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 |  My blog for the blog challenge |
| Ahem, ahem, ahem ... cough cough cough ... mememememememe ... Okay, I'm ready to write now. |
| Prompt for July 11, 2013 Competition brings out the best and the worst in us. Should more activities or competitions be encouraged for children in schools? Or should they be discouraged? Competition is sometimes known as a dirty word when it comes to raising and educating our children. People say it makes children feel bad about themselves if they can't win which hurts their self-esteem, or that it makes winning more important than anything else. Personally, I think competition can be a great thing for children. And why shouldn't it be "taught" and used in schools? Our whole adult world revolves around competitions of some sort or another. We compete at work for the raise and senior position. We compete in play at sports. In our free time we compete at even all the seemingly little things we do, can we grow the first tomato, do we have the better car, who owns more movies, which farm grew the best wheat crop, who cooks the best, whose child got the best grades at school, etc ... Adult life abounds in competition. We are only doing children a favor if we use it in schools and teach them how to handle it appropriately. They will be better prepared for the adult world they must live in later. It isn't reality for children to grow up thinking everyone is equally good at everything just so no one's feelings get hurt. Everyone isn't equally good at everything. And good Lord, who would want to be? I don't want to be a brain surgeon and I wouldn't be any good at it, but I'm certainly glad that someone is good at it. I would also make a lousy car salesman (or a salesman of any kind), a miserable pastry chef, a so-so mechanic, a horribly grumpy kindergarten teacher, a bored to tears shoe factory worker, etc ... Teaching children to be the best they can be at whatever it is they can do well and teaching them to respect others for what they can do well is the ultimate goal, I believe. Having competitions of a varied nature would allow those conversations to arise and bring those ideas out in the open. It would teach children how to handle disappointment and how to persevere even when everything doesn't go their way, as well. And oh boy, do we need someone teaching that now days! |
| Prompt for July 10, 2013 What was your favorite meal as a child? Do you still eat it today, or make it for your own children (if you have them)? Does eating it/making it bring back any childhood memories? Are you ready for this? The warning is I was not your average ordinary child who enjoyed a bowl of mac and cheese or a hamburger from McDonald's. Instead my favorite meal was ... curried sausage and apples with a side of green peas and jasmine rice. I can't eat a meal of it today without seeing the beautiful face of our neighbor from Pakistan who introduced us to this sweet and savory curry dish when I was hardly four years old. The heady aroma of all those spices toasting on her kitchen stove drifted out of her house and all the way down the creek that ran behind our houses. We always knew when to stop by for a treat because we could smell it long before it was ready to eat. And what a beautiful smell it was. My children have eaten and still eat this dish many times a ...  ... whoops, sorry about that. My cat decided to join me. Where was I? oh ... many time a year. Unfortunately they never got to meet Nene. Unfortunately I never got to learn how to make all of the other yummy things she used to treat us to as well. She taught my mom how to make curried sausage and apples and a flatbread that we use to eat a stew with but that's all my mom retained. Some people might not have the same associations with curry that I do, I realize, and I can hardly talk about this food experience without adding the rest of why this dish is such a part of who I am and who my family is. You see, I grew up in the South. My father's family was so southern no one had lived north of Tennesee since 1648 when a family of siblings came from France to North Carolina until my cousin moved to Michigan in 1998. Every stereotypical concept anyone has ever had of people from the south is somewhere at some point in time true of my father's family. Inbred, gun toting, prejudiced, duct taping, baling wiring, dirt farming, rebel rousing, red neck, yokels who are never without sweet tea, whiskey fueled mint juleps, and a gracious "welcome y'all" defines them in a nutshell. On the other hand my mother's family came from Scotland in the early 1900's and refused to live anywhere near the South because they used to own slaves. Hmm, was I a mixed up child or what? By all rights, I should have grown up during the 1960's and 1970's in the south about as prejudiced as any child could be. My parents, on the other hand, decided before they had children that they only wanted