More Vehicles Than Really Fit (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday, an A to Z Challenge Post

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday, Catsynth, Keith, 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 yours truly right here.

This week’s prompts are:

shell

deck

chest

proof

dawn

effective

and/or the following words which are seldom used any longer

brabble — a loud, dumb argument

izzard — the letter z

picaroon — a scoundrel

Charlotte's colour of the month is Sea Green.

"He is a nothing but a PICAROON who is always a willing participant in every BRABBLE," she said to herself as she wrote, causing her older brother, passing by the door of the library where she was at the desk, to stop and put his head in.

"What did you say?" he asked, wondering what his creative little sister was up to this time.

"I'm writing a story," she said.  "It's a homework assignment, and the teacher passed out themes, and I got the pirate theme.  Everyone wanted it, but she wasn't looking, just handing each of us a folded paper and I was the lucky one.

"Anyway, it's fun to write.  The pirates are looking for a treasure CHEST, of course, but they also have to find the one special kind SHELL from a certain beach which will open the chamber where it's hidden.  They have a Sea Green ship so other ships have a hard time seeing it until it is very close.  I can use lots of fun lines like, 'We sail at DAWN,' and 'swab the DECK,' and even, 'I'll cut an IZZARD on your gizzard!'"

"You'll cut a what?" he asked, trying not to laugh, but he couldn't help smiling.  This little sister was always so enthusiastic about everything she did.

"An izzard.  Did you know it's an old name for the letter 'z'?  Kind of like in Canada they call that letter, 'zed,' well it used to sometimes be called izzard."

"I had no idea," he said, shaking his head.  "Where do you learn these things?" 

"By reading a lot.  If you want to be an EFFECTIVE writer, you have to be a strong reader, that's what my teacher says."

"Well, you've effectively got me hooked and you'll have to read me your story before you turn it in," he said, walking away and laughing when he was out of earshot.  She was such a fun and funny little sister, sometimes he couldn't help it.

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Today is:

Celtic Tree Month Saille (willow) begins

Day of the Sun -- North Korea (Kim Il Sung's Birthday Holiday)

Fast Food Day -- the first franchised McDonald's opened this day in 1955 in Des Plaines, IL, US

Father Damien Day -- Hawaii, US (Patron of lepers)

Festival of Heru; Festival of Bast -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)

Fluff Appreciation Day -- internet generated; i guess as a distraction for Tax Day

Fordicalia -- Ancient Roman Calendar (cow sacrifice to the earth mother, Tellus Mater)

Guangzhou (Canton) Spring Trade Fair -- Guangzhou (Canton), China (a month-long spring trade fair held the same dates each year)

Hillsborough Disaster Memorial -- Anfield at Liverpool, England

Income Tax Pay Day -- Philippines; US (most years)

     related observances:

     Freak Out Day

     National Griper's Day (after all, you have to pay your taxes, and the Titanic sank today*)

     Tax Resistors' Day -- good luck!

     That Sucks Day (appropriate, isn't it)

Jackie Robinson Day -- Major League Baseball

National Glazed Ham Day

Rubber Eraser Day -- today in 1770, Joseph Priestly described a vegetable gum which had the ability to rub out pencil marks

St. Hunna's Day (Patron of laundresses, laundry workers, washerwomen)

Swallow Day -- England (traditional date of the return of chimney swallows)

Take a Wild Guess Day -- sponsored by Jim Barber as a day to honor guesses, hunches, inspirations, speculations and other forms of “intuitive intelligence;” just not on your taxes, please

Tipsa Diena -- Ancient Latvian Calendar (celebration of the start of plowing)

Titanic Remembrance Day

World Creativity and Innovation Week -- always begins on DaVinci's birth anniversary

    World Art Day -- because he was an artist as well as inventor

*If you want to add other reasons why today should be considered "That Sucks Day", please go share your horror story of the day at www.thatsucks.net

Anniversary Today:

Gallaudet University is founded, 1817 (first US public school for the deaf)

Birthdays Today:

Emma Watson, 1990

Ilya Kovalchuck, 1983

Seth Rogen, 1982

Patrick Carney, 1980

Anna Torv, 1978

Emma Thompson, 1959

Evelyn Ashford, 1957

Heloise Cruse Evans, 1951

Amy Wright, 1950

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, 1947

Claudia Cardinale, 1939

Roy Clark, 1933

Elizabeth Montgomery, 1933

Leon Schotter, 1922

Harold Washington, 1922

Hilda Simms, 1920

Hans Conried, 1917

Bessie Smith, 1894

Thomas Hart Benton, 1889

Sam Rodia, 1875

John Munroe Longyear, 1850

Henry James, 1843

Joseph E. Seagram, 1841

Charles Willson Peale, 1741(O.S. date)

Leonardo da Vinci, 1452

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"In Living Color"(TV), 1990

"Driving Miss Daisy"(Play), 1987

Today in History:

Pope Innocent III refuses to grant permission to the Jews of Cordova, Spain, to build a synagogue, 1250

Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language is published in London, 1755

The first school for the deaf in the US opens in Hartford, Connecticut, 1817

The last day US silver coins are allowed to circulate in Canada, 1870

Harley Proctor begins producing Ivory Soap, 1878

General Electric Company is incorporated, 1892

The Titanic sinks, 1912

Insulin becomes available to diabetics, 1923

Rand McNally publishes its first road atlas, 1924

Jackie Robinson debuts with the Brooklyn Dodgers, 1947

White Rock, British Columbia officially separates from Surrey, British Columbia and is incorporated as a new city, 1957

Tokyo Disney Resort (and the Tokyo Disneyland park) opens in Tokyo Bay (Japan), 1983

Upon Hu Yaobang's death, the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 begin in the People's Republic of China, 1989

Representatives of 124 countries and the European Communities sign the Marrakesh Agreements revising the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and initiating the World Trade Organization, 1994

Astronomers at San Francisco State University announce the discovery of the first multiplanet solar system besides our own, three planets around Upsilon Andromedaie, 1999

Volcanic ash from the eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland leads to the closure of airspace over most of Europe, 2010

In a Schrodinger's cat experiment, researchers in Japan and Australia successfully teleport wave packets of light; this is the first transfer of quantum information from one point to another, 2011

Ceremonies and special events marking the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic are held around the world, 2012

Google publicly offers Google Glass for the first time in a one-day online sale at $1,500 apiece, 2014

Nokia announces that it will purchase Alcatel-Lucent for $16.6 billion, creating the second-largest manufacturer of mobile communication products behind Ericsson, 2015

Paris cathedral Notre Dame catches fire, toppling its spire and destroying its roof, 2019

Germany ends its use of nuclear power, closing its last three nuclear power plants, 2023

According to a report in Nature Magazine, AI systems now so advanced they nearly match or exceed humans in reading comprehension, image classification and competition-level mathematics, 2024

A huge sandstorm in southern Iraq sends thousands to hospitals and shuts down two airports due to poor visibility, 2025