Word Pirates

At last night’s meeting, the Word Pirates celebrated our second anniversary since Marcia, Leona, and I founded the group in 2006. Wow. Time flies, huh?
~ Joy

On March 4, the Word Pirates talked about characters. What makes a good character? What characters stick in our minds and why? How likable does a character have to be? etc. It was a good discussion.
For the prompt, we wrote with the John Gardner Writing Award in mind.
HERE’S WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR:
We want to see […]

Short and sweet because I’m busy:
Feb 5, 2008 meeting: Word Pirates wrote for 20 minutes based on the titles of Goya’s Caprichos.
Feb 19, 2008 meeting: Word Pirates shared tales of living in the Bay Area and then wrote an essay around the “My Word” section of the San Francisco Chronicle. Guidelines here.
~ Joy

Last Tuesday’s Word Pirates meeting was a humdinger. For the first time in 2008, the group met and shared tales about Christmas and other holiday adventures. After that, we covered the following:
1. Personal writing goals for 2008. The Word Pirates went around in a circle and shared what they would like to accomplish in 2008 […]

n other news, starting November 1, the same day of the meeting, some of us are starting our month-long writing stint for National Novel Writing Month. We changed it slightly to be more along the lines of National Writing Goal Month, where we are undertaking a writing goal for the month and trying to finish […]

Hi folks. I’m back from vacation. For yesterday’s meeting, we discussed the cancellation of the September meeting and discussed why that happened. All was forgiven. Then we talked about:

Possibly doing National Writing Month next November. Do some Word Pirates want to try to write a novel in a month? Let Joy know. Maybe we can […]

Better late than never:
Last week, the WPs had a meeting. We read a few things we have been working on and talked about writing. Then we did the prompt:
Following Joy’s meditations on the use of empathy in writing–that is, empathy of the writer for characters even if the writer does not agree with the character’s […]

Last night, the Word Pirates did a critique of our personal essays. We got through all 8 essays and even managed to fit in a reading of Sarah Vowell’s essay The First Thanksgiving, for inspiration.
Next, we are going to edit the essays based on the criticisms. On September 20, we will have a second critique […]

The Word Pirates have events. For example, we recently had our summer BBQ. Steve and his family generously opened his house up to us on July 12, 2007. We ate tasty food and played DDR. It was a delightful time for all.
Pictures:

Diane, Laura, and Noelani

Steve and Robin

What a spread

Laura is impressed

WPs get down

WPs are tall.
Oh […]

Word Pirates,
Last night’s meeting was swell. We were inspired by the beginning of Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Breakfast of Champions where he breaks U.S. culture down into very simple terms. He explains America as though he were explaining it to a child, breaking down all facts to their smallest components. By doing this, he creates a […]

Last night we celebrated Word Pirates’ slightly belated birthday with a delicious fruit-ladened cheesecake provided by Marcia. Happy one year birthday Word Pirates!
At last night’s meeting we covered a lot. We covered so much that Marcia and I forgot to have people read their work at the beginning of the meeting. First, we talked about […]

Last night’s meeting was a hoot. We played a game called Jabber Jot, “the hilarious word game where you create all kinds of wild tales!” In each round, we had five minutes to write a story using three pictures and a word. Then we switched the stories, read them aloud, and picked the winner. […]

Hi everybody,
Last week’s meeting was a good one. There were snacks, good drink and good stories (Morgan’s was a chapter from a graphic novel). The prompt, for those of you who missed out, is to write about someone minor (fictional or real) associated with a historical figure or character in literature. For instance, a story […]

Yesterday’s critique was a success! The Word Pirates gave each other helpful comments on their stories and ate snacks. Afterwards, we did a prompt.
Since the last Post Secret prompt seemed to inspire us, we decided to start the year out with some similar inspiration. Choose a Post Secret and write for 20 minutes on whatever […]

We will have our reading event at the Phoenix Theater in Petaluma on Feb. 8, 2007. Hurray! We will be able to feature a ton of visual artists, in addition to the reading stylings of the fabulous Word Pirates. Any artists interested should e-mail us.
We will have another critique sesssion for everyone in December. For […]

Yesterday’s Word Pirates meeting was one of the good ones. As usual, the first thing we did was to read our work aloud to each other. (BTW, I was very happy to see that even when some of you don’t make it to the meeting, you still do the prompts.)
After that, we discussed what makes […]

Last night, in honor of the season premiere of The Office, Word Pirates thought about work. The prompt was to write about a character in a strange job OR remember a strange/odd job you have held and write about it. For inspiration, we listened to part of David Sedaris’s Santaland Diaries, about his stint as […]