Nanowrimo starts in a few days. I'm more excited about this than I am about Halloween, Christmas and my birthday put together.
The first time I participated was 2003, when I hit the 50,000 word goal (and then some) but never actually finished the story. Which is for the best. I played along again in 2005 and 2006, two novels that went on to become Chiaroscuro and Something Beautiful. I didn't write anything novel length for a long time after that–until 2009, when I wrote a 60,000 word piece of fanfiction. (There's a challenge in fandom called the Big Bang, where you are to write a long piece, usually 20,000 words. There are dozens of these in the various fandoms, and mulit-fandom ones, too, focusing on various themes.) Even after that, most of my stuff has topped out at 40,000 words or so lately. It's like the long haul of a novel has been more than my stamina can take.
I'm doing this for the first time this year. Best of luck to us both 🙂
@Sarah, good luck to you too!