It’s time for my Story Starter prompt. Here’s how it works. Every so often I’m going to give you a “teaser” sentence or sentence fragment and your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to build a story (prose or poetry) around that sentence/fragment. It doesn’t have to be the first sentence in your story, and you don’t even have to use it in your post at all if you don’t want to. The purpose of the teaser is to spark your imagination and to get your storytelling juices flowing.
This week’s Story Starter teaser is:
When he didn’t reply, I immediately thought, “They’ve got him and now they’re coming for me.”
If you care to write and post a story built from this story starter teaser, be sure to link back to this post and tag your post with #FSS. I would also encourage you to read and enjoy what your fellow bloggers do with their stories.
Welcome to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (U.S.).
Today’s word is “monolithic.”
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. Show them some love.
Esther Chilton has a prompt where she challenges us to craft a humorous limerick.
This week Esther has given us the word “crime.” Are you ready?
Detective Morrisey, sharp as a tack Followed the thief down a shadowy track “Your crime’s plain to see” He bellowed with glee And locked up the crook in a snap
What makes a good leader? The opposite of Donald Trump.
Let me give you one example of why Donald Trump is an awful human being and a terrible leader. He behaves like a petulant child.
In a text message to Norway’s leader on Sunday, Trump said that one reason he is pushing to acquire Greenland is that he didn’t win the Nobel Peace Prize.
Trump wrote, “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America.”
This is the classic example of a petulant child who who owns the football, gets angry because nobody will pass it to him, grabs it, and leaves so no one else can play. In this case, though the petulant child who, when things don’t go his way, quits in a huff and stops everyone else from continuing, is the President of the United States.
Trump’s action is immature and spiteful and is not the way a leader of a nation should behave.
Welcome to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (U.S.).
Today’s word is “serpentine.”
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. Show them some love.
Have you found making hard decisions difficult? Have you regretted any decision that you’ve made in your life?
Not all decisions are alike. For small decisions, flipping a coin or playing rock-paper-scissors (aka, Roshambo or Rochambeau) may work. For example, if my wife and I decide to have dinner delivered by DoorDash, and I want Chinese and she wants Italian, we might flip a coin or do rock-paper-scissors.
But if it’s a significant decision, where hundreds of dollars or thousands of dollars or even larger sums are involved, or if it has a major impact on our lives, that’s a whole different story. That kind of decision involves research, spreadsheets, logic, and carefully weighing options for choosing the best one.
And then my wife makes the final decision based upon what’s in her heart and/or her gut.
As I said in response to this prompt one year ago today and also on this date in 2024:
Among the many thorny questions debated by the delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention, one of the hardest to resolve was how to elect the president. The Founding Fathers debated for months, with some arguing that Congress should pick the president and others insisting on a more democratic direct popular vote, as is done for every other elected office in the land except for the POTUS.
Out of those drawn-out debates came a compromise based on the idea of electoral intermediaries. These intermediaries wouldn’t be picked by Congress nor elected by the people. Instead, the states would each appoint independent “electors” who would cast the actual ballots for the presidency. Their compromise is known as the Electoral College.
The Electoral College calls for the creation, every four years, of a temporary group of electors equal to the total number of representatives in Congress. Technically, it is these electors, and not the American people, who vote for the president. In modern elections, the first candidate to get 270 of the 538 total electoral votes wins the White House.
One important aspect of the Electoral College compromise was that it served as a political workaround for the persistence of slavery in the United States. In 1787, roughly 40 percent of people living in the Southern states were slaves who couldn’t vote. This created a divide between slave-owning and non-slave-owning states. It was the same issue that plagued the distribution of seats in the House of Representatives: should or shouldn’t the Founding Fathers include slaves in counting a state’s population?
James Madison from Virginia, where slaves accounted for 60 percent of the population, knew that either a direct presidential election or one with electors divvied up according to free white residents only, wouldn’t fly in the South.
The result was the controversial “three-fifths compromise,” in which three-fifths of the enslaved black population would be counted toward allocating representatives and electors and calculating federal taxes. The compromise ensured that the Southern slave states would ratify the Constitution.
Due to the Electoral College, two “modern times” candidates who received fewer popular votes but won the Electoral College votes, became president: George W. Bush in 2000 and Donald Fucking Trump in 2016.
Incidentally, the three-fifths compromise was explicitly repealed in Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment (1868), which provided that “representatives shall be apportioned…counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians.”
