Happy Messages
Last week was a strange week. The week before last I realised I had a load of holiday backed up, and very little time in which to take it! So I booked Monday to Thursday off last week. Usually I have weeks to work myself up to a holiday, but this came upon me rather suddenly.
On Monday, I was ill! This was most disagreeable. This is the first time I’ve had anything worse than a cold since early 2003 (when I had pneumonia), so it came as a bit of a surprise. I’d forgotten how rubbish it feels to be unwell. Even the pneumonia was no big deal – no pain, no discomfort, just a bit breathless. A couple of days in hospital and that was that.
This time I actually threw up! The first time in over eleven years. Yuck 😦 . I can’t even remember when I was ill before that – either all the vodka masked the symptoms or it sent all the bugs and viruses running for the hills.
Run, little diseases, run!
A New Life
It’s Friday Fictioneers time again! As always it is hosted by Rochelle and this week’s 100 word photo prompt has been provided by fellow Fictioneerer Adam Ickes.
You can see other entries here – more are added every day, or have a go yourself – it’s fun!
That looks to me like a Native American in the background – if it isn’t, it is for this story!
Copyright Adam Ickes
They’d broken away from their tribes, eschewing modern technology. They wanted to recapture the lives of their ancestors. Over a hundred had gathered in a remote valley to live according to the ways of a long-gone age, following a history gleaned more from John Wayne movies than from textbooks.
From time to time backpackers wandered into their valley. Waste not, want not. Why just take a scalp when the entire body is covered with good, useful skin?
Of course in this modern age they needed money, so they sold their products in town. Their best-seller?
Hiking boots, 100% quality leather.
The Beast Within
It’s Friday Fictioneers day again! Under the watchful eye of our host Rochelle, we write 100 words in response to a photo prompt which this week has been supplied by Randy Mazie.
You can read the other entries here – the list grows all week so check back!
I hope no-one minds, but I altered the spelling of the “writing on the wall” within the story :-).
Copyright Randy Mazie
The building had stood empty for many years, long enough that the tree had grown from a mere promise to near full height. Every so often, questing shoots would slide between the boards on the window. Within seconds they withered, blackened and died.
“NO TRESPASSING.”
No human hand had penned those words.
Samuel was cold and hungry. He couldn’t face another night on the streets and the building looked perfect. He carefully pried one of the boards from the window and slipped inside.
The board snapped back, muffling his last agonised scream.
The beast within tolerated no intrusion.
No trespassing.
Who Put the Black in Black Friday?
That title sounds like the start of a silly song.
“Who put the ‘Black’ in Black Friday?
Grab stuff before it’s all gone. (dum dum dum dum dum)
Don’t be a snivelling cry-baby,
Crash through the queues and be strong!”
The first I really heard about Black Friday was a couple of years ago via Amazon UK’s Black Friday deals. For a while that’s all we had, but this year one of the “Big Four” supermarkets decided to bring Black Friday to the UK! Yes, it has made its way across “The Pond” and reached our happy shore.
Bitter Boat
It’s time for Friday Fictioneers, and this time I’m well stumped. My muse has gone on holiday, I think. Never mind, I’m not missing one so I’ve popped together the story below.
Thanks as always to our host Rochelle, and to Ted Strutz for supplying the photo. Other entries for this week can be found here.
Copyright Ted Strutz
Ah, to be a cruise ship! The majestic lines. A power station turning huge propellers to slice with ease through the dark waters of the Atlantic, the Pacific, to distant and exotic destinations. The pride of the fleet!
It could have been me.
It SHOULD have been me!
Ding ding, all aboard for the harbour tour! All aboard!
Harbour tours. Pah! How could the Great Builder (may He be exhalted) install my consciousness in this tiny, flat-bottomed scow? How has it come to this?
I think today I will end this. Sink myself. All hands lost.
Goodbye, cruel world.
Numero Uno!
It’s Wednesday and it’s time for Friday Fictioneers! Except it’s not because I’m having problems thinking of a story.
Therefore, in a change to our regular Wednesday posting, let’s all put our hands together and applaud me, for I have been awarded the following:
Woohoo wahey wahooie! I’m numero uno! Top dog! Head honcho! Prime, um, rib!
Suzie’s Questions Answered
Suzie has posed a number of questions to the blogging community at large, and I thought I would participate, along with many others. On with the questions!
1. Why have you chosen your blog name?
This is a cunning and clever amalgamation of my title, the short form of my first name and the fact that I am a “man”! I usually use “dralip” which includes the initial of my last name, but it didn’t sound like it would work as well for a blog name.
“mraliman” sounds stupid so I had to do a PhD to get the correct start to my pseudonym :-).
Office Irritations Part 2 – Monitors with Attitude
My computer monitor has attitude.
Not the one on the right. The one on the left. The “primary” display. It feels the need to berate me, before I’ve even had my first cup of coffee.
This is the sight which greets me each morning.
Why are you being so nasty to me, Mr Monitor?
Why is it telling me this so early in the morning? I haven’t saved any trees. It makes me feel bad. What’s with the guilt trip?
Apparently “super energy saving”, whatever that is, is inactive. Who among you has ever fiddled with the settings on a monitor (apart from “auto-adjust” that is)? Monitor controls and menus are so fiddly I find it’s best to leave them alone, in case everything suddenly goes all blue and you can’t work out how to fix it. Trying to find the energy saving setting seems like a recipe for disaster.
The mere act of using a computer rather than writing everything down means I’m “saving trees”, does it not? I recycle every week – I’m a good little recycler. Why are you saying such things to me, Mr Monitor?
It tells me this after it has been physically switched off all night. How is that not saving trees? Apart from the fact that, as far as I know, the power station is powered by coal, or possibly uranium. It’s not wood-fired.
Energy-saving monitors aside, don’t forget to recycle!
Save the trees!
The year is 2093
Tommy’s never seen a tree
He knows they’re tall and brown and green
But not a sight he’s ever seen.
People say it’s such a pity
All the world’s become a city
Trees and grass and bubbling brooks
Can only now be found in books.
No horses, cows or dogs or cats
All the food is grown in vats
People crammed in tiny spaces
Life’s a drudge, no happy faces.
The older ones think “Such a shame”
Wondering just who’s to blame
No more trilling sparrow’s song
Nature’s time has long since gone.
(Poem reposted from dralimanonlife.com/2011/10/14/2093/).
A Day in the Life
Knock me down with a feather if it isn’t time for Friday Fictioneers once again! As ever this 100 word photo prompt is hosted by the talented Rochelle, and this week the photo has been supplied by Sean Fallon. You can read all the entries here – the list will grow over the next few days, so visit often!
After last week’s shock ending, this week I’ve decided to try a sort of monologue. I have modelled the star of my story after Douglas Adams’ “Marvin the Paranoid Android“, as he has the same depressed, pessimistic “not sure if I care any more” attitude. Here goes!
Copyright Sean Fallon
Well, isn’t this just great. As if it wasn’t enough that some bad-tempered overly-touchy god turned me into a mannequin, now some ne’er-do-well has disassembled me.
Wait, here comes someone!
Madam, hello? Please, stick my legs back on?
No-one can hear me. Figures.
What’s this? No, doggie. No! LEG DOWN… well, isn’t this just the crowning point of my day. I’m wet, I smell and I’m in bits.
Who’s this coming now? They’re coming my way! Straight towards me!
Hello? HELLO? Help?
Oh. It’s the garbage men. Come to collect.
Me.
That’s just made my day, that has.
Bloody marvellous.
Chapel Porth
Just a quick post for this Sunday evening. A couple of weeks ago everyone at work went down to Chapel Porth one carload at a time to get our photos taken for one of our websites. Chapel Porth is on the north coast of Cornwall, a few miles from my work.
There we stood on the beach next to cameras and a big professional lamp while older couples wandered past with their dogs. I snapped a few pictures with my phone while we were there.
Click for a random post!
Woohoo!
I totally didn't win!
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