The Daily Spur

Peaceful Demonstration

Fandango13 Comments

“How long have we been stuck in this stinking hellhole?” Barry asked.

“I don’t know, I’ve lost track of time,” Gary answered. “Days? Weeks?”

“This is all your fault, you asshole,” Barry said. “I didn’t want to go to that goddam anti-Trump rally in the first place, but you were vehement. You said it was our civic duty. You were always such a goddam idealistic dreamer.”

“How was I to know that Trump and Barr would call out some sort of secret paramilitary force and have them round us all up, arrest us, and toss us in jail?” Gary asked.

“You should have known, dammit,” Barry said. “As soon as you saw that group of armed counter protesters waving their confederate flags and marching almost arm-in-arm those federal stormtroopers, you should have seen the handwriting on the wall.”

“Look, Barry, you may be willing to wave your constitutionally guaranteed rights as a citizen to peacefully demonstrate?” Gary said, “That’s your choice. So go ahead and call the damn guard and denounce me and the rest of us as being guilty of sedition. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to stop fighting to restore what was once our free and fair country. I’d rather being hanged for sedition than live another day in Trump’s America.

Written for these daily prompts: Ragtag Daily Prompt (hole), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (vehement), The Daily Spur (dreamer), Word of the Day Challenge (wave), and Your Daily Word Prompt (sedition).

A Way With Words

Fandango9 Comments

Words“My creative writing teacher is just trying to aggravate me,” Hal said.

“How so?” Martha asked.

“She gave me a D on my latest fiction story,” Hal lamented. “Can you believe that? It was a literary work of art.”

“Did she explain why she gave you a D?” Martha asked.

“Yeah,” Hal answered. “She said my story was full of extraneous stuff that added nothing to the narrative.”

“Well, Hal,” Martha said, “you do tend to be wordy in your writing. You’re a budding author, Hal. You wouldn’t want her to sugarcoat her constructive criticism, would you?”

“Oh come on Martha,” Hal said. “I need to set the scene for my readers by painting a picture with my words. I need to vividly describe my characters so the readers can visualize them in their minds.

“Maybe you should let your readers use more of their imagination rather than being so descriptive,” Martha said. “Perhaps your teacher is trying to tell you that you’re overdoing it.”

“Martha,” Hal said, “you’ve read my stories. You have to admit that I have a way with words.”

“Yes, Hal,” Martha said, “you do have a way with words, but perhaps you should listen to your creative writing teacher and do away with words…at least some of them.”

Written for these daily prompts: Word of the Day Challenge (aggravate), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (extraneous), Ragtag Daily Prompt (bud), and The Daily Spur (coat).

This Is Not a Drill

Fandango14 Comments

Climate ChangeWhen will people finally awaken to the threat humanity faces due to climate change? How can they simply ignore the frequent “100-year floods” and larger, more intense hurricanes, the significantly hotter summers and colder winters? And what about the staggering increases in the number of devastating wildfires?

How can people close their minds and refuse to correlate climate change with greenhouse gasses and burning fossil fuels?

We are no longer living in the land of milk and honey, folks. There’s no cause for elation, especially if we, as a species, are unwilling to take actions that will slow the trajectory of the inevitable disaster that climate change poses.

This is not a hoax. This is not a drill.

Written for these daily prompts: Ragtag Daily Prompt (awaken), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (climate), Your Daily Word Prompt (correlate), The Daily Spur (milk), and Word the Day Challenge (elation).

Stop Staring at Women’s Tits

Fandango20 Comments

“This doesn’t make any sense to me,” Carl said. “We’d been exchanging message after message on that dating site and everything seemed great.”

“And now?” Carl’s roommate, David asked.

“Nothing but frustration,” Carl answered. I can’t reconcile her latest message with how we’ve been messaging before we finally met in person last night.”

“What did she say to you in her message about last night?” David asked.”

“She said she’s not interested in seeing me again.”

“Did you say or do something that she might have considered inappropriate or possibly even perfidious?” David asked.

“First, I don’t even know what that word means,” Carl said. “But she kept reminding me that her eyes were in her head,” Carl answered.

“Why would anyone have to remind someone that their eyes are in their head?” David responded. “Where else would someone’s eyes be?”
“I don’t know,” Carl said, “although she was wearing a really low cut blouse and I must admit that I had a hard time taking my eyes off of her tits. They were quite, shall we say, ample. Then she said something about my suffering from agastopia. Again, I have no idea what that is, but maybe I should go see a doctor about it. It might contagious.”

“No, I don’t think you need to see a doctor,” David said, “but you might want to improve your vocabulary and you should definitely stop staring at women’s tits.”

Written for these daily prompts: The Daily Spur (message), Ragtag Daily Prompt (frustration), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (reconcile), Your Daily Word Prompt (perfidious), and Word of the Day Challenge (agastopia).

Okay, I know this post is a bit odd (i.e., bad), but so are words like “perfidious” and “agastopia” odd. I mean seriously, who uses words like those in everyday life? Go ahead, you try fitting both of those words into a single, reasonably coherent post and see if you can do any better.

Thursday Inspiration — The Catacombs of My Mind

Fandango11 Comments

“The butterfly leaves no footprint,” Todd said.

“Did you say something, honey,” Monica asked.

“I said…” Todd started to answer but then stopped himself. “Never mind. Just some random thought rattling around inside my head.”

“Ever since you got laid off,” Monica said, “you seem so introspective. You should get a hobby, do something with your hands.

“I like to hide inside my head,” Todd said. “With all of the crazy antics going on in the outside world, I’m loving spending most of my time wandering around the catacombs of my mind. It’s a fascinating place to be, and I’m discovering so much about who I really am.”

“Maybe you should start a blog,” Monica suggested. “That way you could share all of that fascinating shit rattling around inside your head with the rest of the world.”

“Great idea,” Todd said enthusiastically. “I’ll get started on it right away.”

Written for this week’s Thursday Inspiration prompt from Paula Light, where the theme is “butterfly.” Also for these daily prompts: Ragtag Daily Prompt (footprint), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (introspective), The Daily Spur (hide), Your Daily Word Prompt (antic), and WordPress of the Day Challenge (loving).