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A place to keep my entries for various contests and challenges |
| This book is not only a place to create, keep, and store contest entries, it's also a log of items that may one day become something more. |
The April blogging event over at "Invalid Item"  Requires the following:Here's how you can Not Be a Fool (NBF). 1. Write seven (7) blogs between April Fools Day (4/1) and the Ides of April (4/15). Use your own topic or select from any of the Prompts posted at the Banana Bar. Entries must be at least 250 words excluding any mention of this activity, Andre or the Banana Bar. 2. You Must Comment on at least seven (7) blog entries from others on WDC. Comments must be at least 25 words excluding any mention of this activity, Andre, or the Banana Bar. In other words, a real comment that is honest and respectful. There is more, but this is ample for my entry. Oh, and yes I did a word count on the above, just to ensure I have enough of my own material in this entry. A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| The Ides of April are almost upon us which means I need to get my butt moving or I'll run out of time. I've been busy, with spring finally arriving for a day or two before summer set in. Hey, this is Minnesota, a couple of spring days is typical! Yes, it went from barely reaching a temperature high enough to thaw to mid and upper-thirties for a couple of days. But, the temperature over the last few days has been in the sixties. With all the snow and ice we had, this has resulted in vast amounts of flowing water, muck, and mud. I have been shoveling snow, chipping away at the ice, and playing in the mud contouring the driveway so the water will flow away instead of standing and making more mud. Now that I've made progress in ridding areas of snow, ice, and have a lot of the drive dried out and solid, we have the return of spring predicted for Friday, with highs in the mid-forties with rain. Then on Saturday, winter returns with highs near thirty and snow! Sunday's forecast is for me to start this process all over again, but this time around it should be easier and quicker. My older teen claims that Minnesota is bipolar, but I corrected her. With spring, summer, and winter all within three days, I think the state is tripolar. On the bright side, at least we haven't had autumn tossed into the mix again. A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P13. Should education start to require learning a second language? This is a very good question, but before we start talking about second languages, I think we should require education to teach a single language. Half of what passes for spoken language doesn't even make sense and then there's the written language, or what is passed on as language. There are more initialisms in a sentence than actual words. Why? Is it that hard to write out a few words instead of using initialisms? Sure, they are fine for texting, but I, as a writer, refuse to use them. What I'm talking about is when the education system uses them to communicate in place of proper language. But it goes further than just being too lazy to write out a few words. Punctuation is also too difficult, so let's not require or teach high school students to use proper punctuation, capitalization, or even correct sentence structure. I mean, that would require educators to actually work and hold students accountable. Maybe I'm wrong about your education systems, but I have two teens in high school and when they have me read items they've written for school, it's terrible; maybe if they were in third or fourth grade, but not high school. I point out punctuation and grammar mistakes the best I can (I'm terrible at editing) but they tell me it doesn't matter, it doesn't reflect on their grade. On a side note, even written communications from the faculty are full of errors and written poorly. Also, I now have to print. Well, not just now, but for the past few years. As a supervisor, I had to print or type out simple things because the younger people could not read cursive. Why? Again, is it too hard for modern students to learn? Or, maybe it's too difficult for modern teachers to teach? You ask, "Should education require learning a second language?" My answer is, "How in the Hell can anyone learn a second language when they still haven't learned the first!" A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| Four days into April, which should mean, spring is arriving and winter is over. Songbirds are showing up at the feeder, there's a flock of Robins hanging around the pine trees, the sun is higher in the sky and skunks and raccoons are coming out of their winter slumber. But is spring here? Oh, hell no! The songbirds are huddled in the shelter of the pine branches, the Robins are standing in the snow, and the skunks and raccoons are getting into trash receptacles in search of food. For the last two days, the weather has been warmer, just enough to thaw things out a bit and melt a little snow. Saturday the sun did shine, but yesterday was gray and looked like foul weather was approaching. This morning began with thawing temperatures, barely, but soon the snowflakes were fluttering down. Then the wind picked up, a cold, damp, and gusting wind that created the illusion that it was snowing horizontally. Soon enough, the light snow became heavy and by the time I drove home at ten o'clock, roads were slippery, visibility was greatly impaired, and the school was notifying us that the kids would be home early. I'm hoping the loathsome weather will soon pass over, but the folks at the National Weather Service are telling us it could last until Thursday morning. I'm also wishful for a small amount of the cold, wet, and unsavory snow, but those same folks are saying we may get over a foot of the unscrupulous stuff. My Mom used to say, "March winds bring April showers and April showers bring May flowers." I mentioned this in the Newsfeed earlier. Where are the showers? Will we have any Flowers? I'm tired of complaining about shoveling snow, I want to complain about mowing grass instead! Does anyone know if someone made a big mistake with the time change -- instead of an extra hour of daylight it seems we have an extra month of winter! I seriously think and blame world governments