Sometimes It's Any Of Us, a Random and Happy Word Counters Post, plus Wednesday's Words Early

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It's time once again for a random and happy Tuesday, linking up with Stacy's Random Thoughts at Stacy Uncorked and Sandee at Comedy Plus. 

Part of today’s post is also a writing challenge. This is how it works: one of the contributing bloggers picked a number between 12 and 50. The submitted number is a challenge to participating bloggers to write at least one piece using that exact number of words. 

This month, the word count number is: 39

It was submitted by:  Diane at On The Border

 

Links to the other Word Counters posts:

Baking In A Tornado                    

On the Border                                  

Carl is a great source for stories, but he's not the only one by far.  Playing Apples to Apples the other day, the adjective card was Fragile and Becca made me laugh with this choice of a noun card.

Well played, Becca!

Ms. G and i were saddened recently to say good-bye to her beloved cat, Buddy.  After Baby was gone, Buddy actually did decide to be my buddy.  Ms. G is now down to one cat, Angel, the large snowshoe.

She told me it was time to start taking Angel down to two litter boxes, now that we no longer had to deal with poor Buddy's "missing the box" issue and keep so many and have pee pads everywhere.

Knowing she's on a budget, i was against throwing away the clean litter in two boxes.  The clumping cat litter doesn't have to be totally tossed out very often and i could consolidate them slowly and save her money.

My suggestion was to top off the litter in three of the boxes with the litter from the fourth box, then when the remaining three get low, dump one of those into the other two, working our way down.

"No," she said, "the point is to only keep two boxes."  Nodding, i turned to head into the "cat room" when she called out.  "Wait.  You can dump the litter from one into the other three, will it fit?"

I told her it would, and she said, "Do that, then when the remaining three start to get low, dump one into the other two.  That will leave us with two boxes."  Yes, Ms. G.  It's a great idea!

Over at Carl's, a couple of years ago i talked to Ms. V about his bathtub.  He had a nonskid mat in the bottom and it was old, nasty, always holding water, and getting quite slimy and stinky underneath.

The bottom of his tub is a nonskid surface anyway, so i talked her into letting me throw the old mat away.  He did fine with no mat until about two months ago, when a new one showed up.

Knowing Ms. V, she had forgotten our conversation on this topic, got concerned about Carl slipping in the tub without remembering it's a nonskid surface, and procured a new one.  That is okay by me, this one is better.

The tub had gotten to where it needed a good scrubbing out with a certain product that requires the surface be totally dry before use.  It's very strong so Ms. V keeps a brush for this use only, clearly labeled.

As i was drying the tub (water neutralizes this stuff instantly), i noticed water dripping into it from somewhere, and at first i was confused.  Making sure the shower head wasn't dripping, i was stumped until i looked up.

There are those days where i'm my own worst enemy.  Yes, i had cleaned and rinsed that new bathtub mat, and then hung it up to dry, and it was now coming back down on my head, quite literally.

In honor of bathtubs, some funnies.

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It's my month to provide the prompts for Words for Wednesday.  Since it becomes Wednesday in some parts of the world while it is still Tuesday here, i am providing the prompts today, so you can work on them and post them when it's Wednesday where you are.

This week's prompts are:

tap

dump

basic

push

favor

lesson

and/or the following phrases:

a day late and a dollar short

my cup of tea

a home bird

These prompts are suggestions to get you started, feel free to use some, all, or none, it's the creativity that counts.

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Today is:

American Enterprise Day -- US (a project of Future Business Leaders of America, Phi Beta Lambda Chapter)

America Recycles Day -- US     http://americarecyclesday.org/

Changeling Restitution Day -- Fairy Calendar (Goblins)

Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day -- this reminder comes from the folks at CooksInfo.com, where they think you need to get rid of USO's (unidentified shriveled objects)/clean-out-your-refrigerator-day

Day of the German-speaking Community of Belgium -- German-speaking Community of Belgium

Don't Try To Do Everything At Once Day -- internet generated, and a blow to us multitaskers

Ennead Feast in the House of Ra, Horus, and Osiris -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)

George Spelvin Day/More Than One Role Day -- date of first use, in 1886, of this name for an actor playing two roles in one play; George and Georgette Spelvin have since acted in over 10,000 roles on Broadway

I Love to Write Day -- encouraging everyone to write something, begun by John Riddle; this is the perfect time for it, really, in the middle of NaNoWriMo

King's Feast / Dynasty Day -- Belgium

Lhabab Duechen -- Buddhism (Descending Day of Lord Buddha)

     a public holiday in Bhutan, although the exact day off may vary

National Entrepreneurs Day -- US (by Congressional designation)

