Writing routine (3-b)

So....Assignment b this week - what's your routine? From start to finish, what do you do on an average session when you sit down and write. I'm not looking for a day - I'm looking for an average breakdown of a couple of hours. Lets see what you get up to!

I'm not so sure I have a set routine. This I do know: Having a 7-month-old baby who requires my arms around her to sleep adds one-handed typing and breast exposure to the mix. For now, anyway.

I always check my e-mail before I start to write. I used to read all of my new messages, too, until I finally admitted to myself that reading them all left me with no time to write. Now I just read the ones that either require immediate attention or are just too juicy to pass up! :-)

I always have a beverage at hand. If I write in the morning, it's hot, black coffee. Mid-day calls for a Diet Coke. Otherwise, a tumbler of ice-water sits at my right.

To write here in my blog, I sometimes read the other BC blogs first, but I usually try to give it a go on my own. I fear downgrading my own thoughts on a topic if I read someone else's point of view first. But so long as I have my drink to my right and my baby at my breast, I am blog ready.

When I go to write anything else, I research first. I research WAY too much. Instead of outlining something specific to write about and determining what I specifically need to learn about in order to write about it, I pick a topic and try to become an expert at it before I write a word.

You can guess how much time I waste in doing this.

When even I can't put off the writing any longer, I make sure all my research is at hand. I have my drink to my right, my favorite pens at hand, and my baby at my breast. (smile.) I open up Word. I open up my American-Heritage Dictionary software and WordMenu.

Then I try to write.

Unlike Heather, I don't write in bursts. I write slowly and painstakingly. I type a word or a phrase, and then check my notes for accuracy. I reword, rephrase and reposition, paragraph by paragraph. It's a very slow and almost painful process. I think I put off the writing for so long because it takes me so damn long to write anything.

Anything not of a personal nature, that is.

I don't write for a set amount of time. I write (my form of it, anyway) until I'm forced to stop because I need to do something else, like get juice for the 3yo, or start dinner, or, as is the case right now, find a bill that dh wants me to find and pay RIGHT NOW even though it's Sunday and it's not going anywhere until tomorrow.

So I guess my entry for today is done.