Oh, yes, November will be intense.

I know, I know. I've heard all the objections and whining about NaNoWriMo. If you are one of the NaNo wowsers (a great word that I only learned after coming to Australia), I suppose you are performing a useful service for those who traffic in outrage. Me, I love NaNo. I love the camaraderie and the productivity and the buzz and the spirit of fun. Because, at its heart, it's a game. A fun, encouraging, energizing game.

This year, in fact, I'm deliberately breaking the rules of NaNoWriMo, in that I will be adding words to an existing work, rather than starting a new project. And for you NaNo rule heavies, well, I stick my tongue out at you, too. (To show just how much, or how little, the rules matter in this good-natured game, there's an "official" term for people like me: NaNo rebels.)

I look forward to the encouragement of my Egoboo buddies, and I look forward to getting a very large percentage of my novel-in-progress drafted, or at least raking together a big pile of word-leaves to jump in and scatter. (Ah, what you Australians miss, growing up amid a tragic paucity of deciduous trees.) And I especially look forward to the chance to cheer my buddies on, on, on! On to glory! On to victory! On to transcendent states of mind where the words flow like the Zambezi over the Victoria Falls!