I founded and moderated a group called Pencils! Writing Workshop in Norwalk, Connecticut, from 2003-2009. One of our members, Nanette, introduced the group to NaNoWriMo, and a gaggle of us participated. We had a great time, but the best times were our weekly Friday Night Hang-Outs. Here we are after our first four days of writing, November 5, 2004, at Black Bear Saloon in SoNo (South Norwalk, the city’s entertainment district). Back Row, from left: Jen, A.J., Jill, me. Front row: Nanette, Tammy.

Here we all are later that night, clowning around with cigarettes. For the record, I think only one or two of us smoked.

This was the following year, Labor Day, 2005. It was early September, but we rented a house in Maine to start strategizing for that year’s NaNo and hash out some ideas. For the record, Bad Apple would come out of 2005’s event.

Thanks to all our planning, November 2005 was a rockin’ NaNo! We wrote like fiends from Saturday on and gathered to do some serious partying on the Friday nights. This was our first gathering of that year, in the same place—the Black Bear Saloon—where we’d kicked off the 2004 event. Friday, November 4, 2005.

Friday, November 4, 2005. The guy in the picture was a relatively new member of Pencils! Notice the file in the lower right hand corner—it contained all my research and notes for Bad Apple.

Tammy hides while Erica takes notes. Friday, November 4, 2005.

There was a great nightclub in SoNo called Martini’s (it’s not there anymore). They were having a costume party on Friday, November 11, although I’m not sure why. Anyway, we all dressed up as our favorite writers or fictional characters. I went as Anais Nin. I don’t remember who Nanette, on the right, went as. We had a really great time…so great I don’t remember a lot of it, so boy was it fun rediscovering these photos!

Left, AJ, and Jill.

Me and Jill. Jill went as Lolita; that novel had been a Pencils! Writing Workshop Book Club pick earlier in the year.

Nanette. Do you think she needs another glass of wine?

Jill and a friend walking toward the car. I only included this because I thought her Lolita costume was spot-on!

We had a mid-week party that year, too. Tuesday, November 15, we all dialed it back a notch and had dinner and drinks at Tammy’s house. It was a nice change of pace, but we were all starting to panic as the month was half over.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005. Sadly, this photo and the one above are the only two I took that night. I remember us staying until the wee hours (I might even have slept over). Those were good times!

Friday, November 18, 2005. I was in my third semester at Burlington College, and we would, at every residency, have a Friday Night Reading Series (we had some clever name for the event; damned if I can recall it now). Bad Apple, which I was still in the throes of finishing, was just about all I was working on, so I presented the complete opening scene to gauge the shock factor on its ending. It was met with more than just a positive response (it even surprised me)! For the record, Bad Apple would be edited and revised three times before it went out for submission, and three more times once Vagabondage Press Books bought it…but the opening scene, in essence, changed very little. It’s very close to the way it was originally written and presented that night.

Who doesn’t love NaNo swag? I’m one of those chicks that buys a lot of it! Here I am on November 17, 2006, sporting a NaNo temporary tattoo. I don’t think they sell these in the store anymore.

By 2007’s NaNo, many of the old Pencils! Workshop gang were pursuing other projects or doing other things. There wasn’t, at the time, a Fairfield County Region, so I found some people through the forums and we sort of “formed” our own. Eventually, one of the NaNoers I met did get a Fairfield County Region formed—and to this day he does a great job, and keeps at it year round. (Aside: Fairfield County is so large there really should be a “northern” region and a “southern” region; most of us up Danbury way don’t want to drive what amounts to an hour or more for write-ins…this year I’ve got a couple of friends who are doing this, so it’s likely we’ll do our own thing). Anyway…here was one of our first “unofficial region” gatherings at Rocco’s Restaurant in Brookfield, Connecticut. It was our “Kick-Off” party, October 28, 2007.

Me and Rob. I’m not sure, but I THINK that was his first NaNo. We both have plans to tie up loose ends with Read Short Fiction this year so we can have the whole month of November free to NaNo.

The receipt. Don’t ask me why I took a photo of this, but it’s a fun memory now.

November 4, 2007: Our write-in was at the Borders in Danbury (long gone, building still vacant).

One of our favorite write-in spots was the Starbucks up in New Milford. We met there on several occasions. November 11, 2007.

Rob writes on his NEO at the New Milford Starbucks. I was so enamored with it I bought one, too. I’ve written more than a few good short stories on it since then, among them “Bridging Christmas.”

Borders, Danbury, Connecticut, November 18, 2007.