Where My Towel Is [socs]

I throw in the towel regularly, as it is not my nature to pursue difficult goals or persevere in the face of obstacles. Especially now, at my advanced age, I feel there’s even less of a reason to cause myself extra pain or stress just to chase an elusive dream. We always hear the positive side of no pain, no gain, but we rarely acknowledge the negative, which is mo pain, mo pain.

For all the people who pushed through their limits to complete a marathon, there are a bunch of poor souls left on the side of the road with heat exhaustion, torn ligaments, sprained ankles, etc. We read about a single mom who lived on four hours sleep for 10 years while working two jobs so she could finish her literary masterpiece and get a million-dollar advance, but there are also thousands of others who sacrifice sleep to write and get nowhere but massively tired. I am no longer willing to make that sacrifice ~ I love sleep!

I can easily adapt to new situations (hence the towel reference), if I have to, but most of the time it’s unnecessary to adapt when I can simply withdraw. Thus, it’s important I know where my towel is at all times so I can throw it in. Guess where I learned about this Hitchhiker’s Guide towel nonsense? Yep, from some man on a dating site who was a nerd supreme and said he was madly attracted to me. I stayed up for an entire night video-chatting with him, and the next day he ghosted me.

I should have thrown in my towel right then instead of chasing the elusive butterfly of love for several more fruitless years. All my towels are now safely back in the closet where they belong.

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

I’ve Been Interviewed!

Gracious Barbara @ Book Club Mom has interviewed me! Please check it out! She gave me a very comprehensive set of questions and I know you are curious. So get on over there, read, like, leave a comment, and BUY ALL MY BOOKS… let’s go!

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Southern Mash [fff]

[Reposted from 01/27/2022 for Fandango’s Flashback Friday.]

Your voice retains
A slight Southern twang,
Barely noticeable,
But I notice
That warm summer tang—
It transforms your narcissistic pumpkins
Into gilded porch swing coaxes.
Not the deserved frogs and snakes,
But darlins and honeys drip
From your mint juleped mouth,
So sweetly
And irresistibly,
That even now
I can’t remember
What I was angry about.
Come to Wonderland,
You said after a month of silence;
Meet me in Wonderland,
You said with an edge of red velvet promise.
The hint of a future
That never materializes,
The suggestion of the possible,
A tantalization of fantasy…
All tempt me to project my version of reality
Onto your humid jabberwocky
And slide down that rabbit hole
Looking for cake.
But there is no cake,
Only a Cheshire checkerboard
And messages that dissolve at midnight,
Leaving a slight scent of magnolias.

~*~
©️2022 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Reposted with permission from Paula Light’s All She Wrote.

TGIF ~ Goodreads

This week was weird, and I’m glad to be done with it. There were some highlights, such as my riddle post and the replies, finding a sweet birthday gift for my daughter, having Autumn kitty come visit, etc., but I tweaked my back and had to deal with extra pain for a few days, which wasn’t fun. Also, one night I began to update my profile here, there, and wherever, and I discovered that the KDP author page had gone all kerflooey (technical term). Both my author names were listed, but none of my books for either were associated with me, though I could find them via an exhaustive search. That made me so mad I took Anna’s books off KDP Select, which means Amazon will get even less money from my no sales than the zero they get already. Hah! That’ll teach them to mess with me!

Out of curiosity, I looked up both Paula and Anna on Goodreads (I had issues with them previously and deleted my account), and lo and behold all the books for Anna and Paula were listed, including some I’ve unpublished. Now, that’s bizarre, right? Amazon owns Goodreads and they are explicitly connected, so why would only one site have the correct lists?

Impulsively, I rejoined Goodreads because I have to admit it’s a more convenient way of tracking the books I read than using a spreadsheet. A few hours later, after tinkering with my profile a bit, I decided to change my photo on the Paula KDP page, and suddenly some of my books reappeared! By the time I went to bed, they all were showing. Today, Anna’s were back as well. WTF? Are they rewarding me for rejoining Goodreads or is this some kind of woo woo coincidence?

I’m going with the woo woo because it’s clear that Amazon has redone the KDP author pages. For example, they no longer have a space to display blog feeds:

“We have updated the look of U.S. Author Pages. As of Dec 2022, blog feeds are not displayed on U.S. Author Pages.“

Well, pffft. Whatever.

Feel free to TGIF and link back to me. What’s up?

PS: Be sure to check back on Monday when I’ll be temporarily hosting Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge!

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Imagine…

You live in a world where no Gods exist.

Concrete surrounds you in a tedium of grey upon grey, under a steely sky promising rain that never comes. Even the trees have been stripped of color so as not to offend. There are no beeps, buzzes, barking, birdsong, or any possibility of irritation.

The bleak optics transcend your reality of freedom from suffering and struggling; perversely, they magnify your isolation to the point where this bespoke heaven feels like punishment.

When did I ask for this, you moan in despair, missing your flawed family, your annoying friends, and your stressful job. But no one is listening because interaction disappeared to eliminate conflict. You check your phone, hoping for at least a robocall, but those are gone too.

I didn’t mean it, you scream in a flurry of self-pity, and a grey cat materializes from the fog with a grey mouse in his mouth.

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Written for Reena’s Xploration Challenge 265.

