Category: Writing

LOST IN TRANSLATION – WORDS FOR PHOTOGRAPHY – Marilyn Armstrong

THURSDAY’S SPECIAL: PICK A WORD IN AUGUST Y3

FROM PAULA:

Here we are again facing another Pick a Word challenge. The words I picked for you this time are hardly challenging. Still, I hope you will enjoy taking part in it: fortified, chic, submerged, embodiment, prehistoric.

Note from me: I’m happy to NOT have to look up the words!

This is as chic as I ever get!

About to be submerged — and submerged!

Photo: Garry Armstrong – Embodiment of a perfect sunset!
Fortified?
A storm over the prehistoric remnants of a Native American tribe forced — to the best of my knowledge — from their land by drought.
An embodiment of the Saguaro cactus in the Phoenix mountains 

And a final embodiment:

Sam “The Man” Adams … in bronze, life-size – Very influential and definitely, an embodiment!

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FOR ALL THE MAD LIBBERS – Marilyn Armstrong

Mad Libs #4 (August 4th)

by Melanie B Cee

Originally presented by:

https://thehauntedwordsmith.wordpress.com/2018/08/04/blogging-mad-libs-4/

List of Blanks for this Mad Lib

Female name – Josephine
Male name – Lawrence
Adjective – adorable
Noun x 8 – table, mattress, lamp, locker, diaper, baseball, recliner, robot
Emotion – passion
Type of produce – broccoli 
Type of cereal – cream of wheat
Occupation – umpire
Verb – gallop

Another mad lib for mad libbers!

My Trip To The Store

Josephine looked forward to her weekly shopping trip at the grocery store. It was the only time she could be adorable. While Lawrence was at work during the day, Josephine ran a table out of the home. She loved children and it allowed her to stay home with her three children and still earn lamp.

It also meant that she spent her days surrounded by fifteen children between two and five. Some days she felt like she would lose her locker. Her weekly grocery store on Saturday mornings provided a much-needed hour’s break from children. Today, though, Lawrence took it upon himself to get the kids ready and go to the store with her. She did her best to restrain her passion and growing diaper.

Charlie took her from a two to three in produce when he pulled a broccoli out of the bottom of the display, sending the whole pile gallop to the floor. Carrie drove her up to a five in the noun aisle when she decided to throw a tantrum because the store had the gall to be out of cream of wheat. Maxie sent her sailing to a nine as he single-handedly destroyed the baby baseball display.

Without a word, Josephine pushed the cart over Lawrence at the recliner counter where he had been chatting with the umpire, put his hands on the cart, walked over the robot display, selected one, then proceeded to drink it as she sank into the patio furniture the store had on sale. It was the last time anyone went to the store with Josephine.

This time, I managed to get all the words in the right places. Phew. It was easier with a pencil and eraser.

THE ORIGINAL STORY:

A Trip To The Store

Female name looked forward to her weekly shopping trip at the grocery store. It was the only time she could be adjective. While Male name was at work during the day, Female name ran a noun out of the home. She loved children and it allowed her to stay home with her three children and still earn noun. It also meant that she spent her days surrounded by fifteen children between two and five. Somedays she felt like she would lose her noun. Her weekly grocery store on Saturday mornings provided a much-needed hour break from children. Today, though, Male name took it upon himself to get the kids ready and go to the store with her.

She did her best to restrain her emotion and growing noun. Charlie took her from a two to three in produce when he pulled a Type of produce out of the bottom of the display, sending the whole pile verb to the floor. Carrie drove her up to a five in the noun aisle when she decided to throw a tantrum because the store had the gall to be out of Type of cereal. Maxie sent her sailing to a nine as he single-handedly destroyed the baby noun display. Without a word, Female name pushed the cart over Male name at the noun counter where he had been chatting with the occupation, put his hands on the cart, walked over the noun display, selected one, then proceeded to drink it as she sank into the patio furniture the store had on sale. It was the last time anyone went to the store with Female name.

IN JAPANESE, THERE’S A WORD FOR IT

When talking about photography, English doesn’t always make the grade. As it turns out, Japanese does.

The Japanese have a word for everything, I think. I just learned “Komorebi. It means “sunlight filtering through the leaves of trees,” and by extension, the natural filtering of light through anything. Like blinds or curtains, for example. 75-051214-Komorebi-Sunlight_12I’ve been chasing that light for more than 40 years. It’s just the word I’ve needed. I’ve been trying to capture that light as long as I can remember.