their children to be well educated and well traveled. As such I don't really belong anywhere and my only criteria for liking people is based upon how they treat me and other people around me. I really don't understand race issues from either side of the coin because of how I was raised and the people I have met along the way from almost every nation on this planet but race was certainly an issue when I was growing up. Even in the upscale, highly mobile town I lived in with people moving in and out from all over the world all the time, prejudice was a real part of life. Nene and her family ended up leaving our town, and our country to settle elsewhere because of the prejudices they faced. And, when I was a teenager they ended up in Iran where her husband and sons were killed for opposing the Ayatollah. We've never heard from her since and have no idea what happened to her our her daughter. For me, every time I eat curried sausage and apples I feel like I am somehow keeping Nene and her family alive, if only through the memory of how sweet and kind and beautiful they were as people. |
| Prompt for July 9, 2013 Have you ever collected anything? Tell us about your collection - why you started it, how long you've been collecting (or were collecting) and your favorite pieces in the collection. My collections are large and varied. As a child I collected antique children's books and salt and pepper shakers. They were cheap at the flea market, things I could afford on my meager allowance of $1.50. As a teen my interests shifted somewhat. While I had more money from working, I was even more thrifty in my spending habits and spent a lot of my free time (which wasn't much) collecting all manner of bugs, spiders, snakes, and toads. Consequently, I then spent the rest of my free time collecting the food to feed them. It proved to be a useful collection as my mother refused to be anywhere near the spiders and snakes and so my room remained an adult free zone for many years. As an adult I have collected still more things. Some of them, like blue glass bottles, cream pitchers, and mugs from my travels, while great memory boosters, are proving to be more handy for collecting dust and cat hair than anything else. I do use the mugs to drink hot tea from, but one can't drink from quite so many mugs all at the same time and thus most are still just collecting dust. Other things, like children (I've had 24 live in my home) and cats (only 9 now), make life more interesting and challenging. I really probably shouldn't include them as a collection but somedays that's the only way to see them. A collection of children can be a happy, busy, active, thriving hub of laughter and homework and jokes and games. It can also be an angst filled stressed out dump of the worst humanity has to offer. Somehow the good always seems to make the bad forgettable. My books, above anything else that I collect, are my joy. Duh, I'm a writer and you can't be a good writer if you don't read. I inherited an entire collection of Rex Stout Nero Wolfe mysteries from my grandfather, several of which are first editions. I also own several first edition "Elsie Dinsmore" books by Martha Finley. Of course when I bought them at the flea market as a child I had no idea what a first edition was. I just liked to read them and they were old which made them cool as far as I was concerned. Now, I actively seek them out everywhere I go. If I could find a children's book called "Dr. Goat" I would be over the moon. It was my favorite as a little girl but try as I might, having searched most places between South Carolina and Colorado, I can not seem to locate one. The pinnacle of my collection though, has to be hands down my first edition Edgar Allen Poe. I didn't purchase it. I can't even imagine how much it would have cost to buy. Instead it was handed down through my family, the story goes having been given to my great great grandfather by the man himself who was supposedly his friend. I'm not sure how much truth one can ever attach to family oral history but my great grandfather was named Edgar Poe supposedly after his dad's friend. Whatever the story or truth might be, it is certainly the most famous thing I own. Good thing I like Edgar Allen Poe's work. |
| Prompt for July 8, 2013 Freeze a scene from your weekend and describe it in as much sensory detail as possible. The smooth laminate black and white speckled table stretched out between us like the hub of a rectangular wheel. Eight people, tall, short, young, old, black hair, gray hair, red hair, blond hair, and brown hair topping their heads. Faces lit up with excitement, talking calmly, stretching, yawning, standing, bending taking a break from a day sitting and writing notes furiously. And then the prompt came. Six word sentences like Hemingway's famous one that apparently everyone knew except me. Fun. A word, then two, then a phrase and a sentence. The thought of grandma's hair sprayed head catching fire leads to talk of grandpa's finger pulling game taught to How many children exactly? Don't light a match near Grandpa. Laughter. Snorts. Guffaws. Choking. Take a drink, and another. Ice rattles. Straws squeak. Another moment of silence. Glances skyward for fear of resuming the laugh-a-thon. More words, more phrases, and another six words. Fourth of July fireworks with Grandpa. More laughter. Another round of snorting. Tears drip from the corners of eyes. Innocent bystanders staring, frowning, misunderstanding. More laughter, the kind that comes with a belly ache and no sound. We disperse, resume our seats, and let the laughter work it's magic and relieve the stress. |
