Voting is as cool as the Coop
Register to vote today! Plus Chicken Coop tickets, community events and writing prompts
Hi! Hello! How’s it going?
I know, another free newsletter this week! Wild!
Just in case you missed it, today is your last chance to register to vote in the UK General Election. For more information on how to register to vote, check out this post by Simple Politics.
Yes, it’s another reminder for you to register to vote, but this election feels particularly important as it’s past time to hold power to account and build something better.
If we want an optimistic, fair, and sustainable future, we need to know that the people coming into government will do everything they can to help our communities (creative or otherwise) thrive at local, national, and international levels, including supporting an accessible, well-funded art and culture scene now and for future generations.
If you’d like to learn more about what each party is pledging for the arts, check out this analysis from Campaign for the Arts.
CFTA is a non-partisan alliance advocating for the arts, they don’t favour any particular party or candidate. Their work is focused on championing, defending, and expanding access to the arts and culture for the public.
They believe access to the arts should be available from childhood, accessible to all, and thriving everywhere. The campaign has seen significant success this year, including restoring arts funding in Scotland after 15,000 people signed their petition.
For more information on how you can get involved with CFTA, check out their website.
Don’t worry, I won’t be talking about this forever, just until the election is done on July 4.
Join us at The Chicken Coop
That’s right, tickets are still available for The Chicken Coop Writing Group on Tuesday, June 25 from 6-8 pm at Lost in Leith Bar.
I’ve mentioned this before, but this month we’ll be taking on a slight political edge and working together to imagine what we’d like our communities to look like.
We’re taking inspiration from local organising, like The Pride Bridge campaign, unions like Living Rent, who have campaigned successfully for lights on Leith Links and who are currently campaigning for rent controls across Scotland, and movements like Solarpunk, a literary and artistic movement that works to address how the future could look if we address climate change and pollution through interconnected communities grounded in nature. Check out Solarpunk Magazine for more.
Please come join us as we work in hope for the future and find practical ways to empower ourselves to create a fairer future for us all.
Community event announcements
This week is packed with great events, from writing groups and open mics, to showcases and workshops there’s something for everyone!
Tomorrow, June 19, the Experimental Writing Group run by Iris Ollier returns to Embassy Gallery for an evening of writing for writers of all levels and genres who are interested in visual arts and visual artists who are interested in writing. For more information, reach out to Iris on Instagram.
Also, tomorrow, June 19, The Sad Song Club is at Sketchy Beats. SSC is a multi-media night that welcomes music, poetry, and more hosted by local musician, tour guide, comedian, and creator of Dune! The Musical, Dan Collins. Get more information about SSC events on Facebook.
This Friday, June 21, the Hame-ish Cabaret is back at The Sung at Assembly Roxy. This month they have music from Storm The Palace and comedy from Bentley Green and Strange. This month’s Hame-ish Live section features C.D. Boyland, Rebecca Green, SIASA, Aditya Narayan and Geoff Winde. Get your free cabaret tickets here.
Also on Friday, June 21, the Loud Poets are at the Scottish Storytelling Centre with their Spoken Word showcase featuring John Lawrie, Jj Fadaka, Megan McCorquodale, and former Birmingham Poet Laureate, Casey Bailey. They’re also at The Canon’s Gait next Monday, June 24, for their open mic with local feature, Hjarta. Check out more of their events and get open mic sign-up information here.
Next week, on Tuesday, June 25, we’ll be at Lost in Leith for The Chicken Coop Writing Group from 6-8 pm for some collaborative and hopeful writing! Grab your tickets here.
Next weekend, Porty Pride is running a great programme of events, including outdoor activities, open mics and workshops. Some of my top picks include Exploring Queer Space, Make Good Trouble, Queer and the Cost of Living, and The Story Sessions. You can find the full Porty Pride programme here.
Writing prompt
This week, we had our second of two monthly writing sessions for community members. It’s always great to get together with people and take some more time to write, especially when the world is battering at our doors or the rain is pouring down.
One of our writers and community members, Joanna Helms, shared their writing prompt with us yesterday and I couldn’t resist sharing it with you today. So, here it is…
Write a conversation between two inanimate objects.
I love this prompt as it holds so many possibilities. Joanna shared a piece where they’d written a conversation between an amp and a microphone apologising to each other because of feedback.
If you’re writing to this prompt, consider usual pairings, for example, your left shoe talking to your right or a key talking to a lock, and unusual pairings, like an origami dragon talking to a rubber duck (both things I can see on my desk right now).
Stretch task
Challenge yourself by trying something new here, you can collage your response using words cut out from a newspaper or magazine, doodle a comic strip (I won’t drop this, sorry), or try writing in a form you’ve never used before.
If you’d like to join us for our twice-monthly writing groups, you can become a member of our community by becoming a paid subscriber to our newsletter for £5 a month.
Membership not only gives you access to these additional free writing groups and our full newsletter back catalogue, but it also allows you to join our Discord Server where we connect online to share open calls for submission and performance, plus sharing skills and professional development opportunities, and getting early-bird access to Chicken Coop and Inkubator tickets.
All membership fees go back into supporting my work on The Good Egg Project, including research for our event roundups, scouting out opportunities, and preparation time for the Coop, the Inkubator, and Good Egg writing groups.
Thank you for reading!
It’s a pleasure to see so many of you out there spreading the voting love!
I hope you’re feeling optimistic seeing the possibilities of successful change at a local level and engaging less with the flip-flopping and empty promises from the disconnected political class.
Stay whelmed and I’ll see you next week at the Coop at Lost in Leith for some writing and collaborative imagining.
Take care and speak soon,
Naomi
P.s. You can still register to vote until 11.59 pm today. Register to vote here.
P.p.s. Pay-what-you-can tickets for the Coop are available here.
P.p.p.s. Taco sends love and snuggles to anyone who needs them right now.