National Peace Day -- Cote d'Ivoire

National Philanthropy Day® -- Association of Fundraising Professionals 

National Raisin Bran Cereal Day

National Spicy Hermit Christmas Cookie Day

Nativity Fast begins a/k/a Winter Lent (through Dec 24) -- Orthodox Christian

Pack Your Mom's Lunch Day -- in honor of all the times she packed yours; combine it with I Love to Write Day and include a note telling her how special she is

Republic Day -- Turkish Republic of North Cyprus

Republic Proclamation Day -- Brazil

Rock Your Mocs Day -- Indigenous Americans (begun by Jessica Jaylyn Atsye, a Laguna Pueblo, to encourage all Native Americans to wear the one item they all have in common, hand-made moccasins, with pride)

Safety Razor Day -- King Gillette was granted the patent for his style of safety razor on this day in 1904, changing how men shaved each day

School Pride Day -- US (always on the Tuesday of American Education Week)

Shichi-Go-San (Shrine Visiting Day)/Seven-Five-Three Festival -- Japan (picturesque festival in which 3-year-old children of either sex, five-year-old boys, and seven-year-old girls go to shrines dressed in their best; guardian spirits are thanked for the health of the children and prayers said for their future to be equally bright)

Sing in Your Car Day -- they need a day for this?

St. Albertus Magnus' Day (Patron of medical technicians, natural sciences, philosophers, schoolchildren, scientists, students, theology students; Cincinnati, Ohio)

St. Leopold's Day (King Leopold III, Patron of dying children, large families, step-parents; Austria)

     Leopoldstag/Goose Day -- Austria (the start of the heurigen, the new wine season)

Anniversary Today:

William Shatner marries Nerine Kidd, 1997

Birthdays Today:

Jonny Lee Miller,1972

Kevin Eubanks, 1957

Beverly D'Angelo, 1954

Daniel Barenboim, 1942

Sam Waterston, 1940

Yaphet Kotto, 1937

Joanna Barnes, 1934

Petula Clark, 1932

Ed Asner, 1929

Bill "C.W. McCall" Fries, 1928

Joseph Wapner, 1919

Erwin Rommel, 1891

Georgia O'Keeffe, 1887

Forrest Clare "Fogg" Allen, 1885

F. William Herschel, 1738

William Pitt the Elder, 1708

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"A Few Good Men"(Play), 1989

Love Me Tender(Film), 1956

"Li'l Abner"(Musical), 1956

"The Planets"(Holst Op. 32), 1920

"Masse Mensch/Mass Man"(Toller play), 1920

Today in History:

Christopher Columbus notes the first recorded reference to tobacco, 1492

The NY General Assembly permits Jews to omit the phrase "Upon the faith of a Christian" from adjuration oaths, 1727

Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon begin surveying the Mason-Dixon Line between Pennsylvania and Maryland, 1763

The Articles of Confederation are adopted by the Continental Congress, 1777

Georgetown University, the first Catholic college in the US, opens, 1791

Zebulon Pike gets his first sight of Pike's Peak, Colorado, 1806

Isaac Pitman introduces his steno/shorthand system of writing, 1832

Union Major General Sherman burns Atlanta, Georgia, 1864

King C. Gillette patents the Gillette razor blade, 1904

The first telecast of an unscheduled event, a fire, takes place on W2XBT, in NY, 1938

In Columbus, Ohio, Dave Thomas opens the first Wendy's restaurant, 1969

Intel releases world's first commercial single-chip microprocessor, 1971

René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois take power to become the first Quebec government of the 20th century clearly in favour of independence, 1976

The Anglo-Irish Agreement is signed at Hillsborough Castle by British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Irish Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald, 1985

An independent State of Palestine is proclaimed by the Palestinian National Council, 1988

The first Fairtrade label, Max Havelaar, is launched in the Netherlands, 1988

Cyclone Sidr hit Bangladesh, killing an estimated 5000 people and destroyed the world's largest mangrove forest, Sundarbans, 2007

Sony introduces the Playstation 4, selling a million units the first day, 2013 

World leaders gather in Brisbane for the G20 Summit, which will focus on economic growth, 2014

France launches air strikes on Isis stronghold Raqqa in Syria in the wake of terror attack on Paris, 2015

Pakistan unveils the remains of 1,700 year-old sleeping Buddha in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, 2017

Art experts in England authenticate two bronzes of men riding panthers as Michelangelo’s only surviving bronze works, 2018

The SpaceX Falcon 9 is launched on its first regular flight to the International Space Station with four astronauts aboard, 2020