December 2008 and January 2009

Our November gathering at which we discussed short stories selected by the group was great fun. We stayed up way too late yakking and I for one will treasure forever in my heart the tale of Jennifer's family's call-out responses to readings of "The Not-So-Pitiful Thanksgiving."

We also discussed our upcoming reading selections and decided to actually meet in December, like the crazy gals we are. Hoo-boy! There's no stopping us. We'll be meeting December 10 at Amy's house and instead of having assigned reading we will be having more of a party. (To be honest, this differs only slightly from our usual meetings.)

• Bring your favorite Christmas story to share. This can be a short story or a picture book or other appropriate shortish format.
• Bring a wrapped used (or new, if you're feeling spendy) book for a white elephant book exchange. It was stressed to me that this was not the time to pass off my copy of Raising Rabbits for Food and Fur. So only bring a book that someone might conceivably want.
• We said something about treats, and how we should all bring them. I didn't write down exactly what we decided, but when in doubt, bring food. Perhaps someone will enlighten me in the comments.
  

In 2009 we will be moving our meeting night from Wednesday to Thursday to avoid scheduling conflicts. For the first part of 2009 our book selections are as follows:

• January: Life Among the Savages by Shirley Jackson. Unfortunately there are only three copies of this book in the local library system and there's a wait, too. Perhaps we should revisit this selection?
• February: The Magic of Ordinary Days by Ann Howard Creel
• March: The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner