Month: October 2019

Time To Soar

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69EBF9D7-327F-4928-B234-9CB937CA8831“So how are you feeling now that the divorce is final?” Claire asked her best friend over coffee at the local Starbucks.

“Oh my God, Claire,” Diana responded. “I feel like a tremendous weight has been lifted off of me. I feel so light that if a strong breeze came along, it would lift me up and I’d fly through the air.”

“That’s great, Diana,” Claire said. “After all you’ve been through, you deserve happiness.”

Diana sighed and her eyes glassed over. “Claire, what’s going to happen to me now?” Diana said. “I’m floating, but where is that breeze going to take me? Where am I going to land? What am I going to do?”

“You’re a strong woman and I’ve no doubt that you’ll land on your feet,” Claire said, trying to reassure her friend.

“I hope you’re right, but I’m so used to being Steve’s wife and it’s been so long since I’ve been on my own,” Diana said. “I’m not used to flying solo.”

“Listen, Diana,” Claire said. “You know what they say about fight or flight? Well, my friend, you won the fight. Now it’s time for you to take flight. It’s time for you to soar.”

Written for the Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Photo Challenge. Photo credit: Javier Ideami

See, Hear, Speak No Evil

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1141D16F-F961-4944-B4B9-A4565821C218The U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution today laying out the framework for the next phase of the impeachment inquiry into Donald Trump’s actions regarding holding aid to Ukraine hostage unless they would gather dirt on Trump’s political opponent and for obstruction of justice in the investigation of those actions. The resolution passed on a vote of 232-196.

Apparently the Republican members of the House of Representatives are acting like those infamous three monkeys who, as the old adage says, see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil — at least when it comes to Donald Trump — as not one Republican representative voted to support the resolution. Not one!FAB4C148-BDE4-465F-939E-D22608BB7DE8The symbolism of the three monkeys is that it depicts a lack of moral responsibility on the part of people who refuse to acknowledge impropriety, looking the other way or feigning ignorance. Such people turn a blind eye to something that is legally or morally wrong. In this case, these elected officials see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil and pretend that they have not witnessed wrongdoing, and, therefore, abdicate all responsibility for righting a wrong.

Clearly 100% of Republicans in the Congress of the United States of America have abdicated their responsibility to uphold the U.S. Constitution and to act in the best interests of their constituents, the citizens of America.

They truly are a basket of deplorables.

Retiring Dragon

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99AFB4A0-ADAB-4B0A-B146-A609D44FE472I’m so tired. I’ve been at this since the beginning of time, flying around up in the jagged mountains, down in the lush, green valleys, over the flowing rivers, and across the deep, blue seas. And there are just so many towns and villages can a dragon burn to cinders and ashes with its fire breath.

And then there are all these irritating little hero wannabes out there with their puny little swords or bows and arrows who want to make a name for themselves by slaying the dragon. Yeah, right. Give me a break. Listen, deep down I’m not a bad guy, but a dragon’s gotta do what a dragon’s gotta do, am I right? It’s in my nature.

But I gotta tell you, this whole shtick is beginning to be a drag on me. Hey, did you see what I did there? It’s a “drag on” me. And I’m a dragon. Ha! Who says dragons don’t have a sense of humor? I bet I coulda been a smash at one of those comedy clubs in the villages if I hadn’t burned them all down by breathing my fire breath on them. That’s what you call bad breath. Ba da bing, ba da boom, eh?

But I digress. Yes, I’m misunderstood, imposing, and feared, but all in all, I’ve had a good run. I think the time has come for me to retire to my lair, to spend my golden years relaxing and binge watching “Game of Thrones” or some other stupid show with their bullshit depictions of dragons. And sure, I may occasionally swoop down and grab a damsel or a knight for a late night snack. Just for grins, you know.

Written for the What Do You See? prompt, now from Sadje, over at Keep It Alive, who has taken this prompt over after the passing of Hélène Vaillant earlier this year. Image credit: Google.

FOWC with Fandango — Adage

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FOWCWelcome to October 31, 2019 and to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). It’s designed to fill the void after WordPress bailed on its daily one-word prompt.

I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (US).

Today’s word is “adage.”

Write a post using that word. It can be prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction. It can be any length. It can be just a picture or a drawing if you want. No holds barred, so to speak.

Once you are done, tag your post with #FOWC and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Or you can simply include a link to your post in the comments.

The issue with pingbacks not showing up seems to have been resolved, but you might check to confirm that your pingback is there. If not, please manually add your link in the comments.

And be sure to read the posts of other bloggers who respond to this prompt. You will marvel at their creativity.

Talk About Fake News

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740DE7BB-1519-4B9C-91C6-0FB57F6B4A69Donald Trump tweeted a photo showing him allegedly putting a medal around the neck of the “hero dog” that participated in the raid that ended up in the death of ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

The reality, though, is that the photo didn’t really happen. Someone photoshopped a picture of the hero dog over an Associated Press photo of 2017 Medal of Honor recipient James McCloughan.155D33C6-1612-480B-A824-C872149925DCIn fact, the hero dog has never been to the White House and is back on duty despite being injured by an electric cable during an explosion at the raid, according to U.S. Central Command.

And, by the way, this was not the first instance of photoshopping of official White House photos. Here’s one that photoshopped Trump’s former National Security Advisor John Bolton out of a photograph, replacing him with Attorney General William Barr.6C1003F6-A4CD-4AE3-99CD-BD9EC58EA958Well, as Trump once said, “Don’t believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news. … What you’re seeing and what you’re reading is not what’s happening.”

Don’t Judge Me

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Don’t you hate it when you’re going through the checkout line at the grocery store and the cashier runs your items through the scanner and then gives you a look that silently says, “Seriously, you’re buying this shit?”

