I like New York in June, how 'bout you?

Even though I've been to New York City many times (I tried to sit down and count the other day, and found that I could not), I still discover new things every time I go. Such as:

* Walking across the Brooklyn Bridge at sunset.
* The view of lower Manhattan from Brooklyn and Liberty Island.
* My unironic patriotic love for the Statue of Liberty. On the other hand, my feelings about the 9/11 memorials around the World Trade Center are much more mixed.
* Sitting on a rock in Central Park and watching the world go by.
* Bryant Park. Especially the Bryant Park Reading Room.
* The view from the top of Rockefeller Center (aka "Top of the Rock").
* Craft. Not a cheap experience (to put it mildly), but an easy pick for one of my top five meals ever.
* The High Line at night.
* Visiting in the summer. I keep going to New York in the winter for some reason. Summer is so much better. (Especially when you get lucky with the weather and there's never a high above 86 degrees, and it doesn't rain at all.)

More stories and pictures to come, especially pictures once T gets his processed. He has some beauties...

June update; July goals

Days written: 26/30
Words written: 16,277
Words of fic written: 14,130
Stories worked on: Somewhere between 3 and 6 (I have a bunch of DA fragments that could be one story, or several; we'll have to see how they come together.)
Stories posted: One (in four separate chapters)

( Here's the graph )

Specific goals progress:

1. Write an average of six days per week. On average, yes.

2. Finish "Aftermath". No, I didn't even touch it. I can blame this on the fact that the draft is still in beta, but if I'm being honest, I probably would have focused on "The Prodigal" instead anyway. >.>

3. Finish megaflare_ff documentation and start fleshing out my story idea. Yes on the documentation, a little on the idea. It needs a lot more help, though.

4. Complete draft of current DA WIP. Completed and posted!

5. Write at least one more newgameplus story. Totally failed on this one. I may still write more of the prompts, but it'll have to be in the free-for-all phase. Although one of the prompts is inspiring my Mega Flare, does that count?

Considering that I ignored my week's vacation when I was setting these goals, I don't think I did too badly.

As long as I'm here at the halfway mark, how about we check in on progress for my goals for 2011 as a whole?

1. Successfully hit the getyourwordsout target. Ahead of pace -- I'm currently at 90,281. I am, in fact, almost on the 200,000 word pace, although that's entirely due to how much I wrote in May.

2. Finish "Aftermath" -- completely: signed, sealed, and delivered -- by the end of June. No, but I'm pretty sure it will be done by the end of the summer.

3. Finish more WIPs than I start. I think this is probably a no, if only because I'm being consumed by a new fandom, which is conducive to starting new WIPs rather than finishing old ones...

4. Participate in at least one Big Bang other than megaflare_ff and/or at least one exchange other than FFEX. I haven't ventured into a new Big Bang yet, but I have participated in another Porn Battle and one two rounds of newgameplus, and for two out of three, I wrote in a non-Final Fantasy fandom. This is seriously, seriously a big deal for me.

5. Write at least three journal entries per week and at least one on a substantial topic. This one, I feel like I've fallen down on entirely, especially the substantial topics part. I've done a couple of projects -- the Vorkosigan Saga reviews, the 30 days of FF meme, the FogCon write-ups -- but none of those have carried over into regular writing momentum. I'll need to contemplate this.

Okay, enough of the check-ins; how about July?

1. Write at least six days per week (not wimping out with the "average" this time; I have no travel, so I have no excuse).

2. Write and post areyougame claim.

3. Finish "Aftermath", pending beta.

4. Turn Dragon Age fragments into actual story.

5. Outline and more on megaflare_ff story.

Yep, that looks good.