A to Z: Vanquishing Spider Webs, a Lucky Throw (Wordless Wednesday) and Vacation (Words for Wednesday)

(Because some people like Blogger and some like WordPress, i am putting the same content at both.  If you would prefer to read this on the other site, it is linked here.)    

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday.

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Words for Wednesday is a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts that encourages us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.  This month, the prompts are being posted by Elephant's Child.   

This week's prompts are:

1. thin
2. frightened
3. scratch
4. wealthy
5. flowery
6. sulky 

And/or 

1. stove
2. unwieldy
3. fearless
4. zoo
5. price
6. inquisitive

 And a photo to use or ignore as well.

“This is so much more fun than a ZOO!” he chortled gleefully.

She put on a THIN smile to try to hide the fact that she was a bit FRIGHTENED.  She didn’t want to appear SULKY, after all.  He had put up with going to a couple of museums that held little interest for him, the least she could do on their shared vacation was go with him to see alligators in their natural habitat.

He was very INQUISITIVE, asking their guide question after question about all of the swamp creatures.  He was FEARLESS when the guide snatched a baby alligator out of the water and let him hold it; she wouldn’t go near it for any PRICE.  It looked so UNWIELDY and it squirmed, and she had an unreasonable feeling that its mama was going to come roaring out of the water and STOVE in the side of the little boat, landing them right where they would be ‘gator bait.

Once they were back at the landing, heading for their rental car, he was still grinning from ear to ear as he said, “Well, I can SCRATCH holding an alligator off of my bucket list!  Thank you so much, sweetheart, for indulging me in this.  How about I take you out for a dinner fit for the WEALTHY?”

She looked at him with a real smile and said, “I’ll even wear that FLOWERY dress you like so much!”

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To enjoy more blogs participating in the A to Z Challenge, click here.

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Today is:

Administrative Professionals Day 

Adonia -- Greece (women's festival mourning the death of Adonis; date approximate)

ANZAC Day -- Australia; Christmas Island; Cocos (Keeling) Islands; Cook Islands; New Zealand; Niue; Norfolk Island; Tonga

Army Day -- North Korea

DNA Day -- structure of DNA first published this day in 1953; human genome project ended today in 2003; related observance

    DNA Day -- a day for teachers, students, and everyone to learn more about genetics and genomics sponsored by genome.gov and the Smithsonian 

Duck Appreciation Society Day -- The Duck Appreciation Society (some sites say May 10; either way, go feed the ducks if you like them, but not stale white bread, it's no better for them than it is for us)

East Meets West Day -- Allies from the East and West finally met up this day in 1945 about 75 miles from Berlin

Festival of Robigalia -- Ancient Roman Calendar (to protect against corn blight; festival of Robiga and Rogibus, the brother and sister fertility gods)

Flag Day -- Faroe Islands; Swaziland

Gio to Hung Vuong Day -- Vietnam (National Day; celebrating the founding of the nation by Emperor Hung Vuong some three millenia ago)

Hairstylist Appreciation Day -- if you have a good one, let him/her know (some sites put this on the 30th)

Hug A Plumber Day -- because when you are knee deep in it, you really need them around

International Guide Dog Day

Liberation Day -- Italy; Portugal

Mesir Paste Festival -- Manisa, Turkey (mesir paste is a blend of 41 different spices and is intended as a general cure-all and tonic; lots of craft exhibitions, concerts and sporting tournaments, as well as traditional throwing of paste off minaret of the Sultan Mosque; through Sunday)

National Crayola Day -- no one claims starting this holiday, observe it with your children/grandchildren/nieces/nephews/kids down the street, and remember how fun it is to color pictures

National Golf Day -- We Are Golf sponsors this day, and is holding an event on Capitol Hill today, too  

National Zucchini Bread Day -- they hold this at a time when you are not yet sick of all that zucchini you grew in the garden

Parental Alienation Awareness Day -- raising awareness of Parental Alienation or Hostile Aggressive Parenting 

Poetry & the Creative Mind Gala -- Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center, New York, NY, US (an extraordinary evening celebrating the role of contemporary poetry in American culture sponsored by Academy of American Poets)

