Rain Stories

Rain was a popular subject for primary school children learning to read in the early 1900’s.  I am basing this assumption on these stories from the Ontario Readers Primer, authorized by THE MINISTER OF EDUCATION (that part was important enough in the book to print in all caps bold) published in 1920.

How lucky am I to possess books that are almost a hundred years old? Even if the stories are blatantly sexist.  Wimpy little girl afraid of the rain vs. bold adventurous little boy having fun.

In this case the smart males all seek shelter and the silly female goose doesn’t. Girls just can’t win.

Isn’t that delightful? The pages are well-read, faded and stained, the cover is worn and falling apart and the binding disintegrating and barely holding everything together. It’s one of the things my mother felt was worth saving, and it is one of my treasures.

Christmas-ish Haiku

Nothing left to do,
Nowhere else I need to be.
I love Christmas Eve.

 

Christmas candle fills

The air with cranberry cheer,

Whatever that is.

 

Happy Holidays,

Merry Christmas, Peace on Earth

Tidings of great joy.

Drink Drank Drunk

We drank our coffee, we drunk our coffee.  We did not get drunk on coffee, and that is why, although it is acceptable to ask who drunk all the coffee, we don’t because of the association of the word ‘drunk’ with intoxication.  It just sounds better to say ‘drank’.

I would also like to say think, thank, thunk.  Because English.  It thunks.

Thanks to Electronic Bag Lady and her bag of bits, I now know the meaning of this excellent word:  QUAFFTIDE  Go there for the definition of the word, and stay for many good reads.  I think you will thank me later.

Now if you had asked me yesterday if I was done with homework for the rest of my life,  I would have told you yes.  But then EBL also said this.

Your homework is to tell me your terms for quafftiding like it’s 2015, and ideally also to relate an anecdote about such a party. It may involve Pan-Galactic Gargleblasters if you wish, and be purely hypothetical. No photocopiers should be harmed in the production of your story.

Although it wasn’t written in that exact annoying colour or font, still I have decided to take it seriously.  Never having outgrown my nerdy tendency to complete all homework assignments ever given to me,  I will now ramble off all the phrases I know or have used personally to describe what happens to you when you participate to an unhealthy degree in quafftidling events.

 sloshed, buzzed, wasted, shit faced,

three sheets to the wind, tipsy, pickled, pissed,

trashed, hooped, under the influence, plastered,

hammered, blind drunk,

on a bender, ripped,

looped

blotto

smashed,

wiggy,

stoned,

loaded, half cut,

out of your tree, and totally wrecked.

There are probably more I’ve forgotten (and most of these are no doubt no longer popular in 2015)  but that’s all I’ve got, likely because of what all that booze supposedly does to your brain cells.  Contrary to what you might have been lead to believe (because I often talk about wine and like to put words into wine glass shapes) I don’t drink much at all anymore.  My doctor asked me how much alcohol I consume on a daily or weekly basis, and I said  “Just the occasional bottle of wine.  Shit!  I mean GLASS.  Glass of wine.  Gawd.”

I drink more when I’m on a holiday or with people of like mind who are also drinking of course.  And I certainly did my share of partying in high school and university,  and socially whenever we could get away with it while our kids were young, until we decided we should set a better example for them.

I remember how impressed W’s university friends were on a couple of occasions when I was able to keep up with them consuming draft beer.  Some guys are just so easily dazzled.  I don’t remember ever seeing any Pan-Galactic Gargleblasters though.  When I’ve had enough to drink and can no longer feel my feet, I say goodnight and go to bed.  So it’s entirely possible I passed out before they joined the party.

Gentle

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Snow is gently falling this morning and if there is any wind at all, it is gentle too.

My Saturday morning house is quiet and the January light reflects off the gently rotating hangy-things dangling across the kitchen window.

Yes, there does appear to be a photo in this slide show which doesn’t belong.  It is meant to show that beauty can be found on a cluttered kitchen counter.

I am about to begin session three of my gentle stretching of miscellaneous newly awakened muscles.

There are miles to go before I sleep.

Feel free to take all of this and shape it in to an epic piece of poetry.  My brain is currently tuned to the gentle setting and won’t cooperate.

Shipwreck

                     He says he wants to brave the rapids

                So one leg in the canoe I give us a push

                        Bare feet with life jacket over bikini

              Too late I realize we’re bound to mess up

                Grab the paddles and endeavour to row

       Whack some rocks in the creeks white water

                  Bumping and tossing we finally capsize

                        Our little adventure is less than epic

           In three feet of water we wade to the dock

Poetry Prompt #6 – Reverse Acrostic from We Drink Because We’re Poets

Well this was fun!  Why start off with a frontwards Acrostic when you can do a backwards one?

Stargazing

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nickydoyl/6861479921/

 

Surrender,  let the night embrace us

There is light in deep dark spaces

Inky, pitch black, sunless places

See the truth in the cold night sky

Where Pegasus and Auriga fly

Transforming harsh to calm and kind

Tracking moonbeams where dreams unwind

 

 What’s so amazing that keeps us stargazing?

First Gargleblaster Writing Challenge

Got 42 words?  Click on the link and join the fun.

