*** Wordzzle Challenge ***

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, is the hostess of this word puzzle, Wordzzle. You will find her story there as well as links to other writers of this challenge. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10): Chorus line, clam chowder, apples, jack-in-the-box, puddles, Iran, quarry, housekeeping, speed, letter

Mini Challenge (5): motorcycle, grandiose, summer, flying off the handle, blue jays

My Mini Challenge (5):

Here I sit on a nice summer night, enjoying the grandiose pleasure of my life. As I dream of being off somewhere riding a motorcycle, I sit here in my computer chair with 2 birds bedded down on top of my head. One is blue, though neither of them are blue jays. They are free to fly around my home much of the time. I've seen them flying off their cage to catch up to me as I go away from them, I've seen them flying off the other bird cages, I've seen them flying off the top of the hutch on my computer desk... though I have never seen them flying off the handle. Haha. Oddly enough this is a true story.

My Main Challenge (10):

Sally rushed from her job in the hospital's housekeeping department, to her other job in the Chorus line. As she drove quickly through the city traffic she ate what would pass for her dinner this evening... clam chowder in a thermos and cut up pieces of apples. It was a rainy evening and she drove right through the puddles, not even trying to miss them. As she drove past the quarry, Sally didn't even notice that a man from Iran stood on the dark, wet sidewalk, waiting to cross the street, and her speed caused her to splash cold, dirty water all over him. She was thinking only of getting to the set of "jack-in-the-box" on time, and of the letter she had received today. The letter told of some cardboard displays her friend Matt was making of Farrah Fawcett & of Michael Jackson, both having left the earth on June 25th and it was his way of saying Bon Voyage.


I wrote the above last night.... now at 4pm Saturday, I remembered I had only gotten half way through the Mega 15. I am again 'time challenged', so have decided to skip the Mega 15 or you won't ever get any of this. Have a wonderful day!!

*** Wordzzle Challenge ***

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10):
prefix, art festival, income tax, chicken noodle soup, jump rope, Dutch Treat, flowering plum tree, bats in the belfry, diamond earrings, tigers

Mini Challenge (5):
book club, organic tea, the cow jumped over the moon, paragon of virtue, wench

My Mini Challenge (5):

The weekly book club meeting was held at the Organic Tea Room, a small shop run by a woman who grew her own herbs and such, using them to make every tea she sold, by the cup or in packets to take home with you. The book of the month was titled The Cow Jumped Over The Moon, though it was not about bovines. Instead, it was about a young serving girl, who was a paragon of virtue. "Lord and lady, groom and wench" -- the quote by Chaucer started the first chapter.

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

"Lets go for lunch," said one of the Overbeak brothers.
"It's Dutch Treat," chimed in the other brother, and she knew they meant they were paying. They were Dutch, and it was their treat. Sunday afternoon lunch with the brothers always proved to be of the highest enjoyment for her, a prefix to a day filled with laughter and with deep spiritual discussions where it was always safe to disagree, knowing there would be no put downs or reprisals, only learning and growing. The brothers were from a large family that had been raised with strict religion, she was from a medium sized family that had never gone to church, and yet they were all attending the same Spiritual Centre now.

One Sunday in particular, they had gone to a small cafe called the Flowering Plum Tree, where she had ordered chicken noodle soup with an egg salad sandwich, and upon the urging of the brothers added strawberry pie for desert... she was going to have to jump rope a lot this week to wear that lunch off.

Afterward, the three friends went to an art festival that was on that weekend at the Area. Gayle had sent several of her creations to the festival with a friend who had a booth there, so wanted to see how things were going as well as investigate all other booths and items for sale and display. She owed money on her income tax, so knew she must have bats in the belfry when she decided to buy a pair of diamond earrings in the shape of tigers. They were just so beautiful, one of a kind, and were surprisingly low priced for the quality she was getting. Each of the brothers offered to pay part of it, though she thanked them kindly and assured them she could manage it herself.

