The Coffee Meeting [flash 247]

John and Joan met for coffee on Sunday afternoon. They’d been chatting on the dating site, Future Plans, and decided they were compatible enough to take the plunge and talk face to face.

“I find you very attractive in person,” John said to Joan as they stood in line. “What kind of coffee do you like?”

“Thank you,” Joan replied. “You look exactly like your photos, which makes me happy. I’m an avid fan of French roast with whole milk and no sweetener.”

John smiled and ordered two coffees. “Wow! That’s just how I like my coffee! That site sure has a much better concept of how to match people than those other sites.”

“I hate the other sites!” Joan yelled as they walked to the end of the coffee bar to wait for their order. “They never match me with someone who follows my ideology.”

John tried to talk in a softer voice, hoping Joan would follow suit. “Yes, it’s important to find the person we’ll get along with for the long-term. I heard on your profile vid that you also have a collection of Beatles’ records?”

“Not the music group!” Joan laughed. “Actual beetles. I love bugs. Don’t you?”

“Um…”

“And I have a pet boa! He’s my baby. I feed him live mice.”

John looked at his phone. “Oh gosh. I have an emergency at work. I’m going to have to take my coffee and run. Enjoy yours. It was great meeting you!”

~*~

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Before Cell Phones

We parted with enmity

And now he is gone,

Left without a kiss,

And sailed off at dawn.

I shall write him a letter,

Include a photograph too,

And stuff them in a bottle,

Toss them in waves of blue.

As he sails round the globe,

My love note behind him,

Fate may have to intervene,

For this message to find him.

~*~

Shoe Trouble [flash 115]

“What’s wrong?” Candy asked Cinnamon as they stood in line for the bus. She noticed that her friend looked forlorn this morning.

Cinnamon sniffled as tears filled her eyes. “I’m just feeling a lot of buyer’s remorse over my new school shoes.”

Candy glanced down at Cinnamon’s feet. “They are cute shoes, but…”

“My feet already hurt!” Cinnamon stamped them in frustration.

“Um, that might be cuz your shoes are on the wrong feet,” Candy said. “Let me hold your backpack and you can switch them.”

Cinnamon smiled. “You’re a good friend! Want to be science lab partners this year?”

Candy blanched. “Let’s just focus on your shoes for now. One thing at a time!”

Fandango Made Me Do It

I thought I was gonna get away with just one post today because it was that long FTS thingie, but now Fandango accused me of saying his prompts aren’t fun, which I did not! If he still believes I did, I’ll issue a politician’s apology: please forgive me if you feel offended.

Now that I’ve bothered to begin more jabberish, I may as well shovel in the rest of the prompts. I hope you’ll all show me the proper amount of gratitude for that.

You may have noticed I’m spelling post the normal way. Getting bored with lolcat. It’s been a while. The dogs bark, and the circus moves on. (Look it up.) I don’t like to get too predictable, too trapped into a pattern of behavior. That stifles creativity.

As part of my recovery, my reclaiming of my time and my own goals, I have not been Ms. Hospitality. I can’t be. In order to do all my paying work, take care of my health, and focus on my writing, I’ve had to cut back dramatically on entertainment. I no longer go to movies or meetups. I don’t date or chat on FB. I don’t watch the newest stuff on Prime and Netflix. I accept very few social invites and issue even fewer. Etc.

I do, however, blog and tweet, since I find both of these communities conducive to writing. I was going to join a book club, but that didn’t work out, which is probably for the best. I do try to read a few books per month, except for November when I NaNo. Because family is everything, they get priority… but luckily they’re mostly too busy for me!

Dimensions

Maybe what they call madness

Is simply another dimension.

They are trapped in conventions,

Familiar and mundane,

Obsessed with their labels:

“Abnormal” and “insane.”

Madness or access

To worlds made of words?

Time has no meaning

Where dreams come to play,

Twirling around, upside down,

Bending into birds

And flying away.

Housekeeping

Who even understands the algorithmic mystery of why some posts appear in the feed reader and others don’t? We’ve never solved the app gap either, for those of us who prefer phones to ‘puter reading. I make do by keeping a list of faves in the search tab, but I know I miss posts.

In the interest of lightening the burden on my poor reader, I’ve now done a second purge. This time I was quite merciless, if I do say so myself (I do). I’m now hopeful that my reader will deliver more of your freshly pressed posts to me in chronological order.

A gwamma can dream, no? ✨

If I’ve inadvertently sent a follower to the oubliette, my apologies. If your blog is in English and you’ve updated in the past 30 days without offensive content, then give me a nudge and I’ll fish you out. Or add you for the first time if I haven’t yet. Lotta ifs in this para…

What’s “offensive content,” you may ask? Great question! It’s whatever I decide it is, at that moment, arbitrarily. 😂

Another mystery… if anyone can figure out why my landline, which is plugged into the soccer ball, isn’t getting a dial tone, PLMK. Thx!

