Month: February 2020

#FridayThoughts: Adios #AccountaClub

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Things change and with that change comes change. You can write that down. It’s deep.

And thus, here in February, we bid a fond farewell, or a tepid farewell, to #AccountaClub. Oh, #AccountaClub, we hardly knew ye. Except we did, and frankly, you’re just less fun than #FridayThoughts.

So that is that. We can always still talk about our weeks, but the structured post is going the way of the dodo, poor dodo.

It’s freeing, you know, letting go of systems that don’t work for you. We don’t have to do things just because we’ve always done them, or we’ve done them for a while.

Especially in our own little corners of the universe. Well, not a corner really. More like a teeny tiny tiny tiny speck of the universe.

With that I hope you have a delightful Friday and an even more delightful weekend.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

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#ThursdayThoughts Ten Word Photo Prompt: FREE SKATE!

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Photo by Anny Patterson on Pexels.com

It’s ten word story time! But today we’re going rogue. COMPLETELY ROGUE.

While you can use the above photo as a prompt, if you choose, today you can write a ten word story about ANYTHING. Absolutely anything.

Only rule? It has to be ten words.

What’s that? This is actually HARDER than having a prompt?

Evil laugh.

Ready? Here’s mine:

“Just a coordinate.”

Click. The chronotron whirred.

“Just a coordinate.”

#WendesdayWisdom: Boundaries

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Boundaries are a necessary part of life. They’re not complicated, really. If someone has set one, respect it; if you have set one, honor it and don’t feel bad about enforcing it.

See? Not complicated.

For women, particularly, boundaries can prove difficult, as we are trained to put the feelings of others above our own, and to be “polite.” Somehow, carving space for ourselves is not “polite.” Deciding what is acceptable for ourselves, or what we do or do not want in our lives is not “polite.”

Well.

Screw that.

Social media, ironically has made setting boundaries all the easier, because if someone violates one, all you have to do is block. Or mute, if you prefer. Inner peace in one click.

Don’t feel guilty about boundaries. They’re healthy and necessary. And pay attention when others set them, they have them for a reason.

Now go have a fantastic Wednesday.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

#TuesdayThoughts: They said snow

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But don’t think it’s going to snow. Maybe later, I guess. It’s gray right now, an innocuous kind of gray, not that gray that tells you it means business.

Yesterday I tried to start off with enthusiasm, but the day kind of got away from me, as Mondays are wont to do.

Wont.

It’s funny, does anyone ever use that word in any other way? It just sits around the dictionary, knowing people aren’t wont to use it.

Yes, I have a sly smile on my face right now. It takes very little to amuse me

Writing was medium yesterday, not the outlet but the amount, and I need to make better progress today. Also there’s a little thing called editing I haven’t done in ages. I should probably do some of that.

I kind of wish it would snow, I like inclement weather writing. That’s always so cozy.

Anyway, snow or no snow, I hope you enjoy your Tuesday.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

#MondayThoughts: Mondaying up our Monday

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We’re all tired. We’re all grumpy. And it’s Monday.

So here’s what I suggest. Let’s make it the Mondayist of Mondays, full of Mondayliciousness. Who’s with me?

Give me a half-shrug and an tepid “eh!”

There’s the spirit! So…how do we Monday it up? Start something. ANYTHING. Monday is the non-official beginning of the week, so make it the official beginning of something else. Whatever you want.

Thinking of starting an exercise program? Monday it up! Got a writing project rattling around your head? Get all Monday on its not-fleshed-out behind!

Pick one thing, large or small, and just start it. Give Monday a wave and let it energize you. Even if that thing you start today is something that will make the Mondays of the future more palatable.

Carve yourself out a little pocket of yes. And now that we’re pumped up, or at least marginally less deflated, have a great Monday.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

#FridayThoughts: The bad and the good

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So I was just browsing Twitter, as I tend to do, and saw the story of Quaden Bayles, an Australian boy bullied at school for his dwarfism. It hit me hard, the sadness of it, the cruelty of it, a boy tormented over something he cannot control.

