Camp NaNoWriMo in July: A Procrastiwriter’s Outlook

Somehow it’s Camp NaNo again – here comes a month of scrambling to finish that novel I thought I would finish two years ago! If you know anything about me (or my blog name, for that matter), you know that this writer is not nearly ready. No, I did not stay up at midnight to get a head start with a couple thousand words, and I am not reclining comfortably now with the knowledge that I have nothing left to do today.

Instead, I just may have startled awake at 5am with my lights on and a laptop still playing a YouTube video. And I’m about to go to leave for my library job now, where I get to stare at shelves of books that have already been written. I haven’t even announced my NaNo project on the nanowrimo.org website.

I’m not proud of my procrasti-writer status, but it sure has its moments of convenience.

5 Things to Do When You Could Be Writing

1. Trim your pet’s nails. Well, it has to be done!
2. Go back and watch through all of your favorite Youtuber’s daily uploads from five years ago.
3. Dust your ceiling fan. And when was the last time you organized the books on the top shelf? They would look really cool if they were organized by color!
4. Plan the vacation you’ve always wanted to take but can’t right now. You never know, maybe you could set your next book in Maui.
5. Sharpen all our pencils. When you do have the urge to write, you will be ready!

I’m not completely sure why I’m sharing this list on the first day of Juliwrimo (aka Camp NaNo in Jul). I’m supposed to encourage and fill with excitement both you and myself for the month ahead! If anything, perhaps it can illustrate how we can make up any ridiculous excuse not to write. So sit back for 15 minutes and write!!

Last Camp NaNoWriMo in April, I wrote and posted one quarantine-themed poem every day. This month, I’m focusing on my beloved novel in progress and writing the 40,000 words i will take to finish it. However, a little something to keep me accountable in my blogging: as always, I’ll be blogging every day this month, but in each day’s post, I’ll include a haiku about life as a writer. (Haiku = less time rhyming and more time for my novel!)

No writing today
Hey, I have the best excuse:
Cat on the keyboard.