Yesterday, I reached my goal of 700,000 words written for 2019.

Wow.

Yeah, that kind of boggles me as well.

My original goal had been 750K. I kept pushing toward that, but never quite made it. The writing marathons helped me reach 700K. Without them, I would have written 600K for the year. (And you don’t know how difficult it was to not write “only” in that last sentence. However, there should never be an “only” when listing 600K words written for a year!)

I have two more writing days before the end of the year. I’m at 43K for the month. Don’t know if I’ll make 50K. Even if I don’t, I’ll be close.

That brings me to next year, 2020. I plan on writing the same amount of words next year, that is, 700K. That’s 50K a month, basically, to Nano every month.

I do not have any writing marathons planned for next year. I may end up doing one or two, I may not. So if I don’t have that to fall back on, I really need to be writing 50K a month. There is no catching up if I don’t have any marathons.

I’m not completely sure how I feel about that. A little anxious, TBH. Though my health is better, I can’t rely on it. Last week was not great. Not just because I came down with strep throat, but also because of PMS, I had several Meh days. Days when it was a struggle to write even 500 words.

Were the Meh days due to travel, not sleeping in my own bed, not eating as many veggies as I should, socializing too much? Yes to all of the above. So I’m hopeful that it was just an off week while I was traveling and that in January I won’t have a week of Meh. (Still haven’t had my period yet, and it no longer feels as though it’s going to start any day now. We’ll see what actually happens in January.)

Reaching 50K a month every month may be a stretch for me, without the writing marathons. But that’s my goal. I may end up figuring out how to do a writing marathon next year regardless. I do get so much done when I go on them, but they’re also expensive, and we’re trying to cut back on expenses in 2020.

And I think that’s it for this morning. I’m pleased with what I’ve accomplished, celebrating 700K, despite not reaching my original goal. I knew that original goal was ambitious. Maybe some year I’ll get there, but not next year. Not unless my health dramatically improves.

So what are you word count goals for 2020? Or do you not do word count, but project count instead?