My Mega Challenge (15)

"It breaks my heart to not be able to deliver you the juicy stories from behind the bar that have kept tavern wench going this long," said the bar tender, "howsoever, I have had the Mrs. down my throat about sharing such stories." Thus went the beginning of Chapter 3 in "The Cow Jumped Over The Moon."

"Yer Mrs. can be a bit of a cow that way," added one of the fellows standing at the bar, drinking a tall glass of ale.

"Aye, she can at that! A real Dutch Treat!" threw in another customer. "Another ale, Henry." he ordered as all the men laughed at his statement.

"Me wife is a good mother an all. Aye, she's a right paragon of virtue," the bartender, Henry, prefixed before going on to complain some more about the woman he was married to.

After several minutes of drinking ale and discussing the less than fine points of the woman, the conversation died down, all men standing around drinking their ale. "She does make a right fine chicken noodle soup! And biscuits too," said one of the men. "You'd have bats in the belfry to not admit that." and the conversation went on about the woman's culinary skills, and what a fine wife she was.

Gayle sipped her organic tea as she continued reading the book of the month for her book club. Having sold several things at the art festival, she had paid off her income tax and her credit card, so now she could fully enjoy the sparkling diamond earrings in the shape of tigers that now danced below her shapely ears. She set her book aside as she sat beneath the flowering plum tree, and thought about how she had really blown things. She wondered whatever had possessed her to sleep with one of the Overbeak brothers, and if she was going to do such a thing, why had it been Hans when it should have been Burt. Burt was the one she was closest to, after all, and he loved her. She knew she had fallen into a self destruct mode... again. She had hurt Burt, and now would never see either of the brothers again, though she knew she'd never forget them. They were both imprinted on her heart forever.

Getting up, she picked her jump rope off the chair beside her and went to get some exercise. Maybe she could sweat the brothers out of her mind, if only for awhile.


In less than 10 mintues a friend will be here to pick me up... oh oh she's early... gotta run.

*** Wordzzle Dragon Award ***

Many thanks to the astute Fandango and his band of brainy dragons over at Dragon's Lair, for once again choosing me to receive the coveted Wordzzle Dragon Award. It was such an honor to win the first ever Wordzzle Dragon Award on February 14, and now have finally received it again. This is the 9th of these awards to be bestowed. If you would like to read what won this prestigous accolade, follow this link: Wordzzle Challenge.

*** Wordzzle Challenge ***

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10): acrobat; grocery store; ceiling fan; dandelion; bumble bee; alabaster; scissors; chartreuse; strenuously; cube

Mini Challenge (5): iPod; poison ivy; computer; interpreter; optometrist

And it's always fun to do an extra challenge, combine the 5 + 10 and do a 15 word challenge.

The story started in last week's Wordzzle Challenge... and now it continues.

My Mini Challenge (5):

"Lizzy Darling, Momma's busy on the computer right now. I am looking for some iphone accessories and need to concentrate on what I'm doing. Why don't you go play with iPod... or find Grandpa and get him to play with you?"

"Wew is iPod kitty, Momma?" asked the three year old, or at least she would be three in just a few weeks. She was the apple of her grandfather's eye, and doted upon by her parents.

"I don't know Dear. Why don't you go call him? Or see if Grandpa can help you find him?" her mother asked, only half paying attention, deep in her internet search. The little girl said something her mother didn't quite catch, and toddled off. Several minutes later, Linda absentmindedly looked out the window at her daughter in the yard, searching for the cat, and went back to her work, but only for a moment before it hit.

"Lizzy!! No!! That's poison ivy you're in!" the mother yelled as she jumped up, nearly knocking the computer desk over as she dashed out the door to rescue her daughter. She didn't need an optometrist to help her see the beginning of red on the little arms and legs already, nor did she need an interpreter to tell what this meant, to tell of the reaction the little girl was having to the plant.

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

Oliver J. Mustard, retired Brigadier General, picked a dandelion for his granddaughter as he walked back home from the grocery store. It was a beautiful, hot, late spring day and Oliver was thinking about what it would take to install a ceiling fan in the living room when a bumble bee floated past his nose. Oliver laughted out loud, "You're quite the little acrobat aren't you, little buddy!" he said to the bee.

