Only in NOLA Would You Be Makin' Groceries (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday

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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 to encourage us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    

This month, the prompts are being provided by Charlotte/Mother Owl.    

The words this week:

slowly

sign

metallic

agreement

reality

flash

and/or

tomorrow

artificially

protested

sea

stump

labor

The key turned SLOWLY and with a loud METALLIC click the lock finally gave way.  Sam expected the door to open with a squeak, but it was silent on its hinges, which he took as a good SIGN.  His work on them the week before had not been in vain.

He took in the details of the room in a FLASH, noting that it was, as he'd hoped, empty.  As long as it stayed that way, he could do what he'd come to do and not have to use the ARTIFICIALLY constructed excuses he'd been coached in.

From the beginning, he PROTESTED that he was not the right person for the job.  Everyone else was in AGREEMENT that he was the right person because he had access to all the keys, so he lost the argument.  In REALITY, they were right, he just wasn't as glib as most of the others and would have had a harder time pulling off keeping what he was doing a secret if he'd been caught.

But Sam had been in the room much more often than the others, as the most frequent visitor to the resident he would be less likely to arouse suspicion going there.  He also knew the room better, and so could place the items more strategically.

He closed the door quietly and got to work.  I'd feel like Santa Clause, he thought to himself, except that I'm not holding the STUMP of a pipe in my teeth.  He emptied the grocery sack into the apartment-sized refrigerator, replaced the threadbare blanket on the bed with a new, SEA green down comforter, and left several other gifts in various places where they'd be found when needed.

The whole thing was a LABOR of love, something his wife had come up with to help the eccentric gentleman in the tiny room at the end of the hall.  Everyone knew he had very little but a small pension to live on, that he rented the smallest and cheapest room in the place, and that he was too proud to ask for things they knew he needed.  Chipping in together, they'd decided to surprise him by sneaking things into his room and agreed to pretend after that they knew nothing about it.

They also knew the gentleman went for a walk at a specific time each day, so Sam the maintenance man, with the manager winking at it, lifted the key and worked quickly to be done before he came back.  Then Sam snuck out, locked the door, and put the key away.

Mission accomplished.

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Today is:

Democracy Day -- Cape Verde

Feast of St. Kentigern (a/k/a St. Mungo) (Patron of Glasgow whose given name meant "head chief" but whose nickname meant "dear one.")

Ides of January -- Ancient Roman Calendar

Kayin New Year -- Myanmar (The Kayin, or Karen, are the second largest ethnic minority in the country, and their New Year is an extra holiday with traditional costume and lots of celebrating)

Liberation Day -- Togo

Maghi -- Sikh

Make Your Dreams Come True Day -- no info on the origin of this; maybe someone who broke their New Year's resolutions by this day used the fact that it's New Year's by the Julian calendar to start over

Midvintersblot -- Ancient Norse Calendar (midwinter festival)

National Peach Melba Day

Old New Year's Day -- Belarus; Georgia; Montenegro; Republic of Macedonia; Republic of Srpska (Yes, that's how it's spelled; no, i don't know how to pronounce it); Serbia; Russia; Ukraine; Wales (Julian Calendar)

Pongal begins -- India (thanksgiving festival at the end of the harvest season, honoring Indra, god of clouds and rain)

     first day, Bhogi

Radio Day -- anniversary of the first public radio broadcast in 1910

Recuperation Fortnight begins -- Fairy Calendar (i think i need one of those!)

Runic Half-month of Peorth (womb) begins

Rubber Ducky Day

Sidereal Winter Solstice Eve -- celebrations through South and Southeast Asia, including

     Bhogi -- Tamil (first day of Pongal)

     Lohri -- Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh

     Uruka -- Assam

Silvesterklausen -- Switzerland ("Old" New Year's celebration, based on the Julian Calendar)

St. Hilarius' Day (according to English tradition, the coldest day of the year; Patron of learning challenged children; Argusto, Italy; Vervio, Italy; against snakes and snake bites)

St. Knut's Day (a/k/a Little Christmas or Twentieth Day or Tyvendedagen among the Scandinavians, it celebrates Canute IV of Denmark and is the day to "plunder" the tree put up on Christmas Eve, eating the candies and cookies that were decorating it, and puting all the other decorations away before the tree is removed.)

