Month: November 2018

100WW — The American Dream

Fandango13 Comments

46DDCC97-6342-4ECC-A50B-0924501FB421“The American Dream. Yeah, right,” Todd said. “The so-called American Dream is dead. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and the middle class is disappearing.”

Dwayne didn’t say a word. He just continued to stroll along and look into all the shop windows.

“Hey, are you ignoring me? There’s nothing worse than being ignored,” Todd said.

No response from Dwayne.

“Dammit,” Todd said, “say something.”

“You sound like a fucking mad hatter.” Dwayne said. “You’re white. Try being a black man in America. There never was an American Dream for black people.”

“Wanna grab a beer?” Todd asked.

(100 words)

Written for Bikurgurl’s 100 Word Wednesday prompt. And for the Daily Writing Challenge from The Haunted Wordsmith using these items: annoying, mad hatter, and <your favorite drink>, which is beer.

I also included a new challenge from An Upturned Soul, where we’re supposed to “put the term “ignored” into Google or Goodreads, and whatever comes up and catches your attention so much that you can’t ignore it, and say something about it, like how there’s nothing worse than being ignored.

Freedom of Information

Fandango9 Comments

FBCE7043-0A29-4B4C-9B26-4893AF272560“Your FOIA request is denied. The requested information is classified,” the letter said. A doleful expression appeared on Teresa’s face.

“What’s the matter, honey?” her grandfather asked. “You look so sad and disappointed.”

“Why do they call it the ‘Freedom of Information Act’ when all they have to do is mark things secret or classified and then no one can have access to it,” Teresa asked. “Don’t you find that awfully suspicious, Gramps?”

“Oh sweetly,” Gramps replied. “It will be a frosty day in hell before there’s anything close to transparency in government and politics.”

This post was inspired by the comment Teresa (The Haunted Wordsmith) made on my one-word challenge (classified). I used her comment as the first line of this post. I also used these prompts: Word of the Day Challenge (doleful), Scotts Daily Prompt (grandfather), Your Daily Word Prompt (suspicious), and Ragtag Daily Prompt (frost).

frost doleful suspicious grandfather

In Other Words — Madness

Fandango14 Comments

89C6160C-121F-4C9B-BC09-1EF78F9468DBThis is America in the age of Trump

This is crazy

This is scary

This is dangerous

In other words, this is madness

In other wordsThis post was written for the In Other Words prompt from Patricia’s Place. The challenge this week is to write a story or poem of five lines or fewer using the word “madness.” Image credit: Michael Vadon’s Flickr photostream.

Friday Fictioneers — Collectibles

Fandango21 Comments

94247FB4-713F-427D-9241-422285E99667“They’re oil squirt cans, Kenny,” Sam said. “I worked as a machinist back in the day and I had to keep those machines well lubricated by squirting oil from cans just like these into the moving parts on the equipment.”

“But why do you have them on the shelf?” the boy asked.

“I just started to collect them, is all,” Sam said.

“Why?”

“Everyone has something they collect, Kenny,” Sam said. “When I was a kid I collected baseball cards and comic books. Don’t you have anything you collect?”

“Yeah.”

“What?”

“Money,” Kenny said. “Got a dollar for my collection?”

(100 words)

Written for the Friday Fictioneers prompt from Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. Photo credit: Nick Allen.

The Talkative Tag

Fandango18 Comments

D8215BD6-0928-4740-80C1-7538D06B6649There is a blogger, The Eclectic Contarian, who started a tag that he calls “The Talkative Tag.”

This tag, he said, is to offer a little “thanks” to those who have been very talkative and involved with his blog and to show his appreciation.

Eventually this tag found its way to Sadje, of Keep It Alive. And then Sadje tagged me, among others who have commented on her posts. She wrote, “What can I say about Fandango! He is a great writer. He is also the inventor of The Fandango One Word Challenge. We all look up to him and wait for his prompts. You also should check out his new series of questions; FPQ!”

So it seems what you’re supposed to do is bring up the screen from you WordPress stats where you can see who has been commenting on your blog, take a screenshot, write your own Talkative Tag post, include that screenshot, and mention the people who have commented on your posts the most.

And here’s that screenshot:B36070DB-D0D5-4B61-9161-0258BACAEACBNow I’m not sure what period this covers, but I also saw in my stats that so far in 2018 my posts have received around 22,000 comments, so I find it a little strange that these number of comments were so low. But, you know, whatever.

As to my top six list in the screenshot, Marleen, who tops the list, doesn’t have her own blog, but she does comment a lot on my posts and her comments are generally well thought out and insightful. And Sight, number three on the list, just announced that he’s taking an indefinite hiatus from blogging. So I suppose I can’t pass this “Talkative Tag” to either of them. And I can’t tag Sadje because she tagged me.

So I am going to tag the next three on the list. First there is Leigha Robbins, who consistently responds to my daily One-Word Challenge with great poetry and prose, and who comments on pretty much ever one of my posts.

And then there’s Teresa Grabs, aka, The Haunted Wordsmith, a prolific and creative flash fiction writer who also offers many of her own writing prompts to inspire us.

And finally, Marilyn Armstrong, a blogger who has been sharing her life with the WordPress community for a number of years and whose posts are personal, insightful, and inspiring, and who is a terrific photographer.

So Leigha, Teresa, and Marilyn, feel free to do your own Talkative Tag post. Or not. Your call.