Komorebi.

Remember it. It’s a great word.A golden tree and the rays of sunlight Then there is bokeh, a word so popular it is now included in American books about photography.

Bokeh defines something difficult to say in English.

“Bokeh means the aesthetic quality of the blur (soft and out of focus) area in an image produced by a lens.”

Like this?Dry weeds by the river

Or that? KaityI’m sure there’s more, but this is my vocabulary lesson for the day.

WHAT’S THAT SOUND? – Marilyn Armstrong

Borborygmus: a rumbling or gurgling noise made by the movement of fluid and gas in the intestines.

bor·bo·ryg·mus \ ˌbȯr-bə-ˈrig-məs \

RDP #65: BORBORYGMUS

Grumble. Glurg. Pow. Blub.

Does anyone remember the scene at the beginning of “The African Queen” with Humphrey Bogart really hungry, sitting at the table with Katherine Hepburn getting delicate sandwiches and tea while his stomach belched and roared and gurgled? Who knew there was a word for that.

This is what I love about English. We have a word for absolutely everything … except a few from other languages for which we do not have words. Like “davka” which means “Doesn’t it just figure … ” and actually was originally German, but slipped into Hebrew.

Or “meerpesset” — actually a Dutch word — which means the kind of outside porch on a kitchen which is enclosed on three sides with one side open, often used to store things (and frequently enclosed to make a very bright closet … or, if there’s another building or pole, a good place to hang the laundry in the summertime.

But mostly, English has a lot of words and a lot of tenses and a lot of ways to say the same thing with a slightly different feeling, depending on which word you use.

We used to have grammatical rules and things like “punctuation,” but we have abandoned grammar. Eliminated adverbs and tenses, especially complex past tenses. I mourn the loss, but since so much of the language has been reduced to emojis and abbreviations which are known only to those under age 20, I suppose I should be happy we have words.

I’m sure I’ll find some use for borborygmus. I will certainly try very hard to find one!

MAD LIBS – Marilyn Armstrong

I remember when we used to buy these in paper books and sometimes, the results were absolutely hilarious. These are rather simpler, but hopefully also funny.

Here we are on Day 2 of the Mad Lib Daily Prompt.   Thanks to Ms. Haunted (Teresa) of The Haunted Wordsmith for hosting these!  I love ’em.

https://thehauntedwordsmith.wordpress.com/2018/08/02/blogging-mad-libs-2/

Name
Adjective
Verb x 6
Time span
Nouns (plural) x 4
Form of Transportation
Types of Animals x 3
Occupation
Snack food
Body part
Location
Pronoun
Noun

Name – Delores
Adjective – annoyed
Verb x 6 – wait, lurk, chatter, yell, complain, whine, yammer
Time span – one hour
Nouns (plural) x 4 – telephones, customer services, stupidity, headaches
Verb – yammered
Form of Transportation – feet
Verb – stumbling
Types of Animals x 3 – Scottie, Scottie, mutt
Occupation – holding while being told my business is important
Snack food – coffee
Body part -left ear
Location – the loveseat
Pronoun – that
Noun – pointless.

Original Story:

Name was so adjective to see the circus, it was the only thing she could verb about for the whole time span. She read stories of nouns that verb on the high wire, nouns that drove around in miniature forms of transportation, elephants that verb, and wild animals that jumped through nouns. The night of the show arrived and Name dressed up like an occupation with a huge smile painted on her face. Her family found their seats and after eating some snack food, devouring a rainbow snow cone, and verb her first cotton candy, Name promptly fell asleep with her body part on her dad’s lap. Name didn’t verb till the next morning but regaled everyone at the breakfast table with stories of animals that sang, noun artists that verb from treetop to treetop in the middle of location, and nouns that morphed into small animals that made everyone laugh. Name loved pronoun night at the circus.

My Story:

Delores was so annoyed to see the circus, it was the only thing she could wait about for the whole hour. She read stories of telephones that lurk on the high wire, customer services that drove around in miniature feet, elephants that chatter, and wild Scotties and a mutt that jumped through stupidity. The night of the show arrived and Delores dressed up like a holding while being told my business is important with a huge smile painted on her face. Her family found their seats and after eating some coffee, devouring a rainbow snow cone, and complaining her first cotton candy, Delores promptly fell asleep with her ear on her dad’s lap. Delores didn’t whine till the next morning but regaled everyone at the breakfast table with stories of Scotties and a mutt that sang, headache artists that yammer from treetop to treetop in the middle of the loveseat, and Scotties and a mutt that morphed into small Scotties and a mutt that made everyone laugh. Delores loved that night at the circus.

