Wednesday 2 November 2011

Today has been a busy day.

This morning it was our monthly Wensleydale Writers' Group. We are in the process of setting up our own web site so shortly you will be able to see what we are up to. In the meantime, today we had a speaker and a workshop on Short Story writing.

We meet in the Golden Lion pub which is a good venue as there is coffee and tea to hand - and often the chef sends us out a plate of scones too.

We did a couple of interesting exercises to get us going. The first was to use the five given words and incorporate them all into one paragraph of writing. The five words were:- elevate, spinnaker elegant, potato and writer. Of course, the addition of the word 'spinnaker' meant that we almost all wrote a paragraph which included boating in some form, apart from our one lateral thinker, who called her dog Spinnaker.

Then we split into groups and each group (of 3) was given a passage from a book cut into pieces, so that we had to put them in the correct order - or at least in an order which made the passage understandable. Then we had to say what we thought the subject of the book was, the genre, when it was written etc. This was a most interesting exercise and again caused a lot of interesting conversation.

The last half hour was spent in discussion about construction. Altogether a most enjoyable session and one which left me feeling pretty tired. Coming home and cooking lunch was also a bit hectic, but nothing like as wearing as what happened after my walk.

Tess and I did our usual sharp walk which always leaves me feeling good. So I embarked on entry onto the Government Gateway site to register some cattle movement. Does anyone else ever get totally frustrated by being unable to achieve one's aim on the computer. It kept telling me that I was doing it wrong without telling me how to put it right!

A friend popped in to see if I would like a ride up the Dale to an art exhibition. Would I like a ride - I'll say! Anything to get away from a very contrary computer.

The exhibition was interesting - a watercolourist, an oil painter and a fabric collage artist - we both enjoyed it and then had a wander round Hawes. But of course, now that the clocks have lost that British Summertime, it began to get dark very early. We came back in the dusk, following a herd of sleepy cows up the road for quite a long way as they went home to be milked.

After tea I had another try at logging on to the correct site and finally managed it! Eureka - once there I put the information on in no time at all. But I must say I am now pretty tired.

Still 9pm tonight sees the wonderful 'Frozen Planet' on television - I think the most splendid programme that has been on for a very long time - so after putting on my blog I shall go and relax - hope you are all doing the same.

PS If you haven't been to John Gray's blog (Going Gently) and seen his adorable new bulldog, Mabel (what a glorious name for a bulldog) do find time to pop over and see her photograph.

8 comments:

Elizabeth said...

What splendid writing exercises.
I wish I had a writers' group going at the moment.
Quite a tiring day I would think!

Titus said...

Weaver, that would have left me done in! A lot of lovely activities though, and you certainly can't beat a bit of Attenborough at his very best after all that.

Heather said...

Your Writers' Group exercises sound fascinating, even to a non-writer like me.
I can sympathise with your exhaustion and frustration with the computer. At present I am denied access to the student log-in for the course I am doing. I have emailed the principal and my tutor but so far have heard nothing. At least I can get on with more coursework. Enjoy your evening.

rkbsnana said...

Yes, a very eventful day. Can relate to the computer frustration. But what do you expect? We were still using manual typewriters when I was in high school.

ChrisJ said...

Well your writer's group really works hard! I can just imagine your slow drive home behind the cows. I want to go over and see Mabel too. It's getting late. Maybe tomorrow. And don't I just know your frustration with computers! What about TV's and DVD players and three different remotes!

Elisabeth said...

I like the idea of that writing exercise. I wonder how it would be if you re-arranged the word order and spinnaker appeared last on the list.

The Weaver of Grass said...

Elizabeth - in answer to your query, we could use them in any order we liked - I should have made that clear.

Thanks to you all for the comments.

Dave King said...

Sounds great. I shall be waiting for the website to appear.