Three Things Challenge #190

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PATH
HONESTY
REMOTE

In a remote village, odd in so many ways, one being a propensity for honesty among all locals. It was a compulsion within the villagers to always be honest and in particular when it came to cooking. No one had too thick a skin to receive the honest criticism of their cooking. Except for Myra Curtis who took exception to criticism and had locked all access to her place by locking the path to her house.

This, of course, attracted a lot of honest criticism about her chosen action.

Myra found herself living more remotely than any of the locals as people avoided her at every opportunity.

All other paths were open, tended with care and those that were not up to scratch, marked accordingly, as one would expect.

 

Written for: https://pensitivity101.wordpress.com/2020/03/30/three-things-challenge-190/

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Wordle #183 – Kat Berry

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This week’s words: Amazing  Berry Ask Drive Pout Year  Watch Apoplectic- extremely angry; furious  Sweep Mortal Cut Off

Kat Berry was an aggressive woman. On any day, it didn’t take much to stir her ire.

It was amazing she had lived as long as she had considering the number of people she had irritated over the years.

It was a mistake, I discovered, to ask her for a lift anywhere. Driving brought out the demons in her.

If any discretion was noticed, she would pout, her brain engaged in what insult she might utter totally unaware of the consequences.

One day about a year ago, I sat in the car with her and watched  as she went into an apoplectic rage when an innocent old lady had the hide to cut her off.  Her fury was frightening. Her language enough to make a wharfie blush.

With a sweep of her arm, she proceeded to berate the woman who I’m sure realised the mortal state she had placed herself in. Had the lights not turned green at that point I’m sure Kat Berry would have been out of the car and at the poor woman’s throat.

 

Written for: https://mindlovemiserysmenagerie.wordpress.com/2020/03/30/wordle-183-2/

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Sunday Writing Prompt “Dear Diary” – The Future.

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Dear Diary,

Tuesday, 31st March.

It’s day six hundred of social distancing. Who’d a thought I’d be in this situation?

Life has become so routine; it’s hard to imagine it was not like this.

All around me are the scars of the virus, which shows little sense of abating its desire to devour all of us.

Gone are the days of wandering over to the shops, of meeting friends in the food court, hanging around on hot days, as there was nowhere else comfortable to spend the day.

What I miss most is choice.

The supermarkets are struggling to keep up supply. So much of what we once took for granted is now rationed or just doesn’t exist. The shopping centres are shells, empty cities, long-abandoned shops that once stocked with every variety of clothing and household good imaginable.

The online shops existed for a time until they found their workers were succumbing to the virus and they too shut down.

Our supermarkets, aided by government funding, have endeavoured to stay open, though the shelves are so often empty rather than full.

We are organised into certain days and times when we can shop. Initially, there was a designated time for older people, but as they have largely disappeared, those times have been relaxed. We now have an odds and evens schedule.

Today the opening times changed once again, now its 7am – 12noon. The window is narrowing all the time. I wonder where we will be a week from now.

Thankfully there is still radio coverage, and like most people, I listen each day for the latest updates, new restrictions and news of the virus on a global scale. It’s bleak everywhere.

 

Dear Diary

April 1st.

I’ve woken with a sore throat and a temperature. This has happened a few times, but this time it feels more serious.

I’ll write more later….

 

 

Written for: https://mindlovemiserysmenagerie.wordpress.com/2020/03/29/sunday-writing-prompt-dear-diary/

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Reena’s Exploration Challenge #128 – Fear

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War is hell. You can’t photograph a flying bullet, but you can capture genuine fear.

This week I’m thinking about fear in the context of the world right now.

We are surrounded by so much hysteria, anxiety and confusion about what is happening and what is to come.

I listened to Ekhart Tolle the other day talking about fear and anxiety in terms of adversity.

Fear he suggests is what we sense is coming. In the present, the now, what we feel is anxiety about the present, and that manifests itself in fear of the unknown.

How then do we live in the present with so much gloom and doom descending on us?

One of the situations we are all facing is the stay at home request imposed by most governments.

For me, that is an easy one as I stay at home most of the time anyway. But when it comes time to go to the shops, to get life’s necessities I have a dilemma. I am one of life’s at-risk people, I have a chronic disease. I could easily stay locked up in my house, but I know that’s not always a healthy thing to do. Yes, I am anxious about going out, I fear contracting this virus.

The fear of all this happening is what I project upon myself. Anxiety is what I feel in the here and now.

So, I have decided to change a few habits, normally I would go to my local Aldi store today, Sunday, but from experience, I know it will be crowded this morning. So, I shall go tomorrow, based on the belief the store may not be as crowded as will be today. It’s been pleasing that panic buying seems to have settled down, thanks to the shops placing limits on how many of anything you can buy. A sensible idea I think.

The fear of what the future holds is real, but despite the potential gloom and doom, life carries on. There are still people who need us, love us and care for us. And maybe do my shopping???

 

 

Written for: https://reinventionsreena.wordpress.com/2020/03/26/reenas-exploration-challenge-128/

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Crimson’s Creative Challenge #72 – Crisp and Marriage

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Tale Weaver – #268 – Medical – 26th March – Colonoscopy

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It was their first date, and although it was basically a takeaway coffee and a sit in the park, one point five metres apart, he was nervous as could be and never really understood when asked in all innocence, what he’d been doing lately he blurted out he’d just had a colonoscopy.

It was hardly the subject to endear himself to her, and most likely the least favourite subject to begin a potential relationship.

“Oh,” she said, not sure what to say.

“I returned a positive result on my poo test,” he replied. His brain by now had gone into ‘it’s too late to back out of this one, forge on, you never know where it might lead’.

“Oh,” she said again. His revelation about the state of his stomach and bowel had left her speechless.

“It’s all okay though, no cancers or anything to worry about.”

“Oh! I’ve never had one. Does it hurt?”

“No, they knock you out and then stick a camera up your bottom and have a look around in your large intestine.”

“Oh! I don’t think I’d like that.”

“Piece of cake really,” he said, “it’s the preparation that’s hard work. You have to drink this stuff that cleans out your bowel so they can get a good look up there. It a liquid diet for about twenty-four hours and a sore as can be bum.”

It was at this point that he realised he had probably revealed more than he should. But nerves will do that to you. Your mouth goes into overdrive and leaves your brain protesting loudly, but its concerns don’t stop your mouth blathering on ignoring all the good advice to shut up coming it’s way.

He noticed that by now the one point five distance had increased to a good two-point-five and she had that look as if deciding when might be the ideal moment to make a dash to safety.

It happened when he opened his mouth to announce the next phase, a pill test, where he told her about having to swallow a tiny camera which would take photos of his small intestine, about sixty thousand he said as if that was something to be impressed by.

“I’m going to have to go,” she told him, “I remembered I promised my mother I’d stop by and wash her hair. It’s been lovely meeting you, thanks for the coffee and I’ll phone you.”

With that, she was up and walking off.

What a shame he thought and I was just getting to the part where I explain how I get rid of the camera.

 

Written for: https://mindlovemiserysmenagerie.wordpress.com/2020/03/26/tale-weaver-268-medical-26th-march/

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Reena’s Exploration Challenge #127 – Deja Vu

PROMPT #127

Déjà vu

The house at No. 18 always gave me a weird feeling whenever I walked past.

It was a dark and foreboding place. A high fence sheltered it from the outside world, and the house itself appeared to be sunk into the hill.

If I happened to pause as I went by I could feel a familiarity.

I had never been inside the front gate as far as I knew. My mother had told me to keep away, to not venture inside the gate as bad things had happened there.

When pressed, she would say it was best not spoken about.

The inhabitants of No.18 were a collection of aged sisters. They dressed in black, they shuffled in old age, one was a gardener and was often seen weeding or pruning, another could be seen each Wednesday, on pension day, pulling her shopping cart to the supermarket, head down, ignoring all that surrounded her.

On a bright Sunday morning, I found one of the sisters, Miss Florence, out in the street. She looked troubled, disorientated, she signalled for me to help, I ran to tell my mother, it turned out one of the sisters was ill.

I met my mother as she came out, the ambulance had been called, and the ill sister taken away. Mum looked at me and said: “I’m glad you didn’t go in there, it’s not a pleasant place. I’m glad you don’t remember what happened.”

My mother years later told me what had happened. How I had been caught in the house, the sister’s brother was an unpleasant man, he frightened me, wouldn’t let me go home, I must have been terrified as when I was let go, mum called the doctor and dad went and spoke to the brother who protested he was only being friendly.

It explained the feelings I had walking past.

 

Written for: https://reinventionsreena.wordpress.com/2020/03/19/reenas-exploration-challenge-127/

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Tale Weaver – #267 – Fairytale – Fairyland – 19th March – Clert’s Garden.

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Clert had been head gardener at the Fairyton Garden for as long as anyone could remember. His family had been gardeners for several generations since great grandfather Dlert had been caught pilfering secret herbs from Madam Floss’ garden and his punishment was to look after the fledgling town garden. To everyone’s surprise, he found he liked gardening, and so it became a skill passed on to future generations.

Now it was Clert’s responsibility, and he took it all very seriously.

He had enacted no-fly zones to preserve the flora, had designated other areas as picnic space and in one far-flung corner of the garden had made a lover’s section, with quiet and solitude much to the thanks of some and the ire of others.

Fairyton was, for the most part, a bit of a back water, it was off the major fly paths, the fairy highway that linked the major cities, but it possessed a bustling community, it had everything you needed in a town, every shop imaginable and on Sunday’s a thriving market selling everything a fairy might need to live more than comfortably.

It was Fairyton who built the first Retirement Home for Aging Fairies. Clert’s mother was a resident there, and he had therefore spent time working on the Home’s gardens with his mum who despite her advanced years still loved to get her hands in the dirt though nowadays she didn’t know the difference between a dandelion and a ruby rose. However, Clert didn’t mind as his mum was out in the sunshine and she still knew who he was, well somedays at least.

As the day drew to a close Clert took his mother’s arm and guided her back into Retirement Home, she thanked him for the gardening and said she was expecting his father at any minute. Clert rolled his eyes and told himself to humour her and said he was looking forward to seeing his father too. “You look a lot like him,” said his mum as he headed out the door.

He returned to the garden in the centre of Fairyton and spent a good hour admiring the colours he had propagated, he flitted from one to the other, his heart full of pride.

 

Written for: https://mindlovemiserysmenagerie.wordpress.com/2020/03/19/tale-weaver-267-fairytale-fairyland-19th-march/

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Crimson’s Creative Challenge #71 – Art and Crisp

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Crisp, my aged companion had very definite opinions as to what constituted art.

She was especially biased against graffiti. She saw it as a desecration.

“They should be made to clean it off,” she said her tone laced with distain.

“I’m sure the artist thought it was his best,” I remarked.

“Poppycock!”

I could sense she was getting hot under the collar.

“My uncle Harvey liked to draw on the walls of the barn back home. He claimed it was artistic license, my Aunt called it obscenity and was forever wandering the farm with a bucket of paint and a brush covering over the images he drew. Uncle Harvey had a fixation on the penis. My Aunt explained her husband had never gotten over his arrival at puberty.”

That memory seemed to return Crisp to a time she’d rather forget as she’d been confronted more than once as a young girl by her Uncle’s art work.

 

Written for: https://crispinakemp.com/2020/03/18/crimsons-creative-challenge-71/

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Sunday Writing Prompt “Diner” – Hell’s Kitchen

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When it came eternity, there was only one eatery worth talking about, Hell’s Kitchen.

Located inside the gates of Hell and run by a very large soul called Bruno, the Kitchen served the most delicious food. In particular, it was famous for being the only place in eternity you could get decent sushi.

Bruno had lived an interesting life as a florist. It seemed unlikely that a man such as Bruno would possess culinary skills like he did but as he said on more than one occasion: “It’s amazing what you pick up dealing flowers and stuff.” By ‘stuff’ it was known he learned his trade growing a variety of plants and fungi that resulted in many a lost evening in one way or another.

Today the Kitchen was humming as it always did. For many of Hell’s inhabitants, the kitchen provided a short break from the endless repetition that was all things Hell. Admittedly Bruno was tarred with the same brush, for his menu was the same, day in and out but that never bothered his customers as everything tasted more delicious than anyone imaged and after the day most of them had the Kitchen was respite like no other.

The unique aspect of Hell’s Kitchen was that it attracted both dark angels from Hell and a few white feathery angels from upstairs, so to speak.

It took a bit of convincing for a heavenly angel to gain admittance, but as it was well known, where there was a will, there was a way, even if angelic deities didn’t really have wills as such.

For most heavenly entities, there was a sure-fire way to gain entry, (no pun intended). Heaven was the only place you could get a decent ham sandwich, and no matter how hard Bruno tried, and as simple as the whole process appeared to be, he was unable to make a sandwich like they did in Heaven. So, any angel wanting to eat in the Kitchen, and usually Bruno’s sushi, they would arrive at Hell’s Kitchen with a ham sandwich wrapped in a brown paper bag, present it to the doorman and gain entry.

The angels when eating in the Kitchen were usually placed in a back corner as they had a nasty habit of emitting a light so bring it took all the fun away from the locals enjoying their chosen repast.

Bruno was busy preparing his fiftieth sushi for the day, Dolores, his waitress, was waiting tables, floating from one to another, leaving a trail of ash where ever she went. Ralph his drinks man was concentrating on his drinks counter, getting it wrong more often than not but such was his reputation the worse it tasted, the more challenging, and his customers, after another rough day looked forward to any sort of challenge.

Bruno was on his third ham sandwich when there was a commotion among the cess-pit cleaners. They were often at each other throats, never happy and always smelling foul. As there was no waste in eternity, Bruno wondered how and where their work place was, but somethings he figured weren’t the trouble of asking about. They were an obnoxious bunch of riff-raff, for obvious reasons.

All and any disputes were settled quickly by Bruno, you could easily be banned from the Kitchen, or made to eat what you didn’t order.

With order restored, Bruno went back to what he did best, munch on a ham sandwich and roll some more sushi.

 

Written for: https://mindlovemiserysmenagerie.wordpress.com/2020/03/15/sunday-writing-prompt-diner/

 

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