Six Impossible Things

This is an Occasionally Random Post

It was the White Queen, from Through the Looking Glass, who said:

"When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."

I'd like to thank everyone who stopped by Monday-Wednesday to give me words of encouragement and virtual hugs. It means a lot.

You see, my childhood best friend is dying and the news has taken me by surprise. We met right around the time we turned eleven and were an instant dynamic duo.

In honor of Jay, I've decided to believe in six impossible things. It is something he would definitely approve of.

1. I'm sure the Magic Pool is real because it took us to many fantastic places where we had many fabulous adventures.

2. It is possible to make a perfect score with a Kurplunk Bomb.

3. We will have lunch with George Harrison and Jimi Hendrix.

4. Someday, everyone in the Bish Mob will being together again and we'll stage another mock fight at Trunk Bay.

5. I'll win a round at the Annual Coke Bottle Cap Batting Contest.

6. I'll remember everything and forget nothing.

And this bonus.

7.Someday  I'll be funnier than you.

Nope, sorry, that last one truly is impossible. 

Jay, making me laugh, like always. Around 1978.

It's okay to leave, my friend. I'll breathe your air for you.

It's About Friendship

I'm kind of in a semi-state of limbo, waiting for news of the not so happy sort. It's hard for me to express myself so I'm going to try to say it with quotes.

***

Bob Marley
The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for.




A. A. Milne

“We'll be Friends Forever, won't we, Pooh?" asked Piglet.

"Even longer," Pooh answered. 

Promise me you'll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.

 Elbert Hubbard

A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you. 

C. S. Lewis

Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: "What! You too? I thought I was the only one."


Ray Bradbury
"Why is it," he said, one time, at the subway entrance, "I feel I've known you so many years?"
"Because I like you," she said, "and I don't want anything from you."

Ralph Waldo Emerson
It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.

Let us even bid our dearest friends farewell, and defy them, saying, "Who are you? Unhand me: I will be dependent no more." Ah! seest thou not, O brother, that thus we part only to meet again on a higher platform, and only be more each other's, because we are more our own?

Alternatives for Bring

Alternatives is a recurring post in which I give synonyms for an over used word. Click on the tab above for a "complete" list of over used words.

Today's word is:

Bring is a complicated word with way more synonyms than I realized. I'm bringing you a whole basket full of alternatives.

Depending on how you use it, this list may come in handy for finding another way to say the same thing.

bring/bring about

accompany, accomplish, achieve, add up to, advance, affect, affirm, allow, allure, amount to, appear, argue, arraign, attend, atrract

back, bear, be burdened with something, be sold, bring around, bring about, bring before, broach, buck, beget, breed,

call, call for, call forth, care for, carry, carry off, carry out, catalyze, cause, chaperon, chase after, cite, claim, come, come to, companion, compass, comprise, conduct, consort with, contain, contribute to, contrive, convert, convey, convince, convoy, cost, create, cut back, cut down

decide, deliver, derive, depose, determine, dethrone, develop, diminish, discuss, disgorge, display, dispose, do, do to, draw, draw down, draw on, drive,

earn, educate, effect, effectuate, elevate, elicit, emphasize, engage, engender, enlist, entail, escort, evoke

feature, fetch, fetch and carry, find, focus on, form

gain, gather, generate, get, get to do, get together, give birth to, give rise to, go after, go for, guide, gun

haul off, heel, hold, hump

illuminate, implicate, imply, import, inaugurate, incline, induce, issue, invent, invoke

lead, lead to, lessen, lift, look after, lug, lure

make, make happen, make known, make public, manage, mention, motivate, mount up to, move

nurture

obtain, occasion, offer, oust, overthrown, overturn

pack, pen up, perform, persuade, pick up, piggyback, prevail, present, presume, presuppose, procure, produce, prompt, provoke, publish, pull off, put on, put out, put over

raise, realize, rear, recall, reduce, regurgitate, release, report, require, restore, result in, resuscitate, retrieve, return, revive, ride, run after, run into, run to,

satisfy, schlep, secure, sell, sell for, set forth, set off, set one back, shag, shepherd, shoulder, spawn, stage, start off, submit, subsume, succeed, succeed in, superinduce, sway

take, take along, take in, talk about, talk into, teach, tempt, throw up, toke, topple, total, total up to, touch on, train, transfer, translate into, transport, trigger, truck, tutor

unseat, usher

visit upon, vomit

walk, win over, work, work out, wreak

yield

I much prefer this version to the one The Animals did.

