I’m back from the dead! // ft. life updates, getting back to reading and taking part in NaNo!

Helloooo! Someone’s still alive here in this part of the blogosphere. Not that you would know, of course. Granted, I disappeared without forewarning, but there was a good reason.

SCHOOL STARTED!! Not really though, but I physically went to school after nearly 2 years of studying online (which, to put it bluntly, I’m sick of). It’s not regular school yet, we just had to go alternate days of the week to give our mid-term examinations, but hey, that’s a step forward right? I felt so exhilarated to finally see students milling about me (yeah milling, but in a social distanced type of way?) and to see the school buildings and the classes, which were like distant memories crouched in a corner of my mind until then. Anyway, in short, I had to go to school physically (for 7 whole days!) and I loved it. (correction. most of it. I’m not a fan of trying to recognise old friends and teachers when 80% of their faces are covered in masks. Especially when they recognised me and said hi. Panic mode on.)

So yeah, that was part of why I couldn’t really be active around the community. Even when I had some time, I couldn’t find the motivation to sit down and write a full post. The excitement of school and the stress of the examinations sucked my energy like bloodthirsty mosquitoes. Hence my absence (that must have left a gaping hole in the blogosphere right? right??) which I’m duly sorry for. But now I do have vacations for a week or so, I’ll definitely try to catch up.

I will be doing a combined october and november wrap later so you’ll know there anyway, but basically October was a TERRIBLE reading month, quantity-wise, for reasons aforementioned (my slump-y mood might have played a part too). I literally did not finish reading a single book for the first half of the month, it was only in the second half that I picked up pace and managed to read something.

BUT. November has started off really well, I already finished two books and I’m positive I’m on a good streak for this month atleast. Yay for that!

Now for the big news. I decided to take part in NaNoWriMo for the first time ever! For those of you who are not aware, this is sort of an annual thing where writers have to write 50000 words of their story in the 30 days of November.

Granted, I didn’t do nearly as much planning for my WIP as a lot of you writers out there, but I am not expecting much too, and that’s okay! I mean, I have made it pretty clear to myself that there’s no way I am going to get even close to 50K words by the end of November (I’ll be on cloud nine even if I get 5K done!) so this time I am just casually taking part and actually doing the outlining I should have done earlier. (I never realized I’ll actually have to pick NAMES for all those characters and places I had in mind) (who was the one who decided having names was a good idea instead of people calling each other “red haired girl” and “bald mustached man” like they do in my head??)

So anyway, I am using the official NaNoWriMo website so feel free to add me as a friend there! My username is ~Rachel~

And, that’s it for today friends! I am seriously so happy to be back, I can’t wait to interact with you all and stay tuned because I have lots of new content coming up!

Did you have a good reading month in October? Are you taking part in NaNoWriMo? Let’s chat in the comments!!

~Rachel