Day: July 31, 2019

The Good Old Days of Sanity

Fandango19 Comments

D257B441-014C-49BC-9511-18DEC2BCFEAAI have to admit that watching the Democratic candidates debates last night and tonight, I was hit with a wave of nostalgia. I was overcome with an adoration for the good old days of relative sanity before Donald Trump came on the political scene.

Between the human rights atrocities that are happening at our southern border courtesy of Trump, the climate change doubters in the Republican Party, tax breaks for the wealthy at the expense of the poor and middle class, and an attempt to take healthcare away from most Americans, Donald Trump and his sycophants in Congress are destroying all of the characteristics that have made America great.

Personally, I would be overjoyed if we, as citizens of our country, can come together and oust Donald Trump and his corrupt, unpatriotic cronies from our government. Because if Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, and the other spineless, unscrupulous Republicans get re-elected in 2020, I fear that the America we have known and loved will disappear. And should that be the case, I might actually have to abjure my American citizenship and find someplace else in the world to call home.

Written for these daily prompts: Ragtag Daily Prompt (Nostalgia), Word of the Day Challenge (adoration), The Daily Spur (border), Weekly Prompts (doubters), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (overjoyed), Daily Addictions (together), and Nova’s Daily Random Word (abjure).

In Other Words — Life is a Carousel

Fandango7 Comments

EE741DF6-FC27-4699-A002-3283AC6A8D4CHe felt that he was just going round and round and up and down.

Moving in circles, as if riding atop a painted pony on a merry-go-round.

He wanted to look forward and to see his life ahead.

But he’d seen and done it all; he might as well be dead.

He was living his life trapped on a carousel from which there was no escape.

In other wordsWritten 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 picture above and/or the words “carousel.” Image credit: skeeze from Pixabay.

Back To The Drawing Board

Fandango9 Comments

B0389F28-4D3E-4436-9370-38F528AEA54CThey were told that the procedure would treat all of the demons that were tormenting them. It was, they were told, a quantum leap forward in the field of electroconvulsive therapy. They were told that the odds of something going wrong were minuscule. All they had to do was sign the release papers that would relieve the doctors and the facility from any responsibility for adverse effects of the treatment.

The three men lined up against the wall in a large, padded cell. They were each outfitted with a series of electrodes strategically placed on their bodies. Each man was then linked to the other in a sort of electronic daisy chain. The patient on the left was plugged into an electrical outlet.

“This is Dr. Bergson speaking,” a voice coming from a speaker in the ceiling said. The three men couldn’t see the doctor, as he was in an adjacent room looking at his patients through a two-way mirror. “Let me explain what is about to happen,” Bergson said. “The three of you have been wired together and linked electronically. In a few moments, I will send an electric current through your bodies. Because you are all connected together, the process requires less current than if you were individually wired because it leverages the collective natural electrical impulses that are in your linked bodies.”

“Will it hurt?” the man in the middle asked?

“You will feel a slight electrical shock and a tingling sensation, but it will be milder than the shock treatments you’ve had in previous individual sessions,” the doctor answered. “I’m going to count to three and then turn on the current. One. Two. Three.”

There was a cracking sound and all three men started jerking violently. The man in the middle watched in horror as the man on his left fell to the ground, foam escaping from his mouth. Then he, too, slumped down, legs akimbo and his back against the padded wall. The man to his right was still standing, but seemed to be frozen. The last thing the man in the middle saw before everything went black was the man on his right fall like a stiff mannequin, face first onto the hard concrete floor.

******

In the adjacent room, on the other side of the two-way mirror, Dr. Bergson sighed and told one of his interns to turn off the current. “Back to the drawing board,” he said with a slight shoulder shrug. He then instructed a second intern, “Go take care of the bodies.”

Written for the Photo Challenge from Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie. Photo credit: LightPaintingPhotography.com.

Fandango’s Provocative Question #34

Fandango14 Comments

FPQWelcome once again to Fandango’s Provocative Question. Each week I will pose what I think is a provocative question for your consideration. By provocative, I don’t mean a question that will cause annoyance or anger. Nor do I mean a question intended to arouse sexual desire or interest.

What I do mean is a question that is likely to get you to think, to be creative, and to provoke a response. Hopefully a positive response.

For this week’s provocative question, I am going to leverage the social and political upheavals going on all around the globe. So my question for this week is relatively straightforward.

What are the three biggest challenges your country (or, if you prefer, the world) is facing right now?

If you don’t follow current events, you may answer the question from a personal perspective:

What are the three biggest challenges you are facing in your life right now?

If you choose to participate, write a post with your response to the question. Once you are done, tag your post with #FPQ and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Or you can simply include a link to your post in the comments.

The issue with pingbacks not showing up seems to have been resolved, but you might check to confirm that your pingback is there. If not, please manually add your link in the comments.