This week has been all about getting back into routine (where last week was all about playing catch up). I’ve started a new thing where I get up at 6 am to get my full 45-50 minute workout in before work, and have so far managed that 3 days straight–which is something of a minor miracle. It helps that my stationary bike is my reading time and right now I am in the middle of Meljean Brook’s The Iron Duke which is effing fabulous. So that extra pull to know what happens next (I’m not allowed to touch it unless I’m on the bike), actually helps me haul my sleepy butt out of bed. Proof that I need to have REALLY GOOD BOOKS for exercise.
Part of this change in routine is to give me more writing time at lunch or to make room for a round of weights or yoga during the stretch that would usually be devoted to boxing. So far this hasn’t happened, as I’ve had lunch dates both Monday and Tuesday. But I have hopes for today. The extra long morning workout is enough of a schedule change this week, so I’ll save the weights or yoga to start next week, I think. Because just now, even thinking about them makes me want to fall back into bed and hit the Super Snooze.
On the writing front I’ve been taking a lot of walks down memory lane in the last week. I’ve been revisiting and thinking about assorted abandoned WIPs from my romantic suspense days. That has somewhat interfered with actual production on my current WIPs, but I wouldn’t say it’s wasted time. I have a deeper and different understanding of plot and structure now than I did when I was writing them, so I’ve been making notes about things to fix in the ones I’d like to pick back up at some point. So from a long-term standpoint, that’s productive.
I really need to be splitting my time between Red and my anthology story (due Feb. 22nd). So far that hasn’t happened either. I got my first scene written for the latter, but my attempts to move forward from there have been miserable failures (not helped in the least by my recent obsessive research on gluten intolerance and gluten free eating for hubby). I still need to do the GMC work for the characters in that story. And I will this weekend, or perhaps Thursday and Friday, as it’s hubby’s short week at work, so I won’t get as much writing done. But I do know what happens next and have the dialogue roughed out for that scene.
On Red I’ve written 1238 words and FINALLY figured out why Sawyer was giving me crap about the scene I was on. Because he totally wouldn’t have gone home at that point as he was in the middle of an epic brood. Teenage boys, I am discovering, or at least this one, are very prone to those. A large chunk of that scene is now in brackets, but the gist is there and I can move forward with the sequence that’s really been playing on a loop in my head the last several days.
And other than that, it’s serious productivity at the Evil Day Job. LOTS of stuff due February first, so it’s a busy week that doesn’t leave much time for me to squeeze in other stuff. Which means I’m totally late. Again. Later!
4 thoughts on “ROW80 Check-In and Getting Back To Routine”
My next plan is to get the exercise routine back. I stopped going to the gym when during my last pregnancy but that baby is 6 months old now so I’m kinda out of excuses. I enjoy the exercise, I just hate going outside in the rain. 🙂
Good luck with the anthology story and broody teenage boys!
Congrats on the exercise routine! I’m so impressed. If I ever have to resort to getting up at 6 a.m. to get my workout in…omg the universe will RUE the day it forces me to do that.
I keep contemplating getting up and doing my exercise early instead of after work. Notice I said “contemplating”. Instead of reading (because the movement kind of makes my eyes feel wonky on the page), I’ve been watching episodes of “Angel” on my portable DVD player. I think it’s great that you have enough discipline to get up earlier to do it when it’s so much easier just to lie in bed and say “forget it”.
Do you write down your priorities, like “finish anthology story”, “write a scene in Red”, or that kind of thing? I know you’re really organized, but I wasn’t sure how far you went with that when it came to listing things.
Um…I’m one of those people who will even add things I have already done to the list, just so I can cross it off. So yeah, I totally have all this stuff in my planner on my phone (I use the Intuition app for iPhone to organize my life). In excruciating detail because the more steps I can list, the more stuff I get to cross off. Don’t judge. I’ll take whatever positive reinforcement I can get. 😀