Tuesdays with Story

Tuesdays With Story
WRITER’S MAIL for December 21, 2012

Good Words from Way Back

At Christmas I no more desire a rose
Than wish a snow in May’s new-fangled mirth;
But like of each thing that in season grows.
So you, to study now it is too late,
Climb o’er the house to unlock the little gate.

–Biron to Ferdinand, King of Navarre, in Act 1, Scene 1 of Love’s Labours Lost (1598) by William Shakespeare (1564-1616), courtesy of The Literature Network (http://www.online-literature.com/shakespeare/lovelost/1/)

December 18 Meeting: Eight Gathered ’Round
“Eight of us gathered ’round tables at the Alicia Ashman Library for the last meeting of 2012,” reports Amber Boudreau of First-and-Third group.

Lisa McDougal read from Chapter 9 of Follow the Yellow and noted her own doubts about the last line she had read. Amber Boudreau suggested dropping that sentence altogether. Pat Edwards liked a fight scene she thought was “well-blocked,” but she wished at that point the main character could talk to a friend. Jerry Peterson enjoyed the fight scene but had a few concerns. He suggested Lisa could cut everything before her asterisks, because there’s a lot of telling instead of showing. Pat wasn’t squeamish about foul language in the chapter, but thought Lisa could cut out some of it and avoid offending her audience. Millie Mader questioned a character’s abilities and imagined the mother would be more concerned and not so accepting. Pat saw the mother as concerned, but practical.

Amber Boudreau offered “a reiteration” of Chapter 6 of her YA novel, tentatively titled Noble. Pat hated that the Librarian struck her as a vampire and wondered whether he might not smell like old books. Lisa expected one character to be more aggressive and confused, less accepting. Jerry wanted to see Moira work to put a nook back instead of just finding where it goes. Everyone seemed to agree this chapter was much more tightly written than before.

Millie Mader presented Chapter 40 of her novel, Life On Hold. Aaron Boehm and Lisa agreed that they would have liked to see the main character get caught. Jerry was expecting more of a reaction from the main character when her nemesis shows up. Pat suggested cutting down on the ambiance since it takes away from the narrative. Lisa and Pat wondered whether the current love interest of the main character would make it to the end of the book. Jerry had a few questions about the medical care given to one character in the hospital.

Aaron Boehm shared the second part of his screenplay, Whole Again. Millie missed that the main characters were once conjoined twins. Pat asked whether Aaron intended all of the puns. The author answered, “Sometimes.” Pat also wondered whether a twin would say “we” rather than “I.” Lisa doubted that a character would rush another who is holding a knife. Jen Wilcher suggested that if the paramedics showed up, they should at least escort the character out to the truck. Some of the group thought Aaron could just cut that part.

Jerry Peterson read from Part II of Santa Train. Amber questioned “the orders.” Pat wondered what happened to the oranges the Preacher took with him. Millie liked the part with the oranges and enjoyed the images of poor backcountry life. Pat thought Jerry’s piece offered interesting history and train content, along with great descriptions of good food.

Thanks Amber!

Who’s Up Next?
December 25: No meeting for Second-and-Fourth group.
January 1: No meeting for First-and-Third group.
January 8 with Second-and-Fourth group returning to Barnes & Noble West: Terry Hoffman (chapter, The Great Tome), Jack Freiburger (rewrite — with illustrations! — Path to Bray’s Head), Jen Wilcher (chapter, Hogoshiro Chronicles), Carol Hornung (chapter 1, scene 1, The Ghost of Heffron College), and time for two more – contact Carol (see below).
January 15 with First-and-Third group returning to Barnes & Noble West: Clayton Gill (chapter 17, Fishing Derby), Susanne Fortunato (?), Rebecca Rettenmund (chapter 14, The Cheese Logue), Alicia Connolly-Lohr (chapter, Lincoln’s Other War), Bob Kralapp (?), and Michelle Nightoak (chapter, memoir).

To read or reschedule reading:
• First-and-Third Tuesdays, contact Jerry Peterson
• Second-and-Fourth Tuesdays, contact Carol Hornung

Post-Christmas Recovery… We Mean, Party!… January 5
The annual TWS post-Christmas party hosted by Jerry and Marge Peterson includes a fabulous potluck buffet followed by actual (aka “non-virtual”), traditional board and card games with fellow writers. Plan your visit for Saturday afternoon, January 5 to the Peterson Christmas Palace at 920 Glen Street, Janesville. Jerry warns that feasting commences promptly at 1:30 p.m.

Members should do the following now, please:
• Email Jerry to (1) tell him you are coming, (2) note what you intend to bring for the banquet table, and (3) who you are bringing as a guest – “Yes,” Jerry says, “spouses and friends are welcome!”
• Look for fellow TWS writers with whom you can carpool.
• Set aside a game (card game, board game, etc.) to bring that we might play.

