Wednesday, April 24, 2019

A to Z: Unexpected (Wordless Wednesday) and 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.) 

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


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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday and Sandee at Comedy Plus.     





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Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts that encourages us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    

This month, i am providing the prompts.  You can write your story on your blog and leave a link here, or write your story in the comments, your choice.

Pick words from one list, or both, use them all, or use none.  The whole point is to get us writing, so please have fun with it!

This week's words are

introduce
bawdy
insidious
outgoing
laborer
polite

and/or

hall
conscious
ad hoc
sign
yarn
share


Now, about the picture above, the wordless one.  As some of you may have guessed, there's a story, a long YARN connected with it.  Of course, i have to SHARE.

For those of you who never met Bigger Girl's car Cicero, this is a lousy way to INTRODUCE you.  For those of you who have met her, please join me in wishing that she rest in peace as of this past Monday night.

Yes, Monday night, after all that running around for Dr. D, as i wrote up the story for the Tuesday post an INSIDIOUS voice told me the day was not over.  It was right.  About 8:30 pm, Bigger Girl called.

"Mom, I've really messed up this time, I mean really, really messed up, I've had an accident, and this time it's not just a bump, Cicero is leaking fluid all over the place and she's going to have to be towed and I don't think anyone was hurt but i was slowing down for the light and my phone was on the dash, I wasn't talking on it or anything and it started to slide and I got distracted and reached to catch it and when I looked up I realized I hadn't braked hard enough and it was too late to stop and I'm so sorry!"

Now you would think, after saying all of that in one sentence with no breaths, the person speaking would no longer be CONSCIOUS, having turned blue and passed out.  Not Bigger Girl.  For her, that's just a warm up exercise.

Yes, she is rather OUTGOING sometimes, why do you ask?  (She is a bipolar Aspie, so sometimes she's like this, and other times she won't leave the microbiology lab except to eat and sleep, and won't talk to anyone except for business, so this happened on an up day.)

Anyway, as is usual in these situations i put on the mommy-take-care-of-it hat and headed out.  The place was easy to find, what with all the flashing blue lights and three cars on the median being a SIGN i could not miss.  Pulling up in front of them all, as much out of the way of passing traffic as possible, i got out and tried to take in the scene.

Cicero, her hood hiked up like the skirt of a BAWDY dancing girl showing off what's underneath, had indeed poured fluid and sprayed glass and plastic all over.  Two other cars were in front of her, and Bigger Girl was pacing around like a caged tiger.  

When she saw me, she ran over and said, "Oh, mom, there you are, tell me, do I look concussed?"

No more so than usual, i told her drily, then i gave her a hug and asked if she thought she was hurt or needed a doctor.

"No, I'm okay, and I think the other drivers are okay, and I rear-ended this guy, but his car is drivable and it got pushed into that lady's car that was ahead of him and that one is drivable, and the only one that isn't drivable is Cicero and mom, I'm so sorry!"

By now one of the officers had approached and i introduced myself as the mom person and owner of the car.  The officer told me the tow truck had been called and we had a few minutes to get things out of the vehicle before it arrived.  After that, i'd have to go to the tow yard.

While Bigger Girl filled in all of her information to share with the other drivers, i went and spoke with both of them, trying to be POLITE and offering my apologies and telling them i hoped they were okay, while reassuring them we have good insurance.

The first car she hit had a dent in the hatchback and a scuff mark across the front bumper.  The car that was in front of it had a scuff mark on the back bumper.  The lady in that car at the front of the line had bonked her head on the steering wheel and had a small bruise.  Other than that, everyone was unhurt and the driver of the car that ended up in the middle was on his phone laughing with a friend and telling him he'd be along soon, that everything was fine.

Then i pulled Lunceford the Land Yacht as close to Cicero as i could and proceeded to show that being a manual LABORER agrees with me, as i hauled a very heavy boxed ergonomic desk, a chandelier (yes, really!) and a whole lot of other stuff from Cicero to Lunceford in just a very few minutes.  The back seat of my car looked like an AD HOC storage unit whose contents had been tossed around like the ingredients of a good salad.  There were even some of Bigger Girl's balloons for making balloon animals weaving colorful streamers throughout.

