National Graphic Novel Writing Month, Day 11: Can you afford to get sick?
Day eleven. Are you ahead of where you thought you’d be? Or have you fallen behind?
It happens, you know. Some days, you’re sick and can’t write. Or you aren’t inspired. Or you’re stuck doing something that takes you away from they keyboard.
If you’re smart, you built in some cushion for your deadline– so with any luck, you’re a bit ahead and can take that emergency day. But if not– you’re in for a bad crunch at the end.
Ever wonder why so many stories fall apart at the end? Yes, in the words of William Goldman, endings are a bitch– but they aren’t often improved by doing it at a rush. And a lot of endings are simply that– rushed.
If you’re working in a bit of time, you have the chance to not only take a day off if you need to, you could spend that extra time going back and revising, cleaning up, and otherwise tweaking. And remember, there’s somebody next on the assembly line who can’t get started until you deliver pages– the artist. The sooner there’s a script to work on, the sooner he can get started– and if you can give him more time to do the job, he’ll deliver a better project– or at least, he’ll think better of you because you aren’t forcing him to rush as much.
Otherwise, you’ll be typing at 11:05 PM to hit a midnight deadline. And only an idiot would allow that to happen. See, right now, it’s only 11:03. Plenty of time to finis– ooh, who’s on The Daily Show tonight? Really? Okay, I’ll get started after that… after Colbert, for sure.
Remember: you can follow all the NaGraNoWriMo posts here!