Next Noble Pen Meeting

Dec 17th, 2015 at 7 pm

Scott’s Family Restaurant

1906 Blairs Ferry Rd NE, Cedar Rapids

News

Barnes and Noble is looking to increase revenue by broadening their offerings beyond books to include games and toys.

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A new book discusses Cedar Rapids native Carl Van Vechten, who is best remembered for his photographs of authors, artists, and entertainers.  You can also see some of his photos at CSPS hall.

Victories

Cassie has the final proof of her book.  It is available for pre-order on line, she signed up for a PR blitz, and has scheduled a launch party.  She has drafted a third of the next story in the series.

Dylan has a subscriber and started serializing a second novel.

Daniel’s book on role playing game is in stores.

Education (?)

Commas can make a big difference.  The classic example is “Let’s eat Grandpa,” which was probably meant to read “Let’s eat, Grandpa.”

The Oxford Comma, the one that precedes the “and” in a list, is favored by many but rejected by others.  Commas or their lack can be expensive sometimes, as shown by this court case and this one.

A discussion at the last meeting about a bag of commas reminded me to reprint this attempt at humor from an older newsletter.

Some people do not favor commas because their ancestors learned to get along without them, after they found commas too difficult to transport over the mountains as they moved west.  They chose an extra barrel of flour over a supply of commas when they packed their wagons.   Even today, the cost of shipping a carton of commas restricts their use.

People may resort to modifying apostrophes, which seem to be in excess supply these days.  However when lowering the apostrophes it is easy to drop and bend them so that the best you can do is cut them down to salvage periods, which are only worth pennies on the dollar.  Few people use semicolons, so if you have an unneeded one you can cut it in two and have both a period and a comma for little effort.

I have spent most of the day putting in a comma and the rest of the day taking it out.— Oscar Wilde

Upcoming Schedule

Dec 17
Dylan
Charlie

Dec 24
Christmas Eve – no meeting

Dec 31
New Year’s Eve – no meeting

Jan 7
Randy
Nick

Jan 14
Bill W.
Open slot

Keep Writing,
Bill