PIGGYBACK WRITER

Piggyback – a strange word – isn’t it? Have you ever seen a stack of pigs?

I could understand frogbacking, maybe…Frogsor Continue reading

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BFFD – A Pet Peeve

“Even you, Sir Richard Branson? You should be ashamed of yourself!” was my first thought, as I took my seat on Tuesday night’s Virgin America red-eye flight from San Francisco to Florida. I even mentioned it out loud. “Looks like I need to write Richard a letter,” I grumbled.

Why? Continue reading

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HELL HATH NO FURY LIKE MS. MUFFET SCORNED

This is a fable of blood and deceit—
Not for the faint-hearted, or stomachs that are weak.
The tale, its author, the unpopular Father Gander,
Was written from his viewpoint with unflinching candor.
This is the real story of an ogre, once sweet,
A sworn vegetarian—tricked—into eating raw meat. Continue reading

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MOTHER LOVE – an Earth Day tale

 

Sweating and belching, the young mother rolls into the Emergency Room at precisely one minute before midnight.

The attending physician’s eyebrows take on the appearance of his last patient’s electro-cardiogram a moment before her death.

“What is it this time?” he says.

“My temperature is rising,” she rasps.

“Sweat streams like rushing rivers down my face. My feet burn. I can hardly breathe and my mouth is as dry as the Grand Canyon in August.”

His eyebrows cinch. “Has the stabbing pain in your lungs worsened since last you were here?” Continue reading

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WALLS

I once sat upon an ancient rock contemplating my life—my raison d’être—in this vast world of ours. When you find yourself—an itty-bitty pinprick, a teeny-tiny dot, hardly a smudge in the landscape—gazing upon the millions-of-years-old arctic ice cap, you can’t help but wonder.

Russell Glacier, Kangerlussuaq, Greenland in 2009

Me in Awe at the Russell Glacier, Kangerlussuaq, Greenland in 2009

Continue reading

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UP

Where’s My Backpack is a travel-based blog that I have recently started following. Love it! And every week, Ailsa suggests a theme and invites her readers to share their own photo adventure.

No sooner had I read this week’s suggestion when it became clear to me how often I too look down at the ground when I’m walking out, about, and all over town. But then, who wouldn’t after having recently tripped over a curb and made a face plant onto a concrete sidewalk? After screaming softly muttering a chain of expletives that mimic figs, fudge, and fajitas into my hand,

Continue reading

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WHERE THE LOST SOCKS ARE

This adventure has been rated OSFA, One-size-fits-all, by the International Knee-Sport-and-Leisure-Sock Association of Planetearth. Otherwise known as IKSLAP.

Have you seen this sock today?

MISSING - Last Seen Entering Dryer

MISSING-Last Seen Entering Dryer 12/12/12

After half a century of sitting on their hands, many members of CADS, the Center for the Abnormal Dematerialization of Socks, still refuse to accept that the daily disappearance of an inordinate number of the world’s socks is a problem of epic proportion. Continue reading

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Illumination

Show Me The Way To Go Home

Show Me The Way To Go Home

The sun shows her face for only a moment, illuminating the way home, pointing out that we always have a choice…

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AUF WIEDERSEHEN – Until We Meet Again

RUTHLESS. What a curious word. And how did it ever come to mean ‘cruel, heartless, pitiless.’ Could it have been coined in a gal leaves guy country-western ballad—Cold and callous, she ground his heart like the butt of her Camel with the heel of her boot—Leaving him to drown in shots of bourbon and vermouth—Yes, Ruth cut him loose on that fateful day—she left him RUTH-LESS—RUTH-LESS, lost, and astray.

When I recently read in Publishers Weekly that Barbara Lalicki,

photo by Tom Lalicki

photo by Tom Lalicki

senior vice-president and editorial director at HarperCollins Children’s Books, is retiring at the end of this month, I had a similar thought.

No! Not that Barbara has anything to do with being ruthless. Continue reading

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GOOD DAY MOON

On top of Round Hill, in a land called Marin,
December’s sun coaxed a new day to begin.

SUN

As she climbed, bit by bit, up into the sky,
Sun noticed the Moon, waiting patiently nigh.

28 December 2012

Full Daytime Moon – 28 December 2012

“Is something wrong, brother?” she sighed on the breeze. Continue reading

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