Writing without the Internet!

So, we have not had the internet for about 5 months, until today. It was a bit of a learning experience, but not as much as I thought it would be. Having grown up without internet for much of my childhood, I think of it as a luxury and not a necessity - necessities being things like food and water. I thought that not having the internet would help me focus on writing, seeing as we still had a computer to type on. And it kind of did. But that lesson only took a few weeks to sink in. After that, all I learned was that life in the USA is run as if every one has internet, because most people do. Heck, even I had my data connection on my phone, which was kind of like having dialup, and there's always the library if you don't have two toddlers to drag with you. Point being that people expect you to be able to search your email, email back, check online calendars, fill out forms online, etc., and do all that quickly. The biggest blow besides not being able to pay bills online was not being able to blog or submit my writing through online forms. It's great to get more writing done, but shorter projects have a greater need to get out there in some fashion. I mean, I am doing reviews for two websites now and I am lucky that they have been able to work with me on not being able to put up the review myself.

Now I am very grateful for the internet and I'm forming a plan for how to get the most out of it for my writing. One thing I learned was that I should have a single task for each night's writing time. More focus means faster typing and editing and less forgetting of details. Keeping a physical weekly/2week project calendar helps me remember external and internally motivated deadlines alike. Smaller tasks can be relegated to non-writing time when I can grab five minutes during the day and focus (or typing long winded posts...) is not an issue. I think I have a pretty good idea of what my phone can handle, haha. And! And! Once we get the wireless set up, my phone will do these "5 minute" things faster. Drooooool.

Here is my generic weekly plan for my new internet-laden writing times:

• Posting Monday - Scheduling all my posts for the coming week, including this blog, and reviews, and tweets...
• Review Tuesday - A good day to feel guilty about reviews I haven't written yet and get on that. Links to reviews that have just gone live may appear this day if I scheduled them on Monday, but this is a no-internet day for me.
• Submission Wednesday - A day to check where I plan to submit and where I am with those goals, and then Beta Read. I have to be submitting things myself before I can read and comment on other people's unpublished writing.
• Writing Thursday - You won't be hearing from me this day because I will be writing fiction like the internet hasn't been invented yet.
• Exerpt Friday - This is my accountability day, the day that I post on this blog to tell you what I have written during the week. I'll be posting an excerpt, summary, link, or flash piece for #flashfriday on twitter.
• Podcasting Saturday - This is the day that Pendragon Variety records, when they are recording that week. I'd also like to get back into recording short fiction like for the Dribblecast.
• Homeschooling Sunday - During the traditional school sessions, I teach at a homeschool Coop on Mondays. Plus, I also do light homeschooling for my 3 year old. Plus whatever else strikes my fancy. I have been itching to upload materials to TeachersPayTeachers.

This is something I will tweek every week because I can't stand being tied too closely to a schedule with no regard for specific projects. But, this is the default. This is something to start with. Yay!