#GBE2: Midnight

Cinderella - You Wimp!

This week's blogging group challenge is "Midnight." What is it about this special time being the bewitching hour and all kinds of creepy stuff happening when the clock strikes twelve? For example, take Cinderella.

Her Fairy Godmother said, "Be home by midnight or your carriage will turn into a pumpkin and you'll be back to wearing rags." Talk about tough love! Really, lady? First off, why a pumpkin? That frail chick couldn't even carry her round ride home without pulling out her wimpy spine. If she tried to roll it, the thing would probably hit a rock and get her arrested for smashing gourds in the street. At least turn it into a cell phone so she could call for a ride. But oh wait, she's a prisoner of her evil step mother and has no one to call. Such a pathetic role model for our young girls.

Elizabeth - My heroine!

Cinderella wears rags, but I'm not one to judge folks by their clothing. Look at Elizabeth the Paper Bag Princess. The dragon came to town, burned her duds, and kidnapped her stuck-up Prince Ronald (no relation to the clown), so she took off to save him with only a paper bag to grant her modesty.

Now, think about this. Would you go to a fire breathing dragon with just a paper bag on? Let's hope he's not a horny devil. Anyway, this tough chick outsmarted the dragon and rescued the prince who wanted her to comb her hair and shower. She didn't need a Fairy Godmother to tell her to dump the creep. She told him to take a hike all by her little self.

 But I digress : Midnight

I remember this great song by Eric Clapton, "After Midnight." He had that one right. In those days the party didn't even get started until after midnight. Now if only I could stay up that late. . . but that's another post. Thanks, Beth! This one was fun.

If you like my blog, please vote for me on the Picket Fence because I'm kinda in a rut right now. My fence post spot is 69 and if you look to the left, you'll see the title of my most popular post. Not good for a respectable blog like this one! Thanks. :)

Wordless Wednesday: Kennedy Space Center

Having a "blast" in Orlando! We're here for our daughter's college orientation. We arrived a few days early so we could play tourist. I even rode on a shuttle blast off simulation ride. For someone who hates motion and likes to keep her feet on the ground, this was big!

Here are some vacation pics.

Mitchell and Me Being Spacey.

   

Erica and Mitchell having a Blast

As Erica sets out for the new world of college, she is a true "Explorer."

"To infinity and beyond!" 
~Buzz Lightyear, Space Ranger

If you like this post, push the fence button or http://picketfenceblogs.com/vote/3715 to vote for my blog. Thanks!

#GBE2: The Bakery

It's a ?

A good product takes time to develop. First, one must choose the right ingredients. Two summers ago, we witnessed the union of my nephew Brent to his beautiful wife Jill. Next, they ordered the product from a stork, and we've had a nine month wait. Although the due date was July 6th, the little bakery bundle has chosen to go for extended time in the oven. Jill started contractions on Wednesday night; but here it is Monday, and the stork has not delivered. I'm a good aunt, but I'd like to be a great one, so here are my suggestions to get the oven timer to ding:

•  Rain dances have been common in tribes. How about a baby dance. The expecting mom needs to perform deep knee bends while saying goo.
• Sometimes we roll dough to get the air out. How about rolling bellies to get the kid out?
• Ever see chefs throw pizza dough in the air? Have the perspective daddy throw mama in the air too.

If all else fails, there is always prayer! I'll keep you posted as to when our bakery product pops out of the oven.

If you like this post, push the fence button or http://picketfenceblogs.com/vote/3715 to vote for my blog. Thanks!

7/13/11

 

It's a Girl!

Dating Nerds

Revenge of the Nerds

Do you remember the poster, are you a nerd? Arrows pointed to different spots of the nerd photograph making sure to point out the pocket protector, tape on glasses, high-water pants, etc., etc. Way back when, I went out with this guy. It was a blind date, but unfortunately I wasn't blind. The nerd kept trying to put his awkward little arm around my shoulders and a car load of "cool" guys even drove by pointing and laughing.

The clincher at the end of the evening was the dead fly in his ear. No, I didn't make this up. After we got our food (he ordered peaches and cottage cheese), I noticed the little insect that lay on its wings with bent legs folded up into his greasy ear canal. I lost my appetite. 

Who knows? He may be the CEO of some multi-million dollar corporation right now, but it's not worth it. Gross! Here's a link to one of my favorite nerd videos staring Dimitri Martin. It's great so check it out!

