I'm looking forward to teaching Found Stories, a one-day class at Hugo House this October 27 aimed at generating new fiction using found objects. There will be some very essential and very fun pre-class homework: I'm asking students to bring in objects that they find - post-it notes, mittens, music boxes - anything that will be helpful in generating stories, which, really, could be anything. I'll be bringing in a few of my own artifacts, and until class, I'm also keeping an eye out for goodies left on sidewalks, yard sales, and the like. But I'm really curious about what else people will bring. What stories catch your eye when you see something left behind - discarded or forgotten?In the meantime, here's a great story Andrei Codrescu told on NPR today about two items he found while moving: a box of chocolates wrapped in miniature covers of one of his poetry books and a bag of petrified pretzels. And here's a bit about Joseph Cornell, an artist I've been slowly reading up on who used found objects in his dreamy work .