2018 Wrap Party

This was an interesting year.

I gave up both Facebook and dating sites early in the year. Spent 2017 depressed about both, ostensibly for different reasons but ultimately the same ~ I had devoted a huge amount of time to the pursuit of long-distance friendships and local relationships via both those venues and the end result was similar: meh.*

What’s that BS about how you get out what you put in? Yeah right.

Anyway, I decided to splurge on myself by reclaiming my time and emotional energy, and this was a great gift. I’ve been so much happier and more productive since. In April, I released a poetry book that I finally had time to finish… and yesterday I just released another one. I hope you’ll check them out: All She Wrote (April book) and Monochrome (December book).

In June, it was my absolute joy to welcome my new baby granddaughter to the world. She brings total love and sweetness to my life, and I’m thankful for all the wonderful family time I’ve had this year.

At some point during 2018, a WordPress prompt site closed up shop. Zillions of us who love to natter on about nothing had the big sads. A handful of bloggers stepped up and created their own prompts, which was very cool of them… but then a weird thing happened. Instead of popping over to the site, grabbing the prompt, and writing to our same audience, we began to actually interact with these new prompters and their followers. We started to play more writing games and follow each other and turn into a supportive creative community of awesome!

In October, I was lucky to be able to take a week off from work to help my daughter in NorCal. Also, I got to bond with her new puppy. Last week I had an amazing time with both my daughters, their hubbies, and the baby. Family rocks!

On Thanksgiving, I had a super fun time with friends at the LA Zoo, and yesterday we went up to Simi to visit the Reagan Library. I hope to visit more museums and local points of interest in 2019. Though I was into movies for a while, I find lately I’m feeling rather indifferent toward them.

I have tons of books to read! Not literally, since most are on my Kindle. And now it’s time to begin integrating the mess I wrote on Ghosted during NaNoWriMo with my main novel document. Oh fun. After that, I have to write “the ending,” by which I mean the last third of the book.

And to wrap up the wrap, for the past 7 years, I’m beyond lucky and grateful and thankful that I get to share my life with this amazing lil dude. ❤️🐱❤️

*I treasure my friendships that transcend FB. Not talking about you great folks.

Fluffy’s Interesting Christmas [flash 321]

Fluffy is a good boy. Yes, he is. He didn’t knock down the tree like Mittens did. Kitties are silly! And he didn’t eat the cookies the Food People left out all night on a plate. Of course as soon as they let Mittens out of the kitchen she pushed the plate on the floor and smashed it to bits. Kitties are bad!

Fluffy is a good boy. Everyone says so. He sits quietly while all the New People come into the house with packages. Some smell like food and this makes him happy. He woofs softly and wags his tail. People pet him. Mittens yowls from the kitchen. Kitties are noisy!

Fluffy is a good boy. But the front door is open and there is a squirrel and it’s so easy to run right out and Fluffy doesn’t know exactly how it happens but suddenly he is chasing the squirrel up a tree and next a mouse and a butterfly and now he’s far away from the Food House, oh dear. Fluffy wonders what he should do.

Fluffy is a good boy. He wags his tail at the New People who approach him, check his tags, and put an ouchie under his skin. The nice lady gives him a treat and this makes him happy. The nice man says, “All good. It’s transmitting.” The New People go away in their car. Fluffy woofs. He wishes he could have more treats.

Fluffy is a good boy. But he’s sad and hungry now. He misses the Food People and even that bad kitty Mittens. “There you are, Fluffy!” Yay, it’s the Food Man, jogging down the street with Fluffy’s leash. He snaps it on and they go home.

“Fluffy’s a good boy,” the Food Lady says to her coworkers from the Pod, “but he’s just a baby.” She gives Fluffy a yummy piece of ham from her plate and he is happy.

~*~

Misty Reminiscing…

I may come across as a hissing witch of negativity when it comes to dating (dating sites in particular), but I wasn’t always this way. Before I began denouncing the entire process as an impossible nightmare, there were a few fun times.

I remember meeting one man just about this time of year, waaay back in 2011, which seems like a lifetime ago now. This was only a few months after my divorce was final and I felt so free and happy. I had joined a couple dating sites and was very upbeat, not sarcastic, not dark and fatalistic, but optimistic and energetic.

Anyway, I met this guy at a Starbucks near my office after work. Back then, I didn’t roll my eyes at the cliché of a coffee meet. It was all new and fun! I didn’t care where we met! After we got our drinks and sat down, he held a sprig of mistletoe over my head and kissed me. Just a little kiss! It was so cute! I thought, wow, my life is really just beginning.

But it turned out he was married. Now, here’s the thing. Back then, I was a purist. I was divorced, so I wanted to date divorced men, not separated men. Sometimes men who say they’re separated are actually still living with their wives… they’ve only just “separated” for an hour and a half. But some people really do go through lengthy divorce proceedings (mine took 2+ years), and maybe I was too quick to write them all off.