Once the tow truck driver had come, swept up much of the debris and deposited it unceremoniously in Cicero's back seat, strewn cat litter over the liquid in the road, given me all the contact information i needed and loaded Cicero, the officers told us we could leave.  The other drivers were already on their way, so Bigger Girl and i got in and i asked where she had been heading.

"To see my friend Paul, and give him some chocolates, I hadn't seen him in a long time," she said.  So we went to see Paul and give him chocolates, then i brought her home.  All of her stuff from Cicero went in the HALL closet.

Tuesday, while working, i called and filed the claim, then after work i went to the tow yard to retrieve anything we'd forgotten.  It shocked me how much we'd overlooked in the dark, although i drew the line at grabbing all of her soy sauce packets (yes, she lives in her car the way i do).  Then i gave permission for them to give the car to the insurance company for an adjuster to move and inspect it.

Now we just wait to see what they decide, although a 13-year-old car that looks like an accordion and had an airbag deployed is most likely to be declared a total loss.

Rest in peace, Cicero.


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Today is:


Administrative Professionals Day -- US

Ambivalence Day -- a holiday to tell your friends about, or not

American Quilter's Society Quilt Show -- Paducah, KY, US (auction, workshops, and prizes for the best quilts; through Saturday)

Concord Day -- Niger

Feast of Eros -- Ancient Greek Calendar (date approximate)

Genocide Remembrance Day / Martyrs' Day-- Armenia

Happenstance and Coincidence Evening -- Fairy Calendar

International Guide Dog Day

Kapyong Day -- Australia (Battle of Kapyong, 1951)

Loktantra Diwas -- Nepal (Democracy Day, celebrating the restoration of the Nepali Congress on this date in 2006)

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, as has been celebrated for almost 50 years; through Sunday)

Peppercorn Ceremony -- St. George, Bermuda (commemorates the renting of what is now the Old State House by the Masonic Lodge to the governor of Burmuda for the cost of one peppercorn per annum, now a well attended festival)

Pigs in a Blanket Day

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)

Spring Cat Cleaning Day -- because someone, somewhere, thinks you need to bathe your cat; ask the cat, he will refuse, and if you become insistent, be careful

St. Ives' Day (Patron of St. Ives, Cambridgeshire, England)

St. Mark's Eve*

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)

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



*A young lady may eat a boiled dove's egg sprinkled with salt and place a tulip, sacred to St. Mark, in a vase next to her bed, and so she will dream of the man she will marry.


Anniversaries Today:

Mary, Queen of Scots marries Dauphin of France, François, at Notre Dame de Paris, 1558


Birthdays Today:

Courtnee Draper, 1985
Kelly Clarkson, 1982
Eric Balfour, 1977
Chipper Jones, 1972
Cedric the Entertainer, 1964
Djimon Hounsou, 1964
Michael O’Keefe, 1955
Eric Bogosian, 1953
Jean-Paul Gaultier, 1952
Doug Clifford, 1945
Barbra Streisand, 1942
Richard M. Daley, 1942
Sue Grafton, 1940
Jill Ireland, 1936
Shirley MacLaine, 1934
Stanley J. Kauffmann, 1916
Robert Penn Warren, 1905
Michael J. Dady, 1850
George N. Bascom, 1836
Anthony Trollope, 1815
Robert Bailey Thomas, 1766
Edmund Cartwright, 1743


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Dancing at Lughnasa"(Play), 1990
"Die Jahreszeiten/The Seasons"(Oratorio, Haydn H 21/3), 1801
The Boston News-Letter(Newspaper), 1704 (first successful newspaper in the British colonies)


Today in History:

