Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Didja Hear That?

That funny rumbling sound? I think it's the NaNoWriMo Typewriter Brigade starting to wake.

And lo, the literary world doth tremble, for a million monkeys were nigh upon the keys.

Who's starting to feel a little Brigade withdrawal? According to the calendar, we are forty days and nights away from the start... give or take a few hours depending on your local timezone. What are your plans for sacrificing free time, common sense, and personal hygiene in the name of massive amounts of terrible writing?

They cast down the backspace key. They rejected the false god of spell-check. They embraced their run-on sentences and comma splices unsullied by the hands of Strunk and White, and grammarians did weep at their passing.

The NaNo Powers That Be usually apply their scorched-earth policies to the forums at the end of September: this may be one of your last chances to read last year's threads here and here. Supposedly the new forum software is Bigger and Better and More Badass than years' past, but that remains to be seen. Will the Brigade continue to top the "Technology" forum? Will we continue to smack talk the AlphaSmart group? Will we attain the nexus of collective smug every time someone's laptop dies mid-novel? Oh yes, yes we will.

And thus there arose from the bowels of the forums a tremendous chatter, and there was talk of ribbons, and there was talk of onionskin, and there was talk of word count, and yea did the moderators quake at their advance, for the Typewriter Brigade had come home.

11 comments:

notagain said...

looking forward to it

Art said...

I'll be heading up the Mafia again this year.
For those of you without working typers, feel free to contact me via NaNo mail (@theanab)--we band together as outcasts of the Brigade.

maschinengeschrieben said...

I'm thinking about it too. 50'000 words is about 200 typewritten pages, right? I'm desperately thinking.

mpclemens said...

It's about 200 - 250 double spaced letter/A4 pages, yes. It does depend on the typeface, though. On pica machines, I average about 270 words per page. On "Olympia elite" 11 cpi machines, it's closer to 320.

Your best friend in NaNoWriMo is a last of easy correction. The manual typewriter is perfect for this. If you make a mistake, just keep typing forwards. I've rewritten whole sections mid-draft as needed. Word count is based on the honor system, and November is no time to become honorable. :-)

mpclemens said...

"lack of easy correction" that is. See, I'm already prepared!

Cameron said...

There are monkeys knocking at my door and scratching at the windows and for the life of me I cannot figure out why.

Duffy Moon said...

So let it be written.
So let it be done.
I'll be there for my now-annual butt kicking.

Anonymous said...

I can't wait, and there's no eloquent way to put that in all the excitement I have building up from this. Oh yes.

word verif: tocaspat
do with that what you will.

satchmotypes said...

I'm there and square. :)

(7th attempt...maybe I'll make it this year!)

D. Loon said...

The new forums are up!
http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/forums

D. Loon said...

Oh, I posted too soon - just found the group. Heheh, sorry.

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