Comedy Central - Hoodwinkers

If you like this post, push the fence button or http://picketfenceblogs.com/vote/3715 to vote for my blog. Thanks!

Wordless Wednesday - Silent pictures

Who said Wordless Wednesday has to be still pictures? Enjoy my talented daughter's first movie.

 

... and to think, Erica can't decide what to major in.

If you like my blog, please click on the White Picket Fence or push Picket Fence to vote for my blog. Thanks!

#GBE2 Challenge: Wretched Life

Great Rental Place

We have a most unique challenge with the GBE 2 group, and as a writer, I'm certainly up for this one. Write a 100 word fiction story. I'm all on it, with the exception that I've cheated a little by taking a story I wrote some time ago and cutting it down, but what do you want? I'm vacationing in Charleston. Today, I even tried a paddle boat for the first and last time. After falling into the Charleston Harbor, I decided to swap it for a kayak. Then I went up Shem's Creek where two playful dolphins jumped in front of my boat.

Here is a story that has nothing to do with paddle boating, kayaking, or Charleston, but I hope you like it anyway. It can't be over 100 words, including the title. Really, Beth? "You're killing me Smalls."

Ballymote Castle

Wretched Life
by
 Joyce Paull Lansky

     Jeremy followed the tour under a familiar tapestry suspended in the banquet hall. He’d been fascinated by fourteenth century Ireland. Now, he was there!

     Staring at a cauldron, he felt certain he'd eaten scraps of honey-covered mutton from the Master’s platter. Worse, he'd slept nude on hay-covered dung while the Lord and Lady enjoyed a cozy pallet; but, being naked was better than wearing insect-infested tunics.

    After climbing slyly-constructed, irregular steps that circled a stone column, he ducked under the wall's arrow slit. Jeremy cringed from the memory of the arrow that had ended his wretched past life.


If you like my blog, please click on the White Picket Fence or push Picket Fence Vote to vote for my blog. Thanks!

Six Sentence Sunday

Ouch!

It's been over a month since I've participated in Six Sentence Sunday, but I'm glad to be back with an excerpt from my Work in Progress (WIP), Mrs. Zimmerman's Donuts. Knob has just met his friend Slater's mom for the first time, and he's not used to adults playing tricks.

Slater’s mom pulled a chisel-shaped knife out of an antique cabinet's top drawer and leaned her head back. With the precision of a surgeon, she gently slid the blade downward until it disappeared into her throat. Next she thrust it out with one gigantic swing. Blood covered the blade while red liquid filled her mouth. Her eyes rounded as her lips curved into a smug smile. She winked at me! 

If you like my blog, please click on the White Picket Fence or push Picket Fence Vote to vote for my blog. Thanks!  

Fireworks

Happy Independence Day week-end! It's been 235 years since our country was founded and the most popular American fourth of July tradition is fireworks. Many of us gather around to see shows from the ground, but have you ever wondered what fireworks look like from an airplane? I imagined bright bouquets of color filling up the window, but that's not it at all.

Years ago, my husband pointed out the window of an airplane and said, "Look. Fireworks."

"Where?" I asked.

After scanning the skies, I finally spotted a quarter shaped explosion, followed by several other mini light displays. Sure, it was cool but not what I expected. In reality, planes fly much higher than exploding fireworks, so just like everything else from above, the light display shrunk.

Even with today's technology, I've never seen a film or still photo that captures the true beauty of fireworks, but here's a short clip which I enjoyed.

Mom's Revenge

For those who remember my last week's Wordless Wednesday post, Jo suggested I do the same to my kids' pictures. However, I didn't have to do much, they'd already done it to themselves.

Miami, Florida 1949

We've all heard of visits from spirits. This actually happened in my family, and here's photographic proof. My youngest daughter accompanied my parents on their honeymoon in 1949!

Super Dan

The Jolly Green Giant and Smurfs have nothing on this character. Watch Daniel flex his muscles for the blue ray. When he was in preschool, I used to pin pillowcases to his back so he could run around saving the world. Not much has changed.

Six Eyes

Sweet Judy would never alter her Mom's picture and had nothing to do with last week's post, but I wouldn't want her to feel left out, so here is six eyes--no multiple personality disorder here.

The Best Brand of Fertilizer - #GBE2

What's That?

