The Creative Retirement Institute hosts a lunch with Mark Lijek, retired Foreign Service officer, for his presentation, “The Best Bad Idea: The True Story of Argo,” which will focus on his experience with his wife and four others of sanctuary in the Canadian embassy and being smuggled out of Iran following the 1979 revolution.

Seating for the presentation will be at 11:30 a.m., Sept. 11 on the the second floor of Woodway Hall on the main campus of Edmonds Community College.

Tickets for the luncheon and speaker are $26 and available for purchase at the CRI office (T-F 10 a.m.-2 p.m.) in the Edmonds Conference Center (201 – 4th Ave. N., downtown Edmonds) or by mail using a registration form. Register for the luncheon or purchase your tickets before August 27. The luncheon cost is $15 for CRI members. Tickets are not sold at the door. For more information call: 425-640-1830.

No parking passes needed for luncheon. Park in student or staff spaces not golf parking spaces. No phone reservations.

Lijek will discuss the embassy takeover, the events of the day itself, six days in hiding, refuge in the Canadian Embassy, and final departure to freedom. He grew up in Seattle, attended Seattle Preparatory School, the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University and received an MBA from the American University.

Lijek is the author of “The Houseguests: A Memoir of Canadian Courage and CIA Sorcery,” as well as a minor consultant to the Academy Award-winning film “Argo”. This event is sponsored by the Dr. Maybelle Chapman Speakers Series.