Since a sudden and severe case of apoplexy had nearly cost Oliver his life, and had cost him his career, his military attitude and strength of character had stood him in good stead. Life as he'd known it had been cut off, as if with a pair of scissors, and yet he had, thanks to the return of his daughter and her family, taken his new lifestyle in stride as he strenuously worked to regain his health and mobility.

As Oliver entered his yard through the garden gate, he was thinking about the bottle of Chartreuse he had chilling in the refridgerator, and that thought left his mind with mock speed when he saw his daughter. She was crouched down, and her face looked like alabaster as she stood up with her daughter in her arms. Taking in the scene in a nano second, he knew what had happened and went into action. "Get in the car, Linda. I'll grab some ice cubes for her and be right with you. We're taking Lizzy to Emergency!"

My Mega Challenge (15)

It was a week since what the family now referred to as the "poison ivy incident", and little Lizzy was doing well. You could barely see that she had had a terrible rash on her little arms and legs. The doctor had said it was a good thing they'd used the ice cubes to cool the skin as they brought Lizzy in where she was given medications to combat the reactions. The minute he heard what had happened to his little girl, JJ had taken a pair of scissors and cut it all down, following that with a treatment of boiling salt water to kill the roots of the plants.

JJ was now working as a computer analist and part time interpreter. His father-in-law had been forced to admit that his genes weren't from the shallow end of the pool after all. The tough ex-millitary man had grown to love the young man his daughter had taken up with, and he often laughed now about how he'd been so against it all back then.

"I think I need to go see an optometrist, Hummingbird," JJ said to his wife, still using the name she'd gone by for awhile 'back in the day'. I've been having some problems with my eye site. Nothing serious, but I might need some glasses. Can you make me an appointment tomorrow?"

"Okay, Sweety, I'll call tomorrow," she responded. When Lizzy was a baby & her father was in the early stages of recovery from his stroke, Linda had created an online business which paid fairly well, though now that her father could look after his granddaughter for part of the day, she was also working part time at the local grocery store, and loving it. "Dad, did you look into getting that ceiling fan for the livingroom? I'd like one in our bedroom too. If we're getting an electrician in to install one, we may as well have him do two." She wiped the sweat from her face with a chartreuse colored cotton napkin.

"Yes Dear, I've been busy as a bumble bee taking care of you," the old man grinned at his only child. "Is there anything else you'd like, my Dearest Dandelion?" he teased.

"Ya, Dad, I want an alabaster statue for the garden," she teased right back. Some days she had to be like a verbal acrobat just to keep up with her father's wit.

" iPod!" Lizzy said in her cute little almost-three-year-old voice as the big old cat walked through the door, into the house. She toddled off across the room to welcome her furry friend home.

"Hey, Dad," interjected JJ, "we have some wonderful news for you. You tell him, Hummingbird," he said to his wife.

"Ohhhh, there's the 'mushy name', what's up?" Oliver teased them as always.

"Daddy, we've been working strenuously... to give you a new grandchild and Lizzy a new sibling," Linda said sofly."And..."

"Are you...?" Oliver cut in with hope in his voice.

"Yes, Daddy... we are."

And here is One Sentence using ALL of the 15 words/phrases:

The acrobat with poison ivy, having been to his optometrist, listened to his chartreuse iPod as he strenuously walked home from the grocery store, carrying a 'Bumble Bee' ceiling fan, an alabaster dandelion statue, a pair of scissors, and a bag of ice cubes while planning to do some computer research into being an interpreter.

Now, just for fun, here is a bit of
poetry using all 15 words/phrases:

The ceiling fan goes round and round
Pushing grocery store air to the ground.
The acrobat, and interpreter too,
Pound bumble bee into glue.
Scissors cut chartreuse from red,
Making comforter for alabaster bed.
Dandelion pushes strenuously from ground,
You know the cube is not round.
Optometrist squints his eyes to see
Damage done by poison ivy.
iPod entertains a commuter
Working on his lapotp computer.
And there it is, for you unfurled,
A story of our crazy new world.