This week's GBE 2 prompt is a picture. Unfortunately, this plant is something I've never seen thriving in our yard. My husband and I tried to plant one and fertilized it with advanced college degrees. You know how it goes:  BS = bull sh*t; MS = more sh*t; PhD = piled higher and deeper. I guess we didn't add enough manure to the plant because it didn't bear fruit for long.

Maybe my degrees were all wrong. I received a BHS instead of the standard BS. It stands for Bachelor of Health Science which is a joke because I never had the clinical ear to be a speech therapist and listen to kids say, "Ew, ew, er." As for the Audiology part, I dropped it after noticing the people who worked hard for more sh*t degrees only to change jobs before thirty. You can only push buttons for so long.

So with the desire to make loads and loads of money, I pursued a more sh*t degree in Special Education. Our high pay is the reason the economy is so messed up. Just ask any of those politicians who are pushing anti-teacher bills. Since my career wasn't bearing fruit on the money tree, I could only hope the husband bought the right brand of fertilizer.

He holds three degrees. After receiving his BS, he went on to pile it higher and deeper, but lawyers do it wrong. After the doctor of jurisprudence, he added more sh*t. The tree started to bear fruit, but so did we. Three little money suckers swung from the tree's branches and turned it into firewood.

Now the monkeys are trying to add fertilizer to their own trees. Hopefully they're buying the right brand of manure at their institutes of higher education! I know the son did. A degree in Economics landed him an instant job straight out of college.

Spilling Guts

Should I or Shouldn't I?

Several bloggers discussed whether or not to spill ones guts out in posts. I say, "No." It's a messy business that will result in me tripping and pulling five feet of intestinal material out of my body. Of course with that, I could have a fine jump rope but probably wouldn't feel like skipping. I mean who wants to jump rope with your guts sticking out? Plus while everything's open, I could pull out excess fat. They call that a tummy tuck, but this would be a homemade one that wouldn't cost ten-thousand dollars. All I'd have to do is spill my guts, pull out fat, then shove the intestines back in. I'd probably lose forty pounds, so on second thought--okay. Maybe we should spill our guts out after all. But not in front of the computer because if one bleeds on the keyboard the computer might crash!

Wordless Wednesday - Kids & Computers

This is what happens when your kids get a hold of your photo and an art program on a computer.

GBE2: First Love

At our wedding reception, my brother warned my husband to be wary about what I did to my first love. I tore my love into pieces then cried at the departure, but it wasn't totally my fault. Being the youngest of four, I tended to listen to the bad advice of older siblings. He who shall not be named told me to rip my love so that I could spread its joy around and have plenty.

Micky the Monkey

Waaaa! Blanky. **sniff** I tore it into multiple pieces then rummaged through the scraps for one smidgen large enough to rub against my nose as I sucked my thumb. That was a dirty trick to play on an unsuspecting toddler, but not to worry.

My mom paid $2 for a stuffed monkey at the grocery store, and he replaced my torn blanky. I named him Micky after Micky Dolenz from the Monkees because Micky was so cute! He also made me laugh as he banged his drums and did silly stuff on TV. Everyone else was in love with Davy Jones, not me. I liked Micky.

I also had a little crush on Robin from the Batman show . . . until he took off his mask. :p . . .  He was ugly underneath, so it was time to forget about television and focus on real boys.

Happy Father's Day Wherever You Are

Theodore Paull

On Father's Day I'm reminded of my dad and our thirty-one years together. I used to complain about how unfair it was to have had so little time with him, but after chatting with various people about their childhoods, I stopped. I'd rather have had thirty-one years with mine than sixty-two with yours. Hopefully your dad was great too, but I've heard multiple stories about abusive fathers. This is not one of them!

Although he never hit me, he could snap me into line with a look  for it was critical not to disappoint him. Unlike most children today, I had fear mixed with respect when it came to my father. When I became a parent, he told me, "Don't ever hit your children, but don't ever let them think you won't." Yep. He had me fooled.

Dad had a funny side too. Having grown up during the depression era, no one spent money on luxuries such as getting one's teeth straightened; so, Dad enjoyed making us laugh by squinting his eyes and showing his skinny little teeth with spaces between each one. Still, I couldn't wait for my handsome daddy to come home each night. My siblings and I listened for the groan of the garage door followed by a steady bump, bump, bump up the staircase. We'd charge out of bed to hug Dad who would remove his sports coat and replace it with his worn, blue terrycloth robe. I loved when Dad put me in bed because he'd tuck me in with a series of geeks, ya it was goofy but so was Dad at times. Although my kids' memories of my father are sketchy or absent, they know what geeking is all about.

