@meg - Y'know, I'm almost embarassed to admit it, but I don't get Twitter. I don't get how to sign up, I don't get where to go to get updates, or how to make them... That's largely because I'm very much an anti-social sort. I have negative interest in social networking, so I've never done more than glance at Facebook or Myspace and I've been actively avoiding them and Twitter as well. I just don't like the feeling of being connected to that many people all the frickin' time. It gives me the colliewobbles. I didn't even have a phone capable of getting texts for the longest time, until the phone died and I had to replace it, because I don't like being that in-touch.
However, it's becoming painfully clear to me that these days, it helps to break as an author if you're into the whole social networking thing. I'm still refusing to get a Facebook page, but I do have a website and a blog I'm going to be posting in, and I suppose at some point I ought to at least look at Twitter and figure out what the deal is.
@prophet - Depends on the day.
On a good day, it only takes me an hour or so. I type close to 100 wpm, though, so an hour is still mostly thinking and deciding, not so much actually pounding the keys. On a bad day... it can take every spare moment. I've been known to stay up until 2 or 3am to make my wordcount, but I do not go to bed until it's done. That was my promise to myself, the committment I made. The word count is the word count, rain or shine, day or night, no matter what else happens that day. I haven't always lived up to it, but I feel *very* guilty when I don't, and even when I don't manage the 1.5k, I do still at least do some writing.
I will say I don't do "makeup" days. If I only make 1k on Monday, I don't force myself to do an extra 500 words on Tuesday. That way lies disaster, I think. If I have a couple of bad days in a row, I'd end up facing a day where, no matter what, I had to do 4k or 5k. I *can* do those days, I have done them (my record is 12.5k), but that's only when the spirit really moves me. If I *had* to do that much, I'm sure I'd give up in disgust and drown my sorrows in Ben & Jerry's Boston Cream Pie ice cream.