Desire

For Jim’s Thursday Inspiration prompt of desire this week, I’m doing a musical acrostic a la John.

Delilah: a man is driven to murder because his woman desired another man (Tom Jones).
Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic: a man is scared to tell a woman he desires her (Police).
Stacy’s Mom: a guy desires his girlfriend’s mother (Fountains of Wayne).
I’m On Fire: a man desperately desires a woman who is with someone else (Bruce Springsteen).
Red Red Wine: a man desires alcohol in hopes of forgetting a woman (Neil Diamond).
Ex’s and Oh’s: a woman describes various men who desire her madly, but she casually loves and leaves them all (Elle King).

Enjoy!

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Twist

The spaghetti mystery
Baffled the brilliant brain
Of physicist Richard Feynman,
Who died unable to explain
Why a stressed strand snaps
In multiple locations,
Not conveniently in half.

My grandmother counted
The strands of spaghetti
To cook half a box;
She was neurotic like that,
Didn’t trust guesstimates.
She knew to do the twist,
Though she never took physics,
To keep the stress centered,
And avoid getting pasta bits
All over the stovetop.

Now they have an equation
To describe the stress breaks
Of spaghetti strands —
Physicists rejoice!
It’s not just about the pasta,
You understand.
Lots of things have multiple
Stress points and could snap
Unpredictably
When put under pressure,
Especially if there’s a pot
Of boiling water nearby.

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Reprinted from Monochrome for dVerse Poets’ prompt on grandmothers. I could write a lot more about this particular granny, but I think the spaghetti strand counting is enough, for now.

Thursday Morning Dawdles

Rory @ Earthly Comforts posted new Morning Dawdler questions for us yesterday; however, I was busy with my riddle then. I think it’s OK if I answer them now.

On a scale of 1 – 10, how happy are you?

At this moment? Maybe a 7. I had a good day yesterday, but still all the usual aches and pains plague me. Overall it’s more like 5-6, as I find it impossible to feel more than momentary happiness for my good fortune while so many are suffering. Yesterday at the drugstore the woman ahead of me had her credit card declined for her prescriptions ~ which were $1200! Twelve hundred dollars! For one month! My migraine meds were $15, but I can’t stop thinking about that poor woman and our sh!tty healthcare system. I could be her someday.

Why do people ask how we are but do not want to know the truth?

Well, not everyone does this or even a majority. When my family and friends ask, they do want to know the truth. When coworkers ask, they probably would prefer an abbreviated version (as would I). When a store clerk or bank teller asks how I am, obviously they don’t care, and I find it infuriating that they’re instructed to ask. Just say “hello, how can I help you?” What’s wrong with that?

How much meat do you consume in a week, and if you are not a meat eater, have you ever considered meat alternatives, and if so, what are they?

Uh, I dunno… it depends on the week. Some weeks I hardly eat any meat, but other weeks I might have meat daily. Starting from last Sunday, I’ve had fish twice and steak once. That’s probably it for this week, given that tomorrow’s dinner is at a vegan place and I’ll be home Friday and Saturday ~ I don’t cook meat at home. There are times I get a bunch of frozen dinners that contain some chicken and have one for my office lunch daily until I get sick of them and switch back to salads. I went vegetarian for a while (a couple times), which was OK, except I didn’t feel like living on eggs and cheese, and I got tired of carbs. Regarding alt-meat… Tofu? I like it. Seitan? It’s OK. Impossible Burger meat and the like? Only in tacos/burritos.

Are you a slow or fast eater, and which behaviour do you think is best and why?

I don’t know what’s “best.” Whatever makes the person feel good, I guess. I am probably on the fast side, as I just want to finish, not nibble, have my tea, and be done. I don’t care how fast/slow other people eat, unless they’re so slow that they’re holding up the group from leaving a restaurant. I do care that Gatsby sometimes eats too fast and throws up. Annoying!

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

JYP IS THE MVP, THE VIP, AND THE…

Queen Bee! My riddle set has been solved by blogger JYP in a honey-sweet victory. Others were getting close, and some got one, but she figured out all three. Yayyy! And finally we get to see a pic of her ~ she looks stunning. Or should I say, stinging?

For the curious, here are the deets.

What is at the beginning,
But never in the end;
It’s a royal riddle–
Can you solve it, my friend?

Bee is at the beginning but not in “the end.” Add royal from line 3 and you get Queen Bee.

Elvis and Elle,
Salmon and BB–
If you get this,
You might be quite snaky!

Several guessed King correctly for this one. I thought someone might add Cake, as Mardi Gras is coming up and there’s a baby (BB) in the cake for some bizarre reason.

Sometimes high,
Sometimes low–
Do we need a detective
To give this a go?

Aces can be high or aces can be low, and Jim Carrey is Ace Ventura: Pet Detective!

Queen. King. Ace.

And there you have it! Special mention goes to Greg of Greg’s Blog for his fabulous logic in coming up with King Charles’ Coronation!

Thank you, everyone. This was so much fun I might do it again. And now I have all your email addresses, bwahahaha!

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.

Wayward Introvert

I am a wayward introvert,
Ducking out of invitations,
Alone upon my hill until
I crave in-person conversations.
But even a minuscule amount
Of socializing is so draining;
I rush home again to recharge,
With equilibrium maintaining.

~*~
©️2023 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.