He hated this picture but I love it!

Dad loved to tell pop corn, such as how his classmates nicknamed him Tadpole. A teacher with a thick German accent called attendance: Ted Paull came out sounding like tadpole, and the name stuck. Dad had his own nickname for me BooBoo, and my sibs had their fun with theories of where that name came from.

A cornier pop corn came from Dad's boyhood walk to school down Flora Place. Every morning the neighbors would lean out their windows and sing, "Theodora don't spit on the flora." Fertilize the lawn with that story, which always sounded best coming from Dad.

When an earthquake shook our house, Dad hollered, "Florence [my mother]! Quit jumping around up there!" But don't think he didn't care deeply for her. He showed his love and devotion through constant care for Mom when she became ill. He quit working and socializing to be by her bedside while she lay unconscious in an Iowa hospital. Refusing to leave her side, his stress became evident when he lost control of his Diabetes. Mom's health improved while Dad died of "total system failure" in 1993.

I miss my daddy on Father's Day and every day, but I have been blessed to have married a kind man who is much like my dad.

Meet Knob

Jeannie Campbell is hosting a blog hop and contest about getting to know our characters. So please meet the main character of my Work in Progress. Then you may buzz over to her site and meet other fictional people. How To Connect With Your MC


Knob's formal name is William Donald Donellson, but he received the nick name of Knob after Slater announced that his shaved hair made his head look like a door knob. Knob is a respectable name for an amazing, tough soldier. Unfortunately as the butt of the fifth grade, Wimpy Will has never felt like a tough anything.

Thanks for the interview. I'll answer the questions as best I can because I always do.

Question 1: What is your greatest fear? 

Gee, that's a tough one because I'm scared of everything. My brother died from falling off a bicycle and bleeding to death. I know, it sounds weird, but he had a disease called hemophilia and the doctors couldn't save him. Although I don't have the disease, you'd think I did by the way my mom hovers over me. I guess I'm scared of getting it. They say it's hereditary, so what happens if one day I catch hemophilia, start bleeding, and can't stop it?

Question 2: What is your biggest accomplishment?

I'm smart. Two years ago I won my age group in The Under the Arch Chess Tournament. I almost won again last year but a girl named Haley beat me. She's the only one who can beat me at chess, and I'm a little knock kneed at the thought of going up against her this year in the ten-year-old's category. Okay, I confess, I kinda like her, so scratch out my answer to question one. I'm most afraid of Haley--which is probably why I lost the tournament.

 

Question 3: What is your biggest regret?

I regret letting Randy bug me all the time in class. He always bullies me, but I've never stopped him because I'm kinda chicken. If I tell him to leave me alone, he might punch me, make me bleed, and do it in front of Haley. So on second thought, I guess I'm most afraid of Randy Butcher.

You didn't ask me what's been bugging me, but I'm going to tell you anyway. No one has gotten to meet me because my author has not gotten my story into query shape. It needs a lot of revisions. Here's the start of my story, MRS. ZIMMERMAN'S DONUTS by Joyce Paull Lansky. If you like it, tell your agent or editor friend about her because I want to be famous. Err, maybe not. It might be scary.

Mrs. Zimmerman's Donuts

            Every Friday after school, Harrison Zimmerman invited popular boys—not me, over for a stupid end-of-the-week celebration. His mom, the best chef in St. Louis County and co-founder of Zimmerman’s bakery, would fry up homemade donuts dipped in thick chocolate sauce. My mouth watered as we drove down Aberdeen Avenue and I breathed in the scent of those gooey pieces on a bed of powdered sugar.            

By the age of ten most guys had wolfed down seven-dozen pastries or more, but I’d never even tasted Mrs. Zimmerman’s donuts. I convinced myself that it was because my mom would’ve fallen into a tantrum at the thought of me swallowing anything slightly junky. She usually made a fuss over eating healthy as if my gut would explode if the tiniest bit of sugar or grease tickled my insides. But the real reason I’d never eaten the donuts—the fact that bothered me even more than Mom’s obsession over food, cleanliness, and safety—was that Harrison had never asked me to come to his stupid party. Actually, no one had ever invited me to go anywhere; but things were about to change.
  

That's what's been bugging me, but it's okay. Slater moved to town,

and he's going to help me be cool. See ya later.   ❧ Knob