Next Week's Ten Word Challenge will be: prefix, art festival, income tax, chicken noodle soup, jump rope, Dutch Treat, flowering plum tree, bats in the belfry, diamond earrings, tigers

Mini Challenge: book club, organic tea, the cow jumped over the moon, paragon of virtue, wench

Wordzzle Challenge

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10):
apoplexy, doctor, hummingbird, shallow end of the pool, brigadier general, mustard, greed, parallelogram, slumber party, casual

Mini Challenge (5): Mount Olympus, arsonist, portraits, birch trees, "that car needs a new muffler"

And it's always fun to do an extra challenge, combine the 5 + 10 and do a 15 word challenge.

My Mini Challenge (5):

With the incredible sunset, it looked like an arsonist had been at work up on Mount Olympus, the sky glowed fiery red. Oliver enjoyed sitting quietly among the birch trees, watching the mountain at the end of day. He had done this every day for more years than he cared to admit to, and had even had a few portraits taken of himself sitting here. As his solitude was shattered by a most noisy car passing by, he said "that car needs a new muffler" then returned to enjoying the sunset.

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

Brigadier General Mustard nearly died of apoplexy when he found out that his daughter Linda, or Hummingbird as she insisted on being called these days, was inviting several of her looser friends over for a slumber party. Being a career military man with a greed for military structure, he saw his daughter's friends as being from the shallow end of the pool, genetically speaking, and could not abide by their casual approach to life. He would have liked to see his only child go into the military as he had, or at the very least, marry into it, an officer or a military doctor in the family would have suited him just fine. Now he pulled his mind back from the contemplation of his daughter's life, returning to the work at hand. He was writing a speech using words to draw a parallelogram of the Outer Banks.

My Mega Challenge (15):

He'd said it before and would likely say it again, "That car needs a new muffler". Brigadier General Oliver J. Mustard sat amongst his beloved birch trees, wrapped in a blanket to guard him against the cool of the evening. He had gotten a a comfortable chair placed out here so he could sit and watch his beloved sunsets over Mount Olympus. All had changed the night Linda had left home, he still couldn't think of his daughter as Hummingbird. It had been a terrible argument. She had told him she was in love with one of her looser friends, a young man from the shallow end of the pool, in Oliver's way of thinking. She'd obviously had a slumber party or two with this fellow as she confessed to being pregnant, and her father had exploded, he could not be casual about this kind of behavior. The lines of the parallelogram of his life hand moved and crossed that day, resulting in apoplexy, this time for real, and nearly resulting in his death. His doctor said he had to retire, to stay home take life easy. Oliver still had a thurst, a greed even, for a life he could no longer live. His wife long dead, now daughter was gone, and he feared he would never see her again. His face that he had been proud of was misshapen to where he would never sit for any more portraits. He was so unhappy he didn't even pay attention to the fire in the sunset, what he had come to think of as the Arsonist Sky. There just was no point in living any more.

"Daddy?" he thought he heard Linda's voice. "Daddy?" there is was again. He looked up. "Daddy, can we talk?" she queried. The old man's broken heart nearly stopped, skipping a beat or two in joy as he saw his 'little girl' standing there.... with a bundle in her arms.

"Linda? Errr, Hummingbird?" he choked out.

"Yes, Daddy, it's me. It's okay if you call me Linda. My friends still call me Hummingbird, but I know now that it's okay if you still call me Linda. It can be our special name, and I will still call you Daddy. Okay?" She smiled at him as she said this.

"Oh yes, that sounds good to me, Darling," her father agreed.

"I thought you would like to meet your grandaughter, Daddy."

"Grandaughter?"

"Yes, Daddy, I had a beautiful baby girl. I hope it's okay with you that we named her Elizabether, after Momma."

A lone tear ran down the old man's cheek. "Elizabeth! Lizzy! Oh, Linda," he choked out emotionally, "that is more than okay with me!"

The healing had begun, for both the old man and his daughter who had so rebelled against his strict military ways. The pendulum had swung the full distance, and now was evening out in the center of its reach. Life would find a new normal and a new joy.

Next Week's Ten Word Challenge will be: acrobat; grocery store; ceiling fan; dandelion; bumble bee; alabaster; scissors; chartreuse; strenuously; cube

Mini Challenge: iPod; poison ivy; computer; interpreter; optometrist
.

Wordzzle Challenge

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10): partition, imagination, salvation, mirror image, green power, highway, roasting marshmallows, serial killer, autograph, cartography

Mini Challenge (5): cell phone, Big Mac, panther, legendary, poets corner

And it's always fun to do an extra challenge, combine the 5 + 10 and do a 15 word challenge.

My Mega Challenge (15):

The cell phone rang and rang, unanswered by its owner, Big Mac. He just stood there, not hearing his phone, staring at the man who had just been found guilty in a court of law. Staring at the serial killer who was a mirror image of himself. No wonder the police had thought he was involved with all those murders, no wonder they had harassed him all those months on end, up until they had found this guy and used finger prints to establish who was who, and still he had not actually seen the man until now. It boggled his imagination as to how any two people could look so much alike, and yet be so very different in every way. In school he had always hated science, and now it had been his salvation, causing what amounted to a partition between himself and this animal as far as the law was concerned.

The gentle giant left the court house then, content to believe that the other man would never be a problem for him or anyone else again. He would be locked up tight for the rest of time. Since childhood, Big Mac had loved to study cartography, his father's passion too, and now he had decided to take some time off work, to hit the highway and explore some of the maps he'd studied all these years. Big Mac usually rode a bike about town, into green power and saving the Earth, but for this trip he would need to take a "carbon burner" as he liked to good naturedly call vehicles. He had found himself a small truck with a camper he could live in for the summer, signed his autograph at the bottom of the contract and it was his. He dreamed of nights on the road, roasting marshmallows over his camp fire. He packed any of his belongings he thought he would need on the road as well as groceries and such, even spare light bulbs, putting it all safely into his new summer home, the camper. Last thing he packed was the two books he was currently reading, "The Legendary Panther", and "Poets Corner". He had said his good-byes to his friends last night, right after everything was safely stowed in the camper, today he had gone to the court house to see his look-alike and to see the man sentenced and locked away. Now it was time to go on his adventure and put the past behind him.

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

The serial killer, Matt Joness, laughed at the idea of green power as he fired up his old muscle car and headed out onto the highway, headed south. There seemed to be a partition in his brain, one part was 'nice guy' then so quickly he became nothing short of a monster he didn't understand. He had studied his mirror image at times, usually as he was shaving just after a kill, trying to figure out if it was his imagination, knowing it wasn't and that there was no salvation for him. Matt had stopped using his real name years ago, when his mother died too young, and went by her maden name of Smythe. Matt Smythe. He thought now about that time years ago when he was sitting by a camp fire with his uncle, Joe Smythe, roasting marshmallows, and had found out that his father had studied cartography, it was his passion apparently. Other than this, all that Matt knew about his father was that, tired of an unhappy marriage, he had left his wife and son behind and hit the road for points unknown. All the man had of his father was his autograph on an old slip of paper with burned edges. Rescued from the fire, it was all that was left of a letter he had written to his wife those many years ago. She had been a bitter woman who had taken out her anger and frustrations on her son, seemingly making him pay for all his father might have done... and Matt had in turn made those other women pay for what his mother had done to him. That is, until the police had finally stopped him from what he had been unable to stop himself.

My Mini Challenge (5):

Big Mac Jones checked the GPS in his cell phone once again, coordinating it with the paper map he had laid out on the picnic table in front of him. When he was growing up, he had often wondered about his mother, but his father refused to talk about the past. He said it was always best to leave well enough alone, and something about sleeping dogs. Mac had never quite understood any of it, but his father's stuborness and determination to live in the present was legendary. After his father passed away, Mac had been cleaning out his belongings and had come across some old newspaper clippings from Panther, PA, a town Mac had never heard of and had wondered about ever since he'd found them. Some of the clippings had been poems from the Poets Corner of the newspaper, written by a woman, Sadie Joness. One of the clippings was about identical twin boys being born to Mr. & Mrs. M. Joness. Mac had no idea who these people were, or why his father had these clippings. He also had never heard of Panther PA before, but maybe his father had been there at some time in his past. He was going to find out, that's for sure. His father had never remarried, if he'd ever even been married to Mac's mother, so Mac had never had a mother and had been an only child. He wondered if he would find out anything about his mother in this town when he got there.