If you ever change your mind
About leavin', leavin' me behind
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, oh yeah

You know I laughed (ha ha) when you left
But now I know I've only hurt myself
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)

I'll give you jewellery, money too
And that's not all, all I'll do for you
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)
Yeah

You know I'll always be your slave
Till I'm dead and buried in my grave
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)

If you ever change your mind
About leavin', leavin' me behind
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)
Yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)

The Anti-Blogfest Blogfest, A Call for Help AND A Win

Announcing the "Anti-Blogfest Gary Fest" 

This blog hop honors Mr. anti-blog hop himself, Gary at Klahanie.

Hosted by Mark “Madman” Koopmans, Ninja Captain Alex J. Cavanaugh, “Life is Good” Tina,  Rockin’ Robyn Engel and Morgan “The Morg” Shamy. 

The rules are *very* simple. 

Create the titles of three PG-13 rated blogfests you would never join - and then add a descriptive sentence or two. That's it!

Here are my humble contributions.

Name Your Favorite Disease The winner of this blogfest will get one free visit to the specialist of his/her choice!


My Favorite Jellyfish Recipe If you didn't know you could eat jellyfish click HERE, where you'll find jellyfish recipes. (No kidding!)

Personally, I don't have anything against jellyfish, they are beautiful creatures. I'm just not sure about eating them....






Show Me Your Booger *Pick* the best booger out of your collection, photograph and post it. The bigger the better.

That was fun. :)

A Call for Help

Okay people, I'm finally trying to get my ya-ya's in a row and get my collection of Anansi stories published. You remember Anansi don't you? That lovable trickster spider? Well we need a little help.

I've just about got my MS as clean as I can get it. You know, commas where they need to be, no missing words, no misspelled words etc. etc. etc. (Can you tell I just saw a local production of The King and I?)

What I need now are fresh eyes to go over it, to proofread/edit. Is this something any of you would do? Or, do you know someone who can do it who's good but doesn't charge the moon? (Maybe I'm dreaming, but a girl can dream can't she?)

Once I have it as clean as possible I'm turning Anansi over to Diane Wolfe at Punk on a Stick  because my attempts at formatting have not been pretty.

PLEASE, leave a comment or email me if this is something you'd like to do or if you know someone. I surely would appreciate it!

Lastly I recently won an ecopy of Nancy LaRonda Johnson's book, Salted With Fire.

Thanks Nancy. 

About Salted With Fire:

Black magic, murder, insanity, humor, honor and devotion. Salted With Fire is a journey of flash fiction and poetry that shows my writing transformation from worldly to wanting to please God. Flash fiction is my passion; poetry is my release. I love creating a complete story, with a beginning, middle and end, with twists, humor, drama, compassion and horror, all under 1000 words. Salted With Fire isn’t just a book of stories and poetry, it is my journey as a writer, from writing only for the mere joy of it regardless of the message, to writing stories that highlight God’s will for people, even if the stories themselves are not religious in nature. Inside are fifteen flash fiction pieces and twelve poems with full-color pictures, and short Biblical discussions after each story.


Did you participate in the anti-blogfest? Are you good at proofing your own writing? Have you won anything lately?

Alternatives for Boring

Alternatives is a recurring post in which I give synonyms for an over used word. Click on the tab above for a "complete" list of over used words.

Today's word is:

And I’m not talking about drilling… Personally I don't think I've ever been bored -- boring maybe, :) but never bored. I have become frustrated when I couldn't do something because of time constraints, lack of materials, lack of money, etc. There have certainly been times when I have become disinterested in something I was doing/seeing/listening to etc. In those cases I've moved on to something else. But bored? There's just too much to do, too many things to learn, places to go, books to read. I personally have never understood how/why people get bored. 

Depending on how you use it, this list may come in handy for finding another way to say the same thing.

annoying, arid, aseptic

barren, big yawn, blank, blah, bomb, bothersome, bromidic, bummer, by rote

characterless, cloying, colorless, common, commonplace, cumbersome

dead, debilitating, demoralizing, discouraging, disheartening, dispiriting, drab, drag, draining, dreary, drudging, dry, dry as dust, dull/dullish, dullard, dusty

earthbound, enfeebling, exhausting,

flat, fuddy-duddy

gray/grey

harp on the same thing, heavy, ho-hum, humdrum

inanimate, irksome, irritating, insipid, interminable

jading, fatiguing, jejune

leaden, lifeless, longsome, lumbering

mind-numbing, monochromatic, monotonous, moth-eaten, mundane

nothing, nowhere, numbing

old, one note song, ordinary

pallid, palling, pedantic, pedestrian, platitudinous, plebeian, pleasureless, plodding, poky/pokey, ponderous, prosaic, prosy

repetitious, routine

slow, soggy, spiritless stale, stereotyped, sterile, stodgy, stuffed shirt, stuffy, stupid, suspenselss

tame, tedious, tepid, threadbare, tiresome, tiring, trite

undramatic, uneventful, unexceptional, unexciting, unimaginative, uninspiring, uninteresting, unnewsworthy, unrewarding, unsensational, unspectacular, unsurprising, unvaried

vapid

wearisome, weary, wearying, well-worn

yawnsome

zero

In case you still aren't sure what boring is, check out this very funny song!