Thutmose III ascends to the throne of Egypt, although power effectively shifts to Hatshepsut, BC1479
Traditional date for the Greeks entering Troy using the Trojan Horse, BC1184
The appearance of Halley's Comet causes monks in England to predict evil happenings, 1066
"La Marseillaise" is composed by Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisle, 1792
The Boston "News-Letter" becomes the first successful newspaper in the colonies, 1704
The Library of Congress is established, 1800
A patent is granted for the first soda fountain, 1833
William Price of the Washington Star becomes the first reporter to be specifically assigned to the White House, 1897
The fathometer, which measures underwater depth, is patented, 1928
Winston Churchill is knighted by Queen Elizabeth II, 1953
Cosmonaut  Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1, the first person to die during a space mission, 1967
Mauritius becomes a member state of the United Nations, 1968
The first Chinese satellite, Dong Fang Hong I, is launched, 1970
Gruinard Island, Scotland, is officially declared free of the anthrax disease after 48 years of quarantine, 1990
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is inaugurated as the 265th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church taking the name Pope Benedict XVI, 2005
Snuppy, the world's first cloned dog is born in South Korea, 2005
Iceland announces that Norway will shoulder the defense of Iceland during peacetime, 2007
Scientists in Kamchatka, Russia, report sighting the first adult white orca to be seen in the wild, 2012
Suffragist Millicent Fawcett is the first woman to have a statue erected in Parliament Square, London, England, 2018

27 comments:

  1. I am so glad that Bigger Girl and everyone else involved has no more damage than bruises (and bruised pride).
    RIP Cicero indeed.
    Love your use of the prompts and am awed at your stamina. And indeed at all mothers' stamina.

    Its a sign of the bloody times if you ask me.
    What is?
    The shareholders are insisting we introduce a woman as the head of Gorilla Builders. Yet another effing insidious takeover by feminists. Before you know it she will be banning bawdy language at our worksites and making ad hoc rules and regulations about being polite. I even heard that labourers were going to have to 'be more conscious of their language' if they wanted to share a yarn at smoko, and that OUR reception and display hall was going to be redecorated in green and purple (fem colours or some such crap). If she knows which side her bread is buttered on she will tone these loony tune ideas down quick smart or she will lose all her best workers. Including me.
    Where do you get these ideas?
    Our Lionel is a friend of someone who knows the woman who used to clean the office of the outgoing CEO. She said that he said that we wouldn't know what had hit us. Profits would bottom out and the shareholders would be very sorry and BEGGING him to come back.
    I see. Third or possibly fourth hand gospel. And probably Fake News. Wait and see what happens.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This story is almost too close to real life to be funny, but then again. Let's hope this indeed is fake news.

      Delete
    2. When I saw the photo, I thouhgt, Oh on, let's hope this is not Messymimis car. Then reading your yarn I hoped for nobody to be hurt. BRuises and hurt pride is a good outcome of this incident. I think we've all had that moment.As my mother used to say, Beware, the idiot is always out there! I usde to add in the quiet of my mind. Yes, and sometimes you're the idiot.

      Delete
    3. EC, any woman worth her salt can hold her own with those guys, i believe she can do it.

      Uglemor, yes, sometimes the idiot is us.

      Delete
    4. I am with Mimi, the woman can do it!

      Delete
  2. I'm so glad Bigger Girl and the other driver's aren't hurt. Next time, just let the phone slide and retrieve it later.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thank God, Bigger Girl and the other drivers were all not hurt. One split second distraction can be very dangerous. It is better and wiser to let the phone slide. Hope something good will come out of it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. What a mess. The worst is having no car, and most likely needing to get a new one asap. At least no one was hurt.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Mimi,

    I'm glad Bigger Girl is okay. Bless her poor heart! That sort of thing can happen to anyone. Cell phones are such a distraction even if they are doing nothing but laying around except while in a moving car and then they tend to go places you don't want unless you secure it. Perhaps in her next vehicle, she'll find a better place to lay her phone other than on the dash.

    A2Z Little Mermaid art sketch series 'Ursula'

    ReplyDelete
  6. Dang, I'm sorry Bigger Girl had that crash but at least she seems to be okay. YIKES!

