time

The Wedding Planner

Fandango10 Comments

Marsha was feeling a little tense as she was preparing for her daughter’s nuptials on Sunday. She had a preoccupation with all of the details and feared that she would run out of time before the big day.

Unfortunately, Marsha couldn’t just create more time, and with no time to waste, she reached out to her husband, who amid all the pressure Marsha was feeling, sat in the living room binge-watching “Stranger Things.”

“Bob, you need to shut off the TV, get up off your ass, and help me out with the wedding before I go completely insane,” Marsha said, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Of course, babe,” Bob said. He turned off the television, stood up, walked over to Marsha, gave her a big hug, and said, “You can count on me to be the wind beneath your wings.”

Marsha smiled. “Living with you, Bob, is never dull.”

Written for these daily prompts: Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (tense/dull), Word of the Day Challenge (nuptials/wind), The Daily Spur (preoccupation), My Vivid Blog (run), Ragtag Daily Prompt (create), Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge (waste), Your Daily Word Prompt (amid), and E.M.’s Random Word Prompt (binge).

Thursday Inspiration — Wine and Roses

Fandango6 Comments

You gave me a diamond
And a bottle of fine wine
When what I really wanted
Was a cultured pearl, a rose
And much more of your time

Written for Jim Adams’ Thursday Inspiration prompt, which I’m responding to using the prompt word “pearl,” and the above picture. I’m also featuring the song, “The Days of Wine and Roses,” written by Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer, and performed by Andy Williams.

Share Your World — 01/17/2022

Fandango15 Comments

It’s Monday and Melanie is out with another edition of Share Your World.

Fill in: ‘If I were really completely honest, I would say that …’ This is a question for ‘radical honesty’. What are the things you wouldn’t normally say? Things you would otherwise actually hide? What’s on your mind? What would you really like to be able to say?

If I were really completely honest, I would say that being “completely honest (i.e., brutally honest) is no way to win friends and influence people. While honesty is the best policy, sometimes you have to couch that honesty in a way that doesn’t hurt others. So rather than being “radically” honest, I would try to figure out a way to make my point without making matters worse or destroying a relationship.

Have you ever broken anything? What about rules?

I’ve broken traffic laws (mostly by driving faster than the posted speed limit). I once went through the express (15 items or less) line at the grocery store with 16 items. I also have a tendency to break arcane grammatical rules, like never start a sentence with a conjunction or end one with a preposition.

Are you also afraid of spiders? What is your biggest fear, other than spiders? (If you’re not afraid of spiders, use your biggest phobia instead.)

I am not afraid of spiders, but I’m not a fan of spiders, either. As to a phobia, which is defined as an extreme or irrational fear of or aversion to something, I don’t have a true phobia. That’s not to say I’m fearless. It’s just that my fears are neither extreme or irrational.

Do you think time goes faster as you get older?

Definitely. When I was a kid, time traveled at a snail’s pace, but now, my god, it whizzes by. Take 2021, for example. That year lasted for the blink of an eye.

Please share something that really inspired you from this last week or month.

I think what inspires me the most are those of you who read my blog, who respond to my prompts, who create your own prompts that inspire others, and who share your worlds with the rest of us.

Fibbing Friday — Hey, Kids, What Time is It?

Fandango5 Comments

Frank (aka PCGuy) and Di (aka Pensitivity101) alternate as hosts for Fibbing Friday, a silly little exercise where we are to write a post with our answers to the ten questions below. But as the title suggests, truth is not an option. The idea is to fib a little, a lot, tell whoppers, be inventive, silly, or even outrageous, in our responses. Today’s Fibbing Friday was posted by Melanie, of Sparks From a Combustible Mind, who is subbing for Frank while he takes a short break. Mel wants to know…

1. Instead of counting sheep, WHAT was counted?

Chickens before they hatched.

2. If auld acquaintance be forgot, what was remembered?

That time last New Year’s Eve when you got drunk and threw up all over your host’s wife. That’s why you weren’t invited back this year.

3. Time keeps WHAT away?

The good, the bad, and the ugly.

4. The WHAT is gone, the song is over, thought I’d something more to say.

The karaoke machine on the fritz.

5. It was his WHAT time in the unemployment line?

Last time because he finally got a job.

6. WHAT in time does a stitch save?

The embarrassment of a wardrobe malfunction on national TV.

7. Like wind on the plains and sand through the glass, we WHAT?

We need a warm bath.

8. If I could save time in a WHAT?

A freezer. I’d be frozen in time.

9. Woke up, fell out of bed and then WHAT?

Went to the hospital with a broken arm.

10. Lying in my bed, I hear the WHAT tick and think of you?

Bomb.

Bonus: As the clock chimes midnight to ring in the New Year, a Spanish tradition involves eating twelve of what – one for each chime?

Cockroaches at the annual La Cucaracha festival.

MLMM Tale Weaver — Time

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Stephanie Colpron, who hosts this prompt, would like us to tell her a tale about time. Like when we felt it slip through our fingers, or when we first realized how precious it is, or when we reminisced about a time of happiness or sadness. Alternatively, she suggests we may wish to craft a tale about time traveling, or time wrapping, whatever that is.

Yesterday afternoon, after a fairly active morning doing chores around the house, I developed a bit of an ache in my lower back. I decided to take a couple of Advil and to lie down in my bed, feeling sorry for myself because I am old and my body can’t do the things it used to be able to do. I was thinking that time is not on my side and the old Rolling Stones song, “Time Is On My Side” came to mind. I started humming it and thinking back to 1964, when that song was released. I had just started my freshman year in college, and back then, time was, indeed, on my side.

I had my whole adult life in front of me. Nothing but time. Plenty of time. I could waste as much time as I wanted to at that time and it was no big deal. Time was in abundance. There was a seemingly inexhaustible supply.

Back 57 years ago, when that Rolling Stones song was released, I didn’t worry much about time. I was invincible. Fast forward to late 2021. Now I’m quite vincible. Time for me is no longer in abundance as it was 57 years ago. There’s no longer an inexhaustible supply of time. In fact, if I’m lucky, I may get five more years of time before I simply run out of time. If I’m very lucky, maybe ten years. Any more time than that might not be such a good thing, especially if I run out of money before I run out of time.

That said, I’m not obsessed with time — or with dying. I’m not creating a bucket list of wild and crazy things that I feel I need to do while there’s still time. I prefer to spend whatever time I have left chilling. Just relaxing these old bones in the comfort of my home. (And okay, yes, figuring out how to ride my new e-bike without killing myself.)

As to crafting a tale about time traveling, as Stephanie suggested, I think maybe I’ll save that for another time in the future. Or maybe in the past.