Plan B.

Tonight was the NaNoWriMo kick off party, in Corvallis. I am so glad I went. Here's how it went down:

The invitation said the party was from 6-8, so I showed up at 6:05 to a room full of people, who were nearly done introducing themselves. I found a seat in the corner and introduced myself. The next lady was on her 8th NaNo, and she was recently contacted by an agent who asked her to do some editing on one of her older novels. Intimidating. The gal who introduced herself after her is on her second NaNo, she "failed miserably" last year. I missed the names and accomplishments of the other 15 people there.

Then, our leader Ellen started the icebreaker games. First, we had to write down where we were going to send our "inner editor" for the month of November. I said rehab, because my inner editor is a fat smelly drunk guy. We all read our various editor purgatories, then voted on the most evil place and the cushiest place. The winners got stickers. Stickers are a hot NaNo commodity. Only the coolest novelists have stickers.
Then we found the least and most organized novelists in the room. Since I have no outline, no names for my characters, no setting, no real "plan", I was co-winner for least organized. We each got a pack of index cards. I told Ellen that I already have index cards, but she wanted me to keep them because you can never have enough. Also, Madison was with me and she was coveting those index cards.
Then, we offered up our orphaned plots. We shared novel ideas that we hadn't quite fleshed out yet and made them up for adoption. I shared my "plan b" plot about a wealthy elderly woman who writes a letter to the world about her ungrateful family and pins it into the lining of a fancy coat (Perhaps a cashmere Norm Thompson coat?), which she donates to a thrift store. The buyer of the coat finds the note, and in turn writes her own story, which she hides in a donated item and so forth and so on.
And they LOVED it. They voted it the best plot.
So that's the novel I am going to write.

My "plan a" novel is still inside me, but it is so complicated that I think it will take about 11 months to get it untangled and ready to write for next year.