| Prompt for July 7, 2013 Blog. Tell us about your week. Include your favorite blog entry from your fellow challengers from the preceding week and, most importantly, why. "Bald headed people are always evil." Our writing instructor repeats a phrase similar to this at least once during each class and I realized yesterday, while thinking up six word stories, that it made the perfect six word story. He is bald, of course, which makes it humorous and humorous sums up the end to my very busy, time consuming, fidgety, hot, tiring week. Most of the happenings of my week would bore everyone to tears. Feeding chickens and turkeys, watering garden beds, canning tomatoes, driving back and forth to my parents house, shopping, and paying bills pretty much filled up my time. Not much excitement to comment on other than the normal things like my daughter battling the turkeys over her red fingernail polish and me battling the silkie chickens over my tomatoes. It's always an adventure. My writing ventures have been fruitful in the review and blog arenas but not so much in novel progression. I don't think I had more than an hour at any given time to sit down and write this whole week, which is perfect for reviewing a couple of things or throwing out a blog entry, but really sucks as a creative writing time of the novel variety. We're getting down to the wire for a couple of contest submissions so I have to get down to business. This is probably cheating somehow, but I have enjoyed being part of this blog so much that I can not pick a favorite blog that someone else wrote. I've read them all with great relish and look forward to being able to read more the next day. Writing something new each day to a prompt is a great challenge to my writing calisthenics which I love. And yesterdays prompt of the six word story lead to some hysterical moments during a break in writing class when a whole group of us stood around thinking them up on the spot and adding to and adding to and adding to. It was "pee your pants" "choke on your drink" kind of funny and it was so welcome after the last few very hard weeks that I've had. If I wasn't part of this blog, the whole conversation wouldn't have taken place at all, so I guess if I have to pick something to be a favorite I'll pick the blog prompt to write six word stories! Loved it! |
| Prompt for July 6, 2013 Write a minimum of five, but a maximum of however many you like, 6-word stories discussing your relationships with the people in your life (your significant other, coworker, kids, pets, parents, that stranger who cut in line at the supermarket). See this site for examples and more information: Husband - Love woos, life happens, compromise sucks. Son - My Zombie is home from college. Daughter - Teenage hormone fueled blond electronic babble. Parents - Don't light a match near Grandpa. (with chapters including, Fourth of July fireworks with Grandpa, Pull my finger and run away, Grandpa and the long car trip) Writing Instructor - Bald headed people are always evil. Friend - The sunrise gives way to grief. I wish I had had more time to spend on this because this was fun but I was in a writing class all day ... thus the story about the writing instructor which is very tongue-in-cheek, not serious. Thanks for the prompt! |
| Prompt for July 5, 2013 Make me laugh in any way you can. So today I turned the oven on to Hi broil to start my ribs for lunch. As I began to prepare my ribs I noticed a funny smell in the air and wondered if something was burning, but instead of checking I convinced myself that it was just the oven heating up. So I seasoned my ribs, added the liquid smoke, rolled back the foil, picked up the pan, and swung open the oven door. A plume of black smoke poured from the opening door and wafted around my head. Needless to say I put the ribs down, luckily I didn't drop them, and fanned at the smoke to dissipate it. Sticking my head in the oven I realized that when we had made waffles a few days earlier, someone had put one in the oven to keep it warm and forgot to remove it later. Now that waffle was on fire and the parts that weren't on fire were charred black and crispy. Being the Facebook guru that I am, I immediately posted my demise so that all of my friends could have a