Life in progress


23 Comments

Zis is it!

Ze thing est fini! My illegal A-Z is complete, and with a minimal amount of uproar!

I made it through without turning into a zombie, though I have to say it was close sometimes.

In all it’s been a zany ride.

With a few zesty episodes.

So here’s to another (kind of) challenge down. I hope to join in without risk of going to blogger jail next year.

Thanks to the three lovely ladies who gave me my “Z” words. You’ll find their links under “zombie,” “zany,” and “zesty.” Honourable mention to the “uproar” guy! He’s one of the best bloggers I know. 🙂

And thanks to everyone who helped me find my words all month.

Cheers!

 


21 Comments

Yikes!

Yikes! It’s late.

I slept in this morning.

Forgot to fix my alarm to include Monday after the holiday last week.

Because Alex is back home from the hospital (as of yesterday) and he went back to school today.

But the doctor told me it’s probably a good idea to feed him more slowly, because it’s possible the issue with his respiratory system could be bronchitis. And that could be due to coughing up little bits of formula when he’s sleeping through his morning tube feed.

So I have to get up early now. Five am instead of 5:30.

Yee-haw!

It’s fun to be me.

Oh, and yellow. Because I had to say it.

Finally! I need “Z” words for tomorrow’s illegal A-Z post. One word per person, please, and keep it clean. Note that the oldest comments are at the bottom.

Thank you to the three lovely ladies who gave me today’s words. You’ll find under the words “yikes,” “yee-haw,” and “yellow.”


47 Comments

#SoCS – Expletive

I uttered an expletive tonight.

When I poured myself a rare beer

In a beer glass.

It had the perfect head upon it

And my mouth was verily watering

After a day of work, and visiting the hospital

And more work

(And a bit of learning thrown in for good measure.)

And so I lifted my beer glass from the kitchen counter

My beer, cold

The glass not yet forming condensation

And I got my glass about a foot off the counter and toward myself

Readying to carry it back to the living room

To my laptop

To write this post …

And the bottom dropped cleanly off the glass

Not a shard

Not a splinter to be found

A smooth cut straight off the bottom

As though it had been cut by a master craftsman

(One who obviously hates me)

And so not a drop

Was left in my glass

And now the dog is suffering with beer farts

(Or should I say I am suffering with the dog’s beer farts?)

And I am one glass

(and one beer)

Short of a six pack.

I suppose it could have been worse …

The glass could have lasted until it was hovering over my laptop …

I’ll need suggestions for “Y” words for Monday’s less-than-above-board A-Z post. One word per person, please, and keep it clean. Note that the oldest comments are at the bottom.

SoCS badge by Pamela, at https://achronicalofhope.com/

This s***ty post is part of Stream of Consciousness Saturday! Click the following link to find all the awesome posts in the comments, and join in … It’s fun! https://lindaghill.com/2019/04/26/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-april-27-19/


24 Comments

What happened to Linda?

Let’s play “What happened to Linda? This morning’s edition,” shall we?

I started writing this post–read: that first sentence–before I had a nap. When it took me a full minute to decide whether the word should be “edition” or “addition,” I knew finishing the post wasn’t worth risking my career as an editor.

Even after a three-hour nap, it’s an iffy prospect. I sincerely hope I’m making sense.

Where was I? Oh, yeah.

I put my darling son Alex to bed at just after 10 last night. He fell asleep after begging me to take him to the hospital. Now, you have to realize that the hospital is one of his favourite places in the world, so I take most of his pleas with a grain of salt. Last night, though, his breathing started sounding more horrible than it has all week.

At midnight, I finally said yes. By 1am, the decision had been made by the doctor to admit him for a couple of days. He has pneumonia again.

But, of course, it couldn’t possibly be that easy. Alex’s ultimate goal was to get out of emergency and up onto the floor, where he could hang out with the nurses. For the next thirteen hours he sat in anticipation of being admitted, asking me every fifteen seconds, When are we going upstairs?

I got home at 3pm.

So that’s “What happened to Linda,” and why I was thinking I should be posting the SoCS prompt at 9:30 this morning, too far away from my laptop to do it. And, backing up, why I was thinking I should be posting my illegal-A-Z-Challenge for the letter “V” at midnight last night as I drove to my local hospital.