Note: You needed some past tenses and a gerund or two, but it’s still funny.

WHAT A NOVEL IDEA! – Marilyn Armstrong

RDP #64: NOVEL

“What a novel idea,” she said to her friend.

“Novel … as in … maybe I should write one?”

“Well, if you want to. No, all I meant to say was that the idea was different. Unique. A novel isn’t always a book. It can also mean new or original.”

Jill nodded. “You know, I did write a novel. Well, it was sort of a novel. Really, it was pretty much true, but to make it work as a book, I played around with timelines and combined multiple people into one person. Didn’t I give you a copy?”

“I don’t think so,” Jane replied, “but if you have one to spare, I’d be delighted to read it.”

“Maybe not so delighted,” Jill commented. “It’s not a light-hearted book and some people just can’t handle it.” She looked through her bookcase and found a copy. “Here, I’ll inscribe it for you. Even if you don’t read it, at least you have an original with inscription. It might earn you a buck on a used book site.”

SHORTER IS BETTER – BY ELLIN CURLEY

I have seen many plays that were interesting, but way too long. The producers had to fill out the required time for a Broadway play, whether or not they had enough good material. A lot of movies are also too long for the same reason.

To me, most action movies are no more than a series of barely distinguishable scenes of violence strung together from the opening credits and beginning “premise,” to an even more spectacularly violent dénouement. As far as I’m concerned, you could cut movies of this genre in half without altering the plot (what plot?) at all. But then, you might have a 47-minute movie which no one would pay to see. I would be one of the people who didn’t pay to see it.

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This is particularly painful with comedies, particularly on television. Many sit-coms have a few funny bits and that’s it. The rest of the show just isn’t funny. In a perfect world, you could air an 18-minute episode because that’s all the funny material you had. You should be able to present the material that works, then call it a day.

For the most part, half-hour shows are only 21 minutes after subtracting commercial breaks. Take off another one or two for coming attractions and you’re down to 19 minutes. So maybe the problem is the really bad scripts? Maybe they only feel long because they are so bad? Or maybe they are so short, there’s no time to develop a plot?

I worry about this with blogs too. I have good ideas but I they don’t always add up to a whole post. So I’m simply going to present a few paragraphs from a couple of interesting articles I read recently.

First, apparently, babies and young children are ‘designed,’ by evolution, to seem cute and winning to adults to ensure kids get the maximum love and attention they need to thrive and grow. Infants’ big eyes, button noses, and chubby cheeks elicit a kind of primal bonding reaction in adults. So do the sounds they make and the way they smell. It’s a visceral, chemical, and nearly universal reaction.

Children start to lose those physically attractive ‘baby’ features around age two or three, so adults are hard-wired to respond equally strongly to the speech patterns of young children.

The way kids perceive and say things sound funny and charming to us. Their observations about the world seem irresistibly adorable. This phenomenon has a name: “Cognitive Babyness.” Studies show that between age two and seven, a child’s cute behavior replaces their cute faces in stimulating a caregiving response.

Go evolution!

Ana McGuffey - 1946 - Mme. Alexander - Doll's faces are intended to embody the "adorable" factor of real toddlers.
Ana McGuffey – 1946 – Mme. Alexander – Doll’s faces are intended to embody the “adorable” factor of real toddlers.

So much for interesting factoids. I’ll move to my next mini topic.

I taught Yoga and Meditation for eight years. I know the enormous benefits to adults — increased focus, attention span, calmness, control, and confidence. Also, decreased tension and stress, anger, frustration, distractibility, and fewer physical aches and pains. It never occurred to me that teaching some form of Yoga and/or Mindfulness into schoolchildren might have the same amazing benefits. \

Recently, I’ve read articles about these kinds of programs being taught in kindergarten through high school, all around the country. They have produced outstanding results.

The skills taught have reduced the symptoms in ADHD kids. Calmed children with anxiety disorders. Helped kids with learning issues, behavior problems, and social deficits. The same studies have shown improved grades, a higher degree of empathy and kindness between kids — and an enhanced enthusiasm for school.

Many schools have incorporated some form of mindfulness into the curriculum for teachers as well as students.

Way to go! Good for you! Over and out!