Strive and Succeed Day -- Horatio Alger's birth anniversary

Theogamia -- Ancient Greek Calendar (anniversary celebration of the marriage of Zeus and Hera; date approximate, but during Gamelion, the month of marriages)

Tiugunde Day -- Old England (midwinter offering, a celebration picked up from the Norse Midvintersblot)

Tyvendedagen -- Norway (Twentieth day after Christmas, official end of Yuletide or "Juletid")

Birthdays Today:

Joannie Rochette, 1966

Orlando Bloom, 1977

Nicole Eggert, 1972

Keith Coogan, 1970

Patrick Dempsey, 1966

Penelope Ann Miller, 1964

Julia Louis-Dreyfus, 1961

Kevin Anderson, 1960

Jay McInerney, 1955

Richard Moll, 1943

Frank Gallo, 1933

Charles Nelson Reilly, 1931

Frances Sternhagen, 1930

Gwen Verdon, 1925

Army Archerd, 1922

Robert Stack, 1919

Alfred Carl Fuller, 1885

Sophia Tucker, 1884

Horatio Alger, 1832

Salmon P. Chase, 1808

DEbuting/Premiering Today:

"The Sopranos"(TV), 1999

"Mickey Mouse"(Comic strip), 1930

Today in History:

Crusaders set fire to Mara, Syria, 1099

Sicut Didum, the papal bull prohibiting the enslavement of Canary Island natives who had converted to Christianity, is promulgated, 1435

The controversial play Eastward Hoe by Ben Jonson, George Chapman, and John Marston is performed, landing two of the authors in prison, 1605

The Bank Of Genoa fails after the announcement of national bankruptcy in Spain, 1607

Jonathan Swift is ordained and Anglican priest in Ireland, 1695

James Oglethorpe and 130 colonists arrive in Charleston, South Carolina, 1733

John Walter publishes the first issue of the London Times, 1785

The Great fire of New Orleans, Louisiana begins, 1830

Dr. William Brydon, a surgeon in the British Army during the First Anglo-Afghan War, becomes famous for being the sole European survivor of an army of 16,500 when he reaches the safety of a garrison in Jalalabad, 1842

Anthony Foss patents the accordion, 1854

A chenille manufacturing machine is patented by William Canter of NYC, 1863

A circus fire in Poland kills 430, 1883

 The Independent Labour Party of the UK has its first meeting, 1893

U.S. Marines land in Honolulu from the U.S.S. Boston to prevent the queen from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution, 1893

The first radio set is advertised, a Telimco for $7.50 in Scientific American; claimed to receive signals up to one mile, 1906

The first public radio broadcast takes place; a live performance of the opera Cavalleria rusticana is sent out over the airwaves from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, 1910

An earthquake in Avezzano, Italy kills 29,800, 1915

The Black Friday bush fires burn 20,000 square kilometres of land in Australia, claiming the lives of 71 people, 1939

Henry Ford patents a plastic automobile, which is 30% lighter than a regular car, 1942

Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II, is appointed archbishop of Krakow, Poland, 1964

Robert C. Weaver becomes the first African American  US Cabinet member, 1966

Johnny Cash performs live at Folsom Prison, 1968

A passenger train plunged into a ravine at Ethiopia, killing 428 in the worst railroad disaster in Africa, 1985

L. Douglas Wilder becomes the first elected African American US governor as he takes office in Richmond, Virginia, 1990

Soviet Union military troops attack Lithuanian independence supporters in Vilnius, 1991

An earthquake hits El Salvador, killing more than 800, 2001

The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia sinks off the coast of Italy, 2012

An early-morning ballistic missile alert is sent across Hawaii in error and revoked after 38 minutes, 2018

Scientists studying the Murchison Meteorite announce their belief that it contains material that is 7.5 billion years old, 2020