Day: November 28, 2022

Goodbye and Good Luck

Fandango7 Comments

Your work is exemplary.
Your attitude is quite positive.
You hit a grand slam on all of your assignments.
But with all the recent high tech layoffs,
The market is teeming with engineers.
And a lot earn way less than you!
Now I don’t mean to sound stingy,
But I’m going to have to let you go.
I can get two recently laid-off engineers
To replace you on the particle accelerator project
And still pay them less you.

Goodbye and good luck, my friend,
Finding a new job in this economy.
It wont be easy, quite difficult in fact.
But I’ll be happy to write you a sterling reference letter.

Written for these daily prompts: Fandango’s One Word Challenge (work), The Daily Spur (slam), Your Daily Word Prompt (teem), My Vivid Blog (stingy), Word of the Day Challenge (particle), and Ragtag Daily Prompt (sterling).

Blogging Insights — Intuition

Fandango23 Comments

It’s Monday and Dr. Tanya is back with her weekly Blogging Insights prompt. She provides us with a quote about blogging or writing and asks us to express our opinion about said quote.

This week’s quote is from Kelly Thoreson, a self-proclaimed “Killer Content Queen” and creator of Blogfiti, a place for bloggers to learn to write unicorn content that ranks high on Google and moves their businesses forward. Here’s her quote:

“Here’s the only blogging tip you really need: always follow your intuition.”

Let’s see. The quote Tanya gave us last week told us that the only two attributes that make someone a good writer/blogger are talent and the ability to avoid being distracted by the internet, and 97% of that is the latter. This week’s quote is that the only thing a good blogger needs is to follow their intuition. Forget about talent or the ability to avoid being distracted by the internet. That’s so last week This week it’s only intuition!

Come on, Kelly. All you need is intuition? How about commutations skills? Or language skills? Or the ability to tell a story — one that is engaging, interesting, informative, and/or imaginative? Nah, those things are not necessary. All you need to do is follow your gut…and hope it doesn’t give your readers indigestion in their guts.

Share Your World — 11/28/2022

Fandango16 Comments
Share Your World

Di, at Pensitivity101, is our host for Share Your World each week. Here are her questions for this week, which are mostly about Christmas traditions.

1. Do you have any family traditions?

We always try to get together for the holidays, gathering for dinners, parties, gift exchanges, etc., at various extended family members’ homes starting with Thanksgiving and running almost weekly through the end of the year.

2. With December on its way, have you ever been carol singing?

The last time I remember singing carols was when I was a member of the seventh grade chorus in junior high school and we performed at the school’s Christmas assembly.

3. Do you decorate your home for the Christmas holidays?

Nope. Never have, never will.

4. Do you enjoy the Christmas rush for preparations and shopping?

We do all of our holiday shopping online. My wife enjoys scouring the internet looking for unique, creative, imaginative, personal gifts. If I had my way, we’d get everyone gift cards or certificates so they could pick out anything they wanted or needed.

But to get to Di’s question, no, I don’t enjoy the Christmas rush. It has become so commercialized that for most, it’s all about material things, and less about it’s spiritual or religious context.

Gratitude question.

I’m grateful to have a wife who enjoys scouring the internet looking for unique, creative, imaginative, personal gifts so that I don’t have to.

Here’s the Deal

Fandango6 Comments

“Do you have an alibi for last Tuesday at 10 pm?” Detective Fred Morrisey asked the man sitting across the table from him in the interrogation room.

“Lemme see,” Ronald said. “Tuesday at 10 pm, you say?” Morrisey nodded. “Oh yeah, I was moving.”

“Moving? Moving what?” Morrisey asked.

“My clothes and belongings,” Ronald said.

“You were moving clothes and belongings at 10 o’clock at night?”

“Yeah,” Ronald said, a look of anxiety crossing his face. Even he knew his so-called alibi sounded dubitable.

“Can anyone vouch for you!” Morrisey asked.

“No, I was alone,” Ronald said. “S’why I was still at it that late.”

Ron Hayden, Morrisey’s partner, handed Fred a piece of paper.

“Says here, Ronald,” Morrisey said, “that your address is 506 19th Avenue, unit 2B. Is that your old address or your new address?”

“New,” Ronald said. He began to visibly sweat.

“That’s interesting,” Morrisey said, “because we executed a search warrant on that address and it seems all of your stuff is still there and your landlord said you’ve been there for almost six months.”

“Oh wait,” Ronald said. “I meant that was my old address, before I moved, you know. Sorry. I’m nervous and you’ve got me all confused.”

“Listen carefully, Ronald,” Morrisey said. “Here’s the deal. If you tell me who hired you to assault the victim, I’ll tell the D.A. that you cooperated, and he’ll take that into consideration when pressing charges. But this is a one time offer, Ronald. If you don’t cooperate, you’re toast.”

Ronald brightened up. “I am hungry,” he said. “Toast would be good, but if you can get me some French toast,” that would be even better.”

Written for these daily prompts from yestersay: Word of the Day Challenge (alibi), Ragtag Daily Prompt (moving), Fandango’s One Word Challenge (anxiety/offer), Your Daily Word Prompt (dubitable), and My Vivid Blog (French toast).

Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge #195

Fandango13 Comments

Welcome to Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge. Each week I will be posting a photo I grab off the internet and challenging bloggers to write a flash fiction piece or a poem inspired by the photo. There are no style or word limits.

The image below is from 8machine_ at unsplash.com.

For the visually challenged writer, the photo shows four giant stone sculptures of heads, perhaps religious in nature, with a man wearing a red outfit walking toward them.

If this week’s image inspires you and you wish to participate, please write your post, use the tag #FFFC, and link back to this post. I hope it will generate some great posts.

Please create a pingback to this post or manually add your link in the comments.