Red Hat Society Day -- first Red Hat Tea Party held this day in 1998

Sinai Liberation Day -- Egypt

St. Mark the Evangelist's Day (Patron of attorneys/barristers/lawyers/notaries, captives, glaziers, imprisoned people/prisoners, lions, stained glass workers, struma patients; Egypt; Boretto, Italy; Creazzo, Italy; Infanta, Philippines; Ionian Islands; Pordenone, Italy; Sonnino, Italy; Venice, Italy; against impenitence, insect bites, scrofulous diseases, struma)

Tag des Baumes -- Germany (Tree Day/Arbor Day)

Tucson International Mariachi Conference -- Tucson, AZ, US (festival showcasing the best of balle folklorico and mariachi; through Saturday)

USA Film Festival -- Dallas, TX, US (major showcase of new studio and indie films; through Sunday)

Vallenato Legend Festival -- Valledupar, Colombia (one of Colombia’s most important music and folk festivals; through Apr. 30)

Walk @ Lunch Day -- founded and encouraged by Blue Cross / Blue Shield

World Malaria Day / Malaria Awareness Day -- WHO and the International Community

World Penguin Day -- because they begin migrating on or around this day     

Zabdrung Kuchhoe -- Bhutan (death anniversary of Zhabdrung)

20-Something Service Day -- can't find who started this one, but it's a good idea, whomever it was, whether you are 20 or older to do some community service or volunteer work regularly

Anniversaries Today:

Theodore Roosevelt National Park is established, ND, US, 1947

The United Negro College Fund is founded, 1944

Birthdays Today:

Jacob Underwood, 1980

Emily Bergl, 1975

Jason Lee, 1970

Renee Zellweger, 1969

Hank Azaria, 1964

Jeffrey DeMunn, 1947

Talia Shire, 1946

Stu Cook, 1945

Bjorn Ulvaeus, 1945

Al Pacino, 1940

"Meadowlark" Lemon, 1932

Paul Mazursky, 1930

Albert King, 1923

Ella Fitzgerald, 1918

Edward R. Murrow, 1908

William Joseph Brennan, Jr., 1906

John Henry "Pop" Lloyd, 1884

Guglielmo Marconi, 1874

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Little Murders"(Play), 1967

"Romulus the Great"(Play), 1949

"Another Language"(Play), 1932

"Turandot"(Opera), 1926

Robinson Crusoe(Publication date), 1719

Today in History:

Lysander's Spartan Armies defeated the Athenians and the Peloponnesian War ends, BC404

German geographer and mapmaker Martin Waldseemuller publishes his Cosmographiae Introductio map in which he gives the American continents their name, 1507

Highwayman Nicholas Pelletier becomes the first person executed by guillotine, 1792

Charles Fremantle arrives in the HMS Challenger off the coast of modern-day Western Australia prior to declaring the Swan River Colony for the United Kingdom, 1829

The last survivors of the Donner Party arrive back in civilization, 1847

The Governor General of Canada, Lord Elgin, signs the Rebellion Losses Bill, outraging Montreal's English population and triggering the Montreal Riots, 1849

British and French engineers break ground for the Suez Canal, 1859

New York State becomes the first US state to require automobiles to be licensed, 1901

First DC Comic with Batman is published, 1939

Fifty nations gather in San Francisco, California to begin the United Nations Conference on International Organizations, 1945

Francis Crick and James D. Watson publish Molecular structure of nucleic acids: a structure for deoxyribose nucleic acid describing the double helix structure of DNA, 1953

The St. Lawrence Seaway, linking the North American Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean, officially opens to shipping, 1959

Robert Noyce is granted a patent for an integrated circuit, 1961

Israel completes its withdrawal from the Sinai peninsula per the Camp David Accords, 1982

American schoolgirl Samantha Smith is invited to visit the Soviet Union by its leader Yuri Andropov after he read her letter in which she expressed fears about nuclear war, 1983

Pioneer 10 travels beyond Pluto's orbit, 1983

The Hubble Telescope is deployed, 1990

The Human Genome Project comes to an end 2.5 years before first anticipated, 2003

The final piece of the Obelisk of Axum is returned to Ethiopia  after being stolen by the invading Italian army in 1937, 2005

Bulgaria and Romania sign accession treaties to join the European Union, 2005

The U.S. government 'condemns' international media outlets, including 'The New York Times' for publishing confidential files, 2011

The United Kingdom reopens its embassy in Somalia after 22 years, 2013
A 7.9-magnitude earthquake hits Nepal, causing over 2,400 deaths, fatal avalanches on Mt. Everest, and destruction of historic sites such as the Dharahara tower, 2015