The Golden Notebook syndrome

In Doris Lessing's famous (pre-)feminist novel entitled 'The Golden Notebook', the main character, Anna, keeps her diary in a number of separate notebooks, each devoted to a particular area of her life, and recognizable by the colour on the cover.

I think she has a red, a blue and a black notebook, and maybe one other one (I say I think because despite appearances and following a long family tradition, I have spent an entire paragraph now creating the illusion that I have actually read this book)
(I haven't)
(... but it is lying on my nightstand, so it's bound to happen one of these days)
(the truth is, I read the preface, written ten years post-partum (I mean later) and it was such a great text, I decided to wait a while before reading the book itself, to give myself a chance to enjoy the preface in its own right)
(have now been enjoying preface steadily for at least two months)

Anyway... this is all besides the point (as parantheses tend to be),

but no, it's too early to get to the point yet, allow me one more tangent:

Anna does this (see above for reference) because she is convinced that unless she keeps all the threads of her life tidily separate, she will go mad. Of course, she goes mad anyway, and the whole point of this book (now that is an ambitious statement to make from my not-yet-reader perspective), as the title indicates (ah, the misleadingness of titles) is that it would have been better had she allowed her life to integrate more, weaving all these colourful strands into one golden web.

So, and now we're nearing the point, the reason I haven't written of late (all of two days, admittedly, but I'm sure you fans out there are already gasping for fresh news) is because I had the idea that this blog was an I-blog (i.e. an Isabelle-blog) and should therefore contain exclusively details of how that young shoot is doing.

And the thing is (the thing, not the point, the thing), I've had other things on my mind these last few days, namely (PAY ATTENTION NOW, THE GOLDEN WEB IS BEING WOVEN!) my novel.

Following the fantastic inspiration of my friend Sam, who managed to begin and complete a 50.000 words novel between the 1st and the 30th of November... all right, let's stop a moment and give her a warm applause,

'Well done Sammy!!! You rock, girl!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!'

Following her example, I decided to take on the challenge and on the 3rd of January, I should have for you, if all goes well, that first novel some of you have been hearing announcements of for as long as I've lived (or, alternatively as long as you've known me) (or, if the two coincide...).

So, from now until January 3rd, there might be less of Isabelle in these pages, and more of my 'états d'âme' as I struggle, jubilate, brag, swear, get depressed, and finally collapse.

Any support you might offer me in this difficult month is not only welcome, but an absolute life-saver.

In exchange, I might promise not to do it again. Maybe.

And to warm you up nicely, here is the first news report from the frontline. We are officially on day 5 of week 1. This means that at a rate of 1667 words a day, I should have in my possession at least 8335 words by midnight tonight.

Knowing which, you will be absolutely flabbergasted (how to spell?) to hear that the novel so far consists of no less than 8841 words, which puts me a whole 506 words ahead of schedule!

More later, as the native is getting restless in the bathroom!