The Christmas Palace is a 45-minute drive from Barnes & Noble West in Madison.

Fifth Tuesday: We’re Still Here after December 21! Now What?
The 2012 Winter Solstice has come and gone and our Fifth Tuesday Challenge has survived, still scheduled for January 29. However, the postponement of Apocalypse has only increased the urgency of work on this Challenge to TWS writers.

Here’s the premise: You (or your character or characters) absolutely believed the world was going to end on December 21 (in the Mayan calendar, the beginning of a time of extraordinary transition, but which many believed was going to be the Last Day of the World). As a true believer in the End Time, you prepared for the Apocalypse. However, on December 22, you were still here. And all the world around you, too. Your Fifth Tuesday Challenge: Tell us what happens next… in 250 words or less.

Jerry Peterson will welcome your flash fiction, essay, poem, song lyrics, PowerPoint presentation, etc. before Friday, January 25. Please send your End-o’-World Challenge text to Jerry.

According to a Reuters global poll reported by the BBC, one in 10 people around the world felt some anxiety about December 21. Russians were so worried that the Minister of Emergency Situations issued a denial that the world would end. Authorities in the village of Bugarach in the South of France barred access to a mountain where some believed a UFO would rescue them.

As for the U.S., the BBC told the world: “And survivalists in America — many of whom use the term ‘prepper’ — have been busy preparing for all manner of cataclysm.”

For more, see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20764906.

You Got Argot?
“Argot” in French, Spanish, and Catalan means “slang,” but in English it denotes a secret language used by members of groups – particularly thieves and other criminals — to prevent outsiders from understanding their conversations. The term argot also refers to the informal specialized vocabulary in a field of study, hobby, job, sport, etc.

French author Victor Hugo was one of the first to research the argot of Paris and use it in his novel, Les Misérables, in which he describes argot as the language of the dark: “What is argot; properly speaking? Argot is the language of misery.”

Wikipedia notes that words can move from argot into common speech. For example, “piaf” was a Parisian argot word for “sparrow.” Taken up by the singer Edith Piaf, this meaning became well known in France and worldwide, and no longer served the purpose of a secret language. For more, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argot.

Writer’s Mail: Duty Roster
We can imagine your Christmas tree aglow, presents piled beneath. A cheery fire crackles on the hearth. Mingled scents of pine, hot toddies, and left-over turkey combine with the dull roar of crowd at Lambeau Field from the new plasma screen television. The Packers are ahead by a comfortable margin. Nothing to become complacent about, but still…. You reach for another beer from the built-in six-pack cooler in your new arm chair recliner.

Then a brick comes tumbling down the chimney to crash into the burning logs, showering sparks and sizzling coals across the bearskin rug. Panicked, you grab the fire extinguisher and smother the room in choking clouds of fine-particle fire-retardant chemicals.

At last you find the brick. It’s at the bottom of the smoking, sooty mess, still hot to the touch. Aluminum foil wrapped around the brick has protected a scrap of ruled notebook paper stuck to the brick with melted rubber bands. The singed note is still legible. It reads, “Looking forward to your editorship of Writer’s Mail sometime soon. Sincerely, Your jolly old friend Nick.”

• December – Clayton, who wraps up his run this month with the December 28 issue.
• January – Pat Edwards, your first Writer’s Mail editor for the New Year.
• February – Overcome “writer’s brick” by editing this month.
• March – May the Ides of Editing be with you!

Join up in February or March with an e-mail to Clayton. And, send him content for the December 28 issue of Writer’s Mail. Thank you!

The Last Word: “Paying for What Was Free”
In the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, Dr. Jonathan Cook (Columbia University) and Dr. Shahzeen Attari (Indiana University) reported on their national online longitudinal survey to explore attitudes and behaviors in response to the recently implemented metered “paywall” by the New York Times (NYT).

NYT online content that was previously unlimited on a free-of-charge basis now has a limit, beyond which readers are asked to pay for a digital subscription. When the paywall was announced and later, weeks after it had taken effect, Cook and Attari surveyed study participants to understand how they would react and adapt to this change. Most NYT online readers planned not to pay and ultimately did not. Instead, the researchers noted, the readers “devalued the newspaper, visited its web site less frequently, and used loopholes” to access NYT online content in other ways.

The researchers also reported: “Results of an experimental justification manipulation revealed that framing the paywall in terms of financial necessity moderately increased support and willingness to pay. Framing the paywall in terms of a profit motive proved to be a noncompelling justification, sharply decreasing both support and willingness to pay. Results suggest that people react negatively to paying for previously free content, but change can be facilitated with compelling justifications that emphasize fairness.”

Send your Writer’s Mail contributions to Clayton. Thank you!