Fall is my best writing season; this fall is no exception.

I've been writing like crazy all week. It's fall, I'm inspired, I've had a bit more free time than usual, etc.

I've been kinda down on myself for not writing more, or not writing more quickly. I have always been my own harshest critic.

Then I thought of something I was shocked I hadn't really considered before. How many pages of single-spaced Microsoft Word pages equal one book page? I was pleasantly surprised that the general consensus seems to think it's about 2 book pages per Microsoft Word page. I have 60 pages at present. So that would be approximately 120 book pages. I'm aiming to write something that's between 200-250 book pages (I'd originally been aiming for 300, but I think that would be overkill for this story). Which means I'm about halfway to my goal.

Halfway fucking through.

It doesn't feel like I'm that far along, but now just knowing that I actually am that far along makes me feel a renewed sense of optimism. It also makes me feel like I don't have to clutter the story up. I'd been worried that for my story to reach the amount of pages I'd originally wanted it to reach, I'd have to add more. Well, I like writing, but I don't like adding anything unnecessary--that'll take away from the story. I like keeping things succinct and concise. Knowing that I don't have as far to go as I originally thought I did to meet my "book pages" goal makes me absolutely ecstatic.

To add to the optimism, I was doing some research on the internet and came across an interview with an author whose books I don't even really like--but the interview offered up some extremely helpful tidbits of information both on her own publishing process and where to go to replicate some of the steps she took to get published. That whole "potentially getting published" thing brings a smile to my face.

That being said, I won't have anything to publish if I don't go ahead and finish what I'm writing. Aiming for 70 typed Word pages by the weekend's end. Can I do it...? :)