These days are cruel, cruel days.

And then there were the outpourings, the GoFundMe from an American comedian, the rugby team inviting him to lead them out. And there’s the good.

Of course it would be so much better if we didn’t need the good because the completely avoidable, preventable bad wasn’t there in the first place. But somehow, here in this point in history, depravity is having a moment.

Its origins can be traced back to two very, very specific points, or three, really, and the reality is that sometimes there are extraordinarily horrible, terrible people who bring out the absolute worst in others, all the way down to children thinking it’s fine to torture a classmate about his dwarfism until he wants to kill himself at the age of 9.

Of course those top-down ringleaders will never take responsibility, will never even acknowledge their downward flow of verbal sewage. So it’s up to us to create the good, where we can, for the most vulnerable among us.

Have a great Friday and a wonderful weekend.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

#ThursdayThoughts Ten Word Photo Prompt: Practice

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Photo by Ike louie Natividad on Pexels.com

It’s gotta be Thursday because it’s ten word story time! Using the above photo as a prompt, write a ten word story.

Exactly ten words.

Ready? Here’s mine:

Despite her training, when gravity went sideways, so did Amelia.

#WednesdayWisdom: Wordless

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Not speechless. Just currently not in the possession of words. Which is not a great position for, you know, a writer.

It happens to all of us sometimes, though. The rivers of thought go dry, and the beds seem picked clean. Any debris there is tangled and uninteresting.

Maybe the answer is more coffee.

And yet I haven’t gotten more coffee.

Quite the dilemma. Only one that’s easily fixed.

It’s brightly sunny today, the kind of day that makes you think spring is possible, only it’s laughing at us because it’s still pretty cold. Ha ha, is all the wind has to say.

The wind in Chicago has a mean streak.

I’m off to rummage around for a vocabulary, wherever one can be found. You have the most wonderful of Wednesdays.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

#TuesdayThoughts: Skim

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Gray again, it seems to be the new normal. Maybe snow, maybe not, but yesterday it was like a snow globe, at least for a while.

My neck and shoulder still hurt, which is clearly annoying, given they are both very useful for typing. Alas.

And as soon as I mentioned the gray, a circle of blue appeared in the sky, the sun bright off the clouds. I guess the weather is contrary, like, it seems, a whole lot of people today.

(Uh oh. I just dropped a pin. Good luck to my feet. Not sure how it vanished so quickly.)

I’m having one of those running in quicksand weeks, as fast as I go, the slower I feel. Maybe it’s all the information coming at us at once; maybe it’s the weather; maybe it’s me.

Maybe I need to learn how to skim across the top. That would be handy.

I’m going to to work on that, and you have a terrific Tuesday.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.

#MondayThoughts: Working out the kinks

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First of all, a cat doing downward dog. Inherently funny.

You’re welcome.

Yesterday my neck and shoulder were tight, why, I have no idea. And it got progressively worse overnight, making sleep nearly impossible.

I wasn’t sure how my workout would go, but as always, movement won over inaction, because, while the pain isn’t entirely gone, it’s definitely better.

Not a perfect answer. But an answer better than the alternative.

Sometimes that’s the best we can hope for.

Meanwhile, it’s a gray, gray Monday and I don’t know if they said snow but it looks like snow. It’s a day with a lot on my mind, but on the plus side it’s also a day with a lot of physical tasks head, so hopefully those thoughts can sort themselves.

I already tackled one problem today, beyond the soreness, so that has to be a plus, right?

Anyway, once more into the Monday. I hope you have an incredibly wonderful one.

Check out  my full-length novels: 
Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   
Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 
Her Cousin Much Removed
The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.
And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s quick and weird and FREE!
Peruse Montraps Publishing
See what I’m writing on Medium.