like~ (and also what its stats are hahahahaha sorry arceus except I’m not sorry at all, keep up with the times and go get a mega you loser)

A little late, but eh!

-Got enough additional junk/organization out of my head that I was finally able to start hacking my way through the Ungodly Mountain of Notes in earnest over the last few days. There were a looot of ideas and unanswered questions that were still locked up in the ol’ brainbox, apparently, and then those ended up spurring new ideas. Which is good! But yeah, it definitely delayed the real meat of this organization effort. Just for a bit of perspective on the Ungodly Mountain, that document in and of itself is over 51,000 words. I already have enough notes and questions and scattered ideas to fill a NaNovel just in that one document, which I’ve been adding to over the course of two+ years. And I’ve only just started digging into it as of, what, end of Friday? I thiiiiink it’s safe to say that I’ll make 50k pretty comfortably.* It is also pretty safe to say that I’ll be doing this forever oh god.

(*I’m not claiming that 50k words of idea organization is just as difficult as 50k words of something that is in at least the vague shape of actual prose, even if one is writing said prose hastily. It’s nowhere near as difficult as all the NaNos I did actually write proper stories for, that’s for sure. I probably shouldn’t even have bothered with the official site for such an egregiously non-regulation NaNo, but for whatever reason November seems to be the only time I can be even remotely productive when it comes to my writing work, and having the official wordcount stats and widgets and expected goals (and my garchomp!) helps keep me motivated. I’ve gotta find a way to work like this during the rest of the year. :/)

-The other reason I’m only just getting a solid start on the Ungodly Mountain of Notes is because I spent the first few days of the week writing parts of a scene from “Holding Out for a Hero” instead of what I was actually supposed to be doing. It’s not even a scene that’s likely to be in the story (it’s already going to be long enough without a prologue or extra flashback or whatever this is argh), but it has helped me clarify a few things, at least. Made a few of the characters’ previously baffling decisions more reasonable, gave me a bit more insight into the protagonist’s ~feelings~ about the whole biblical kaiju situation she’s dealing with, that sort of thing.

-Not much actual progress on the Canterbury Tales whatever whatever, although I think I am homing in on some solid starting points for at least a few of the short stories. Also toying with ideas for some additional protagonists for the frame story. I still don’t really know what the frame story is or why all these weirdos are sitting wherever they are yapping at each other, but I do know that these two are going to have a lot of fun getting on one another’s nerves as they go on their As Yet Undecided Story-Time Avoidance Adventure. And by “they’re going to have fun” I mean “I’m going to have fun, they’ll probably hate it, honestly.” And maybe they might solve a mystery or something, I dunno. That’s what teenagers do when you leave them alone for long enough, right?

-Also touched on this week: fancy religions centered around the Tao trio; lucky articuno feathers; shuckle wine; witchcraft; how to make fat stacks of cash with teleport. Also, let’s all be friends with tentacle manaphy~♪

Now I’mma just sit back and enjoy the mega garchomp in my sidebar, whee. 6220 words in one day! I don’t think I’ve ever written that much in one NaNo day, like, ever, even during the NaNos where I was behind and struggling to catch up. (I don’t actually know that, my memory is awful, but I’m pretty sure I always paced myself when I was behind and didn’t do more than ~5000 a day?) Chipping away at the Ungodly Mountain + barfing sudden ideas about legendaries onto the page does wonders for my progress, apparently.