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writing journey (✨blog✨)
chapter+word counter updates! 🏔️
in a shocking (SHOCKING) turn of events, i have yet again extended snow globe, and, as it turns out, i wrote 29,134 total words within 13 days (across a span of 133 days)… including writing 11,987 of those words solely on june 6th.
in a shocking (SHOCKING) turn of events, i have yet again extended snow globe, and, as it turns out, i wrote 29,134 total words within 13 days (across a span of 133 days)… including writing 11,987 of those words solely on june 6th.
written june 8, 2024 @ 7:03am
hello again, my lovelies!
i had much more time than i thought i would this morning, so i took it as a chance to update all of my word counters! 💕 it’s really inspiring to see all this quantitative data about the work i have put into my projects (dissertation, fanfic, book!), and it’s a really powerful reset for me that makes me more excited to keep writing!
some of you may have already seen my freakout on tumblr two days ago (lol), but i had a SIGNIFICANT writing boom on June 6th (and the few days leading up to it, tbh), which resulted in a chapter update!!! yay!!
this post contains the following:
🏔️ chapter update! | snow globe
🎉 word count updates! | 29,134 words written since january 26th 2024, 171,964 total words since august 1st, 2023
chapter update! | snow globe
to absolutely no one’s surprise, this two-shot three-shot story is now a multi-chaptered fic with four six parts.
On July 1st, the lonely house at the top of the mountain was finally sold.
— In which Jack(son) Overland tries his best to befriend his neighbor, one woodworking project at a time. { neighbors-to-lovers!fic, modern-mountain-living!au }
Prompt from @aicosu: Three-word sentences: "Just say it."
ao3 ❆
part i: bushwhacking grandma (13,282 words | aug. 4, 2023)
part ii: barnyard peasant (11,550 words | dec. 20, 2023)
part iii: Scandinavian woodworking techniques (13,163 words | jan. 6, 2024)
part iv: cinnamon rolls (9,740 words | jan. 27, 2024)
part v: friendship rule #1 (25,991 words | jun., 6, 2024)
part vi: [coming… later!]
an observation (from january 2024). i’ve never wrote a fic in which the characters are experiencing time more or less the same way i am as the author (i.e., part i is set and written in july/august and published in august; part ii is written during fall and early winter, then published in december; part iii is written during christmastime and then published right after the new year… who knows what will happen with part iv 👀).
update (from today, june 8, 2024): so, i wasn’t quite able to get the chapters completely aligned! part v ends on april 30th, while in reality it’s june 7th. i fear there may also be a bit of a lag with part vi, but… close enough!
word counter updates!
between january 26th and june 6th, there were 120 days (out of 133 days: 90.23%) in which 0 words were written, meaning that Kris wrote fanfiction on only 13 days (9.77%) out of 133 days total.
starting by writing 873 words on january 26th (the day before part iv was released), the draft for part v (and part vi, eventually) grew to 29,134 total words written by june 6th (133 days later).
left side of the graph:
1,216 of these words (4.17%) were written between january 26th and may 19th (3 months, 23 days), averaging 10.67 words per day during the spring semester.
right side of the graph:
27,223 (96.33%) of those words were written between may 20th and june 6th (17 days; but i wrote only on 11 of those days), averaging 1,512 words per day.
the most words written on any given day was 11,987 words on june 6th.
words written in may: 12,673 (averaging 1,056 per day).
words written in june (so far): 16,461 (averaging 2,744 per day).
click the image to visit the official word counter!
since august 1, 2023, as of june 7, 2024 (10 months and 6 days), i have written 111,681 words of fanfiction.
(64.9%) fandom:
111,681 words
dropped 15.23% from 80.13% (in january)
(32.4%) dissertation study:
55,634 words
(total resulting wordcount; does not include re-writes and words eventually left in the scrap doc)
(does not include emails, grant applications, grading student papers/peer review/peer feedback, slide decks, or data coding and data analysis. 😂🫠); written from december ‘23 to april ‘24, not including countless countless countless re-writes!
increased 15.98% from 16.42% (in january)
(2.99%) non-fiction/dissertation book:
5,149 words
dropped by 0.46% from 3.45% (in january)
reflections on timing…
fall 2023 was a time of data coding, data analysis, transcription, data cleaning, data annotation, peer feedback/review, grading student papers, and many many grant applications (money!!!!!!)
spring 2024 was, INDEED, a full-throttle academic writing semester!! all my heaviest deadlines for career-related goals and benchmarks were january, february, and march... 💪🥲 and the dissertation proposal defense was in april!!
let’s take a look at my breaks, shall we?
