Day: July 26, 2018

A Public Service Announcement

Fandango14 Comments

E6886D3D-15EF-4E29-B48B-71F3BB445B09A number of you who have been participating in my daily Fandango’s One-Word Challenge have commented that your pingbacks today aren’t working. Actually, they are, but for some reason, they’re not appearing in the comments section until 2-3 minutes after your comment informing me that they’re not showing up.

I don’t know why this is suddenly happening, since I don’t moderate either comments or pingbacks. But I just want to let you know that your pingbacks do eventually get posted, but just not immediately. Again, I have no clue why there is this several minute delay.

So you can be patient and feel fairly confident that your pingback will eventually show up. Or, if you have an OCD personality (like I do), you can send me a comment with a link to your post. Either way, I’ll get it and will read your post.

And, again, thank you all for participating in Fandango’s One-Word Challenge.

Tale Weaver — The Final Performance

Fandango11 Comments

702727B1-60DE-4EA8-94A9-76A515FAAD01

The old man was unable to remember how many years it had been since he first carried his strange instrument, an unlikely combination of a violin and a grind organ, to his regular spot on the sidewalk just outside of the city park. He’d bring his instrument, his folding chair, his satchel containing his lunch and a hot drink in a thermos with him. And, of course, his little dog to keep him company. He was now on — what? — his fourth dog?

He would place his hat on the sidewalk in front of him, set up his folding chair, sit down, put his instrument across his lap, and start playing. Back then he would attract quite a crowd, with kids dancing to his music, and passersbys tossing quarters — and occasional dollar bills — into his hat.

He actually made a decent living as a street musician. He was able to pay rent for his modest room at the boardinghouse and to buy for food for himself and his dog. He spent his days out in the fresh air, only missing those when the weather made being outside a place for neither man nor beast.

His greatest joy was making people smile, seeing them dance, and watching them enjoying his music. He was once interviewed by a reporter for the city’s newspaper. A photographer for the paper took his picture. He made the front page of the local news section and even more people showed up after that to watch him play.

But times had changed. The noises of the city, with all the hustle bustle, seemed to drown out his beautiful music. Other street performers, from drummers pounding on upside down plastic buckets, teens breakdancing to loud hip hop music, strummers with guitars hooked up to electric amplifiers, and people dressed in Sesame Street, Disney, and superhero costumes, took up residence on the crowded sidewalk outside of the park, competing for the few dollars passerbys were willing to spend.

People wanted to take pictures of him with their smartphones, selfies to post on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. But few took the time to stop and appreciate his lovely music. And at least once a week hooligans would steal from his hat whatever meager contributions had been tossed into it.

As much as he loved playing his music, he knew it was time to hang it up. His arthritic fingers prevented him from playing the way he had done for so many years and he grew tired of having to compete with so many other street performers.

It had been a great run and a wonderful life, but now it was time retire to the boardinghouse, where he could visit with his lifelong friends and occasionally make his music in front of the warm fire in the house’s common room.

All things considered, the old man had no regrets.

Written for this week’s Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver prompt. We are asked to weave a tale that involves a street performer.

My Biggest and Best Fans

Fandango24 Comments

4508C6F0-E37B-4A79-A539-6CC0BDC5F0F9Few people sing my praises as a blogger as do those whose comments somehow end up in my spam folder.

I thought, as a public service, I’d share with you, completely unedited, some of the great comments that inexplicably were marked as spam.

hello! I love your writing so much! percentage we keep up a correspondence more about your post on AOL? I need a specialist on this house to unravel my problem. May be that’st you! Looking ahead to peer you.

My post on AOL? Are we back in the 90s? And as to your looking ahead to peer me, that sounds kinda kinky to me.

Heya i am for the first time here. I found this board and I find It truly useful & it helped me out a lot. I am hoping to present something back and aid others like you helped me.

Heya yourself. You are for the first time here and found my post on a board? Like a bulletin board?

definitely know how to keep a reader amused. Between your wit and your videos, I was almost moved to start my own blog (well, almost…HaHa!)