    ReplyDelete
  7. The outcome could have been much worse, thank goodness it wasn't. Your description of the car at the end is brilliant! Just touch you phone when driving in the UK and you are liable for a £200 fine!

    My A-Z of Children's Stories

    ReplyDelete
  8. My use of the words is as follows...

    "They’d made a CONSCIOUS decision agreed by the OUTGOING CEO, and by each of the board members. The SHAREholders had been advised and were being kept in the loop.

    The INSIDIOUS rumour spread by the dissident, militant union because of an unfounded insinuation by one mentally-disturbed LABORER was an obscene, BAWDY, offensive untruth.

    It was an ominous SIGN of future trouble – a pending disaster that had to be dealt with swiftly.

    The whole HALL of management convened, staying up through the night and long into the following day in a concentrated effort to finally, once and for all, solve the problem - a problem which arose from a single accusation that revealed volumes about the AD HOC naivety and gullibility of the union members.

    Like a lengthy YARN of twisted fibres issuing forth from an out-of-control loom the rumour had spread rapidly. It was time to INTRODUCE immediate, strict, unbending measures to stop the “disease” from becoming like a pandemic.

    The time of being POLITE was well and truly over."

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Let's hope they are able to stop it. Sometimes it's like trying to gather up the feathers of a feather pillow after you've shaken them out on a windy day.

      Delete
  9. I, too, am glad to learn no one was hurt. Vehicles can be replaced...people can't be.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I'm so sorry Mimi about your daughter's accident. I'm happy that she and the other people were not really hurt. I hope that things will work out for her. She needs to rest a little from her ordeal. I'll pray for everyone. See ya my friend.

    Cruisin Paul

    ReplyDelete
  11. The most important part is everyone is okay. Looks like her car took the worst beating though. It's just stuff. It can be replaces. I'm glad everyone is okay.

    Thank you for joining the Wordless Wednesday Blog Hop.

    Have a fabulous Wordless Wednesday, my friend. ♥

    ReplyDelete
  12. when I saw the photo I said to myself...."Uh oh..." Glad no one was hurt....glad you were there to help!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Oops!
    Bit 'sad' you had to use your own words in this fashion Mimi but luckily there was no real damage to any person except the lady with the the bumped forehead. Hope she gets it (and her neck) checked out - whiplash can appear in mysterious ways.

    If you're interested my post can be found
    HERE
    Take care
    Cathy


    ReplyDelete
  14. Pigs in a blanket sounds like a great meal right about now. Have a blessed week.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Great job on the story. Sorry about the accident though. I used one set of the words and wrote a story for today :)

    ReplyDelete
  16. Yes, good to hear everyone is ok ~ photo is a story by itself ~

    Happy Day to you,
    A ShutterBug Explores,
    aka (A Creative Harbor)

    ReplyDelete
  17. Here's my WFW Story, thanks for hosting Mimi.

    The large hall in the community centre was arranged in an ad hoc manner, signs placed here and there, it was difficult for Amanda to locate the area where the crafters were gathered.

    It was just beyond the sign that said ‘Bawdy House forum’.
    It was a working class neighbourhood with lots of laborers living there. Nobody liked the idea of having that Bawdy house being set up on Rock Street. They believed it would have an insidious effect on the character of the residents. Hopefully they could convince the town councillor to reject the proposal.


    Moving past this area, Amanda located the crafters. It would be the first knitting class she would be conducting for the group of seniors. She was overly conscious of her appearance, toting a bag full of yarn with skeins of many colours, more than enough to share among the group. A polite, quiet girl, she loved to knit and had started when she was a teenager. She was looking forward to sharing her skill with others.
    Doug, the outgoing community centre manager approached them, introducing her to everyone enthusiastically.

    It promised to be an interesting night at the community centre hall, with lots going on.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Love your tale. I suspect that Amanda is going to be loved by the seniors and may find that she has things to learn from them, as well as teach.

      Delete

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