for this; they have jointly invented and built a weather machine and hid it in Antarctica. They are doing this without disclosure in an attempt to slow global warming... A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P17. UFOs - what's the truth in your opinion? Have you ever seen one? Of course, UFO's exist. But what is a UFO? if it flies and it's unidentified, it's a UFO. It doesn't have to come from space, and it doesn't have to have extraterrestrial associations, it is just something flying that is not identified. Not that a UFO couldn't be from another world, anything is possible. But, if another civilization has developed the ability to travel faster than light, I think they could observe us quite well from a safe distance without being seen. Even more importantly, why would they want to visit us? We can't even get along with our own kind, so what would lure highly advanced travelers to fly to our planet? And, if they did want to travel light years to visit us, why wouldn't they make contact so they can visit us? To me, it would be like driving over a thousand miles to see a city, and just driving through without stopping. So no, I don't think we have aliens from other worlds doing fly-bys. That being said, I have to admit that I have, on a few occasions, witnessed UFOs. The first time was as a young teen. We lived in a small town on the Mesabi Iron Range of Minnesota, and being the introvert I still am, I spent a lot of time exploring the country and old mines around us. On one such occasion, my brother was with me and we had spent the afternoon exploring some old mining roads. It was getting late and we were hurrying home, knowing we had likely missed supper and were in trouble. As we climbed an old ore dump, we stopped to rest for a few minutes and saw a bright red orb fly overhead. It moved quickly, and at first, we thought it was a shooting star. But, it didn't fly straight, it curved and formed a sort of "S" pattern, then stopped in mid-flight, reversed, and returned the way it had come, soon vanishing over the southern horizon. We, being kids, were a bit scared and a bit panicky. I mean, what if it came back and abducted us? We rushed home and into the house out of breath to find my parents sitting very silently in the kitchen. Instead of the normal butt-chewing, however, we got hugs from our mom and dad. After a few minutes, they informed us that my grandmother had called to say grandpa had just passed away a few minutes earlier in the hospital; about the same time we saw the UFO! Another time, I had just got home during a very bad storm. We lived in a trailer and the tornado sirens were going off, it was raining very hard, and the wind was picking up to gale force. I could barely walk against the force of the wind and all sorts of debris was flying past. I heard a whistling sound overhead and when I looked up, something flew over that spinning or so it seemed. It was difficult to see with the rain but it barely passed above the bowing trees. After the storm had passed, my UFO turned out to be a porta-potty that had made an emergency landing just across the highway... Oh, and it was unmanned! A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P24. Wisdom, Knowledge, or Humor. Which is most important and why? (You must select one and not claim they all are) "They all are!" I know, I have to select one and cannot claim all three, but hey, they are all three of equal importance and they are all three intertwined. Think about it! you cannot have wisdom without knowledge, and you cannot know without understanding. And, if one is lacking in either, they may think they are humorous, but let's face it, they aren't. Actually, as I think about this, I find wisdom holds more importance. "Why?" First, let's look at the difference between them; knowledge results in the understanding of a particular subject, whereas wisdom develops the discernment and reasoning ability of a person. What goes does it do to know something if you cannot apply that knowledge? I see a lot of this in society: intelligent people with knowledge, yet they do not apply it. They fail to use reason and no matter how smart they may be, they do dumb stuff and make stupid mistakes. As for humor, the same applies. A good sense of humor requires some knowledge, but even more importantly it requires sound reason and wisdom. It is what makes something funny instead of hurtful. In summary, wisdom equals common sense and without any common sense, it doesn't matter how much you know, what matters is the ability to reason and apply what you know. It is also what makes humor funny instead of cruel. I have a friend, our neighbor, who is a very nice guy, he has a lot of knowledge and can be very helpful, but he can also be challenging to be around because he lacks wisdom and his sense of humor is cruel more often than funny. He doesn't mean to be hurtful or crude, he just doesn't have the wisdom to know any different. A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P10 Rant about annoying situations that keep happening First of all, I don’t “RANT”, if you knew me half as much as you think you did, you’d know that. Secondly, even thinking that I’d fit into a category with people who rant is just wrong. Putting people into groups of like-minded or lack-of-minded people is one of my pet peeves. I strongly dislike how people label other people about anything; each person is unique, just like everyone else! It’s like saying certain people have an accent because they talk normally; you have the accent. Now that I have that off my chest, let’s talk about what I would rant about if I did rant… It’s no use, I just can’t do it. I am not a ranter and no matter how much I try, I’m not going to be able to rant about anything. It’s like trying to read or write on the weekends when the kids are home, as soon as I get started, they show up and interrupt and distract me. I can sit and do basically nothing, entertain myself with some no-brain-activity required game or something and I don’t see them for hours, but pick up a book, my Kindle, or try and write, and “POOF” they appear out of thin air asking, telling, or needing something. About the closest I can come to ranting about something is this: Sandals and socks! I see people wearing sandals with socks on and it drives me nuts. Why put socks on if you’re wearing sandals? The idea of sandals is to be open and let air get to your feet, so putting socks on kind of defeats (pun not intended) the purpose. But, that’s not bad enough. No, not only do you drive me bonkers by putting socks on with sandals, but then you turn around and put your damn shoes on without any socks. Why? It makes no sense! I genuinely believe all the way to my very core, it’s done just to pet my peeves. