Where to meet this Saturday? (Oct 20th)

I won't be in town this Saturday and still not sure if I can skype in. Please discuss where you'd like to meet.

- Bagel shop that Chris mentioned

- Ava Roastaria (near the Beaverton library). Free wifi and a nice coffee shop  

- Or elsewhere. 

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Up ahead. 

The following Saturday, Oct 27th we can meet at my place at the usual time 10-12 pm. But then, there's a NaNoWriMo Kick off party from 2 - 4pm. 

If you have never participated in NaNoWriMo (short for National Novel Writing Month). It's a writerly challenge of writing a novel during the month of November (at least 50,000 words). I tried to participate in this last year, but I quit in the middle because it was my last year of grad school and I was overwhelmed. Now that I graduated, I have no excuse :P...It was a lot of fun. There are many local write-ins all over the city. And it's a good way to meet other writers and people. I encourage you all to participate in it. 

There's a kick off party and here's the email  I got: 

What: Kickoff Party!
When: Saturday, October 27, 2012
Time: 2 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.
Place: Multnomah County Central Library, U.S. Bank Room
See it in our regional forum and on our Google Calendar: http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/regions/usa-oregon-portland
What to bring:
*A snack to share (enough for around 7-10 people; don’t try to bring enough for the whole crowd, you might injure your noveling hand!)
*A bowl or plate to serve your snack if it’s needed
*Your own drink and drinking vessel
What we’ll do:
This is when we get together for a breather during the pre-NaNo frenzy and meet each other, find new WriMo friends, reconnect with old WriMo buddies and gear up for another fabulous year of words. It’s also where we get stickers, plot ninjas, and maybe a new idea or two.
We’ll have a little bit of talking about the ins and outs and details of NaNo. We’ll take some time to introduce ourselves and entice everyone with hints about what we’re going to write. We’ll have a few talks, a lot of laughs, and munchies to give our hands something to do since we can’t write yet.
We have the room starting at 1:30, so if you want to come a bit early and help us move chairs and tables we won’t turn you away. And if you can stay a little past 4:30 to help us move the chairs and tables back where they started, that would be fabulous!
Hope to see you at the kickoff!

Writing Prompts for October 6th, 2012

Bad Mornings—Everybody has them; how do you handle them? On those mornings you have to get up and wrestle yourself out of bed, how do you—how does your character wrestle to get up and perform their daily toil?

. . .

Appearances—how important are appearances to you or your character? Does a first impression tell you everything you need to know? If not, what tells you about a person?

Optional: Tell a story about yourself/your character of choice that involves appearances (or how appearances can be deceiving).

. . .

Day in the life of: Using whatever format is preferable, tell a story about a typical (or not so typical) day in your life/the life of your character.

Optional: Tell multiple stories!

. . .

Following prompts swiped from writing.tumblr.com:

Write a letter to future students in a history class. Explain what it is like to live now.

What would you be interested in knowing if you were them? Daily routines? What houses are like? Food? School? You should consider how much they'll know about things you take for granted. Will they know what cars are? Will they have just heard of them without actually getting to experience them? Telephones? Malls? Books? Will some of these things be forgotten in a few hundred years? Make sure to explain anything that might be unknown to them.

. . .

“Never underestimate the lives of old men sitting on park benches.”

. . .

You are a leaf and fall is only a few weeks away. Explain how you feel about this.

. . .

Explain the difference between dressing like a rock star and dressing like a pop star.

. . .

You've been commissioned to write an accurate, thorough history of dragons by someone who believes they really existed. Make it up.

. . .

If you got one whole day of being immortal*, what would you do with it?

*being “immortal” means you cannot die or get hurt.

. . .

If you hear that someone has good style, how do you imagine they dress? IF you hear someone has good taste, what do you imagine they are in to? What would immediately tell you that someone you just met has style and tastes that your expect? How much does taste and style matter to you?

. . .

You have just discovered evidence [undeniable, 100% accurate] that everyone else is an alien. Describe your day tomorrow.

. . .

Planet for sale.

Humanity has decided to change planets and needs to sell Earth. You've been hired to put it on the market. How do you advertise it and what's the price tag? Make a flyer announcing the sale. If you'd like, make similar flyers for other planets in the solar system or a made up planet of your choice.

. . .

Follow Jesse Walker's Instructions:

“Someday this too will be the Old Weird America. Try to appreciate it now, like a time traveler.”

Decades from now when future people look back on this time, what will they think? What in particular will make this time old and weird? How can you appreciate it like a time traveler?

. . .

Tell this story: “There it was, as peaceful and mysterious as s/he remembered: The Rift. The place where it all began.”