between december 20th and january 5th (16 days), i wrote 37,074 words of fanfiction, averaging 2,317 per day! 😭🙏
between may 20th and june 6th (17 days, including the 6 days in that time period in which i did not write anything at all), i wrote 27,223 words of fanfiction, averaging 1,512 per day.
thank you!
if you’ve made it to the end of this post—thank you! 🥹 calculating and sharing these data gives me such a powerful feeling and reminds me that i very much can, indeed, do hard things (AND I DO THEM OFTEN lol 💕). it’s inspiring to see quant data like this!!
after tallying up all of the word counts in the charts and making the graphs, it’s so easy for me to see patterns and trends in my writing habits—often in ways that would not be possible with self-reflection alone. 🥰 here’s to a rich, full, productive summer!
thanks again, all, and happy writing!
she who will probably focus on her dissertation study for the next few days and wishes everyone many happy and fruitful writing sessions,
kris✨
i have finally opened up my dissertation document (and my non-fic book scrivener file) and must return to the Land of Academia
i know i said in my last post (on jan. 2nd—FOUR days ago) that i was going to go back to work, but then i accidentally wrote another 15,233 words of fanfiction, so. (i mean it, this time.) back to my other passion project!!!!
i know i said in my last post (on jan. 2nd—FOUR days ago) that i was going to go back to work, but then i accidentally wrote another 15,233 words of fanfiction, so. (i mean it, this time.) back to my other passion project!!!!
written january 6, 2024 @ 10:35pm
this post contains the following:
chapter update! | snow globe
milestone! | 100k words written since august 1, 2023
back to the phd grind (for real this time) + goals
before i delve into the “kris is actually working on her doctoral dissertation/master’s thesis paper for her second master’s degree/prep for dissertation proposal defense” topics, here are a final few updates to wrap up the winter break (i.e., fandom extravaganza):
chapter update! | snow globe
to absolutely no one’s surprise, this two-shot three-shot story is now a multi-chaptered fic with four parts.
On July 1st, the lonely house at the top of the mountain was finally sold.
— In which Jack(son) Overland tries his best to befriend his neighbor, one woodworking project at a time. { neighbors-to-lovers!fic, modern-mountain-living!au }
Prompt from @aicosu: Three-word sentences: "Just say it."
ao3 ❆
part i: bushwhacking grandma (13,282 words | aug. 4, 2023)
part ii: barnyard peasant (11,550 words | dec. 20, 2023)
part iii: Scandinavian woodworking techniques (13,163 words | jan. 6, 2024)
part iv: [coming… later!]
thank you! for all of your beautiful comments, replies, reactions on both of the new chapters! 😭🙏
an observation. i’ve never wrote a fic in which the characters are experiencing time more or less the same way i am as the author (i.e., part i is set and written in july/august and published in august; part ii is written during fall and early winter, then published in december; part iii is written during christmastime and then published right after the new year… who knows what will happen with part iv 👀).
milestone! | 100k+ words
click the image to visit the official word counter!
on january 5, 2023, i hit 100k+ words written since august 1, 2023! (5ish months)
(80.13%) fandom: 80,264 words
(16.42%) dissertation study: 16,448 words (does not include emails, grant applications, grading student papers/peer review/peer feedback, slide decks, or data coding and data analysis. 😂🫠)
(3.45%) non-fiction/dissertation book: 3,454 words
fall 2023 was a time of data coding, data analysis, transcription, data cleaning, data annotation, peer feedback/review, grading student papers, and many many grant applications (money!!!!!!)
spring 2024 will be a full-throttle academic writing semester!! all my heaviest deadlines for career-related goals and benchmarks are january, february, and march... 💪🥲
between december 20th and january 5th (16 days), i wrote 37,074 words of fanfiction! 😭🙏
(in other words... of all of my fanfiction writing since august 1st... i wrote 46% of those words in the past two-ish weeks during my winter "break" 😅) CLEARLY, I WAS CRAVING CREATIVE OUTLETS for something squishier and freer than my rigidly structured academic register! and now i've left it all on the internet-table lmao and it is time to return to my ✨Professional Voice ✨
(to be fair, another 48% of fandom writing was completed in august, in the final weeks leading up to the fall semester 😂 the other meager 6% remaining percent was scattered throughout the hectic fall semester—to no one's surprise!)
