Strategies on getting writing done in a busy life

[Phyrebrat]

I'm wondering about what to use when writing away from the house, myself. Do you use the screens keyboard or carry a physical one? I'm thinking of maybe getting a very small laptop with a proper keyboard? I don't find it easy to type on the actual screen of a tablet.

I was exactly the same and so I spent £88 on a keyboard wallet for my iPad. I used it for about a week but it was so user-unfriendly to do so, I might as well have been writing on my MacBook.

In the end I ditched that method and I just use the screenboard - and have for the last few years. This approach is strongly mitigated by using scrivener across platforms because it means I can just let the dreadful typos inherent in screen typing fly, and then when scrivener syncs when I get home - and continue writing on my MacBook - I can run its spellcheck. So there's very little difference to me now.

pH

 

[The Big Peat]

I found laptop with plug in keyboard to be a nightmare for public transport, but it might work better for people whose writing away from the house is in civilised environments.

 

[Martin Gill]

My iPad writing is littered with mistakes and helpful autocorrections. Try writing Viking names. iOS isn't fond. My laptop is a slimline 12"x8" Dell, super compact, powerful but sufficiently large to type on. I take it most places. Work paid for mine, but if I was buying one I'd probably go for a Macbook Air or similar for portability and super fast boot up. I tend to use the iPad if I'm travelling - on the plane, in hotel bars, and usually I'm sketching notes in those situations, not doing hardcore writing.

 

[Phyrebrat]

Oh, yes - thanks for reminding me; when you use scrivener spellcheck I always click/tap 'Learn spelling' so it's not constantly flagging correctly spelt names.

pH

 

[crystal haven]

Thank you for the replies, that's very useful. I'll check out all the suggestions.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Actually. I'd like cake. I'm really struggling at the mo. My kids are off. I've got loads of work on. I'm chair of a board that needs a lot of work. I have a book launch event on Sat and I don't even know what I'm reading at it. And all the little runs into town and the washing and everything just eat into my already slim writing time.


Cake. Send cake!

 

[Phyrebrat]

Drop the kids off with me. They can stay here and do the summer school I'm teaching for a week starting Monday.

Alternatively you could develop a fugue state where you 'forget' to be a mum and just do your own thing

pH

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Alternatively you could develop a fugue state where you 'forget' to be a mum and just do your own thing

pH

I do. And then they create half the problems in my absence

 

[crystal haven]

Lots of hugs, and of course cake. You'll be great at the book launch. I wish I was nearer.

 

[EJDeBrun]

Cake can solve most of the world's great mysteries. Good luck Jo.

 

[Cathbad]

I wish I hadn't come back and read this. Now I want cake!

 

[ralphkern]

Pomedero Technique, or an adaption of it.

For me that is 20 minutes writing, then 20 minutes doing something else... normally something 'brain off' like cleaning etc where I can decide what the next 20 minutes of writing will look like.

Fitness is the same. I like to go for long runs and work through a part which I might be struggling with.

 

[Cathbad]

I don't have a busy life (usually), so my struggle is to find excuses!!

 

[WordWarrior]

I have three kids which I am homeschooling and I live in a housetruck with them and my husband. By the time everyone is asleep I'm generally too tired to write more than cruddy nonsense. I try to write while everyone is having computer time/playing etc.
I used to get up at 4am to write but I burned out...
I write in a notepad or sketch book at every opportunity, so at least I'm writing something, but most of it is small-- snippets of dialogue, description, ideas etc. Still, it keeps me excited about the work when I get back to it.

 

[Steve Harrison]

My full time non-writing job makes keyboard time difficult, something not helped by my minimum and compulsory one hour procrastination period prior to commencement.

I get around this by having at least one 4 hour block of time on the weekend, which provides around two and a half hours of actual writing. I can manage this most weekends, sometime more but mostly less and the work eventually gets done.

I also think a lot about what I'm writing pretty much all the time, writing & editing in my head, so that the writing sessions are often very productive. I don't worry about writing every day, word targets or other nonsense. I'll worry about that when I turn pro