What an Aspiration! (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday, BeThere2Day, 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 David M Gascoigne and they will be posted by Elephant's Child.         

This week's prompts are:

• Variable
• Looking
• Sometimes
• Quite
• Define
• Colourful

and/or

• Tried
• Song
• Honest
• Mood
• Answer
• Favourite

 

 Have fun.

(Should we choose to use it, Charlotte/Mother Owl's color of the month is May Green.)

"Have you started LOOKING for a mother-of-the-bride dress yet?" Pam asked.

Her sister, Judy, tried giving her "the look," but Pam said, "That doesn't work on me, I'm a mom too, remember?  The more you put it off, the worse it's going to be, especially if you have to have it altered."

With a sigh that came from her toes, she said, "You want my HONEST ANSWER?  I'm not the clothes horse, you are.  I wouldn't know a good dress from army fatigues and I dread this process, especially when you add shoes, and accessories, and the whole SONG and dance routine makes me tired to think about."

Pam just smiled.  "I know, I had to help you do it all for your wedding, remember?  We need to pick a day, soon, and meet up to get this done.  Once it's over, you'll feel better."

"Yeah, that's what they said about labor, but then the child raising starts.  Okay, does Thursday work for you?"

"I'll pick you up."

"You mean I can't duck out and run away in the middle?"

"I know you too well, I'm your sister, remember?"

***

"Happy Thursday!  Are you in the MOOD for dress shopping?" Pam asked, coming through the door at what Judy thought an unholy early hour.  Then again, Pam was the early bird and she was the night person.

"DEFINE 'dress shopping mood'," Judy said, burying her face in her coffee cup.

"Hmm, I'd say yours right now is VARIABLE to partly cloudy."

"And you'd be right.  Let me finish my coffee and I'll be ready soon."

***

"Have I TRIED on every suitable dress in this shop yet?" Judy asked wearily.

"Not QUITE," Pam answered back drily.

They shook their heads at each other.

"SOMETIMES you just have to be tenacious.  There are a few on the discontinued rack in the back..." Pam said.

"'Tenacious' is just another word for stubborn, and let's get it over with."

"Tenacious comes from a strong will and stubborn from a strong won't, so they are different, and there's a beautiful dress, very COLORFUL, a May Green and it looks just your size!"

"That's your FAVORITE color, not mine," Judy said, eyeing the garment warily.

"It looks great on you and you know it.  Go try this on, it's beautiful, won't show up the bride, is dignified, and I'll bet it will fit with almost no alterations needed.  Scoot!"

Judy scooted to the undersized "dressing box" as she always called them, claiming they give her claustrophobia.

"Perfect!" Pam said when she emerged.  She snapped a photo before Judy could stop her and sent it to her niece, the bride, who immediately texted back, "Make Mom Buy It Now!"

Pam laughed when the message came back.  "She knows you too well.  We'll get it now and then we can go next door for shoes and an evening purse to match..."

Seeing the look on Judy's face she added, "Next week.  We'll have lunch on Tuesday then come.  You've got enough of mom's jewelry not to need to buy any."

As the clerk did the necessary transaction, Judy hugged her sister.  "Thank you.  I know I'm not the easiest person to wrangle into these things, and even if I'm grumpy, I appreciate the help."

"I'm your sister, I know that.  Now, we go out for a celebratory snack!"

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Today is:

Aldersgate Day -- Methodism

Battle of Pichincha Day -- Ecuador

Bermuda Day -- Bermuda

Brooklyn Bridge Day -- the most often sold bridge in the US (or so i've been told) opened on this day in 1883

Brother's Day -- celebrate all forms of brotherhood, biological, adopted, fraternity brothers, or members of your labor union

Day for the Naming of Rocks and Planets -- Fairy Calendar

Emergency Medical Services for Children Day -- because children need different care, they aren't just tiny adults   

European Day of Parks -- Europe

Feast of Hermes Trismegistus -- Hellenistic Egyptian Calendar (thrice-blessed Hermes, patron of alchemy, date approximate)

Independence Day -- Eritrea(1993)

International Tiara Day -- ladies, celebrate your powers of leadership in your life; tiara wearing is optional, it's the fact that you rule that matters

La Fete des Saintes Maries -- Les-Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, France (Roma [gypsy] festival, to honor St. Sara, St. Marie Jacobe, and St. Marie Salome, their patrons; through the 25th)