It’s time to “un-invent” (repeal) the Electoral College.
For this week’s Song Lyric Sunday theme, Jim Adam has asked us to find a song that mentions “time.”
In October I wrote a post about a song I had just recently become aware of. The song title was “Dear Time” and in it, the narrator (in this case sung by Jackson Browne) addresses time directly (“Dear time”), thanking it for “extra heartbeats” and for both lost lovers and the one that stayed, acknowledging that time has “given me more than what you’ve taken.”
A recurring image in the song is a “little box of memories…tied with twine,” representing life’s moments as fragile keepsakes whose edges blur with age yet still carry deep feeling.
The song mixes gentle humor (quips about cancelling a physician because “you are efficient”) with clear-eyed awareness of mortality and forgetfulness. Listeners and commentators often describe it as tender, sentimental, and resonant for people looking back on decades of life, especially those who came of age in the 1970s with Martin and Browne as cultural touchstones.
At this point, I am going to cut and paste my October 27th post. Or if you prefer, you can read it here.
I came across this song the other day and decided that I had to share it with my fellow bloggers, particularly those of us who are Baby Boomers and Gen Xers.
On October 17th, Steve Martin and Allison Brown released an album titled Safe, Sensible and Sane, a 12-track album featuring original songs co-written and performed by Steve Martin and GRAMMY-winning banjoist Alison Brown. Guest artists on the album include Jackson Browne, Vince Gill, Della Mae, Indigo Girls, Jason Mraz, Tim O’Brien, and Aoife O’Donovan.
The first song from the album released as a single was titled “Dear Time.” The lyrics, written by Steve Martin really resonated with me. The recording is a collaboration between Steve Martin and Alison Brown on banjos with Jackson Browne on vocals and acoustic guitar. Jeff Hanna (of Nitty Gritty Dirt Band) sings harmony vocals.
The song is a soul-baring letter to time itself, balancing playful humor with heartfelt sincerity. The lyrics present a tender, reflective tribute to time’s enduring presence in our lives. It’s an emotionally sensitive song that touches on the passage of time, what time has given and taken, and covers themes like love, loss, and the collection of memories over a lifetime.
The music video was filmed at the legendary Troubadour club in Los Angeles, a significant venue where both Martin and Browne launched their careers in the 1960s, and where Brown also performed as a teenager.
Here are the lyrics to “Dear Time.”
Dear time On this fair occasion I’d like to say you’ve given me More than what you’ve taken
Hey time Working well together I know it’s not forever We’ll both be moving on
Look what I’ve collected A little box of memories Somewhat disconnected Tied with twine Each a small remembrance One inside the other On rewind, tonight I find them Dimmed by wine
Hey time Thank you for the lovers The ones that went astray Thank you for the one that stayed
Hey time Accepting of each other Hold off on that buzzer For just a little while
Look what I’ve collected A little box of memories Somewhat disconnected Tied with twine Each a bit of color Winter, spring, fall and summer Set to burn, they return, a warm blue flame
Dear time You know I’m at your service Thank you for the extra heartbeats I’m not so sure I earned them
Dear time I’ve heard you are efficient I cancelled my physician Whatever you decide
How much have I forgotten In the little box of memories Edges start to soften And lose their shine Each a little wonder A faded watercolor All unsigned, on standby In my mind
Look what I’ve collected A little box of memories Somewhat disconnected Tied with twine Could I trade them in for A visit with my mom and dad Or throw the ball with my old dog One more time
Hey time Look at what you’ve made me Sentimental And slightly crazy
Dear time On this fair occasion I’d like to say you’ve given me More than what you’ve taken
Dear time
I sincerely hope you enjoyed this song as much as I did.
Welcome to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (U.S.).
Today’s word is “disclaimer.”
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. Show them some love.
Okay, maybe I’m being a little persnickety, but the question asked about where you’ve felt loved. Seems to me the more appropriate question is when you’ve felt loved. After all, where refers to a place, a location, whereas when refers to a time.
But, being the literal person that I am, I’m going to respond to the question as it was actually asked versus the way I think it should have been asked.
A positive example of where I’ve felt loved is when I go to my son’s and daughter-in-law’s house and visit my grandkids. They are so happy and excited to see me and come running over to me and give me hugs and kisses. That is where — and when — I feel loved.
Facts, Fictions & Fantasies 