You can write to me and I would be happy to reply. My address is above in this thread (earlier pages I think )Originally Posted by TonyJones
:-)
Yvonne
You can write to me and I would be happy to reply. My address is above in this thread (earlier pages I think )
:-)
Yvonne
This video gave me an odd idea for something I'd want to see in the future, perhaps, for an "icebreaker" activity....
http://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=g...&v=rvKF8OSnqrM
runnyrunny999 makes cooking videos, but he also receives packages of candies and snacks from viewers every once in a while. He tries the treats out and...well. Apparently he doesn't take too kindly to boozy chocolates (they taste like fish?!?!) or licorice. And I love how he went on a bit about how much he likes Daim chocolate, then took a deep sniff of that packet of Daim chocolate and was like: "Smells like dog food!" XD
Anyway--I know that the cost of sending things out to people has to be considered here. So, as a possible icebreaker activity, I had this in mind just now: Think of at least one of your shiny new InCoWriMo penpals. (Not all your penpals, unless you're willing to spend the money.) Consider sharing one favorite candy bar or one other small edible treat of some kind that you think will survive a trip through the mail. Preferably, try choosing something that you don't think the recipient has ever eaten before so it's something completely new. Along with this one small treat, include a handwritten letter. You can say whatever you want in the letter, but be sure to explain what the included treat is, too.
I think this would be so neat to try out. I think it's relatively inexpensive to do, as far as activities go. And it'd be real nice to keep the bar low in terms of requirements: Think of at least one of your new penpals. Buy one candy bar or other treat. That's it. If you'd want to go further than that, by all means, do it. This would be up to you. But at the very least, try this once.
Last edited by TheRoXFiles; February 24th, 2013 at 08:12 AM. Reason: *sniffs packet of Daim rocks* Ehh? O.o Smells like dog food! :P
Cool idea, Rox! I like the idea of attaching a short comment or written story behind what was sent. It would be a cool icebreaker too!
I really like this idea, too. We may not know each other all that well, but I think that one thing that we all have in common is: When it's snack time or it's time for a small treat, we all have a favorite candy bar or bag of chips or something that we reach for. The candies or chips or whatever will be different, depending on where we come from and what we like. But we all have this in common, at least--so let's start there. And it's interesting learning about any country or community by eating the food native to that area...even if it's food we're familiar with. For instance: In Japan, Oreos have been made and sold out there. But they're a little less sweet compared to American Oreos. And just as we gaijin (foreigners) love Pocky, the Japanese love Kit-Kat bars. But in Japan, they make all kinds cool flavors of Kit-Kat that we'll never see in the US, like green tea, sweet potato, blood orange, choco-banana, or...ahem...wasabi. Or miso.
The only thing I'd feel bad about with this kind of activity is that we'd be forced to play favorites in terms of who would be getting the treats. I mean...there are ways to get around this, sorta--like, buy a bag of fun-sized candy bars and add those to the letters instead of full-sized candies so it's more likely that everyone would get something--but then there's still the price of packaging and postage to consider. I know that earlier in this thread, the cost of postage for "InCoWriMo all year" has been a major sticking point, and rightfully so--quite frankly, it's going to get way too expensive to send a letter every single day for the rest of the year. If it were me, I wouldn't want to push anyone to spend more than they'd have to for something like the icebreaker activity I'm suggesting. But it also stinks that yeah...to some extent, depending on how many pen pals we have, we might be forced to play favorites.
Last edited by TheRoXFiles; February 24th, 2013 at 08:50 AM. Reason: Mmmm. Wasabi flavored Kit-Kat. *tilts head back and drools like Homer Simpson* :P
I'm against the idea of sending or receiving food from strangers, a crazy nut case who like rollerball could mail poison chocolate bars and send a bunch of fountain geeks to the hospital.
Until i have my private taster like Ceasar , count me out on this.
I used to think the same thing myself, until I saw runnyrunny999 and this one other YouTube user, Emmymadeinjapan, receive all these packages from viewers. Emmy, especially, receives lots of packages of treats from all over the world. She didn't ask for them--viewers just felt like sending her their favorite treats after watching her videos on her favorite snacks from Japan (her family's native country and where she was living until a few years ago). So these total strangers were willing to send Emmy foods, and she was willing to eat them. There was a certain amount of trust involved...just as I know there has been a certain amount of trust involved with publicly posting our addresses for InCoWriMo.
In terms of using this sort of thing as an icebreaker activity: Well, firstly, I think that if people felt good enough to publicly share their mailing addresses for InCoWriMo...that they were sharing their addresses in good faith and goodwill...then sending a single snack or candy through the mail isn't that big of a step forward. Besides, by the line of reasoning in the quoted post, then I shouldn't trust anything I get from the Goulet Pen Company, for instance, because they always include Dum-Dum lollipops in their packages--and I have never received candy, unsolicited and unexpected, from an online store before. Ever. Because I wasn't expecting that candy, I shouldn't trust Goulet Pens and should get a food taster to make absolutely sure this business is on the up-and-up and isn't trying to poison me. Right?
Secondly: If you want to talk about poisoning people or doing harm to them, you don't need food to do that. You could tamper with just about anything...including fountain pens, and including inks and other things...and send it through the mail. I understand the need to be cautious, but it's real easy to get downright paranoid with something like this, too, if you have absolutely no trust in the penpals you're writing to.
Thirdly: I think that for something like this, it'd be wise to stick to the same rules we use for Halloween trick-or-treating. No homemade things. Only pre-packaged name-brand items that are fully-sealed and from the manufacturer. If you don't trust the treat you got in the mail, don't eat it, period.
