On Saturday, October 17, Litquake’s annual Litcrawl event -- a pubcrawl-style celebration of literary culture in San Francisco -- shook its way down to 826 Valencia for a reading by our talented young authors. Attracting a crowd of 125-strong, our student writers presented work from a selection of 826 Valencia publications. And as a bonus, the books our students read from were packaged together, made available for purchase, and fittingly called a bundle of joy. But that was not all! Audience members also participated in a dictionary game that resulted in some new (and very useful) words.

The evening started off with three prolific writers, beginning with Marco, who read his piece "Wasabi Land," a tale of two foods and mistaken identities. Next, Asher shared a work inspired by the short stories of Sherman Alexie, followed by Kenny, who wowed the crowd with his list of all things cosmic. Edgar, Rosie, and Jennifer took the stage, and shared some of the neologisms they created as part of a dictionary project during 826’s Summer ELL Program (One example: Edgar’s definition for popcorn pizza, popza). These young lexicographers then challenged the audience members to each invent a word and a fitting definition, which would be later be judged by the students.

While a behind-the-curtain committee reviewed the dictionary entries, three more brave readers shared their work: Ruben added a flavor of non-fiction to the evening, reading from a piece he wrote for the Straight-Up News, the in-school newspaper of Everett Middle School. Gina and Evan read from work produced in 826’s Writing and Publishing Apprentices Workshop. Gina shared "Wednesday," her satirical story about a mayor with a serious elephant problem, and Evan read an arresting excerpt from a longer work.

At long last, the finalists of the dictionary challenge were announced. With over 75 entries, the competition was fierce indeed, and the judges were inundated with tantalizing options, including the apt choption and mashboard (see appendix). Unfortunately, only five could make it to the next round, where they would be given a thumbs-up or thumbs-down by our student readers. After hearing the new words such as: epileep and litsperation, a decision was made. Audience-member Ashley’s nifty westbuttered won the top prize: her very own bundle of joy.

All in all, the litsperating evening was a success. And, if you are interested in purchasing your own bundle of joy, head over to the pirate store to pick one up! The bundle of joy is $28 and includes:

• Two Seconds Plus, a chapbook from our Photography workshop
• The Kids Table, a chapbook from our Food Writing workshop
• Look Closer, a chapbook produced by our after-school tutoring students
• A copy of Everett Middle School’s newspaper, the Straight Up News
• A dictionary of words made by our Summer ELL Program
• Our most recent Writers and Apprentices Workshop publication, Parasol and Paroxysm

Huge thanks to the Litquake organizers, our talented young writers, their dedicated parents and teachers, our intrepid 826 interns and volunteers, as well as to everyone who showed up to support 826 at Litcrawl. The event concluded with Litcrawlers making their way to the next phase of the crawl, and from what we heard, not even one person westbuttered throughout the evening. Something to celebrate indeed!

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APPENDIX:

Choption: to chop and mix two unrelated words

Epileep: an epic sleep

Litsperation: the act of being inspired by student writers at Litcrawl

Mashboard: to make mashed potatoes while skateboarding

Westbuttered: referring to those nasty times when one falls into butter and slides west