And here is One run-on Sentence using ALL of the 15 words/phrases:

Never before in his imagination had Big Mac Jones (formerly Joness as it turned out) thought he would ignore his ringing cell phone while fighting the legendary inner panther, knowing that to give in and drink himself silly would not be his salvation, would not partition him from the shock that he had to face and deal with, the fact that he had a mirror image twin brother who had become a serial killer... worse even that he did not believe in green power, had hit the highway in a muscle car burning carbon based fuel, with nothing but an autograph of their late father whose passions included roasting marshmallows & studying cartography, while still keeping a copy of their mother's submission to Poets Corner in an old newspaper.

Next Week's Ten Word Challenge will be: apoplexy, doctor, hummingbird, shallow end of the pool, brigadier general, mustard, greed, parallelogram, slumber party, casual

Mini Challenge: Mount Olympus, arsonist, portraits, birch trees, "that car needs a new muffler"

.

Wordzzle Challenge

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10): humanity, shadow, ricochet, wrong, pluralism, mathematics, personhood, printing press, ink spot, choral society.

Mini Challenge (5): kingdom, take names, best seller, three times, inner demons

My Mega Challenge (15):

She stood alone in the shadow, listening to the preachers voice ricochet off the nearby buildings as he preached his belief in pluralism, how God & the devil have humanity fighting inner demons and such rot. She found it sad that so many people believed in this type of duality as she knew there is only One and that One is God. They all seem to believe that God is Infinite, then swear there is a devil too. How could that be? Obviously the only way that God could be infinite, and there is a devil, is to say that God IS this devil they talk about... and that was just plain wrong. God is Love, God is Light, God is... oh, but this was not the time for that. She had to get back to work now.

Back at the office, she put on her apron with the ink spot, covering her clothes to keep them clean while she worked on the printing press. She had written, and now was about to put to print, editorials of the upcoming concert by the choral society, the elementary school mathematics contest, and the book signing by Stephan Kingdom, the author of the three times best seller, Take Names, a book on developing your personhood.

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

As Cassy stood examining the first paper fresh off the printing press, she heard a sternutation from just outside the door, then another. This followed by the opening of the door, and that man/boy that had come by her home a few days ago. He'd done a good job fixing that gate and a few other things she'd given him to do since that. He obviously lived on his own, and seemed to be getting by just doing odd jobs around the neighborhood.

"Hello, Mam," Joey said, "errr, I mean, Cassy."

"Good afternoon, Joey. How's things with you this fine, sunny day?" As she spoke, Cassy removed the apron with the ink spot, hanging it back on its hook.

"Just fine thanks. I just came from doing some yard work for Mr. Newman over on 41st. I done my best, but I don't think he was very happy with my work."

"Oh, that old zoilist." Cassy shook her head. "He is never happy with anything anyone does. He's something of a dark shadow on humanity, I'm afraid... though we must remember that even he is a creation of God... he just has problems with security in his own personhood.

"Errr, ya," Joey returned, though it was obvious that he wasn't really sure he understood what Cassy had meant. She thought about explaining it to him, realized it would mean a long explanation of pluralism vs Unity, and decided not to go there.

Joey stood there, seemingly giving all his attention to the anopisthograph laying on the shelf beside him. It was a manual, complete with drawings, about the theory of ricochet.

"So, what can I help you with today, Joey?"

"Well Mam, I was wondering if you have any work for me around your work here. Maybe cleaning up your office or something like that. You know, sweeping or washing, putting things away. Even fetching and carrying for you. I'm not all that well schooled cuz Pa wouldn't let me go after grade 6, but I am a quick learner, and have always been good at arithmatic... errr, mathematics."

