A fellow PR guy in Baltimore has started a web site called Weekly Writing Assignment. The premise is simple – he puts out a writing contest every week and shares five finalists before picking a winner. Piece of cake. No prizes, just an exercise for the writing muscles.

I did not get a chance to do the first assignment and almost missed the second deadline, but plopped myself down for a good 20 minutes or so and cranked out the 300-word assignment describing someone looking in a mirror.

I didn’t have much trouble because the character is one from a novel I have written and re-written over the past few years so he pretty much lives in my head (and will continue to do so until I get the damn thing published). This was totally new stuff, not anything lifted from work I had previously done.

And I was picked as a finalist. I’m pretty psyched because I always want people to see what I am writing. Why else would I go through all this. Plus, it’s fiction and as I hopefully prepare to enter a grad program in fiction this fall, I need every little boost I can get.

So go to the site and check out my story. Check out the other finalists too and take a look at the Week 3 assignment to see if you are game. It’s longer than the first two and something I might not have the time to tackle, but what do you have to lose?