pictures from the peter f yacht club #8 ottawa launch

Here are some pictures from the reading we had on December 22, 2007 at The Carleton Tavern [check out John W. MacDonald photos of previous Tavern readings/shindigs here and here] to celebrate the eighth issue of The Peter F. Yacht Club. It was a combined reading/Christmas party, and all-around general excuse to hang around and get silly. It was also a good excuse for a number of us to be able to hear each other read, which might not happen as often as some of us would like; being just before Christmas, the crowd wasn't large, but it was big enough, and certainly appreciative. Readers included Amanda Earl [see her write-up on such here; read her 12 or 20 questions here], Roland Prevost (the pictures here were all taken by his lovely wife, Janice Tokar), myself, Sandra Ridley [see my note on her here] and Nicholas Lea (recently returned to Ottawa from Fredericton; he read a poem responding to one by American poet John Ashbery); we even had Pearl Pirie read as well, even though she's not in the issue, but she's been doing such interesting work lately (she read from a poetry manuscript she's been deep inside of for the past few weeks). Even our bartendress, Kelli, jumped into the fray. There are even some photos Pearl posted later, on flickr: here and here and here and here and here and here.

Amanda Earl;

rob mclennan;

Sandra Ridley;

Roland Prevost;
Pearl Pirie;
James Moran, bartendress Kelli + rob mclennan;

Nicholas Lea;

An appreciative crowd, some of the audience included Steve and Cathy from Dusty Owl, James Moran and a very pregnant Anita Dolman (she declined our invitation to read), Charles Earl [see the photo he took of Ridley and I here], John W. MacDonald, Monique Desnoyers, Rachel Zavitz, Carmel Purkis and Michael Miller; it was too bad we couldn't get some of our other regulars out, such as Jennifer Mulligan, Monty Reid, Stephen Brockwell, Marcus McCann, Jesse Ferguson, Clare Latremouille or Max Middle. Currently, Jesse Ferguson is putting together the next issue for February, and another "Edmonton issue" is scheduled for the end of spring. Can anyone say "further launch"?