Story Game!

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! I'm outta here.

I'm going home for Christmas, and I'll be spending time with real live people in awkward face-to-face situations. So, regrettably, I won't be here to blog. I'm leaving you with a story game to play. Play as much as you want.

Here's how this works. I'll begin a story and you continue it in the comments. Each commentor will pick up where the last one left off. Silliness is encouraged. When I get back, sometime after the first of the year, I'll repost the story. If I need to, I'll try to tie up any loose ends and give it an ending. Then I'll post a link back to each of the participants under the title "Contributing Authors".

Our last story had a lot of participation and was great fun. I'm really looking forward to seeing what you guys come up with this time.


Here's my start:

Frosty the...

TT: New Years Resolutions

Thirteen New Years Resolutions I Won't Make

1. Copy the phone book.

2. Grow out my toenails.

3. Take daily three hour naps.

4. Shave a dirty word in my hair.

5. Gain weight.

6. Decoupage my kitchen with junk mail.

7. Memorize Midsummer Night's Dream in Pig Latin.

8. Build a scale model of the Titanic from dryer lint (I've found dryer lint to be a very difficult medium to work in. If you have tips, please share.)

9. Begin a rigorous underwear ironing regimen.

10. Purposely dye all the whites in the house pink.

11. Teach the dog to bark at the dryer (oh wait, she already does that).

12. Drink more coffee. (I'm not sure this one's even physically possible. How many pots do you drink per day?)

13. Make a commitment to write at least fifty unedited words about my personal life every day and publish them for free on the Internet... oh wait, I already do that.



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WW: What I'm Doing Today

Note: I don't know where this flag is from. This is something an old-fashioned sign painter in town needs made into a vinyl decal, and since I'm distracted getting ready for Christmas, and since the cute dog pictures are all blurry, this is what you're stuck with today too. If you know this flag, clue me in. Otherwise I'll have figure it out and let you know later.

Public Service Announcement: Please Don't Hug the Marilyn

As things really accelerate toward Christmas I have a phenomenon to deal with that I'm not looking forward to... namely, unwanted hugs.

Don't get me wrong, I understand that most people who hand out holiday hugs mean well. In fact, the older gentleman at church that hands out hugs doesn't bother me.

I also know that some don't mean so well. What makes me angry... I really do mean spitting mad, is the humor hugger. This wanton terrorist of physical affection KNOWS I don't like hugs and insists on hugging me because he, or most likely she, thinks it's hilariously funny that I don't like hugs.

People, stop and think for a moment about why a person might be uncomfortable with this kind of intimate contact. I will give you a straight answer if you ask, but you don't really want to know. Just because I don't want a full body smoosh from you doesn't mean I don't like you. Just keep your arms and your boobs to yourself. Okay?

Merry Christmas!

Manic Monday: Carol

I don't know any people named Carol that I really feel compelled to write about, and those study carols they had in high school do not bring back good memories for some reason, so I guess that just leaves Christmas carols. Here's one you probably haven't heard.

We three folks
in Colorado,
driving slow
to Kansas we are.

Eastward leading
still believing,
family's worth driving
ten hours for.

Jasmine's watching
a DVD,
'cause nothing says Christmas
like lots of TV.

Mom and Andy
have NPR,
till the station
wanders too far.

Eastward leading
still believing,
family's worth driving
ten hours for.

BYBS: My Church

This is an awful picture really. I have a great camera but I think I need a better photographer. Anyway, I am grateful for my church, and I look forward t going most Sundays, even when I don't necessarily look forward to getting into a cold truck to get there.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

I'm sorry the above picture is so blurry. This is a picture of a painting of Our Lady of Guadalupe. It was a lovely painting. I don't know who made it. If you want to see a clearer picture and hear the story from both a religious and non-religious perspective, you can click HERE and read the Wikepedia article about it. I'm just giving my own limited cliff-notes-style perspective here.
Here is a picture of Jasmine dressed up as Our Lady of Guadalupe, and if this doesn't leave you scratching your head and saying, "Huh?" it must be because you haven't heard the story. First I'll tell you the story, and then I'll describe how Jasmine got to play the part (along with another lovely young woman who was much more suited to it).

A long time ago, when New Spain (Mexico) was a colony of Spain, there was a man named Juan Diego and he was working in his field when vision of Mary appeared to him and told him to tell the bishop to build an abbey on that spot. So Juan went to the bishop and the bishop said something along the lines of, "yeah right". "Show me some kind of sign and maybe I'll believe you."

Juan went to the place where he saw the vision and she appeared to him again and he said, "there has to be a better messenger than me."

She said, "no, no, I want you to deliver this message". "Come back tomorrow and I'll give you a sign that the bishop will recognize".

Well, Juan's uncle got very sick and Juan thought he was going to die, so missed his appointment, but the Virgin appeared to him and reminded him to go do what she told him and promised the uncle was going to be fine. Then Juan went to the hill where he saw the vision the first time and there were roses blooming in the snow.

He gathered up the roses in his Tilma (an over-shirt kind of a thing) and trotted off to see the bishop who fell to his knees when Juan unfolded the tilma because there was a perfect image of Mary miraculously imprinted into the fabric. The Abbey got built and everybody lived happily ever after.

But wait, it wasn't just any image of Mary. This Mary is called Morena which means dark-skinned. It was an image of Mary that the natives of Mexico could identify with and she promised to always protect them.

The fifth grade class always acts out this story on the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Jasmine is in the fifth grade. People that look like Jasmine are kind of rare around here. She could have been excluded from the celebration. She was not. In fact the other fair-haired girl in her class got to be a reader during their play at the celebration. We had two bishops, two Marys, one Juan, and two readers. There were over ten Marys in the practice but the celebration falls on a Wednesday night so most of them couldn't make it. (I didn't post pictures of the other kids because I don't like to put up other kids pictures on the Internet without their parents permission)

Our Story: A Modern Christmas Tale

'Twas the night before Christmas, and I had just stubbed my toe on the coffee table.

I said a few choice words, and then discovered my son was listening.

He asked me why I said what I said. I replied, "But alas, my child, it just came to my head
the coffee table use to be way over there...who moved it into the center of the room?"


I thought for a moment, then continued, "damn dasher and prancer those fanciful fools! This year I'll bet Santa has a surprise up his sleeve, you see he's way behind on his mortgage payments so rather than leave presents he's taking some back. After he left this house he headed for the pawn shop in the nearest ghetto. You'd better sleep with your mouth shut-he might try to snag your gold teeth!"


"But alas, after selling off Mrs. Claus's jewelry and some toys taken back from children he was "on the fence" about, he grabbed his magic reindeer whip, "Go Rudolph, Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid...", and got onto his sleigh headed towards the south pole. Unfortunately his dyslexia was kicking in again, or maybe he was just 'bi-polar'. At any rate he was headed for what he thought was home when suddenly something from the ground below caught his eye. It was ..."

At that point my son rolled his eyes and interupted, "that's worse than the excuses I give you for foul language." Then he hung up his stocking and stalked off to bed with visions of PlayStations dancing in his head.

Contributing Authors

Matt-Man
Sandee (Comedy +)
Lois Grebowski
katherine.
Bluepaintred
Jeff B
Mags
Steven
stev

TT: warmth=cheer

Thirteen Things you can do to stay warm in cold weather.

1. Take your spouse (or, only if you are not married, a partner, or some other living person that you like and get along with fairly well) to bed early.

2. Stand right under the heater vent at Wal-Mart.

3. Wear six layers of clothing (this makes it hard to move but in Spring everybody will compliment you on your weight loss).

4. Make baked potatoes in the microwave and put them in your pockets.

5. Jumping jacks.

7. Turn on the hair dryer and point it down the front of your shirt (or pants if nobody is looking).

8. Cover yourself in Vaseline.

9. Wear dark colors and stand in direct sunlight.

10. Change into dryer fresh clothing every fifteen minutes.

11. Pull your arms into your shirt.

12. Put your feet in your pockets.

13. Wear a knit hat all the time. (this has the added bonus of getting you out of hairstyling in the morning)

I never said they were good ideas.
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WW: Snow on wood.

Some Writing Links because Bluepaintred Asked

Quickplot is a very simple program you can use to outline... It only takes text, but I'm finding it very useful. It could make lists and outlines for anything but I think it was designed for writers. You can download it HERE and there are some other resources on that page.

Keynote is a program I also have some experience with. It's also free. It has a few more bells and whistles. You can add color and I recall drawing a map and sticking it in there so I think it takes pictures too. It seemed a little buggy and I like Quickplot's simplicity, but the color was fun to play with.

Here and Here are some lists of other resources and Here is a link to an almost inexhaustible web page of information and resources with writers communities where you can even have your work critiqued... I'm trying not to get too involved in all this stuff right now because it seems to drain my ability to actually produce anything, but I've learned a lot from Holly Lisle's web site both before and after she stopped administering it herself. I've been failing at writing fiction for a very long time. I even wrote some articles for them that they actually paid me for. You can find one HERE.

Random resources

Paperback Writer (a very interesting blog)

The Purple Crayon (A children's book writer's resource)

Writer's Market (I'm not going to bother subscribing again till I actually have something to sell)

Let it Snowflake.

It's Tuesday which is the day of the week when I stand on my own two feet and post something that nobody prompted me to post. I'm fresh out of whimsy. I'll have to order some more in.

You might recall the big Job that recently went bad? It is beginning to resemble the biblical person of that name. I mean really, if I were to write this up as a piece of fiction nobody would believe it. Murphy's got his hands all over this thing and if I could get my hands around that evil Murphy's neck I'd put him out of all our misery. It would be funny if thousands of dollars I desperately need weren't at risk, but I'm all emoted out today. Life will, after all, go on... they eliminated debtors prisons years ago (My dad told me this. It is true?). My family are all mostly healthy and we love each other and things really do look better around the corner. I am blessed.
I'm writing again (I mean besides this drivel that I subject you all to every day). I have the zany idea of trying something different. I heard somewhere that if what I've been doing isn't working I shouldn't do that anymore and my recent inability to finish a writing project led me to try something called the Snowflake Method... anybody out there have any experience with it? So far so good... and that's all I'm saying. I don't want to jinx it. I'm using Quickplot to do the outlining. I'm too lazy to look for the link right now, if you want it let me know in the comments and I'll post it.

Don't worry. Tomorrow's Wednesday (or it probably will be by the time you read this) and that means you don't have to read anything I write, you can just look at the picture.

Manic Monday: Ornament

You can tell a lot about somebody by the kind of lawn ornaments they have. Let's take a look at my preconceived notions of the owners of particular kinds of lawn ornaments.

Gazing Ball: A real gardener. A popular person who pays attention to fashion.

Plastic Pink Flamingo: A partier that's not really worried about what the neighbors might think.

Gnome: A bookish person with a sense of humor.

Plywood cutouts of people bending over: An older couple that isn't easily offended and has lots of time on their hands.

Lawn Jockey: I don't know. I don't get it.

Mary in a bathtub: A frugal religious Catholic person.

Angels: My mom has one of these and she's sort of a cross between a gazing ball kind of person and a pink flamingo... but I'm not sure if that holds true for all angel ornamenting people.

Fairies: A person that likes fantasy and enjoys the idea of freedom from the mundane.

I have no lawn ornaments. In fact I have no lawn because it seems like such a waste of water to me. This is sort of like the person without kids trying to tell you what's wrong with your kids. I think, if I did have a lawn ornament it would be a fairy or a gnome. Do you have one? Am I way off base with one of my descriptions?

BYBS: Fuzzy Pink Pajamas

My blessing for today is a pink terry suit Mother-In-Law bought me for Christmas several years ago. When I first got it, it shed little pink fuzzies everywhere, but it has settled down now and reached a zen level of fuzziness which it shares with me in its own pink way.

We all need at least one outfit to wear that has absolutely no dignity about it whatsoever. I do not have bunny slippers. My slippers are a nice green boiled wool and they are very comfy, but these pajamas serve the purpose of bunny slippers in my life. Whimsy and comfort and a definite message of, "I was not expecting you and you should probably leave now," to anybody showing up before church on Sunday or after about 7:00 in the evening on a Saturday.

Do you have pink fuzzy pajamas?

Grandma Goes to New York

Imagine your grandmother was traveling with that nice widower she met at bingo and they were in New York to see a show and she fell down some icy steps in front of the hotel and broke a hip.

They rushed her to the hospital and did all the tests and the doctor, who she doesn't know and speaks with a thick accent she describes simply as foreign, said they have to operate. Meanwhile Mr. Widower took the first plane home at the first hint of trouble.

What could you do? You want Grandma to get the best possible care and you don't want her to languish for weeks in a strange hospital without her family.

You could get an air ambulance to bring her to a hospital you know and trust, and have a doctor she feels comfortable give her the kind of care she deserves after all those years of sneaking you chocolate and helping you defy your parents overly-conservative non-spoiling rules.


Here are some important things I learned about transporting sick people from airambulance.net

1. An air ambulance is most cost effective if the patient has to be transported more than 300 miles.


2. Family members and even pets can come along with notice and preparation.


3. A patient that can sit up safely and relatively comfortably can take a regular commercial flight and have specially trained medical personnel attend him/her during the flight.


4. airambulance.net has a hub in Florida but they have planes all over the country and transport patients across the nation.


Isn't the Internet a wonderful place? This kind of thing could happen to anybody, really, and you wouldn't know what to do about it without the world wide web. Click below to visit the web site and learn more.

air ambulance florida

(this is a paid post, but I still had fun writing it)

A Link

To a picture of my husband the hottie ------> HERE (I'm having trouble with this link. You can get to the same place HERE by scrolling down clicking on his name Andy Glazar... but it irritates me that I can't link directly.)

He took offense at my Christmas list, saying that I didn't ask for any maids for him. If we got Hugh and Antonio though... I'm thinking that we could get whoever he might want to be the pool girl and gardener. Drew Barrymore? That chick who plays the invisible girl in The Fantastic Four? For some reason I have trouble remembering the names of nice looking actresses. I would imagine that my readers might be able to make suggestions.

I'm listening to Car Talk, trying to catch up on my blog visiting, and marveling at the number of folks playing Story Game this week. It's going to be challenging tying up the loose ends. Scroll down to play. (Andy, Dad, Debbie, and the rest of you who read sometimes but don't have blogs... you can comment too, as Anonymous. I just won't be able to link you up. You all have a 10 PR in my world anyway).

Story Game

TGIF

I'm late posting today because I was lettering a truck for one of my favorite customers... a local tractor company. We inherited this customer from the former owner of the business and so their trucks have been lettered by "us" for over ten years... which means I know exactly how they want them to look, and that saves time. Also, they have a garage I get to letter the trucks in, which is wonderful this time of year.

Lets do a story game. Here's how this works. I start the story and then you continue in the comments. The story will run for at least a week (though you may have to click into the archives to see it later in the week). You can add to it as many times as you want. Each commentor takes up where the last one left off. Silliness is encouraged. I'll give it an ending if it doesn't have one yet, try to tie up any loose ends, and repost it next Friday. When I post it I will link up to each of the participants under the heading "contributing authors". Thanks so much for playing along.

Here's my start:

'Twas the night before...

TT: All I Want For Christmas is

Thirteen Things I Probably Won't Get for Christmas

But if you happen to be planning to buy me one that would be okay.

1. Space Shuttle

2. Robot Vacuum Cleaner

3. Season passes to Keystone Ski Area for two adults and one ten-year-old

4. Down-Filled Suit

5. New Car

6. New Muffler for my Old Car

7. Eight bedroom, three bath house in Wheatridge with a whirlpool tub, attached greenhouse/sunroom, attached garage, wood stove, new kitchen, hardwood floors, fenced yard, and a uniformed maid and butler (preferably Antonio Banderas and Hugh Grant but in whichever order they'd like).

8. Membership to Curves and child-free time to go.

9. Bathing suit that optically removes 50 pounds.

10. A free get-out-of-filing-tax-return card.

11. Free health insurance and dental.

12. A magic pill that permanently removes leg hair.

13. An end to War... not just this one, but all of them.

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Whooohooo!

I haven't blogged about all the trials and tribulations of real estate, but it hasn't been the easiest profession for Andy to break into. I'm really proud of him for his persistence, optimism, and the level of sincere caring he brings to each new client.

These days he's working for real estate dot com (I'll post a link to his office's web page as soon as I find it) and I have to say that we've been very happy with them. They really seem to be there for their agents and that really makes it easier for an agent to be there for the client.

He just drew up a contract and he has a closing on the 21st!

That's something to put us in the Christmas Spirit.

WW: Guilty Pleasures

Insert Clever Title Here

There isn't anything cheerful enough going on in my life for me to blog about it and I'm tired of whining... so here are some random thoughts for a Monday night or a Tuesday morning...

1. My page statistics tell me it is most likely a Tuesday morning as you read this.

2. What has a thousand legs but can't walk? Five hundred pairs of pants.

3. I stole that joke from a muppet.

4. I swear I heard on the radio that some branch of the military is having a crotch durability problem with it's uniforms.

5. I asked Matt-Man to investigate but he's been busy with the issue of Santa's Weight Problem.

6. It would be nice of me to link to Matt-Man's article and I probably will tomorrow some time, at which point this sentence will be obsolete but I will be too lazy to remove it and anyway I could use it as an example of a run-on sentence in a homeschooling lesson.

7. Goodnight. (or good morning)

Or... We could go to the zoo.

I love a good zoo. I love warm weather. What better place could there be to visit this time of year than San Diego? In January the temperatures are in the fifties (according to Wikepedia), and that's about as cold as it gets. And the zoo? Let me tell you about the zoo...

It has more than 4,000 animals with 800 different kinds and 700,000 plants on more than 100 acres. It is so big that there are tour buses and an aerial tram that you take from one area to another. The exhibits are arranged around habitat types and are naturalistic so that you see lots of animals close to each other that naturally live close to each other.

The San Diego zoo also has the largest population of Giant Pandas outside of mainland China. I've never seen a panda in person. It's on my to do list. Right after vacation in a warm place during cold weather.

The newest exhibit is the Monkey Trails and Forest Tails Habitat. It includes animals from Africa and Asia in what the zoo calls a "three dimensional journey into the depths of a tropical rain forest". I've never been in a real tropical rain forest, but I've never met a zoo rain forest exhibit I didn't like. Visit a rain forest is on my list too.

Not interested in monkeys and pandas? There's an orangutan there that has her own My Space page.

After seeing Janey in person I'd like to see the rest of San Diego too... and the best way to do both is to go to http://www.trustedtours.com/ and sign up for the San Diego Passport Attraction Package. This package is great because it gives you the zoo with unlimited buss and aerial tram access but you also get to see the art museum, the maritime museum, a harbor tour and your choice of the SEAL tour (an amphibious vehicle tour) or the trolley tour (Old Town with lots of stops). I think I'd take the trolley tour.

In fact, if you sign up for the Trusted Travels newsletter at
http://www.trustedtours.com/newsletter.aspx
from Trusted Tours and Attractions, you will be automatically entered to win 4 free tickets to attractions and tours in one of 21 different cities including San Diego and Key West ! But don't wait too long, you have to sign up before December 14th.

San Diego Zoo information is from http://www.sandiegozoo.org/zoo/index.html

Manic Monday: Ship

-Ship
when used as a suffix, means.
1. The quality or condition of.
2. The status, rank, or office of.
3. The art of or functioning of.

I give to you, for your consideration, the word-- Mothership.

For instance, when addressing that most august of individuals, you might say, "Yes Your Mothership, as you wish so will it be done".

Or there might be a class on mothership that teaches how not to go into hysterics at the sight of a child's blood so that the band-aid can be properly affixed and the booboo kissed without alarming the child.

When a person (male or female) has completed the class, it might be said of her/him that she/he has displayed an astonishing degree of mothership.

Wee Beasties on Display!

I do own a microscope. It was given to me used by a friend and we had to buy a light bulb for the illuminator (fancy word for light) before we could use it. It's good for seeing microscopic wigglies from the fish tank. We have some Paramecium-like things and Stentor in there, I think. They are a lot of fun to watch.

I am irritated that the highest powered objective has a very scratched lens and there are lots of things we can't see very well, but it was free so I can't complain too much.


This microscope that I found at http://www.opticsplanet.com/ would be a wonderful educational tool for Jasmine and a great toy for me. It has all the bells and whistles that I really want in a microscope-- an Abbey condenser, the light (mirrors do not work very well), an iris diaphragm, three objectives, a blue filter for really nice resolution, and it comes with a two year warranty for only $169.00 (which of course I don't have right now but is a good deal). Shipping is free (on orders of $29.95 and more) and they offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee.

They sell a lot of other stuff too from flashlights and expensive sunglasses to binoculars and telescopes. If you need something optical, you should check them out. They have an 800 number and lots of links to advice on how to choose a gift when you don't know much about rifle scopes or night vision binoculars.

Click one of the links below to see their great stuff.

sunglasses
Best Sellers
Gift Guide

This is a paid post. I label all the posts I do for IZEA as paid posts (look for the label at the bottom of this and previous posts) so you can always tell when I'm being paid to talk about something I'm interested in.

BYBS: Comforting Ritual

Both Jasmine and I are feeling under the weather and I've had a rotten, scary week. Next week isn't looking much more prosperous at this point and so I got to thinking about what I can do to feel better.

Homemade soup. A hot shower. Hot tea. An interesting book. Warm slippers and comfy sweats. Maybe some Yoga is on the agenda too.

What do you do when life hands you lemons?

Our Story: Alien Bunny Utopia

Here's the story we worte last week:

In the meadow we can build a paradise without people. Inhabited soley by aliens; Nice cuddly, soft aliens who like to develop animal husbandry skills by raising cuddly, soft bunny rabbits.

But wait, the meadow is becoming overrun with rabbits. So the aliens sit down and have a nice little chat with them about the joys of abstinence.

Contributing Authors:

Sandee (Comedy +)

katherine.

Bluepaintred

Matt-Man