When writing, you know you are in trouble when...

[trboturtle]

... you can't write the first chapter. AAAGHHH! It's so frustrating! I've got my outline written, but i can't write the first freakin' chapter! Not even the first page! AGGGGGGGGH!

Then write the second chapter, and the third, and maybe the fourth. Come back to the first chapter when you feel ready for it.

Craig

[Lord Rae]

When an idea you hoped would be a 5000 word short story is now at 10000 words, and your critique group tells you "you're telling a lot. You need to expand this whole chapter into two or three and show more."

Sounds like a good problem to have. Didn't the Codex Alera just start as a bet for Jim? Surely he wasn't initially looking to write an entire series of books when the idea first was presented. Keep at it.

[Wookinstien]

you know when you are in trouble when you run out of milk duds and coffee.

 

[meg_evonne]

When a scene refuses to behave...

Try to fix it.
Try to fix it.
Try to fix it.
Finally---cut it.

Why couldn't I have figured that out before I spent an entire day on it?

[ItsallSuesfault]

When you absolutely hate the story you working on, but have to get it finished because the story you really want to work on would totally spoil the plot of it.

[Lord Rae]

When you realize that you HATE dialog but have to have people occasionally speaking.

::Ponders how hard it would be to turn everyone in the story world into mutes::

[Enchantedwater]

You have written all of the good parts and can't seem to force yourself to write all of the nessasary junk in between.

[Compass Rose]

^ this. Or when you have left out a scene because you can't figure out exactly what to write / what happened, and all your betavreaders tell you that you really need to write that scene...