And finally: This is where it's a plus to set the bar very low for something like this and send something to ONE person. Pick the penpal you trust the most--both for sending and receiving. If you receive something from anyone else, then just trash it. Done. Read their letter, respond if you wish, but be sure politely explain that you didn't trust the treat they sent you and you threw it out.
Last edited by TheRoXFiles; February 24th, 2013 at 10:37 AM.
With the food, it really depends. If I "know" the person well from these forums, I wouldn't employ a taster...but if I get a random candy in the mail from someone I don't know of (and more importantly others don't know of either), then I would most certainly not eat it. My sister ate the lolipop I got in a package from the Goulets.
Hmm...then I'd think certain extra rules would need to be in order for something like this. Unsolicited treats should not be accepted. No surprises. Off the top of my head, I was thinking that maybe PM's might be in order here--a heads up saying what is coming. Maybe even pictures of what will get sent? But aside from sucking all the surprises and fun out of something like this, I can't tell if this is overkill or not. If people really would be this concerned but would want to try something like this anyway, then these concerns would have to be addressed somehow or other, right?
As for the Goulet lollipops? I eat them because those are the exact same lollipops we have at the bank where I work. Every teller has a jar of these by their station. It was no big deal to me. *shrug*
Don't know if anyone in the group is a Ham (Amateur radio operator) or been around one but they have competitions and events that may be a source for ideas. Like us it is about making contact with someone using a specific communication method. One that I thought of when we first started InCoWriMo was trying to contact someone in every country, or every state, or ...
Some of the crazier people even take generators and portable setups to islands just so that people can contact that location (collecting Postmarks?).
I agree that like NaNoWriMo, 365 or 52 Photo challenges, and every other similar challenge are designed to give people a reason to do something that they enjoy but for one reason or another can't justify the time. The end of the specific time doesn't mean you stop doing it. It just means that hopefully you are now in the habit or have worked out a way to do the thing you enjoy and still get things done.
I think we should start a new thread with each entry be a name and short description of a challenge idea, then they can either be put into a poll questions or voted on in some fashion. Once the next challenge is picked, we can work out the details.
I have really enjoyed participating in InCoWriMo and figure that there will be echo correspondence going in and out of my mail box for a while. Which is a very nice thought.
My issue with the idea of sending treats is that you never know what is restricted in another country. For instance, you're not allowed to mail kinder eggs into the US. For me, I'd prefer something not food related, at least not initially.
It stinks that we can't have Kinder eggs here in the US, doesn't it?I'd seen them in Emmymadeinjapan's videos and thought they were so cool. I kept looking for them and couldn't find them. It wasn't until this past summer, while I was out in Canada for a weekend, that I found out why. Long story short: I saw a three-pack of them at a convenience store and felt like I'd found the Holy Grail. I considered buying them but didn't because I had two choices: either gobble up all the eggs that night, before going back into the US, or try bringing them back with me. I chose to not buy the eggs because my commitment to Weight Watchers beat out my love of chocolate...I'd only want to eat one egg, not be forced to gobble down three just because...and taking them back to the US wasn't going to work because it was so hot out and I didn't think they'd make it back home without turning into a big, melted chocolaty mess. Anyway, it was a good thing I didn't go for the Kinder eggs because I learned about how they're verboten in the US after a couple other guys got in trouble for trying to smuggle the eggs over the border over the July 4th weekend. Each egg nets a $300 fine, right?
Anyway...I think there's a lot that can get sent through the mail and into other countries. I'd point to Emmymadeinjapan and her "Emmy Eats" videos as evidence of that. Anything from, oh...roughly six months ago, after she moved back to the US from Japan?...is fair game. Likewise, in giveaways, Emmy's been able to send Japanese treats and small packets of American candy out to winners.
Last edited by TheRoXFiles; February 24th, 2013 at 12:39 PM.
Why not the INKICOWRIMO? (international killer correspondence writing month, choose your favorite psychokiller stuck on deathrow and try to get a letter out of him or her. No danger there , they will never get out alive!
Dear charles manson etc etc ehehheeh!
Not a HAM operator (when I was going for my license eons ago you needed to pass the morse code test, think they've since changed that) but used to hang out with the group and was an honorary member of the one back home at the time. I loved their challenges and it was awesome when we were able to make contact with people from Ohio and even Alaska (although that one sometimes required relay messages).
That's macabre...
"What are moon-letters?" asked the hobbit full of excitement. He loved maps, as I have told you before; and he also loved runes and letters, and cunning handwriting, though when he wrote himself it was a bit thin and spidery.
lol.
...riiiiiiiiiight.
Anyway--personally, I had one other idea as a challenge:
Let's take a leaf from the Internet and try "replying with quotes" on paper...which isn't a new idea if you've ever done a "round robin" story in person with a group of people. Or actually--why not try doing a round robin story via mail? It's been a long time since I've done this myself, via email, but it's fun.
The basic idea with a round robin, at least, is that each person writes one sentence of a story on a sheet of paper (or in a blank email...), then passes that piece of paper or sends that email off to someone else to continue it. We can always tweak the number of sentences each person is allowed to write per turn. I figure that if this works with stories, it just might work with regular letter writing, too...just have to figure out what else should be involved.
LunaAzurina (February 2nd, 2014)
I'd be willing on a pen pal type level but maybe not the InCoWriMo level requirements.
Fountain Pen Sith Lord | Daakusaido | Everything in one spot
I'm with Mr. Ivan, penpals sounds much better. My busy schedule of work, sleep and eating biscuits doesn't leave me much time to write.
I second the notion
Personally, I thought it was understood that we would all continue to write to our new penpals from tomorrow on out--not write to everyone participating in InCoWriMo, regardless of add-on activities or challenges of some kind that get could get thrown into the mix into the future. O.o
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