Day: July 24, 2020

Pet Project

Fandango11 Comments

0D71FB32-9106-4465-AD24-B800F1BBA048“I need to reserve the next few days to finish this project I started,” Stan said. Seeing the expression on my face, he asked me, “Why did you respond that way to what I just said?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, “I didn’t mean to snicker, but you’re being totally arbitrary. This project of yours makes no sense.”

“You always criticize everything I do,” Stan said.

“But Stan,” I said, “you live in a one room apartment in a high rise building and you don’t have a dog. So why are you building a dog house?”

“You never know what the future will hold,” Stan said. “Now leave me so that I can work on my, um, pet project.”

Written for these daily prompts: Jibber Jabber (need), Your Daily Word Prompt (reserve), Ragtag Daily Prompt (project), The Daily Spur (respond), Word of the Day Challenge (snicker*), and Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (arbitrary).

*The Word of the Day Challenge was actually the word “smicker,” but when I Googled that word, I had a tough time finding a definition. One site said that it’s an antiquated word that means “to ogle and smile amorously —used with at or after.” I unilaterally decided to use “snicker” instead of a word I never heard of and is archaic.

Outta Sight, Outta Mind

Fandango34 Comments

B8900F42-4206-41AE-9F0F-9EBF30AE7037I was quite busy yesterday. Busier, anyway, than I usually am on any given Thursday since my retirement three and a half years ago.

Why was I so busy yesterday? Thank you for asking. I’ll tell you why. I had to move things around in our house to make space for a new dining room table that was being delivered. I had a meeting with a company that installs whole house generators as a backup when the inevitable rolling power outages due to wildfires hit this summer. I met with a landscaper for an estimate on doing some work in our backyard. And I had to take a quick trip to the grocery store. Busy, busy, busy.

Why am I telling you this? Thank you for asking. I’m telling you this because I only posted twice yesterday. One post was my daily Fandago’s one-word challenge, “precocious,” that I posted just after midnight. The other was my response to the Three Line Tales prompt from Sonya, that I posted in the wee hours of the morning. Nothing after those two posts for the rest of the day.

I usually post three to five times a day, a few in response to various prompts, and others expressing my observations, thoughts, and perspectives about the shitstorm we are experiencing under the “leadership” of Donald Trump and his GOP enablers. On average, at least for the first 22 days this month, my blog has been receiving around 420 views, 135 likes, and 57 comments per day.

But yesterday, out of curiosity, I checked my stats. I saw that my blog got only 228 views, just more than half as many as it usually gets per day. And only 75 likes, again, close to half of “normal.” And worse, only 15 comments, about a quarter of my average number of daily comments.

This precipitous drop in stats is due either to the lack of quality in my two posts or the fact that I only posted two posts. Or maybe both.

Well, this leads me to just one course of action. My blog needs a facelift. I need to pick out a new theme, a different design.

Actually, that’s not true. I’m not considering giving my blog a facelift. However, since I’m responding to Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt, where the words are “busier,” “space,” and “facelift,” saying that about giving my blog a facelift was the only way I could figure out how to use all three of her words.

Friday Fictioneers — The Artist

Fandango32 Comments

6CE63A30-E9E5-425C-8B14-3DF60D16E7DB“She was an excellent artist,” Arianna said, as she sorted through her deceased lover’s art supplies.

“Yes, I’m quite aware of that,” Richard responded.

“I modeled for her,” Arianna said.

“You must have done a lot more for her than just model,” Richard said in a bitter tone.

“I suppose it was difficult for you when she left you for me,” Arianna said.

“Yes, it was quite painful.”

“I’m sorry, but….”

The bullet to the brain killed Arianna instantly. Richard placed his wife’s paint palette on Arianna’s lifeless body. “Give that to her when you’re together again…in hell,” Richard said.

(100 words)

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

Fandango’s Friday Flashback — July 24

Fandango16 Comments

Wouldn’t you like to expose your newer readers to some of you earlier posts that they might never have seen? Or remind your long term followers of posts that they might not remember? Each Friday I will publish a post I wrote on this exact date in a previous year.

How about you? Why don’t you reach back into your own archives and highlight a post that you wrote on this very date in a previous year? You can repost your Friday Flashback post on your blog and pingback to this post. Or you can just write a comment below with a link to the post you selected.

If you’ve been blogging for less than a year, go ahead and choose a post that you previously published on this day (the 24th) of any month within the past year and link to that post in a comment.

This was originally published on July 24, 2017 on this blog.

What’s That Fragrance?

When I saw today’s one-word prompt, “Fragrance,” the first thing I thought of was that infamous scene from the movie, “Apocalypse Now,” where Robert Duvall said, “I love the fragrance of napalm in the morning.”

I thought, “Well, that was easy.” Then I Googled “fragrance of napalm” to find a video clip of that scene to put in this post. Imagine my surprise when I watched the clip and saw that Robert Duvall never actually said, “I love the fragrance of napalm in the morning.” Nope. What he did say was, “I love the smell of napalm in the morning.”

Now all I smell is the fragrance of embarrassment. Oh well. My bad.

Okay, it’s time to rise and shine and to start up the coffee grinder/brewer. Because there’s is nothing like the fragrance of coffee in the morning. It smells like victory — for having survived yet another day.

FOWC with Fandango — Arbitrary

Fandango18 Comments

FOWCWelcome to July 24, 2020 and to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). It’s designed to fill the void after WordPress bailed on its daily one-word prompt.

I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (US).

Today’s word is “arbitrary.”

Write a post using that word. It can be prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction. It can be any length. It can be just a picture or a drawing if you want. No holds barred, so to speak.

Once you are done, tag your post with #FOWC and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Please check to confirm that your pingback is there. If not, please manually add your link in the comments.

And be sure to read the posts of other bloggers who respond to this prompt. You will marvel at their creativity.