Last night’s meeting did not follow the typical Word Pirate’s schedule. It became more of an informal meeting about our writing goals.

Because the group was smaller, the Word Pirates had a fieldtrip to a sushi joint in downtown Petaluma where they ate shrimp tempura and unagi. They talked about writing in general — the excuses they use not to write and how to deal with them; how to move into other genres and styles they are not experienced with; how to know if an idea is a good one or not.

They also talked about the writing prompt from the first meeting and how to move from writing exercise into a full-blown story. “What makes a story, exactly?” they wanted to know. They decided to extend the deadline on the first writing prompt so that it is okay to bring in the edited version of the prompt to the May 4th meeting.

The members also reflected on how Word Pirates have already helped them with their writing – Marcia, for example, sent a query to Other Magazine based on this posting. Although the deadline (which was not listed on the website) had passed, the editors at Other were enthusiastic about the idea and invited Marcia to submit again.

All and all, it was a good meeting. The next meeting will be May 4th at 7:30 p.m. at Joy Lanzendorfer’s house.

In other news, I added a FAQ.