50 WORDS
Blowing hot and cold; but mostly cold
Now that we live in a global village, it’s become much harder to describe even definite things like seasons as fixed and immutable. For some people, winters never get that cold; for others, they’re freezing.
We got a lovely mix of stories on our winter topic this week. Here they are, roughly in order of receipt.
Jonica Bradley gets caught up in changes in Texas weather patterns
Wistful writer finds similarities between the hormones of women and the weather
Julie Ranson on the joys of snow days
Fred Ermlich remembers his hottest winter
GB Rogut has all she needs to keep…
50 WORDS
Thrifty Words Theme Challenge #20: Winter
A relative posted a video of his kids tobogganing down a snow-drenched hill this morning. I was warm and toasty in my bed, but watching it, I immediately began to feel the cold.
Another friend joined our zoom lunchtime group, sitting outdoors in her swimsuit with a daiquiri in hand. “It’s so lovely here in Tenerife, she smirked.
What’s it like where you are, today? I know those of us currently in the northern hemisphere are freezing our proverbials off, with temperatures here in the UK ranging from -2°C to 0°C. Brrrrrr!
About eight years ago, I made a promise to myself that I would do everything in my power to spend at least part of the winter months in sunnier climes. And for six years, I made good that promise, residing between two weeks and three months on the sunny isle of St Lucia. …
Thrifty Words Theme Challenge #19: Resolutions
50 WORDS
Thrifty Words Theme Challenge #18: Closure
Our final thrifty word challenge of the year! Many thanks to all the writers who stepped up week after week with prose and poetry in fifty words exactly.
Don’t worry, we’ll be back on Monday — and there’s something new too; Jonica Bradley introduced a new 100-word challenge on New Year’s day.
Meanwhile, pretty much in order of receipt, here’s this week’s submissions.
Fred Ermlich relies on a source close to home
Terry Barr’s counting down the minutes to January 20th
GB Rogut wishes a ghost good luck
Closure remains elusive, thinks Stephen Dalton
Wistful writer calls on 2021 to heal our…
Ideastream
Ode to an apple-knocker
You cannae accept you're a loser
Because you a total apple-knocker
A covidiot who caused untold pain and death
with this unnecessary coronapocalypse
Time to stop talking argie-bargie
on Twitter, and elsewhere
We don’t need your concession speech
Just leave and let those with a little attic salt
Find an argute way to free us
from the coronaporn apoptosis
you’ve led us into
POETRY SALVAGE
Use the following ten words to write a poem. Or prose if you prefer.
- attic salt: refined, incisive wit
- argute: shrewd
- argie-bargie: copious but meaningless talk or writing
- apoptosis: the death of cells that occurs as a normal part of an organism’s growth or…
Thrifty Words Theme Challenge #18: Closure
50 WORDS
Thrifty Words Theme Challenge #18: Closure
Almost at the close of the most incredible and unexpected year I’ve ever experienced in nearly six decades on planet Earth.
I had to cancel plans close to my heart yet I didn’t fall apart. I caught the coronavirus infection, and lived to tell the tale…
I’ve watched in amazement as we humans stepped up to the challenge of facing down an unexpected pandemic as well as an explosion in racial tensions and extra-extraordinary political happenings in the US of A. How we’ve incorporated a new normal into our lives, and made living virtually online as natural as breathing.
What has it been like for you, this year of COVID-19? What do you think 2021 will bring? Something different, it is to be hoped. Less fear? Fewer dead? A vaccine/s to end the pandemic? Will incumbent 45 leave 1600 Pennsylvania Ave quietly, or have to be carried out? …
Ideastream
Time to duck the puns
Is it because I’m Mrs. Scrooge
I won’t put out for a goose?
Or could it be the colour rouge
makes me feel mean like the Grinch?
But hey, it’s Chrismas, so at a pinch
Having a duck will be a cinch
Bring me your cheer, no Bah-Humbug
It’s love that’s for me the drug
Pour me a delicious, mulled-wine mug
This time of year I won’t be too smug
With this, my annual good cheer plug
Join in the fun! Take these ten words and run with them…
Poetry Salvage
Use these ten words to write a poem. …
Thrifty Words Theme Challenge #17: Stimulus
Mainly in bed at night
Don’t tell his wife Camila, but Matthew McConaughey and I have been embroiled in a year-long chat-affair.
It all started when I signed up for a meditation app and discovered an array of sleep stories, one of which is read by actor Matthew McConaughey.
I listened in sleepy awe as he drawled about the many wonders of the universe, including “…rainbows reaching over canyons, jetstreams flowing over mountains, and in New Zealand, misty clouds gathering over beaches of black sand...”
It was amazing to hear so many wonders of our planet listed this way; it made me feel grateful and glad to be alive. …
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