Good day, everyone. I hope 2009 is treating you well so far. I have two announcements for today.

Announcement #1:

I have joined an elite group of bloggers on the www.100wordsaday.com website. The premise behind this site is that eight writers explore daily life in posts of exactly 100 words. Writers don’t have to post every day, but between the eight writers there should be at least one post of 100 words every day. All posts are non-fiction, but creativity is encouraged.

I saw the notice about the open blogger slot on Craigslist; I have no idea how many people sent samples to the site, but of all the submitters, I was chosen. I guess the site owner liked my samples.

I look at this as a great writing exercise. I’ve played with the 100 words concept before, but that was fiction-based. I’m looking forward to creating occasional 100 word posts that are not cryptic, but still tell a story or express an opinion by themselves.

Announcement #2:

Today, my stepson (Logan) will be competing in the Colorado Virtual Academy (COVA) spelling bee in Castle Rock at 2:00 PM MST. COVA is a publicly funded home-schooling organization that uses the K12.com curriculum, and since its students are home schooled, they are scattered throughout Colorado. Logan already competed in and won his regional COVA spelling bee last month, and today’s bee will bring all the regional winners from around Colorado to determine who will represent COVA in the Colorado State Scripps-Howard spelling bee in March. (In that sense, it’s like a district spelling bee in a traditional school setup.)

Last year, when Logan was going to the Pinnacle Charter School, he won that spelling bee and qualified to attend the Scripps-Howard bee. Unfortunately, he didn’t make it past the written round at state, and this is the last year he will be eligible to compete, so we’re hoping he will do well at the COVA-wide bee today.

I will be attempting to live blog Logan’s progress via my phone on my Facebook wall, if anyone is interested in following along. (Feel free to add me as a friend if you have a Facebook account. The same goes for Twitter.)