Too late now, but as I said in the title… misty memories. It’s that time of year for ’em. As the months/years passed, and I met more liars and grew more negative, I’m sure I gave off a bad vibe myself. Hard not to, whether in writing, facial expression, or in person. I became more secretive, not wanting to give my phone number for longer periods of time, which may have made me seem suspicious. Who doesn’t give out a number? Married folks. People who are hiding something and don’t want to be googled. People you can’t trust.

Ah well. You can’t undo what happened. “It is what it is.” And like some soppy holiday movie, I found happiness right where I left it… surrounded by family: two wonderful daughters, their fabulous husbands, and now I even have an adorable grandbaby to love.

Monday Meandering

It was bothering me that my full-size bitmojis appeared on my iPhone reader as humongous pictures dropping off the sides of the screen. Other bloggers’ pics do the same, btw ~ not photographs, which seem to know how to behave themselves, but graphics grabbed from the web, which do not. Anyway, I’ve been resizing mine to medium in the app but haven’t noticed a satisfactory difference, so that’s why I went down to thumbnail on this one. It just bugs me when pics are off. Now the thumbnail will look weird when I view my blog on the web… sigh. 😜

*

I finally figured out why my YouTube vids weren’t previewing properly ~ when I take the link from the YouTube app, it’s a shortlink. I then have to paste it in a browser to get a real link that creates a preview. What a royal pain in the ass. Is there any more annoying problem in the world today, I ask you? Oh, for the halcyon daze of olde when we didn’t have the convenience of apps to bitch about and had to trudge 5 miles in the cybersnow every time we wanted to copypasta any damn thing. 🙄

*

I was just about to stop at Target after work on Friday night to buy a space heater when I remembered I had one. And it wasn’t hidden away in a closet ~ it’s right next to the TV cabinet. This is what happens when the unused spaces in your brain get old and frozen. 🥶

*

My MO in Blogland is not to keep score cuz that’s just annoying and frustrating. I follow around 700 blogs and only 500 or so follow me. But who is MO anyway and why am I letting him set precedent? This I began to wonder today as I unfollowed a few bloggers in my feed who never like any of my poasts. Pffft.

To each their own, but if all a blogger does it repost old stuff, and not interact with me, I’m going to be faster with the unfollow click. I mean, I go to the trouble of writing fresh new boring crap for you guys every single day! I don’t want my feed filled with a parade of moldy recyclables. If I see I’ve already hearted it… grrrr!

Seriously one guy reposts his half-dozen sensual love letters to his “goddess” every night and I’m just BARF ALREADY! Write something new to her, dude. Geez. 🤮

*

I just looked up the definition of cartoon cuz I wasn’t sure what counted. Obviously the shows we used to watch on Saturday morning, but comic strips too? Yup. And movies like Frozen? Yup. And those quickie caricatures? Yup. Also, the word comes from Italian, carta (paper), if anyone cares. First known usage was in 1671, as in a preparatory design. You’re welcome. 😜

*

I’m on the Nextdoor app to keep track of local doings. I was motivated to download it when the OCRegister went to a pay site. I miss the OCR, gotta admit, but I’m not gonna pay. I have no paid subscriptions to anything. Nextdoor is sometimes helpful/interesting, but Twitter is actually more on top of breaking emergencies. Of course there are trolls and idiots and assholes on ND because it is social media. People won’t follow rules and simply must jabber on about “the wall” and whatever other stupid BS pops into their heads. 🤬

Naturally there are the sea lion men, barking questions at women, only to tell them that their opinions are invalid. I ran into one of these jerks this weekend who told me I can’t have an opinion on my city after “only” living here 5 years when he’s been here 25. I muted him. It’s too bad they are only mutes and not blocks like Twitter. I would prefer it if he was not able to see and/or reply to me again. Same goes for anyone I mute in the future.

This is one of the things that makes it hard for women to express themselves online (not to mention in meatspace obviously). You have to constantly worry about angering some wacko man, especially if he’s local. Who even knows what might set some lunatic off into a rage? Idk if this guy is totally fine or a nutball, but I got a bad vibe, and so I let him have the last word because I see from other threads that it’s important to him. And I didn’t insult him like another woman did; I just quietly faded away. I’m not embarrassed to admit that I’m scared of men who seem trollish and unhinged. We read stories all the time about women being stalked and attacked by nutjobs. And crazy men are everywhere. We’re never safe. 😢

No, I’m not being overly dramatic. Just go look up the statistics about violence against women. This is another reason why I quit using dating sites. Besides all the benignly obnoxious jerks and liars and creeps, there are rapists and con men and murderers lurking there. It’s documented. And when some rando gets angry because you reject him after chatting, how do you know which group he falls into?

Not worth the stress.