Hi Alphas,
Welcome to Alphaday 5, Season XII, the last one in 2015. I hope you’ve enjoyed this last part of 2015 and first part of Season V as much as I have. We’ve worked hard, we’ve played hard … and in the process we’ve touched on so many different topics that have stimulated our creativity or briefly whipped up an ephemeral, but passionate polemic. How that’ll help us become better writers I’ve no idea; but it’s the best strategy that I know of.
You’ll need a break now, I think, and luckily that’s precisely what the Alpha calendar has planned for you. Next Alphaday is on the 7th of January 2016, which is in four weeks’ time.
Enjoy yourselves as you celebrate whatever makes this solstice-based festivity special for you.
The Alphaday 5 agenda will, I’m sure, live up to your expectations and, why not, exceed them with a string of writerly delights. As follows:
- This bulletin from me
- The results of the ‘save our planet’ challenge from Morgen
- The collated entries for the ‘list’ challenge from Sally
- The brief for the next challenge from Suzanne
- The LOG from Sally
- The Writers’ Reads column from Morgen
- The ALPHA CHRISTMAS QUIZ from Olaf
- Perhaps even a Showcase piece from Suzanne
You might need more than four weeks to fully enjoy (nice one!) such a wealth of writerly treats. Newbies need to know that Olaf’s notorious Christmas Quiz comes with a health warning. It’s very addictive, and it’s so ‘almost’ impossible to solve that you almost wish it simply was impossible so that you didn’t keep coming back to it. If we have Alpha traditions, Olaf’s Christmas quiz is one of the sacred ones. The other one is our Virtual Cup, of course!
Many thanks to the Alphas who’ve been busy serving up all these treats for you. Some have been on double – even triple – duty to serve you. The main part of every slot, column, item on the agenda (or whatever you like to call them) is, however, what’s inside them. So thank you all for joining in with your fascinating contributions and making these slots lively and buzzing with writerly goodies.
General news:
It doesn’t look too good out there in the world. Depressing really, isn’t it?
Artists – or at least some artists – do have a positive outlook and I loved the winners of the Turner Prize this year. Assemble they call themselves, and they achieved fame by saving ordinary houses that were condemned to be demolished and turning them into works of art which people can live in. They’re not an artist, they’re a group of people with a vision and the DIY skills to make their artistic vision of beauty into reality. Recycling is good for us, we know that, but this is the type of recycling with a ‘the sky is the limit’ attitude that to me is a truly uplifting story.
Then this headline caught my attention:
“Turner Prize: A sign of our deeply embedded housing crisis.”
Why do some people love being wet blankets?
Christine