Where Alex is now, happily wandering the halls, chasing nurses, because his obsession with the hospital far surpasses the actual science that tells the doctors he’s too sick to stay home.

Thank you to the bloggers who volunteered their “V” suggestions for yesterday’s post that’s not going to happen. I need sleep. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.


58 Comments

The Friday Reminder and Prompt for #SoCS April 27/19

Friday’s here, and I’m late for your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt. I’m sorry. 😦 Explanation to follow–and no, it’s not that I forgot about you. During the month of April, I’ll use the appropriate letter of the day to correspond with the A to Z Challenge, so anyone who’s participating in both challenges can do so at the same time. Here’s your prompt:

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “xp.” Use it as a word, or find a word with “xp”in it. As always, use any way you’d like. Enjoy!

After you’ve written your Saturday post tomorrow, please link it here to this week’s prompt page and check to make sure it’s here in the comments so others can find it and see your awesome Stream of Consciousness post. Anyone can join in!

To make your post more visible, use our pretty SoCS badge! Just paste it in your Saturday post so people browsing the reader will immediately know your post is stream of consciousness and/or pin it as a widget to your site to show you’re a participant. Wear it with pride!!

SoCS badge by Pamela, at https://achronicalofhope.com/

Here are the rules:

1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing (typos can be fixed), and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.

2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.

3. I will post the prompt here on my blog every Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The,’” or will simply be a single word to get you started.

4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours.  Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top. NOTE: Pingbacks only work from WordPress sites. If you’re self-hosted or are participating from another host, such as Blogger, please leave a link to your post in the comments below.

5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read all of them! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later or go to the previous week by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find below the “Like” button on my post.

6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!

7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.

8. Have fun!


10 Comments

Über-Unkempt Upheaval

Ah, am I ever überunkempt. (See the cool accent-y things I put in there? I’m fancy with my words at least.)

Having Alex home from school does that to me. He was extra-demanding today. This is what I get for having a weekend off, apparently.

Can’t decide if it’s a man-cold or if he actually needs the hospital.

I’ll keep an eye on him.

It’s all caused more of an upheaval in my schedule.

My amazing timetable in which I do all the things on time is now untimely.

Timeless.

Stricken.

It’s a stricken schedule.

Strike that.

It’s just mush. Yes, it’s a mushy puddle of timetable.

An icky itinerary.

A gooey guide to my bedraggled bookings.

It’s unkempt! That’s what it is!

Yeah, I’ll get caught up. Coz that’s what I do.

Thank you to the three lovely ladies who gave me today’s words. You can find out who they are by clicking the links under “über,” “unkempt,” and “upheaval.”

I’ll need suggestions for “V” words for tomorrow’s less-than-above-board A-Z post. One word per person, please, and keep it clean. Note that the oldest comments are at the bottom.


7 Comments

A Twitchy Troika of Truffles

I’m totally twitchy today. Alex was home–he’s really sick. I hope it’s just a cold since he doesn’t have a fever, but he can’t stop coughing. He’s in bed trying to sleep now and he’s still at it. I won’t bother even trying to get him up to catch the school troika … I mean the school bus tomorrow.

So, why am I twitchy? There were SO many awesome things I was going to accomplish this week! I have a deal going on on Kobo … here’s a screen shot:

and here’s the link if you want to pick up my book for free: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/p/free-ebooks

I was planning to advertise this every which way ’til Sunday. Literally–the deal’s on until Sunday. But I have Alex at home.

Oh, and that appointment I had to get my mother’s staples out of her head this morning? Dragged her all the way to the doctor’s office and found out the retirement home had taken them out a week ago. So we went there for nothing.

Why, oh why can’t anything go smoothly this year?

Because seriously, if they would, I’d stop complaining in your ears. :/

Where are the truffles? I need chocolate!

I also need suggestions for “U” words for tomorrow’s illegal A-Z post. One word per person, please, and keep it clean. Note that the oldest comments are at the bottom.

Thank you to today’s accomplices, whose links you’ll find under the words “twitchy,” “troika,” and “truffles.”


20 Comments

Sweep it under the rug

I’m writing this off the top of my head tonight because (surprise!) I’m once again very tired. I’ll call this Stream of Consciousness Smonday. Totally a word.

I’ve swept a couple of things under the rug in the past couple of days, one of which was my promise to ask for “S” words. Sorry about that. My intentions were good, but my body was weak. And still is.