Subnivean Meltdown

Welcome to our subnivean world

Where the sun will never shine.

I sense your uneasiness with the gloom.

You wonder why we choose to exist

In this silent and cheerless place.

I will play the morosoph to answer;

The decision was ultroneous,

Simply because we had no other choice.

And now there is nowhere else to go.

Perhaps this is also true for you.

See how our refuge keeps us sheltered and warm?

Here we are safe from the rasorial creatures,

Far from the predators in their bosky copse

And the bitter cold above us.

Here there is little to fear.

Stay with us and let your anger soften,

Your fighting spirit and your bitterness melt.

Bear us no ill will and you will be protected.

You will be one with us.

We will play cockal in the darkness

To while away the winter hours,

Nights and days passing in a fog of promnesia.

I think you will get used to it, this somnolent existence.

If not, the alternative is to leave.

Perhaps to die.

Ah, I see you have made up your mind.

A wise decision.

Welcome to our subnivean world.

~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~

No excuses for missing a Trifecta Challenge since now there will be just one a week instead of two. This weeks word is the 3rd definition of “melt” – to make tender or gentle, soften.

I have never written a blog post with footnotes (and I’m not about to start) but I am including some definitions of weird words of the day from Wordnik so that the above will make some small modicum of sense. I love learning new words.  If you don’t need these definitions – wow, you have a very impressive vocabulary. If you do need them, you’re welcome.  Make these words your own and impress your nerdy friends.

subnivean  – Situated or carried on under the snow, an insulated area between packed snow and the ground where small animals take refuge

morosoph –  A philosophical or learned fool, jester This word comes from a Greek phrase meaning ‘foolishly wise.’

promnesia  –  The illusory consciousness that an event, now happening for the first time, has been experienced before.  Also paramnesia, deja vu

ultroneous – Spontaneous; voluntary, from the Latin ‘ultro,’ of one’s own accord.

rasorial  – Given to scratching the ground for food, as poultry;

cockal  – A game played with the anklebones of a sheep in the place of dice.

bosky – Woody; consisting of or covered with bushes; full of thickets.

Limericks for Jack

Tanner’s Jack, from Morland Brewery (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Why is my life so damned boring?

Yelled Jack, with little forewarning.

His friends didn’t know

But suggested he go

Drink some ale to calm down his roaring.

~~~

Since the bartender never stopped pouring,

Jacks head was soon muddled and soaring.

He fell in a bush

And injured his tush.

It was hard to explain in the morning.

Trifecta Week 106  33 to 333 words using the Yiddish word tush – 3rd meaning – buttocks (slang)

The Art of Deception

Empty Eyes (Photo credit: Mire74)

***

With craft and cleverness he fought to own her,

With pledges and promises, halcyon gold.

But only emptiness burned from his eyes,

Dangerous, sinister, forbidding and cold.

She put their betrothal on hold.

***

This weeks Trifecta Writing Challenge:    33 to 333 words using the third definition of the noun CRAFT – skill in deceiving to gain an end.

A List of Beautiful Broken Things

Found on Facebook. On somebody’s Facebook Page. Shared by other Facebook Pages. My news feed is too long and crazy to search for it again.

A shopping list (noun) is a list of items needed to be purchased by a shopper, a grocery list is the most popular type of shopping list– including items that need to be procured on the next visit to the grocery store.

Kintsukuroi is a Japanese noun meaning “to repair with gold”; the art of repairing pottery with gold or silver lacquer and understanding that the piece is more beautiful for having been broken.

Hard to believe the queen of lists missed the shopping list prompt for the promptless.  It certainly wasn’t for lack of lists floating around in my life.  Just maybe it was all those other things floating around with them that I’m too lazy to grab hold of and run with.

So, two prompts in one – Voila! – a list-y poem about breaks.  No, I can’t explain how I came up with that exactly.  But that’s the beauty of poetry – the inspiration for it rarely makes sense. And I’m going with the part of the prompt that said to make up my own.

I have plagiarized and hopefully improved upon my own work from a previous poem.  I won’t link to it, because it sucked even worse than this one.  But I’m having fun!  And that’s all that really matters, right?  Don’t be critical, you could break my heart.

broken vase (Photo credit: Leonard John Matthews)

Things That Break

When dawn breaks,

Morning has broken.

Night falls, but it never breaks.

Give a guy a break and break it to him gently.

Then take a coffee break.

Go ahead and break a leg, break a horse,

Break the connection, break a code.

Break away and break bad habits.

But don’t step on a crack and break your mothers back.

Don’t break in and don’t break out.

Don’t break mirrors, don’t break your neck.

I’ve broken up, I’ve broken down.

Broken hearts, broken promises,

And the silences that must be broken

Before we break apart .

Break a record, break a rule,

But never break a spirit or anybody’s bones.

Precious things get broken.

When you add up all the shattered bits of china

What are the broken pieces worth?

It’s impossible to say.

Might as well try to break it down

For every sorry fragment

Of a broken dream.

Broken Dreams (Photo credit: jumpinjimmyjava)

Related links:

the matticus kingdom – and what a story it is

Mahabore’s Mumblings – A real hero

The D / A Dialogues – Broken