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, there are those people (always the dreaded those) who not only wear socks with sandals, shoes with no socks, but flip-flops with socks… Yes, it is true, I have seen with great despair to my very soul, those people who have on socks and flip-flops. The very thought of that thing wedging a sock deep between the toes is enough to make me cringe and fill me with a burning, unquenchable desire to run my fingers between my toes. A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P16. Complain about something in detail. Complain about what? Should I complain about the weather? It was nice yesterday, the sun was shining, there was little to no breeze, and the temperature got up to forty degrees Fahrenheit. I took advantage of the out-of-season spring day by shoveling snow, scraping ice, and enjoying being outside. Of course, Max was outside with me enjoying the day and helping in a way only a Husky pup can help. So today, it’s twenty degrees colder, windy, and the sky is littered with clouds. Every time I take Max out he wants to play and enjoy being outside, but I’m freezing my tush off. The wind, you know, goes right through my jacket, nips my fingers, and chills to the bone. But what’s to complain about, at least its twenty degrees above zero unlike a week ago when it was twenty below. Besides, it’s winter in Minnesota, what do you expect? No, there’s got to be something other than the weather to complain about. Like those morons who do not know how to operate their high-beam headlights. Of course, they’re likely the same buffoons who can’t figure out turn signals. Mayhap the powers that be should incorporate some night driving into the standard driving test. On second thought, never mind, they would still pass and soon forget how to operate these devices. The ones that really de-cream my coffee are the ones that ride within ten feet or less of my rear bumper, lights on high-beam, and no matter what speed I go, stay right there like they’re locked in a tractor-beam. They fly up behind at a fast rate of speed, then decelerate to match mine and just hang there. I drive a bit slower at night, about five miles per hour less than posted because there are a great many deer who have not figured out to cross at their designated, posted, Deer Crossing Area. So, since these people seem to be in a big hurry, I’ll be nice and slow down a bit more giving them the opportunity to zip around me and clear the road ahead. But they don’t pass, they just slow down and stay there. Why? Would it be bad to mount one of those one-million candle-power light bars on my back bumper with a light-activated switch? A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P13. Crayons, finger paints, or colored chalk do you prefer? “I prefer a nice sharp #2 pencil or an easy-to-grip mechanical pencil equally as much as I prefer a smooth writing, fine-lined ink pen that creates a solid line that does not bleed onto the paper.” “What Andre meant was for artwork, not for writing’” “That’s what I’m referring to,” “What kind of pictures do you paint?” “I paint with words creating poetry and stories.” “Other than writing, what do you prefer to draw or paint with?” “The same, since about all my artistic qualities consist of stick people, the same medium works well for everything.” “But, if you were going to paint something, which would you desire more?” “If I’m painting it depends on what I paint. Sometimes I prefer a brush, sometimes a roller, and yet other times I’ll use a sprayer. With this in mind, I think you can see that chalk and crayons wouldn’t work worth a damn. I can also include finger paints for these forms of painting, but it would take a long time to paint a room with my fingers, and I doubt the finished job would be acceptable.” “Now, the finger paint does inspire me to want to paint, but not rooms, furniture, or other similar items. If I’m going to paint something with my fingers I prefer it to be someone. I think that answers your questions so I’ll go sharpen my pencils since I’m home alone and have nothing to paint.” A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
| P9. Animals you shouldn’t have as pets: Top of the list would be a polar bear. Why? Because they don't do well in homes, they need it much cooler than most people can tolerate and they shed horribly. Actually, I don’t care what kind of animal “you” have as a pet as long as your pet doesn’t pose a risk to other people. If you want a big cat or a bear, go for it, but you better be able to care for it, provide adequate habitat, and not have it endanger others. Oh, and if you get killed, don’t be complaining to me. I’m a dog person. I have always connected to canines and may have a bit of wolf blood myself. I also love cats, not as much as dogs, but they rank a close second. Unfortunately, many years back, we had a female cat that became pregnant. I know, she didn’t just become this way, but I’m not going into details about how she got that way. She had the kittens in the winter, so we closed off the back porch for her, she had food and shelter, it was warm, and it was secluded for her. After she had the kittens, I became allergic to felines. I don’t understand it, but all those puddin-heads must have triggered it somehow. I know, I’m supposed to be writing about what animals shouldn’t be pets. Since the list is too long, I thought I’d list which two animals should be pets. For those of you who are responsible pet owners outside of these two, I do not intend to offend, and I know little of pets outside of these two critter types. I just voice my thoughts on what I prefer. A proud member of "WdC SuperPower Reviewers Group" "Reading soothes the soul, writing sets it free." T.J. |
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Man, you know nothing about monkey business! Never poke your nose in them.