That happened to me this morning when I purchased these items:DCFB1311-DA08-4A4B-A49E-0775F0047872Now before you, too, judge me, let me explain. We have a 14 year-old dog who is suffering from arthritis. So we have to get her to swallow two different capsules twice daily to provide some arthritis relief. Unfortunately, neither of the pills is chewable, so we’ve got to hide it in food that she will eat.

After much experimentation, we discovered that our dog likes Spam and Gerber’s chicken and turkey “sticks” (little sausages). So we poke holes in one or the other, insert the capsules inside of them, and beg her to eat the Spam or “sticks” with the embedded capsules, which she does, thus allowing us to solve the challenge of getting her to take her medicine.

And just for the record, I have never in my life knowingly eaten Spam, nor Gerber’s chicken or turkey sticks. So don’t you dare judge me by what’s in my shopping cart, thank you very much.

Fandango’s Provocative Question #46

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FPQWelcome once again to Fandango’s Provocative Question. Each week I will pose what I think is a provocative question for your consideration. I missed posting last week’s provocative question because I was busy hosting out-of-town guests and didn’t have time to come up with one. But I’m back this week.

Anyway, by provocative, I don’t mean a question that will cause annoyance or anger. Nor do I mean a question intended to arouse sexual desire or interest.

What I do mean is a question that is likely to get you to think, to be creative, and to provoke a response. Hopefully a positive response.

I was watching “Jimmy Kimmel Live” last week and he and his sidekick, Guillermo, paid a visit to the New Yorker magazine in an effort to get a cartoon published in the magazine. Neither was successful, but Jimmy came up with this cartoon, which serves as the inspiration for this week’s provocative question.CDAE46BB-E23E-40BF-BDB9-14331575A5F4The cartoon shows a picture of a young man sitting in a jail cell with headphones on. He’s busy using his smartphone when the prison guard apparently advises the guy in the cell that he’s entitled to a phone call. The guy then asks the guard, “What’s a phone call?”

This got me thinking. According to my iPhone’s screen time tracker, I typically spend eight to ten hours a day using that device. But I spend almost zero time talking on the phone. I don’t answer my phone unless I know who’s calling. And these days, I rarely get phone calls from people I know. My adult kids communicate with me exclusively via text messages. On those rare occasions when I use the phone to call them, the usual response I get is, “Why are you calling? Why didn’t you just text me?”

It seems that, increasingly these days, people of all ages are shunning phone calls in favor of chat apps and texting. So my provocative question this week is:

Has using a telephone for making calls become obsolete? For those of you who grew up without the internet or smartphones, is calling and speaking with people on the phone still important? For those of you who grew up only using smartphones, is it necessary to call anyone anymore?

If you choose to participate, write a post with your response to the question. Once you are done, tag your post with #FPQ and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Or you can simply include a link to your post in the comments.

The issue with pingbacks not showing up seems to have been resolved, but you might check to confirm that your pingback is there. If not, please manually add your link in the comments.

FOWC with Fandango — Solve

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FOWCWelcome to October 30, 2019 and to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). It’s designed to fill the void after WordPress bailed on its daily one-word prompt.

I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (US).

Today’s word is “solve.”

Write a post using that word. It can be prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction. It can be any length. It can be just a picture or a drawing if you want. No holds barred, so to speak.

Once you are done, tag your post with #FOWC and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Or you can simply include a link to your post in the comments.

The issue with pingbacks not showing up seems to have been resolved, but you might check to confirm that your pingback is there. If not, please manually add your link in the comments.

And be sure to read the posts of other bloggers who respond to this prompt. You will marvel at their creativity.

Leigha Wants To Know

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DD53D39B-1DF9-4920-9B55-4F162E05C4B4Leigha Robbins, a lovely, poetic blogger, just received a well-deserved Real Neat Blog Award from Sadje, over at Keep It Alive.

Leigha posed seven questions, as per the rules for the Real Neat Blog Award. But as a self-confessed rule breaker, Leigha said that “I don’t want anyone left out. So, you are ALL nominated. Please join in and have some fun! Now for my questions for all of you.”

Thanks, Leigha. I’m going to take you up on that.

What is your favorite type of writing (poetry, flash fiction, stream of consciousness)?

You didn’t specify whether your talking about writing or reading, so I’ll answer from both perspectives. I enjoy writing flash fiction and I’m a regular participant on Linda G. Hill’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt. So I like writing both. Now, when it comes to writing poetry, I suck at it, so I rarely even try.

As to what kind of writing I like reading, I enjoy all three types.

If you use prompts, what kind do you like (picture, word, phrase, set number of words, etc)?

Yes! 😉

What is your favorite pet you have had or want to get?

We have a 14 year-old dog and an 11 year-old cat and I love them both equally (except when our cat bites and scratches me, which is a daily occurrence).

Since this is close to Halloween, do you like scary movies?

I used to in my younger days, but not so much these days. I do like psychological thrillers and suspenseful movies. Just not the gory, blood and guts kind.

Have you ever seen a movie based on a book that was better than the book?

The only one I can think of was the movie version of Ira Levin’s “Rosemary’s Baby,” the one with Mia Farrow. I enjoyed the book, but I thought the movie did an excellent job of capturing the dark, sinister mood of the book.

Do you prefer coffee or tea?

Without question, coffee. My mother used to make me drink hot tea with a spoonful of honey in it whenever I got sick as a kid. So even now, I still associate hot tea with being sick.

If you listen to it, when do you start to play Christmas music?

If I never hear another Christmas song for the rest of my life, it will be too soon.

Anyone else care to answer Leigha’s questions?