Cassy couldn't understand a man not allowing his child to go to school. That was just plain wrong. Everyone should be well educated, in her mind. "Here's $5, Joey. I sure am glad you came along just when you did. I need this big box taken over to Mrs. Jenkins' house. She's the president of the Choral Society. Are you planning to go to see their concert in the park this weekend, Joey?"

"No mam, errr, Cassy, I hadn't thought of it," Joey admitted, "but I sure will take that box over to Mrs. Jenkins' for you. Is her address on the box?"

"Yes, right on the top there. Give some thought to that concert, Joey. I think you'd enjoy the music, there's even a zither player. You might meet other people who could use a good worker to do odd jobs, and of course, there's the free food they will be handing out to all that attend. It's a special weekend."

"Thank you, Cassy, mam. I guess some music and stuff would be nice."

My Mini Challenge (5):

The first three weeks Joey had been in the city nearly killed him. He'd had no idea how to live on his own, never mind how to live on the streets of a city he was new to. He'd fought with what he called his inner demons, wondering if he should go back home to his parents, and knowing that to die on the streets of the city would be better than that. Still, he wanted to live, not die. One night, there was a terrible fracas on the street, near where he hid behind a garbage dumpster in an alley. It had been a clash between rival gangs that had ended in several deaths, and all Joey could think of was getting out of there in one piece. No fewer than three times, maybe four, he'd thought he was about to be discovered and his miserable life ended. The next morning, as soon as it was safe to come out of hiding, with no money and no food, he started walking, and two days later found himself in a friendlier feeling area on the outskirts of the city. He had managed to find something to eat in a couple dumpsters on the way, so wasn't so bad as he had been.

Since he had found his way to this area, Joey had been able to find enough odd jobs to keep himself eating, and he'd even been able to pay rent on a small room in one of those extended stay hotels. It was no kingdom, but was clean and it was home. It was a lot safer than living on the streets, and a lot more comfortable too. A 'best seller' in Joey's mind, yup, life was starting to go pretty good these days.

Now Joey stood in the park, listening to music, eating hot dogs and drinking lemonade... and they were free, just as Cassy had said they would be. He'd been amazed that they let him go back for another hotdog, then another, and another which he now washed down with his 4th lemonade. Yes, life was good, especially with a full stomach

"Guess I better get busy and take names of people needing work done for them. Ms. Cassy was right, this is a good place of make connections with people who need a good, dependable handy-man to work for them," he thought as he wiped the evidence of his feast from his face. As he moved out into the croud, he thought again of how, if he worked extra hard, he might some day be able to take some school courses and get some education.

And here is One Sentence using ALL of the 15 words/phrases:

The choral society, who in this case take names of best seller books on mathematics, is just one part of the kingdom of humanity; they are a society whos wrong beliefs in pluralism ricochet off their so called inner demons (three times), off into the shadow of the printing press, to be ink spots on the face of basic personhood.

(Well, no one said it was going to be a sentence that makes good sence... just that it would contain all 15 words/phrases.)


If you enjoyed my stories today, I'm sure you will enjoy those of the other very perspicacious, isangelous participants that you will find over at Raven's Nest.

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Wordzzle Challenge

Raven, at Views From Raven's Nest, has created this word puzzle, Wordzzle, for us to have a challenge and write to. The words/phrases to work with this week are:

Main Challenge (10): sugar bowl, cotton, wizard, fund-raising, Ben Hur, salmonella, luke warm, telescope, bank, walk-a-thon

Mini Challenge (5): challenge, sparkling cider, melancholy, snail mail, master carpenter

My Mega Challenge (15):