laugh at my expense. But, instead of laughing at me, one of my friends regaled me with her own story of oven fire woe which was far worse than my own. One day she was roasting chilies in her oven when it began to smoke. Thinking it odd, she pulled them out, turned the oven off, and let everything cool down while opening all the windows in the house and turning on fans to air out the copious amounts of smoke. Once she had it cleared and the oven cooled, she closed all the windows again, put the chilies back in the oven, and turned it back on. Again, smoke began to billow from the closed oven door. This time as she pulled the oven open, flames also greeted her and for the first time that day she looked into the oven where much to her surprise and dismay was the leftover pizza from two nights before in a smoldering box that she had caught on fire not once that day, but twice. All of our conversation about these not so brilliant fires in our ovens made me flash back to one fateful Thanksgiving day several years ago when we were spending the holiday with my husband's grandmother and family. My husband's grandmother lived on a farm a mile from where she was born. At 90 years of age she loved to tell the story of when she moved, one mile away, to get married, among other stories of life on the farm. As we cooked our part of the dinner, she entertained us all with stories of the past as she remembered them and we all listened astutely. The wonderful aromas of roasting turkey, sage stuffing, pumpkin casserole, homemade rolls, and cranberry sauce bubbling away on the stove filled the small kitchen where we were all gathered around the old oak table. And as parts of the meal became ready to eat, we found ourselves stuffing them in warming ovens while we waited on the last set of Aunts, Uncles, and cousins to arrive. This last set of family were supposed to be bringing the pies so of course we weren't about to start without them. So we waited, and waited, and waited some more. Finally, in an act of desperation one of the uncles picked up the phone and called them to see where they were. From our end of the phone all we could hear was some faint screaming, hysterical laughing, and a woman, who we know now was my husband's aunt, screeching "Kill it! Kill it!" then the phone went dead. Needless to say we were all perplexed and rather concerned about the fate of our other family members and the men jumped up grabbing hats and car keys and headed to the door to drive the mile to their house to see what was wrong. However, just as they got their boots on by the door, the phone rang again and on the other end was a much calmer, more subdued aunt who explained that they would be right over. She also explained, quietly, that we would have no pies for dinner that night. So the men took their boots back off, hung up the car keys, and joined everyone else in moving food to the table in preparation for eating. By the time the aunt and uncle arrived, we were sitting in our places waiting and drooling over the meal in front of us. My husband's Uncle Jim said grace but before he could say "Amen" and end it, the aunt who had been so late spoke up and injected "Thank you for not letting our house burn down." We were stunned to say the least. We could all live without pie but the idea of their house burning down was more serious and so the queries began, and slowly but surely the story was told. Aunt Linda began, half laughing, half crying telling us about having spent the week having her stove replaced. The workers had come and removed the old stove which wasn't working any more (after 50 years). She said when they pulled it out they realized the wall behind it had been patched in a weird way with boards just kind of nailed up there at an angle crossing over one another. She didn't really understand why and thought they would be in the way of the new stove, so she got out the hammer and pulled them off. Under the wooden planks, though, was a giant hole in the wall. It was big enough, she said, that a person could have crawled through it into the house. Problem was she didn't have the materials or time to repair the hole before the new stove was to be put in and due to the holiday she couldn't delay having the stove put in until later, so she found a piece of fabric and stapled it over the hole with the intention of repairing it properly once Thanksgiving was over. At various times over the next few days she checked to make sure that the fabric was still over the hole, but only by looking at it as she couldn't reach it. She assumed all was well and set out to cook pies and rolls and other items for three Thanksgiving meals she was invited to. She was so excited to have a new stove that actually heated right and was proud the it had a warming oven as well to keep things hot. She had never had such a fancy place to cook before, she said. So the first day went well. And the second day went well. At the end of the