Writing Process: Outlines & Index Cards

What's the process of writing a novel? What's your writing process like? Do you follow a process when you write?

Readers and other writers often ask me about my writing process, and my answer never makes any sense. Usually because I invent it on the spot to camouflage the fact that I have no process — it's more like "utter randomness" based on stuff like which planets are rising in the house of whatever and what's playing on iTunes and what kind of incense is burning and whether there's any dark