Multitasking Mama (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 River at Drifting Through Life.    

This week's words/prompts are: 

1. "that's not a good idea." "I know, but it's the best bad idea I've got." 

and/or: 

1. fire 

2. rose 

3. time 

4. coins 

5 peanut butter 

6. shouting

Also try to use Charlotte's colour of the month which is Antique Pink for September

She'd seen the old building for years but never had a meeting in it.  She found it fascinating, three floors and a basement, all done in the style of years-gone-by.

After climbing the stairs and heading down the hallway, she realized there was actually an elevator, something she hadn't expected, and decided she'd take it on the way down, thinking it would possibly be one of the old style with the cage door, like there had been in the oldest building back in her college days.

She stopped by the "Ladies' Powder Room" as the Antique Pink sign quaintly called it, and marveled at the ROSE colored fixtures.

The meeting began on TIME, but didn't go quite as expected from there.  Toward the end, she gently but firmly noted, "That's not a good idea."

The response was a most unhelpful, "I know, but it's the best bad idea I've got." 

"Let's do more research, I have a couple of other contacts," she said, after she recovered from that, "and we'll meet again in two weeks, see what else we can come up with."

This was agreed upon, and as lovely as the meeting room was, she was glad to beat a hasty retreat to the aforementioned elevator.

When the doors opened, the light played an odd trick.  There was no cage door to slide back as she expected, but it was dark and she thought she saw the light chain to turn on the light in the elevator car, so she stepped in and reach for it...stepping on nothing and grasping instead the main cable of the elevator car itself.

Startled to find herself sliding, she gripped the cable with both hands and slid down its greasy surface, remembering her gymnastics training by reflex and landing with a bend in her knees on top of the elevator car, which had malfunctioned and sunk to the basement and stayed.

Her hands burned some but with the only light being what little filtered into the shaft from the cracks in the doors on the floors above her, she couldn't see how bad it was or wasn't.  If she'd been in the elevator car, she knew she would be able to ring a bell to summon help, but in this case, SHOUTING seemed her best option for letting people know she was down there.

The FIRE fighters and emergency medical technicians were sitting around the station and doing what they do when they are on duty and no calls are coming in.  One was making himself a PEANUT BUTTER and jelly sandwich, a few others were playing cards, betting all the COINS in their pockets just to pass the time.

There's an adrenaline rush to hearing that radio crackle to life, and this was no exception.  "Station 63, do you copy?"

"Roger."

"Medical emergency at 4869 Rieger, someone fell down an elevator shaft."

"On our way."

Two EMT's headed out followed by two firefighters in a truck with rescue equipment, all with very dark thoughts about what they expected to find when they arrived at the location.

To their surprise the building superintendent had pried open the doors of the elevator shaft on the first floor, and was peering down at a woman standing just a floor below, on top of the elevator car, seemingly not hurt much at all.  They had thought to find a mangled and possibly no longer living person and were quite gratified to see her look up and smile.

One of the EMTs was lowered in on a special rescue ladder, and carried her up.  Once they were out of the elevator shaft, he ascertained her only injuries were the brush burns on her hands, which were quite minor and which he treated, all the while joking and flirting with her.  He escorted her to her car and asked her for a date, saying, "I've never dated a woman who fell down an elevator shaft and looked so beautiful afterward!"

She took him up on the offer, and they were married just over a year later.

(Based on a true story.)

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Today is:

Birthday of the Sun -- Inca (date approximate; a few days before the Autumn Equinox, all fires, including that at the Temple of the Sun, were extinguished and 3 days later ceremonially relighted using only glass to concentrate the sunlight on cotton; followed by 8 days of feasting)

Constitution Day/National Day -- Nepal

Eleven Days of Global Unity -- Day 10, Disarmament (sponsored by We, the World) 

Feast of Orlog -- Scandinavian Deity of Destiny (date approximate)

Feast of Zywie -- Poland (goddess of longevity and health; date approximate)

Genesia -- Ancient Greek Calendar (festival to honor the dead, especially those who died in wars)

National Farm Safety Day -- US (can't find a sponsor, but farming is hard, and dangerous, work, so it's a good idea)

National Rehabilitation Day -- US (on the Wednesday of National Rehab Awareness Week)

National Rum Punch Day

National School Backpack Awareness Day 2023 -- US (or anywhere else that you want to weigh your child's backpack on the 3rd Wednesday of September, to make sure it's not heavy enough to hurt them)   

National Youth Day -- Thailand

Okuma-kabuto Festival -- Nakajima, Japan (Noto Peninsula's top autumn festival)

Pause the World Day -- because we've all wanted to do this at one time or another

St. Eustace's Day (Patron of difficult situations, fire prevention, firefighters, hunters, torture victims, trappers; Madrid, Spain; Poli, Italy; against fire and torture)

Birthdays Today:

Kristen Johnston, 1967

Guy LaFleur, 1951

Taro Aso, 1940

Sophia Loren, 1934

Anne Meara, 1929

Donald A. Hall, 1928

Dr. Joyce Brothers, 1928

Red Auerbach, 1917

Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton, 1890

Maxwell Perkins, 1884

Upton Sinclair, 1878

Rama V, King of Thailand, 1853 (eldest son taught by Anna, of "The King and I" fame)

Emperor Takakura of Japan, 1161

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"The Cosby Show"(TV), 1984

"Eubie"(Revue), 1978

"The Phil Silvers Show"(TV), 1955

"The Corn is Green"(Play), 1938

Today in History:

Atilla the Hun defeated at Chalons-sur-Marne by General Aetius, 451

Saladin begins the siege of Jerusalem, 1187

Ferdinand Magellan sets sail from Sanlúcar de Barrameda with about 270 men on his expedition to circumnavigate the globe, 1519

Galileo Galilei is tried before the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for teaching that the Earth orbits the Sun, 1633

Maryland passes the first "anti-amalgamation" law to stop English women from marrying black men, 1664

The Negro Convention of Free Men agrees to boycott slave-produced goods, 1830

The American Association for the Advancement of Science is created, 1848

The Indian Rebellion of 1857 ends with the recapture of Delhi by troops loyal to the East India Company, 1857

The first gasoline-powered car debuts in Springfield, Massachusetts, United States, 1891

The Otis Elevator Company unveils the first escalator at the Paris Exposition, 1900

Cunard Line's RMS Mauretania is launched, 1906

The first Cannes Film Festival is held, 1946

James Meredith, an African-American, is temporarily barred from entering the University of Mississippi, 1962

The RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 is launched, 1967

Billie Jean King beats Bobby Riggs in The Battle of the Sexes tennis match, 1973

The Socialist Republic of Vietnam joins the UN, 1977

Walt Disney World hosts its 200 millionth guest, 1985

U.S. President George W. Bush declares a "war on terror", 2001

The US Military ends its "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, 2011

SETI researchers propose aliens may have left devices to spy on us planted on near Earth co-orbitals, suggesting these co-orbitals be investigated, 2019

A first edition of Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein sells for $1.17 million, setting new world record for a printed work by a woman, 2021