Thank you for you kind words. Please do start your own blog. I can’t wait to not read it.

Great job. I really loved what you had to say, and more than that, how you presented it. Too cool!

Yeah, I’m too cool.

Wow! At last I got a blog from where I can truly take useful information regarding my study and knowledge.

I’m not sure that whatever your study or knowledge is, of that you will gain all that much from my blog, but thank you, I guess.

whoah this weblog is wonderful i love studying your articles. Stay up the good work! You realize, many persons are searching around for this information, you could aid them greatly.

I’m pleased that you love studying my articles because there will be a pop quiz in the morning. So study away. But first, learn how to spell “whoa.”

For people who choose sizzling drinks like myself, it’s mosting more likely to be a big bonus offer for you.

Sizzling drinks? WTF?

A motivating discussion is definitely worth comment. I think that you need to write more on this topic, it might not be a taboo subject but usually people don’t speak about such topics. To the next! Many thanks!!

To the next. To infinity and beyond!

Hi there very nice blog!! Guy .. Excellent .. Wonderful .. I’ll bookmark your website and take the feeds also? I’m satisfied to search out numerous useful information here in the put up, we’d like develop more techniques in this regard, thank you for sharing. . .

“…here in the put up”? Hmm. Where, exactly, would that be?

Good way of describing, and nice article to obtain facts concerning my presentation subject matter, which i am going to present in academy.

Good luck at the academy. Glad I could be of assistance on whatever your presentation subject might be.

Right away I am going away to do my breakfast, after having my breakfast coming yet again to read additional news.

Enjoy doing your breakfast and coming yet again after breakfast. Must be quite a good breakfast!

So thank you to all of my spammers your kind words. I look forward to continue hearing from you and deleting your insightful comments from my spam folder.

#FOWC — The Dreamer

Fandango6 Comments

3E5D4961-8054-4F54-A3F9-339812C795C2The small table fan did little to cool the air on that terribly hot and muggy summer day. Nick sat on his couch wearing only his underpants in a failed effort to keep cool.

His thoughts wandered to what happened the night before, when Anita told him that she just didn’t love him anymore. “You’re a dreamer, Nick,” she said. “You have all these big dreams, make all of these grandiose plans, but nothing ever comes of it. I need someone who is a realist, not a dreamer. I need someone who will actually make something of himself in the real world, not someone who just dreams about doing things in a make believe dreamscape.”

He’d seen movies, heard songs, and read poems about unrequited love, but he never imaged that he would be the victim of it. He was hurt and was trying to figure out if there was a way to salvage his relationship with Anita.

But Nick realized that there was little he could do. He was, and would always be, a dreamer and his dreams and Anita’s pragmatism were simply incompatible. Maybe someday he would meet the woman of his dreams. But today, his dream was limited to trying to stay cool on this hot summer day.

wrotten for today’s Three Things Challenge, where  the words are fan, cool, and summer. Also for Fandango’s One-Word Challenge, “dreamer,” for the Ragtag Daily Prompt, “salvage,” and for the Word of the Day Challenge, “unrequited.” Photo credit: John Fornander at unsplash.com.

 

50 Word Thursday — The Ring

Fandango10 Comments

DC722FF8-487C-4F60-BF89-E9686866E692If I’d stopped to think I might not have done it, but fury is a great disregarder of caution. I jumped into the murky water from the houseboat we’d rented to try to retrieve the diamond engagement ring my fiancé, in a fit of rage, threw overboard.

I decided to confess that I’d had sex with her sister, but tried to explain that I, in a moment of weakness, was seduced by her sister. That was no reason for her to toss that expensive ring into the water. 

Now my whole body is covered with welts from jellyfish stings.

(100 words)

Written for Deb Whitman’s 50 Word Thursday prompt. The idea is to respond to the prompt in multiples of 50 words – maximum of 250 words. Deb provides a photo and a random phrase from a book she is reading. We can use either or both. This week’s phrase is, “If I’d stopped to think I might not have done it, but fury is a great disregarder of caution.”