The good news? I’m caught up with my work to where I hoped to be by this time today. The bad news? I think I might be coming down with a cold. Alex has one. I hope he’ll go to school tomorrow, but it’s not looking good. And I have to take my mother to an appointment in the morning to get the staples out of her head from where she fell two weeks ago and split it open.

So back to real life it is. No more sweeping stuff under the rug.

In real life, I don’t even have a rug, so there you go. 😛

I need suggestions for “T” words for tomorrow’s illegal A-Z post. There’s actually a method to my madness: if anyone asks, it’s you guys’ fault for encouraging me! HaHa! One word per person, please, and keep it clean. Note that the oldest comments are at the bottom. Thanks!


16 Comments

Qwerty makes Quasimodo (and other long words) Quicker

First, thank you to Ritu for helping me find the title of this post. I don’t think I could have done it without you.

That said, what want to talk about has nothing to do with the title. Which is nothing new, so let’s carry on, shall we?

The day Notre Dame burned, Alex came home from school and asked me why I was sad. Having no way, with my limited vocabulary in sign language, to tell him what had happened, my first thought was of Disney’s “Hunchback of Notre Dame.” So I showed him a picture of the movie, and of Quasimodo at the top of the spire. When he saw it fall in the videos online, he understood.

I’ve been in so many grand cathedrals over the years–Canterbury, St. Pauls and Westminster Abbey in London, Notre Dame Basilica in Montreal, and yes, Notre Dame in Paris, among others–that it’s difficult to remember many specific details of any of them. But the sense of awe when stepping into such a church, of being surrounded by its history, leaves an indelible mark on the soul. When I saw Notre Dame burning, I went quickly from shock to denial and then to grief.

Notre Dame Basilica, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

When all is said and done, Notre Dame is an object. No lives were lost–not even the bees on the roof–which is a miracle all by itself. Still, one can’t help but think we’ve lost so much more than a material thing. Places like that are alive with the spirits of everyone who has walked through their doors.

On a lighter note …

My middle son, Christopher, who is autistic, didn’t start talking until he was four years old. In order to help him out, we bought him computer games to play. There was one, featuring Elmo, that had a mini-game in it to aid kids in learning the alphabet. And it worked! Chris began mimicking Elmo’s voice. For a long while he refused to put sentences together himself–everything he spoke was a line out of a game or a movie. But I distinctly remember one of the first questions he answered independently was, “What is the alphabet?”

Chris quickly answered, “Q W E R T Y U I O P A …” all the way to M. Because he learned the alphabet at the keyboard.

Fascinating how the autistic mind works.

Thanks to the three lovely ladies who gave me my three “Q” words for today’s not-A-Z post. You’ll find their links under the words “Quasimodo,” “quick,” and “QWERTY.”

I don’t need any suggestions for “R” words for tomorrow’s post, because I’ll use SoCS to fulfill my non-duty of writing a non-A-Z post. Watch out for my request for “S” suggestions tomorrow!


43 Comments

The Friday Reminder and Prompt for #SoCS April 20/19

Friday’s here, and that means it’s time for your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt! During the month of April, I’ll use the appropriate letter of the day to correspond with the A to Z Challenge, so anyone who’s participating in both challenges can do so at the same time. Here’s your prompt:

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “rib.” Use it as a word, or find a word with “rib”in it. As always, use any way you’d like. Enjoy!

After you’ve written your Saturday post tomorrow, please link it here to this week’s prompt page and check to make sure it’s here in the comments so others can find it and see your awesome Stream of Consciousness post. Anyone can join in!

To make your post more visible, use our pretty SoCS badge! Just paste it in your Saturday post so people browsing the reader will immediately know your post is stream of consciousness and/or pin it as a widget to your site to show you’re a participant. Wear it with pride!!

SoCS badge by Pamela, at https://achronicalofhope.com/

Here are the rules:

1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing (typos can be fixed), and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.

2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.

3. I will post the prompt here on my blog every Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The,’” or will simply be a single word to get you started.

4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours.  Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top. NOTE: Pingbacks only work from WordPress sites. If you’re self-hosted or are participating from another host, such as Blogger, please leave a link to your post in the comments below.

5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read all of them! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later or go to the previous week by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find below the “Like” button on my post.

6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!

7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.

8. Have fun!