TO THE DISSERTATION/BOOK, WE GO
back to the phd grind (for real, this time) + goals
here are the things that i must complete by the end of march (though not necessarily in this particular order! 😂):
master’s thesis (#2/in passing): finish final revisions on my (second!) master’s thesis then send it to my advisor for final feedback (if applicable) and approval, so that i can apply to graduate for my (second!!!) master’s degree for this spring
prep hiring ad for potential research assistants so i can find my RA for the spring semester (last semester my RA was soo good and i got so spoiled, gah).
write 1-pager invitation letters to my potential academic committee members asking them to serve on my dissertation committee, and send the letters to my advisor for feedback, approval, so she may send them to the committee invitees on my behalf and Cc me. (🤞 and hopefully they have the time and availability to accept! otherwise i have plans b and c, sigh.)
prepare slide decks for my dissertation defense proposal and rehearse the hell out of it.
schedule said proposal defense/oral exam
update my docs for the ethics board re: data collection updates for round two of data collection.
prepare and rehearse for conference presentation: present my preliminary findings at the Big Conference (which includes making sure i got all my grant money!!)
pick which damn algorithm i will use for my cluster analysis
update non-fiction book along the way based on master’s thesis and dissertation study and everything else that cannot fit in an academic paper or journal article
and then later:
prep manuscript for journal article based on the master’s thesis paper once it’s published in the repository and
publish a few mainstream articles for general audiences as well, to share some findings with the rest of the world and potentially generate some concrete interest for publisher connections about the ✨need✨ for my book 👀
collect new data, transcribe new data, code new data, analyze new data, and write about it 😂😅 / dissertation
and i shall do all of these things while teaching two courses at two different institutions and writing letters of recommendation for my students and writing more grant proposals and doing other university responsibilities
and life! 😂😂😂
thank you for reading and following me on this journey!
i hope everyone’s januarys are off to smooth starts 💖💖💖🙏🙏🙏🙏 i’ll still be on and off tumblr over the next few months, but already i can feel the dissertation-dopamine cravings entering my bloodstream, i.e., suffering but being really happy about it 😉💖
thanks again, all, and happy writing!
she who has actually returned to work-work for real this time and has her diss!doc sitting open and ✨updated✨ in a browser tab,
kris✨
a tumblr miracle?? + we love data✨
a tumblr account (and a multi-chap WIP fic) rises from the sand dunes.
silver lining of tumblr deleting all my data —> opportunity to collect my own (✨fancier✨) data (but also tumblr restored my data?????)
TUMBLR RESTORATION??
first and foremost, in an unexpected twist of fate: tumblr emailed me yesterday and declared that my account was restored!!! behold!!
@therentyoupay
of course, i am ecstatic and grateful beyond all measure.
of course, i trust tumblr 0%.
a good reminder, i think, to put your eggs in multiple basket-websites. 🥲🥲🥲🤞 i will continue to use my tumblr account for community, but i will still gradually move my fic, my fic fanart, and other important keepsakes here. with all the social media sites imploding right now… WHO KNOWS.
but i have always been inspired by my favorite early 2000s fic authors who created their own websites (e.g., http://forthwrites.com/) to house their fanfics and, eventually, to share news and sales of their original fic. ✨✨
WORD COUNTER & PRODUCTIVITY TRACKER
plus, i am really sinking into some of the opportunities that squarespace has to offer… LIKE GRAPHS.
also, as i mentioned in my previous post (🌊 beach day = mermaid!au writing session??), i did, indeed, END UP MAKING A WRITING TRACKER for this year, based on the record-breaking year i had in ✨2015✨. thank goodness that post was not lost to the abyss forever.
check out my 2023-2024 word count tracker!! link above on the navi bar ♡
part of me very badly wanted to make some fancy ones in python, but i have learned through experience that squarespace often can’t handle many embedded code bits at once. besides, it’s a nice accountability check-in to come to the website each day and update the graph directly!!!!!
MULTI-CHAP WIP RISES FROM THE WAVES
on that note, GUESS WHAT I FINISHED YESTERDAY
CORRECT
my eternal summertime sadness fic has risen from the sand
the waves
the cape cod ROCKS AND DUNES
i am finally in the FINAL STAGES OF EDITING AND PROOFREADING ✨ update and COMPLETION coming to ao3 soon!!!
BANNERSSSS
i also made this banner (above) when my tumblr account was trapped in the void and i couldn’t find the fic fanart i usually used for chapter updates! 🥲 (i found it now!!)
i really would love to make a banner for each of my stories, but at this point, i just need to be writing them first, not just playing with banners 😂😂😂 i will only make one once i update that fic, THAT WILL BE MY PLAN.
thank you all for visiting and periodically checking out the new changes to this site!! it (1) protects my work from two-thirds of my life omg but also (2) allows for a fun creative outlet (and organizational outlet lbr) that scratches a part of my brain not already being satisfied from writing fic and writing my dissertation!! ✨ we love a happy brain-scratch trifecta
happy writing, all! 💕
in a shocking (SHOCKING) turn of events, i have yet again extended snow globe, and, as it turns out, i wrote 29,134 total words within 13 days (across a span of 133 days)… including writing 11,987 of those words solely on june 6th.