Little Lamb Day -- publication anniversary, in 1830, of the original poem "Mary Had a Little Lamb"

Lubiri Memorial Day -- Buganda Region, Uganda

Morse Code Day -- anniversary of Morse's first message in 1844 (Morse Code Day is also celebrated on his birth anniversary, April 27)

National Escargot Day

Sara-la-Kali -- St. Sara, or St. Sara the Black's Day -- patron of the Roma (Gypsy) Peoples (pilgrimage)

Sts. Cyril and Methodius's Day (Orthodox Church celebration; Patrons of Macedonia) related observances

     Bulgarian Education and Culture and Slavonic Literature Day -- Bulgaria

     Slavonic Enlighteners' Day -- Republic of Macedonia

St. Susanna's Day (Patron of martyrs)

Birthdays Today:

Billy Gilman, 1988

Alyson Hannigan, 1974

Joe Dumars, 1963

Kristin Scott Thomas, 1960

Rosanne Cash, 1955

Alfred Molina, 1953

Jim Broadbent, 1949

Priscilla Beaulieu  Presley, 1945

Patti LaBelle, 1944

Gary Burghoff, 1943

Bob Dylan, 1941

Tommy Chong, 1938

Lilli Palmer, 1914

"Engineer Bill" Stulla, 1911

Samuel I. Newhouse, 1895

Lillian Moller Gilbreth, 1878

Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, 1819

Emanuel Leutze, 1816

Abraham Geiger, 1810

Gabriel Fahrenheit, 1686

Debuting/Premiering Today:

Spy Hard(Film), 1996

Indiana Jones and Last Crusade(Film), 1989

View to a Kill(film), 1985

"Jumpin' Jack Flash"(Single release), 1968

"Mame"(Musical), 1966

"Le roi l'a Dit / The King Has Spoken"(Opera), 1873

Today in History:

The Fifth Crusade leaves Acre for Egypt, 1218

Peter Minuit buys Manhattan, 1626

The English  Parliament  passes the Act of Toleration protecting Protestants; Roman Catholics are intentionally excluded, 1689

John Wesley is converted, essentially launching the Methodist movement; the day is celebrated annually by Methodists as Aldersgate Day, 1738

Antonio José de Sucre secures the independence of the Presidency of Quito, 1822

"Mary Had a Little Lamb" by Sarah Josepha Hale is published, 1830

The first passenger rail service in US, from Baltimore to Elliots Mill, Maryland, begins, 1830

Samuel FB Morse taps out the first telegraph message, "What hath God wrought", 1844

The Brooklyn Bridge in New York City is opened to traffic after 14 years of construction, 1883 

The United Kingdom annexes the Orange Free State, 1900

Amy Johnson lands in Darwin, Northern Territory, becoming the first woman to fly from England to Australia (she left on May 5 for the 11,000 mile flight), 1930

Igor Sikorsky performs the first successful single-rotor helicopter flight, 1940

Conclusion of the Sixth Buddhist Council on Vesak Day, marking the 2,500 year anniversary after the Lord Buddha's Parinibbana, 1956

Cyprus enters the Council of Europe, 1961

FLQ separatists bomb the U.S. consulate in Quebec City, 1968

The drilling of the Kola Superdeep Borehole begins in the Soviet Union, 1970

The International Court of Justice calls for the release of United States embassy hostages in Tehran, Iran, 1980

Eritrea  gains its independence from Ethiopia, 1991

Israel conducts Operation Solomon, evacuating Ethiopian Jews to Israel, 1991

15-year-old Sherpa  Temba Tsheri becomes the youngest person to climb to the top of Mount Everest, 2001

North Korea bans mobile phones, 2004

London's Metropolitan police remove belongings and sleeping bags of homeless people as part of 'a policy of reducing the impact of rough sleepers on the community', 2013

Kaduna state in Nigeria declares a state of emergency as a moth has destroyed 80% of the tomato crops and factories are shutting down, 2016

The world's largest cat-proof fence (44km) completed at Newhaven Wildlife Sanctuary, central Australia to protect endangered species, 2018 

Millions of 17-year cicadas emerge in the US South, posing crop danger and noise issues, 2020

A constitutional crisis deepens in Samoa after the Speaker of the House shuts out Fiame Naomi Mata’afa from being sworn in as the country's first female leader in 56 years, 2021