second day she had four pies and a pan of dressing to take to meals ready to go, but at the last minute one of the dinners was cancelled. Knowing she still had to bring pies to our dinner, she wasn't disturbed by the news one less feast to consume and placed the four pies in the warming oven thinking she would heat them up before she brought them the next day. So she went to bed that night thinking that she was ahead of the game and could just sit back and enjoy the holiday without cooking for a change. At two in the morning things started to change though. First they heard a loud clatter coming from the kitchen end of the house. Second they heard a glass shatter on the tile floor in the family room. So Uncle Harry jumped out of bed, grabbed his shot gun, and went to the kitchen. As he flipped on the lights, he expected to see an intruder, but no one was there. He moved on to the family room. A glass did indeed lay shattered on the floor, but again there was no intruder to be seen. After checking that all the doors were locked and bolted and no one was in the house or in the carport, everyone timidly went back to bed wondering what had caused the noise. Blaming it on the cat seemed to work, but he too had been strangely absent from the scene. On Thanksgiving day Aunt Linda slept in. When she got up, they all watched a movie together waiting on time for our dinner to begin. About halfway through the movie she got up and went to turn the oven on. It started just like it should have and she didn't think much about it expect that there was a strange odor coming it. Living in the country gave them all kinds of funny odors though so she dismissed it and went back to the movie. When the oven beeped that it was up to temp, she went back in the kitchen, where the odor was much stronger than before, pulled the pies out of the warming oven and stuffed them into the oven to warm. The smell was really strong in the warming oven but she had used it a few times in the couple of days since the oven was installed so she guessed, wrongly so, that she had spilled something in it and that was what she was smelling. Again dismissing it, she left the pies and went back to the family room. Within a few minutes the kitchen was embroiled with noises. Growling, hissing, and a whine like scream all came from the oven amid clattering of pans and oven racks. Aunt LInda and Uncle Harry immediately thought the cat must have somehow gotten into the oven and they raced to open the door and rescue it. But instead of being greeted by an angry cat, a long pointy face with rows of sharp pointy teeth grinned back at them from the bottom shelf. A horrible smell wafted from it and a possum scrambled from the open oven door straight into Aunt Linda's face. She was, of course, horrified and began screaming and running around trying to find something to kill it with. Uncle Harry was equally without anything to defend himself and jumped up on the countertop to stay out of the way. Their three daughters all came rushing in from the family room to see what was going on in the meantime, and realizing there was a possum loose in the house, one of them smartly closed the kitchen door to keep it confined. But a chase still ensued and in the middle of it all, we had called to see where they were. Uncle Harry managed to kill the possum finally but they realized the pies were all ruined and had been partially eaten by the possum and the clutch of twelve babies it had with it. We didn't eat pie that year but we did learn why old houses sometimes have strange things in them. And we have never forgotten the story of the possum in the oven for Thanksgiving. |
| Prompt for July 4, 2013 You have been transported back in time to 1776 and the founding fathers are asking for your opinion on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights articles that they are proposing for structuring the new government. Which ones would you keep? Which would you remove or change? Why? "VII. That all elections ought to be free; and that all free men having a sufficient evident common interest with, and attachment to the community, have a right to elect officers, or to be elected into office" This should state "All elections will be free ... " so that there is no loose interpretation of it. "IX. That in all prosecutions for criminal offences, a man hath a right to be heard by himself and his council, to demand the cause and nature of his accusation, to be confronted with the witnesses, to call for evidence in his favour, and a speedy public trial, by an impartial jury of the country, without the unanimous consent of which jury he cannot be found guilty; nor can he be compelled to give evidence against himself; nor can any man be justly deprived of his liberty except by the laws of the land, or the judgment of his peers." More than any other article, I would keep this one. Even with the difficulties that arise in carrying this out in reality, it is so