NaNoWriMo Update

Well, NaNoWriMo is still going. I think today will be the first time (this is the third attempt) that I've completed five consecutive days. (I started a day early because the website where I'm posting my text started displaying a word a minute starting the first minute of the first day. If that made sense.)

Granted, I cheated a little--yesterday I was able to steal a few hundred words from the short story that I'm basing my novel on. Regardless, my novel is up to 8007 words now.

On a different note, I still have pictures from my last canyoneering trip sitting on a memory card. My camera died on that trip (my fault, I crawled through a crack with the camera case open and the camera tried to eat some sand). My laptop has a built-in card reader, but unfortunately Ubuntu can't or I don't know how to get it to recognize it. Although I like Ubuntu and the idea of a free operating system over Windows and all of Microsoft's dirty business tactics, I'm no zealot and don't mind saying that there are a few inconveniences that you have to put up with.

I COULD just buy a USB card reader, but I need to buy a new digital camera, which would negate the need for separate card reader. After looking at new cameras, I decided that I didn't want a new camera for two main reasons.

One, I can get a used one for a quarter of the price.

Two, at 3.2 megapixels, my old camera's pictures were plenty large and clear. If I got a new 8 or 10 MP camera, I would only gain the ability to blow my pictures up to GIANT poster-size instead of REGULAR poster-size, and each picture would take up three times the space on my harddrive.

Well, to be fair, with a new camera I'd probably get a little more zoom, and possibly slightly better video-taking abilities, but it's still not worth the extra price and increased filesize. Who knows. If I don't manage to win an Ebay auction in a few days, I might cave in and buy the new video recorder/camera I was looking for at Walmart.

Update: won the auction. Camera coming soon! When it does, I'll post pictures of the canyoneering trip.

NaNoWriMo Google Gadget

I create a Google Gadget for NaNoWriMo (an event where writers get together and try to write 50,000 words during the month of November.

Here's a screenshot:



If you want to add the NaNoWriMo Google Gadget to your Google homepage, click the button: