What do you slice about on those days where absolutely nothing slice worthy happened and the clock is winding down?
You write: Absolutely nothing slice worthy happened and the clock is winding down.
Oh what a BORING day.
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Today is Day 12 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Come see how others are slicing it up today.
Shawn stood at the stove, fry pan in hand as warmed-up yet another of James’ impromptu dinners. The man had a gift for taking leftovers and whatever else he could find and conjure up deliciousness. It was the only way to get a decent meal in Shawn sometimes. He let work keep him up all manners of hours and a proper meal oft fell by the wayside in the process. James made sure he ate.
After three other roommates had come and gone in a two year span. James signed on. They gave each other a million reason to walk away from being roommates. Yet in a short few weeks of living together there had been a marked difference in the daily routine of the place. Holly claimed it was like the apartment had a cold draft that someone finally sealed and the place was warm again. Shawn knew the draft was him and the warmth was James. He was always the mar, the blemish, the thing wrong in the equation. Until James that is, who arrived with his own issues. His temper being the worst.
Normally Shawn would use the microwave, but he had conducted a food experiment that had not gone quite as expected. James understandably had refused to clean it this time as he had all the other times, but the man was a hard-wired germaphobe. Shawn would often just wait it out knowing James would cave in and do it. Still, every now and then the man would raise a brow and get a stubborn streak. And it would be like sand in his shoe he couldn’t seem to shake out until it was resolved. This was three days later – that was a record. Shawn knew he really was going to have to do something about it. He couldn’t stand it if James employed the silent treatment again.
Over a year ago, the first and last time Shawn made a huge mess and didn’t clean, James absolutely did not speak to him. Being petty, after a week, Shawn had moved the sofa to block the front door, delaying him when he knew James was running late. Shawn sat at the desk on his, earphones on, acting engrossed on his laptop. He looked up just in time to see James eyes turned stormy as he glared at Shawn. He still said nothing as he lifted the couch, flipped it over where it landed on the side table smashing it and went on his way leaving the door wide open. Holly, their landlady heard the crash and came running upstairs, passing a furious James along the way. She walked up to him and smacked on the back of his head so hard he saw stars ordering him to fix it. He knew she did not mean the table. Shawn was not in the least surprised when the cost of the table was charged to his share of the rent. By then he had cleaned the apartment, apologized. He almost cried in relief when James very efficiently and justifiably proceeded to curse him out.
Somehow they made the worse seem better in each other. Now at nearly two years together it was so much improved. James made him do better. No James made him want to do better. Shawn knew James learned to better manage his temper from dealing with him. They balanced each other.
Shawn sighed looking back at the microwave with guilt. He turned off the stove and got the cleaning supplies.
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Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie | Music Challenge #24: “Million Reasons” by Lady Gaga
The Sunday Whirl – Wordle #342
Mar, Draft, Stormy, Sand, Charge, Silence, Fry, Star, Wired, Manner, Gift, Guilt
I get an idea for a story I’m working on as I come in after one in the morning from hanging out with friends. I’m sleepy, but I want to get the idea down while the muse is hot. I hangup my outerwear and head for the computer.
I am happily typing away, occasionally closing my eyes as I try to visualize a scene while writing it down. You know –If she lifts her head up, when and why did she put her head down? – His hand is on the door, handle or knob?– things like that. I get a bit done, but I am sleepy. I convince myself to flesh out this one scene before I head for bead.
I close my eyes only for a moment to visualize the scene. When I open my eyes an hour had passed on my computer. Crap, I fell asleep, I’m clearly sleepier than I thought- fine off to bed I go.
I am in bed when I see my clock radio. It is relic from the 90s. Long before people started using their cell phones, before such things got all digitized fancy. I have to set it manually, but still works so I keep it. I look at the time wondering why it’s an hour off, then realized I hadn’t fallen asleep for an hour…
…Daylight savings had clicked in.
D’oh!
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Today is Day 11 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Come see how others are slicing it up today.
Going to a friend’s place for Game Nite. Just a BYOB gathering of a few friends to chit-chat and yes, play games. Board games, card games whatever. I always try to bring a dish. Learning one of the friends attending has gone gluten free, I decide to make a spinach-artichoke dip. It’s one I’ve made before. The five ingredients are simple enough. It does not take a lot of time to make. It’s easy to transport. I can pick everything up in the morning. Perfect, right? Right!
Yeah, that’s about where this tale goes a little south. I mean seriously the recipe has five freaking ingredients, how hard is it to find one? As it turns out harder than I would have thought. What was the one thing I could not find? Artichokes.
I hit my usual market that until today has not failed me. None what-so-ever. I expect not to find it fresh. I understand is not something consumed a lot of in that market, but they usually have it canned or in a jar. Nix. Fine, I get everything else I need and make my way to market number two a few blocks away. Nein. I had not brought my shopping cart because knew I could carry everything back in one trip. As I headed for a third market, my fingers and my knees are beginning to feel it. Nyet. Three strikes and you’re out right? Not quite.
Must be something comforting about the number three. People always give up after three.
– Sherlock Holmes / BBC’s “Sherlock”
So, I take a cue from “Sherlock” and try a fourth market. Nada.
What the…?!
Has my entire neighborhood given up on the vegetable in any form, or had the last emergency shopping from the last snow storm depleted all the markets in an eight block radius?
Seriously, it’s call a spinach-artichoke dip. I kind of need it?
And because I’m stubborn, now an hour from when I first started this trek, fingers, knees and back making their unhappiness known, I try a fifth.
Nix. Nein. Nyet. Nada. Nope!
I’m NOT getting on a bus and officially throw in the towel.
It’s going to be my spinach dip. They’ll love it!
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Today is Day 10 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Come see how others are slicing it up this Saturday.
I went to the movies to see “A Wrinkle in Time” based on the novel by Madeleine L’Engle. A fellow slicer bemoaned earlier this week about novels versus film adaptations – as in if you’ve read the book, especially if you liked the book, don’t go see the movie. I fully understand that viewpoint. Rarely are films as good as the source material. Including this one.
Granted it is a little messy in driving the plot forward in some places, but that’s almost a trope with adaptations. It is lavish and so beautifully filmed. The costuming details are amazing. Visually stunning. The casting is spot on. Oprah Winfrey, Mindy Kaling and Reese Witherspoon are gems in their rolls. Storm Reid as movie lead, Meg Murray, is a doll. She captivates every scene she is in and she’s in almost every scene of the movie. Deric McCabe as Charles Wallace is simply adorable.
Still… It’s not the book.
You saw it coming, stop it,. Granted, I have not read the book in nearly two decades, but there are passages I do remember, that did not make the cut. All in all, with Ava DuVernay at the helm as director. it is a solid film and I’m glad I saw it.
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Today is Day 9 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Come see how others are slicing it up today.
When I told someone I need to chill this is not exactly what I meant…
…Though it is very representative of my mood right now.
Frosted over, but trying to push through the madness. I seriously chose the wrong year to give up coffee for Lent.
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Today is Day 8 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Let’s how other are slicing and hopefully doing a better job of chilling out today…
Mr. Sandman has chased Ms. Insomnia around the mulberry bush for three days. I may have slept a total of ten hours twixt these three days.
Maybe it’s all the snow that has fallen on my fair city these past few hours, I don’t know. When Insomnia stopped to take a gander at the pristine snowy city streets Sandman finally caught up to the elusive chick. They are battling still, but I feel she’s losing this round – rapidly and I couldn’t be happier.
My head feels like the marionette string has been cut, I can barely keep my head up. The result being one yawn filled slice before the hay hits me <— not a typo.
G’nite y’all.
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Today is Day 7 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
I write. I write documentation at work. I write creatively every where else I can. For instance this is me, during my cruise working on a story while waiting to dock.
In the Broadway show “Hamilton: An American Musical”, at the end of Act I there’s a number called Non Stop in which the friends and family of Alexander Hamilton both praise and bemoan the prolific wordsmith.
“How do you write like tomorrow won’t arrive?
How do you write like you need it to survive?
How do you write ev’ry second you’re alive?
Ev’ry second you’re alive? Ev’ry second you’re alive?”
This is me to a smaller degree, but not by much depending on who you ask.
If I have an idea I write or at least try to write a note to myself to revisit an idea later. Trains. Boats. Planes. At a bar. In the middle of a party wherever I am.
However the downside of that is on occasions like today, where I find myself writing so much about the whole fruit, I forget I need to be writing about – you guessed it – the slice.
So for the second day -er- night in a row. I skate in just under the midnight hour.
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Today is Day 6 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
One of the interesting things about my daily commute is the hill. New York City is not known for its hills. There’s a reason we have an area call Flatlands in Brooklyn and the magical phenomenon called Manhattanhenge which occurs a couple of times a year.. Then you travel north to upper Manhattan where there are inclines that can rival San Francisco. The train station where I exit my evening commute home just happens to be halfway to the bottom of one. There is even a simple marker in the park near one end of the station that notes the area as the highest natural elevation on Manhattan.
Suffice to say at over 400 feet deep it’s a long climb from the subway platform to the street level. Essentially, we are talking a five story tenement building climb.
Normally this is not an issue as there are escalators to help. Two going up and one down, plus a standard flights of stairs. A week ago the usual escalator that goes down went out of service for major repairs, scheduled to be back in service, I hope, next week. As a result, one of the usually two escalators going up, was switched to a down escalator. There was a reason for there being two escalators that went up. This station is a busy station. Two are needed for the volume of ridership that disembark at the station. Down to only one working up escalator the inevitable happened. It gave its all – and died. So this evening after a long day of work, I exit the train and just know by the number or people walking to the right instead of left that the up escalator is broken. This has happened no less than five times last year that I can recall.
Granted, I could walk to the other end of the station and take the elevator, (yes the station also has elevators), but then I would have to walk that same distance back to continue home. What I save in convenience and accessibility, I loose in time. I don’t consider the trade-off worth it, so I climb the steps.
When this happens I dubbed them my “Rocky” steps. For climbing them is very reminiscent of the Philadelphia Art Museum Steps the titular character had trouble climbing. For like Rocky and his steps at the beginning, I have yet to make it up the entire flight of steps without stopping at least twice. I’m faster than a couple of people, much more are faster than I, leaving my in the smoke of their speed. I have no shame, when I need to stop and catch my breath for a moment for a moment, I stop and wheeze and pant. As I stood at the bottom step and looked up at the daunting task ahead of me, I figured today was going to be no different.
Or so I thought…
Today, I plugged in my iPod grabbed a banister and started to climb. It was Drowning Pool and I trudging up the stairs. I didn’t look I simply climbed. I felt my first twinge telling me I was going to need to stop. I looked up and to my surprise I was more than three-quarters up the stairs!!
But… but… But How?!?!?
I had never made it that far up without stopping, I was not going to stop now! I continued climbing. My knees started complaining. I looked up and could have counted the steps if I stopped. I wasn’t stopping. I could easily count I had about a dozen steps left when my lungs started their wheeze.
Are you kidding me? Less than a dozen. Not so easy, let alone peasey, but…
Oh! My! God! I! Did! It!
No, I did not jump up and down like Rocky Balboa. 1- I was too out of breath and 2- while I’m sure many would have gotten the reference, 3 – I would have looked absolutely ridiculous in my suit and winter coat jumping up an down on the pavement.
I climb the steps without stopping! That’s not to say I am going to be able to do the same tomorrow if they’re still down. That’s not so say I will not pray that the escalator is working tomorrow.
But today – today….?
Gonna fly now
Flying high now
Gonna fly, fly, fly!!!!
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Today is Day 5 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Come see how others are slicing it up today.
My eyes opened on the alarm clock blinking at me.
Huh? Blinking? Crap!
Apparently the power had tripped some three plus hours ago. Luckily my circadian system still works and that’s what woke me. I glance at the burgeoning dawn outside my window, grab my cell phone and see I have roughly forty minutes to get it together and catch the bus.
You can do this, shake a tail feather, Raivenne!
Please note, I am not a morning At. All. So I am still not quite awake as I haul arse out of bed and head to the bathroom for my morning ablutions. I am under the shower when my brain starts to come online at last.
Wait…
Why didn’t the alarms on my mobile wake me, even if the clock radio didn’t?
Oh for fuck’s sake! It’s bloody Sunday!
Sigh – I’m wide awake now, in annoyance.
On the plus side – I’ve changed my sheets, completed the Sunday Whirl, posted the story that sprang from it, checked my emails and now have an easy slice to submit today.
Even better – once I post this I’m off to brunch!
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Today is Day 4 of the March Slice Of Life Story Challenge.
Come see how others are slicing it up today.
Raivenne-lations 