far above and beyond what most of the world experiences even today in criminal prosecutions that to lose it would be horrific. "XIV. That a frequent recurrence to fundamental principles, and a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, industry, and frugality are absolutely necessary to preserve the blessings of liberty, and keep a government free: The people ought therefore to pay particular attention to these points in the choice of officers and representatives, and have a right to exact a due and constant regard to them, from their legislatures and magistrates, in the making and executing such laws as are necessary for the good government of the state." Wise men wrote this. It should be taught heavily in schools, posted on Facebook, chisled in stone across the country because most people don't seem to realize that this article even exists let alone follow it's mandates. "...justice, moderation, temperance, industry, and frugality ..." When was the last time we had public leaders with those qualities?? "I. That all men are born equally free and independent, and have certain natural, inherent and inalienable rights, amongst which are, the enjoying and defending life and liberty, acquiring, possessing and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." But nothing in the rest of the Bills of Rights of 1776 means so much as this very sentiment. It defines what we are as Americans, it influences everything else that is written or enacted into law, and it leaves no question that we are, above all else, free to do what so many others in this world can not. Happy 4th of July All!! Cobe |
| Prompt for July 3, 2013 "Look out your window and describe what you see. Alternatively, look at the desk in front of you and describe it. For the ambitious, try both. *Smirk*" The barberry bush all purple and prickly green trees beyond apple and maple still young providing shade for rabbits not men and toads that eat the flies off the chicken poo and cat food from the dish beneath the work table. The deck wooden and warped lined with the extra tomato plants stuck in pots flowering yellow green fruit hanging small and round food for men and chickens that take what they want and leave nothing but scratched raw earth behind. The garden bushy and beautiful squash and okra and tomatoes melons and peppers and beans a testament to generations of men and women who raised me to be a farmer who understands the land. cobe |
| Prompt for July 2, 2013 "Do you know a second (or third, or fourth, etc ...) language? Would you like to learn a new language? Why or why not? If yes, which would you like to learn?" To say that I "know" a second language might not be altogether true if you approach the topic from the viewpoint of languages taught in school. Things like Spanish, German, French, Latin, etc... were offered in my school and I indulged the counselors and my parents by attending classes in both Spanish and Latin on a daily basis. I do not "know" either of them fluently enough to use them very well. I also engaged in attempting to learn French while I was at university but that was a miserable failure. I guarantee I don't KNOW French. Other languages do exist in this world though that I do speak fluently and frequently whether I want to or not. I speak: 1) husband - "One of these days I'm actually going to find a recipe for "I don't care" and fix it for supper." 2) teenage daughter - "Did you say something honey? I couldn't hear you through my MP3 player." 3) daughter of aging parents - "No, you didn't miss anything I said. I'll just write it all down." 4) cat - "Get off (insert various items and surfaces)!!" 5) college age son - "when was the last time you actually did laundry and took out the trash?" 6) student writer - "If I kiss your feet and promote every book you've ever written and tell you everything you say and do is the most hilarious and perfect thing ever, will you please tell me my writing is crap so I can get better at it?" 7) consumer - "Yes, I will wait for another hour in line because your incompetent cashier (that you've neither trained or pay a living wage to) can't count change or remember how to use the register without a manager's help who you don't have on duty because they cost too much to pay." I'm quite certain there are other languages out there that I speak as well - like lover, friend, etc - that are just too numerous to list. For a little more seriousness, I do have a language I would like to learn well. I would like to learn Japanese. My son is attempting to minor in Japanese at college and teaches us some on the weekends and I find it fascinating. I also studied architecture in college and would like to learn Japanese so I can go to Japan and explore the wonders of architecture in that country as well. Now, since it's getting late, in the language of the "Waltons", I say "Goodnight Daddy! Goodnight John Boy!" |
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