Well, the writing year is off to a good start. This is thanks in no small part to the resolutions I wrote out here before, in particular the one about making the essential part of the writing day an uninterrupted 9-12 stint. In the past I’ve tended to slope off mid-way through the morning for a coffee and bun. Initially this worked quite well – you’d be amazed how many plot problems can be solved while on a decent-length walk (even if one does risk looking completely crazy as one distractedly mouths lines of dialogue to oneself) but this had a disturbing tendency to turn into a coffee, bun, read of the paper, mooch round the odd shop, trip for a haircut &c, which pretty much blew a hole in the main part of the writing day.
It’s certainly not true for everyone – many writers like to write through the night – but I know a lot of people who, like me, need to get as much of their work done as possible before lunch. Ask me to digest anything more than an almond croissant and an Americano and all writing skill drifts away for hours, leaving me to stare at a screen all afternoon while trying to tweak the odd character name or rejig a couple of lines, instead of producing those exciting new pages that writing is all about.
Not this year, though … oh no. This will be the year of the extra virgin, double-pressed morning pages. Honest.
A Writer Tries To Write 