Raffle Winners (From The High Desert Retreat Scholarship Fund)

By Marilyn Friedman

WE DID IT! We raised enough money to offer a full scholarship to the retreat through your generous donations, Duchess Willemina Pennington's Soiree Litteraire, the hard work of the Writing Pad staff and volunteers, and our raffle for a 5 week class at Writing Pad in Los Angeles and a 1 day class at Laguna Writers in San Francisco. Yay! Thank you so much for all of your contributions! It takes a village! Now--we have to pick our lucky scholarship recipient. Spread the word about the contest and our fancy judges. Details are here.

Also, Writing Pad has some fantastic, new classes on the schedule. All at lower prices for Oct. and Nov. Call 323-333-2954 to sign up before they are full!

• Writing Pad High Desert Retreat (Weekend of Oct. 22-24)--1 regular spot left, 1 scholarship spot (apply for the contest, peeps!)
• Writing For Your Mummy: Find Your Inner Stephen King (Sun., Oct., 17)--3 spots left
• Acting Out: One Writer, One Act (Thurs p.m., starts Oct. 21)--3 spots left
• So You Want To Be A Writer (Wed. nights, Fri and Sat. mornings)--2 spots left (new, lower price)
• Finishing School (Wed. nights, Fri and Sat. mornings)--2 spots left (new, lower price)
• Your Name In Print (Sun. a.m., starts Nov. 7)--3 spots left (new, lower price)

And now, may I have a drum roll please? Our raffle winners as witnessed by the members of the"And You Thought Your Family Was F*&%$# Up" class) are:

Eric Fraser for the 5 week class at Writing Pad! Congratulations, Eric!

When I asked Eric to name his favorite place to write he said, "my favorite place to write on earth (so far) is Kyoto. Kyoto is one of history's charmed cities. It's beauty makes you imagine strange things about it - that magic is possible there, that it was built by Gods, that it still lives and works under their protection."

Wow! That sounds amazing! Maybe we should have the next retreat in Kyoto! See a picture of Eric's Kyoto writing space below. And the winner of the one day class at Laguna Writers is Heather Tuggle! Congratulations, Heather!When I asked Heather to name her favorite place to write she said, "My favorite place to write is Laguna Writers. Being surrounded by all those gifted writers and such positive energy motivates me to produce in a way that's difficult to duplicate when I'm in a café or at home at my desk. What's more, the inspiration and encouragement I get from writing with others propels me to try to write more when I am alone." Fantastic! I second that. Thanks again, everyone for participating in the raffles and for your generous donations.