Poor Mojo's Newswire

#1: You admire a character for trying more than for their successes. #2: You gotta keep in mind what's interesting to you as an audience, not what's fun to do as a writer. They can be v. different. #3: Trying for theme is important, but you won't see what the story is actually about til you're at the end of it. Now rewrite. #4: Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___. #5: Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You'll feel like you're losing valuable stuff but it sets you free. #6: What is your character good at, comfortable with? Throw the polar opposite at them. Challenge them. How do they deal? #7: Come up with your ending before you figure out your middle. Seriously. Endings are hard, get yours working up front. . . .

Beginning in February, students throughout Quebec began protesting against a proposed 75 percent hike in the cost of their tuition. Demonstrators staged strikes, sit-ins, and marches, in some cases drawing hundreds of thousands of participants and incurring hundreds of arrests. Quebec's government responded by passing a controversial emergency law, Bill 78, that places strict limits on free assembly, including a provision that requires demonstrators to submit protest plans and receive police approval. Reacting to the new law, hundreds of thousands more took to the streets to join the broadening protest. Now, four months later, nightly demonstrations continue across Montreal. These marches are called "casseroles," as participants use pots and pans to create noise and call for attention.

Scientists are trading telescopes for aprons this week to sell Milky Way cupcakes, Saturn cake, and chocolate chip Opportunity cookies in an effort to salvage U.S. planetary science projects. The 2013 budget proposal submitted by the Obama administration earlier this year would cut funding for NASA's planetary science projects by about $300 million. While Congress is still deliberating over the federal budget, groups of scientists are planning a series of demonstrations — in the form of bake sales, car washes and other events — for Saturday to plead their case. More space news from msnbc.com Image: Space spiral Imadomar2 via YouTube Middle East UFO linked to Russian missile test A swirling spiral of light seen in the skies over Israel, Syria and other Middle East countries on Thursday night has been linked to a Russian intercontinental ballistic missile test. Are the aliens calling? Send in the robots! Craters serve as a Martian chronicle Scientists to hold bake sale for NASA Saturday Though planet-studying spacecraft usually cost millions, or even billions, of dollars, every penny helps. That's the reasoning behind the Planetary Exploration Car Wash and Bake Sale to be held by University of Central Florida students and professors who hope to sway lawmakers into providing more money for studying the solar system. It is one of nearly 20 planned demonstrations for Saturday at sites across the country, organizers said.

Taking a page from cyberpunk, traditional West African Juju priests adapted their services to the needs of the information age and started leading down-on-their-luck internet scammers through strange and costly rituals designed to increase their powers of persuasion and make their emails irresistible to greedy Americans. And so “Sakawa” was born. Now, as we discovered when we went to Ghana with our video cameras, not only is Sakawa the country’s most popular youth activity and one of its biggest underground economies, it’s a full-blown national phenomenon. Sakawa has its own tunes, clothing brands, Sakawasploitation flicks, and even a metastatic backlash from Christian preachers and the press.

According to a study by the Commonwealth Fund, 6.6 million young adults have signed up for coverage through their parents’ health insurance plans. Under the ACA provision, young people can now stay on their parents’ plans until the age of 26. About half of the 19-to-25 year-olds interviewed for the study reported opting in to their parents’ plans between November 2010 and November 2011. Last month, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Education Secretary Arne Duncan wrote college presidents and student organizations urging them to remind students they can stay on their parents’ plans after graduation. “Now, graduating students are free to make career choices based on what they want to do, not where they can get health insurance,” they wrote.