So tell me, do you get bored? If so, what how do you combat it?

A True Story

Hassel Island

Recently my sister, Erva, went over to Hassel Island with her boyfriend, D. and a ten year old boy, R. What follows is a slightly abbreviated account of a true story.

***

It's been at least 50 years since I set foot on Hassel Island and much has changed. The old buildings, while overgrown, are still visible.

The Creque marine railway (the rectangular cut-away)
is visible to the far right, with the hill Erva and R.
walked up to the left.

I particularly wanted to see the Hassel family graveyard. There is a trail from the area of the old Creque marine railway that wanders along the shore and past the old coaling station. It then goes up the hill to the other side of the ridge to the 1801 British Officer quarters. Just behind that is the family graveyard. (You can read more about the island's fascinating history HERE)

The Creque marine railway.

R. and I were about a third of the way up the hill, at least a hundred yards away from the shore when I saw something unusual on the trail.  At first I thought it was a blossom that had fallen from one of the trees, but I stopped because that didn't quite register.





I bent down to pick it up - it was alive and gasping - a baby porcupine puffer fish.  It was about an inch and a half long.  I put it into R.'s hands and he ran with it down the trail to the shoreline to get it into the water again.

How did it get there?  Probably a bird - a tern, seagull or frigate - scooped it up from the shallow water, then the poor little fish puffed up exposing its spines and the bird dropped it.

When I got to the shore, R. was tending it in the shallow water, but it was not responding well. As fate would have it, right there, was an intact quart sized Tupperware tub that had washed up. I filled it with seawater and we placed the poor little struggling fish in the tub. As soon as we got back to the old railway, we refilled it with fresh seawater. 

By this time, the little fish was fully puffed up with water...the right thing as it had been so dehydrated.  It's little  tail and fins were dry and sticking to his little body, but they were beginning to loosen from the sides of his body.

Eventually the little fish was no longer all puffed up and back to normal size. All his little fins and tail were functioning correctly and he was even spitting water out of his little mouth.

The next step in the adventure was to call some children, who live on a sailboat in the bay, to come see the fish and help us with a ceremony to return him to the sea.

Maho tree flower

We included a fresh Maho tree blossom to go with him and saw him swimming happily away.

Lovely. 

Have you ever rescued a wild animal from certain death?

Titles to Write By

"Titles" is an occasional blog post in which we play with a single word and turn it into, what else, titles! Afterwards the object is to pick one of them and write a little something.

It was Ray Bradbury, in his book ZEN IN THE ART OF WRITING, who taught me about making lists of words and turning them into titles. If you haven't read it I recommend that you do.

For no particular reason today's word is: 

Strange

Come be My Stranger

Strange Stars, Stranger Places

Strangers to Love

Hate is Full of Strangers

How Strange is Your Life?

A Stranger Thing

Be Strange, Be Real

The Strange Caress

No Longer Strangers

You're Stranger than You Think
A Basket of Strange

Got a favorite title with the word STRANGE or STRANGER in it?

I leave you with my favorite song by The Kinks, STRANGERS


Where are you going I don't mind
I've killed my world and I've killed my time
So where do I go what do I see
I see many people coming after me
So where are you going to I don't mind
If I live too long I'm afraid I'll die
So I will follow you wherever you go
If your offered hand is still open to me
Strangers on this road we are on
We are not two we are one
So you've been where I've just come
From the land that brings losers on
So we will share this road we walk
And mind our mouths and beware our talk
'Till peace we find tell you what I'll do
All the things I own I will share with you
If I feel tomorrow like I feel today
We'll take what we want and give the rest away
Strangers on this road we are on
We are not two we are one
Holy man and holy priest
This love of life makes me weak at my knees
And when we get there make your play
'Cos soon I feel you're gonna carry us away
In a promised lie you made us believe
For many men there is so much grief
And my mind is proud but it aches with rage
And if I live too long I'm afraid I'll die
Strangers on this road we are on
We are not two we are one
Strangers on this road we are on
We are not two we are one