In a rain storm that broke just as the bulk of the participants arrived, we kicked things off Friday afternoon by dividing into groups and unveiling the common theme: the Dining Philosophers. The Dining Philosophers, a concept brought to us by Ben, who is working towards his doctorate in Computer Science, is an analogy for the computing dilemma of concurrency, or several processes occurring simultaneously. The analogy paints the picture of five philosophers sitting at the same table each with a plate of pasta and a chopstick placed in front of them. Because each philosopher would need two chopsticks to eat the pasta, they must take turns using the chopsticks to their left and right. In other words, not all the philosophers can ever be eating at the same time.

The groups set out to respective work areas to mull this concept over and were tasked with creating an outline of a play by the evening's close. That night we also set the precedent for our meals, as everyone sat down together to enjoy a delicious, homemade creation.

Saturday's goal was for each group to take our outline and create a scene synopsis of the play by the end of the day. This was an achievable and satisfying goal because, once completed, a group could theoretically give a reading of their play (the weekend's ultimate objective) as giving an improvised performance based on a detailed outline was an option for fulfilling the first draft requirement.

Preparing the plays for the evening reading was Sunday's objective. By developing the scenes we had described in our synopses, setting dialogue and building richer plot structure, everyone worked to hammer out a solid first draft. In the evening we sat together and each group gave a reading of their brand new play!