Ecila had a headache, again... for the 6th day in a row, and to make things worse, the laptop computer that she so depended on was giving her more troubles. She'd paid over $1000 for it once the taxes and such were added, and that was only just over a year and a half ago. She'd had a lot of problems with it that started around the one year mark, and had often wished she had purchased the extended warranty, but that was so much more money and she would not have had the money to buy the computer and the extended warranty too. Now, not only was it making a lot of nasty noises, but it also was having problems making a connection with the power cord, so often died from no power and took a lot of fiddling to get the connection to work. It was getting worse each day to where, as she now typed, she was not sure how long the battery would last or if she could get it to charge again this time. The noise of the thing was adding to the pain of her headache and her irritability was mounting. It was a good thing she was not able to use sugar any more since being recently diagnosed a diabetic, or she may well have thrown the sugar bowl through the window (no, not out the window, but through it). One of the parrots started to squack and this scared her as she was afraid that it could be a challenge not to get nasty if the noise continued... and was grateful when it didn't.

"Where is a wizard when I need one?" she wondered, not sure that a wizard could help even if there was one handy. "I so need a new computer and for this dam headache to go away."

With a cotton scarf wrapped around her head to keep her hair out of her face, she sat in her armchair working on the dieing machine while watching TV. She was planning a big fund-raising event for her Spiritual Centre and knew it would be good, but how could she raise some funds for herself? All the money left in her bank account would go to paying bills, and still she would be behind on them. She wasn't sure how they'd gotten so out of hand, other than they kept getting bigger and bigger while her income didn't follow that trend.

"As bad as this headache is, things could be worse. I remember when I had salmonella. That was waaaay worse." she thought to herself, hoping it would somehow make her feel better. She raised her cup, took the last sip of luke warm tea, and knew she'd soon need to make a trip to the kitchen for another hot cup of the delicious liquid. "Where is Ben Hur, or a knight in shining armor when a girl needs him?" she joked with her cat that slept in the chair with her.

Tomorrow she had a part in the service at her Spiritual Centre, and a Board Meeting after that. She doubted she would be feeling up to going there or anywhere if things didn't change drastically by then. Her dog wanted to go on a walk-a-thon, and that for sure would not be happening any time soon... unless the headache went away as suddenly as it had come. Ecila felt melancholy, she could sure enjoy a cold sparkling cider just now, though had nothing like that in her home, and knew that in the long run it would help nothing anyway. A tall glass of cold mineral water would have to do. She would go to the kitchen to get that mineral water, and she would be grateful to have it.

On the way back to her chair in the living room, grateful that the laptop was still working, she picked up her snail mail, all bills that she knew she needed to pay and of course would through her internet banking, but not now... not anything much just now with this headache.

"Will I need a master carpenter to cut this pain out of my head and neck?" she wondered. "I must get my mind off the pain if I ever want it to go away. We get what we think about, so I must stop thinking about the pain. I must replace it with thoughts of other things. Maybe I'll think about a telescope."

My Main Wordzzle Challenge (10):

Ben Hur was enjoying the luke warm feeling of the spring rain as it fell on him and all the others taking place in the Sugar Bowl Walk-a-thon. The walk was about fund-raising to lessen the risks of contracting salmonella in the modern world. As they walked, they passed someone dressed in a hand spun cotton hooded cape, dressed like a wizard, sitting on the river bank gazing off into the Universe through his (or her, it was hard to tell) telescope. Ben wondered what the person was seeing that was so captivating... then walked on.

My Mini Challenge (5):

The master carpenter, now off work for the day, guzzled the first few ounces of his cold sparkling cider, fining it a challenge to not drink the whole thing in one go. The handful of snail mail, all bills, made him feel melancholy. With such a good paying joy you'd think he would have no problems with the bills, but with a few ex-wives and all the alamony, well, life was not all he thought it should be. Yet he suddenly remembered "This too shall pass", and felt much better for the knowing.

And here is One Sentence using ALL of the 15 words/phrases:

Ben Hur, the melancholy master carpenter, sat drinking his luke warm sparkling cider as he thumbed through the snail mail; mostly a stack of bills and flyers for things like cotton, fund-raising, salmonella, his bank account, an upcoming walk-a-thon, and his new telescope... he was finding it a challenge not to throw the sugar bowl at the wizard in the street, yelling predictions of doom and gloom.