Sunday, January 25, 2009

Pencils! Points: Important Announcements, January 13 Meeting Notes

Hello, all! Happy 2009!

Important Announcements!

~ Special Pencils! Meeting: Join us this Tuesday, January 27, at 6:30 p.m. at the Norwalk Library in SoNo to hear John Palisano read from his latest work! See you there!

~ Dues: we've set dues at $24/year. If you attend three meetings per year, please send your dues to Carol by Jan. 31!

~ Snow Policy: It's that time of year again, but hey, we're almost to February…only four more meetings at risk! In the event of inclement weather and we need to cancel our Pencils! meeting for the evening, THE DECISION WILL BE MADE AT THE LATEST BY 4 P.M. ON THAT DAY, in which case, we will send out an e-mail to our distribution list. It will also be posted ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE WEBSITE NO LATER THAN 6 P.M.

~ We're BACK at Shop Rite as of February 10th, 2009!

~ Miss the 6th Annual Christmas Fest at Carol's? Check out the pix here!

~ Have good news to share? Please send your announcements to the membership directly using the members address.

~ The Rejection Slip Burning is tentatively slated for Saturday, March 7, 2009! We'll confirm this date and the location in the coming weeks.

And now…on with the show! Pencils! Points for our first meeting of 2009.

  1. Roger opened the night with another chapter—"Blonde Ambition"—from How My Retirement Went South.
  2. Jerry was next with the beginnings of a great new short story, "Sin."
  3. Kaye was up with part of a short story she's reworking from her Admit One project.

Well, that's all, folks! See you all in just a couple of days in SoNo!

-- Kaye

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Pencils! Welcomes 2009 with Important Announcements!

JANUARY 27 MEETING.

For the January 27 meeting, we'll be attending a SPECIAL EVENT at the NORWALK PUBLIC LIBRARY
in South Norwalk to support member John Palisano as he reads from his latest work as part of the 2009 Author Series. Copies of the anthologies in which his most recent work appeared will be available for sale, and proceeds will benefit the Friends of the Norwalk Library.

THE EVENT RUNS FROM 6:30 to 8:30. Please join us! For more information, visit John's website here and click on the link at the right of the page.

NEW FOR 2009 -- MEMBERSHIP DUES.

As you know, over the years, Pencils! has grown -- we've gained and lost members, and many times the subject of charging nominal dues has come up. Dues will not only help us lessen the financial impact of events and other incidentals (printing, mailing, the domain name for the web, etc.), but will help our members strengthen their commitment and put us more in line with other professionally-oriented writing groups and associations.

For 2009 and beyond, we're introducing membership dues for those who attend meetings.

We've set the cost of dues at $24/year due on January 31 of each year (that's not much more than $1/meeting). This amount will also make it easy for us to pro-rate members who join later in the year. New members may attend a maximum of three meetings before deciding whether or not they wish to join.

Carol McManus is the Treasurer and will open our first official Pencils! account. Please send your $24 membership dues as close to January 31 as possible to Carol.

Have a wonderful few days and I'll see you all on January 27!

Kaye