February 05, 2010
A Writer's Guide to Being Snowed-In
When news of an imminent snowstorm hits, ordinary people prepare. Some anxious awaiters visit the home & garden store to buy calcium chloride for the sidewalk. They gas up the snow blower and place the shovel within reach of the front door. Others head for the grocery store to stock their shelves with bread, bottled water, heat-and-serve soup, hot chocolate, and perhaps a little something to spike it with.
But we writers are not ordinary people. Rather than waste our time gathering sidewalk treatments and rushing for staples, we do something that feels perfectly natural to us. We rush TO Staples. Or Office Max or even Target -- whichever is nearest -- for all we need is a couple of packs of printer paper, some fresh ink cartridges, and maybe a new pen.
In preparation for the storm that's already upon us today, I also stopped at the library and the bookstore. It's only supposed to snow for 24 hours, but I checked out three books and purchased two, in hopes of reading and writing and reading some more. Oh, and I did pick up a staple I couldn't do without for 24 hours -- a pound of coffee at the bookstore cafe.
Let's face it, writers view a storm of any kind as a gift, a treat. For all those cancelations offer us that lump of time we haven't been able to whittle out of our schedules for the whole month of January.
How do you plan to spend the next 24 hours? Will you:
* Read for pleasure outside the genre you're currently writing (attempting to turn off that internal book critic)?
* Read to analyze what others in your field are writing?
* Catch up on some publishing news or scan a couple of how-to-hone-your-craft articles?
* Edit your manuscript or brainstorm a new plot?
* Do online research for your work-in-progress?
* Register for Fat Plum's Book Boot Camp? (Hint, hint...which brings me to my next point...)
* Work on social networking and self-promotion?
* Or will you write, write, write until your eyes go blurry and your fingers numb?
For me, the answer is clear and simple. I'm going to do all of the above and more. I might clean out my closet or wash all the sheets. And, oh yeah, I want to make a blueberry pie.
Happy snowstorm, writers! Enjoy!
Posted by Judy at 03:11 PM | Comments (13)