Tag: #dailyprompt

Tortureous Eating

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Daily Prompt:  Spicy

I am not a fan of spicy food.  Or I should say, of hot spicy food  I have always equated spicy with hot but I guess that’s not accurate.  I use many spices when I cook, but hot tasting spices I stay away from.

It is inconceivable to me why anyone would want to suffer while eating.  I associate eating with pleasure, not pain.  I guess that for those of you who love to indulge on a tear producing hot dish, you find it pleasurable.

I can remember when my son was a little boy.  Maybe 4 or so.  We went took the kids to Disney World.  He kept seeing the signs along the highway for Popeye’s Chicken.  Finally, after listening to him say he wanted to eat at Popeye’s we gave in.  He said that the chicken was a little hot, but he liked it.  Personally, it was too much for my tender GI tract and my youngest wouldn’t even try it.  After our lunch, we proceeded to the park where we had a delightful day.  It was the next morning when the full effects of Popeye’s Chicken were felt.  My poor little boy was sitting on the commode crying as the spicy chicken made its way out of his little body.  Needless to say, he never wanted Popeye’s Chicken again.

I don’t get it.  My husband used to tell me that when he was young and his dad worked evening shift on weekends he would stay up until he got home and eat hot peppers with him.  He loved how they tasted going in,  but hated how it felt in when they exited. But he kept eating them.

Maybe I have done my family a disservice by not cooking hot spicy food.  I may have denied them the experience of international cuisine.  If so I apologize.  Somehow it goes against my maternal instinct to cause pain while eating.

You will never find hot spices on the spice carousel in my kitchen.  My recipes don’t include things like Cayenne Pepper or Extra Hot Cajun Seasoning.  Just thinking about these things gets the acid churning in my stomach.  For those of you who enjoy these dietary tortures enjoy.

Wanda

 

Dottie

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Daily Prompt:  Amble

I spent the day yesterday with my friend Dottie, her son Brandon and her granddaughter Alissa ambling through Animal Kindom at Disney World here in Orlando, Florida.  We had a wonderful time.  I love to see all of the animals that are in the park as well as going on the rides.  The new ride in Pandora is unbelievable.  That’s all I will say on the matter because I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who has not ridden on it yet.  I am always so impressed with the technology and ingenuity that Disney puts into their attractions.

Did I mention that my friend Dottie is retiring from Disney, Animal Kingdom to be specific, on Wednesday?  So over the years, every trip to the park with her is always filled with many introductions to other cast members on the job.  Whoever she takes to the park is privy to an extraordinary wealth of knowledge about the animals and the trivia related to Animal Kindom.  Her shimmering love for both the animals and her career is evident by her desire to enhance your visit with these nuances.

Dottie has never been one to take her responsibilities at work casually.  Even in her first career with Western Electric.  She has always had a very strong work ethic.  Dottie has always been a teacher of sorts in the form of training in both of her careers.

We have been friends since our junior year in high school.  Almost fifty years!  I can remember thinking that I would be ancient when I was fifty.  Now, I just feel blessed to have had a wonderful friend for that long.  We were in each other’s weddings.  She is godmother to my daughter and Aunt Dottie to all of my children.  We were partners in crime (as Mom would say) in our teens. She called my mom and dad, Mom and Dad and I called her mom Mom.  Our friendship has weathered enormous joy, great loss, sadness, happiness and separation of time and distance.  And now I will share with her a new chapter in her life.  Retirement.  Anyone who has retired after working since their teens knows that although we work toward retirement, and for retirement and want retirement, it is a difficult transition.  So I will have the honor of celebrating this special day with Dottie, her husband Frank and her Disney family on Wednesday by attending her retirement party.

As we left the park last night, to the symphony of screams and laughter I looked at Dottie smiling, tired from the day, but happy she had shared her home of the last 19 years with us.    It was the last time she would be hosting family and friends as a cast member at Disney.  Who ever takes her place in the park will have so very much to live up to.

I love you, Dottie.  Happy Retirement.

Wanda

 

Foggy Brain

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Daily Prompt:  Foggy

Twelve years ago I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia which is a disorder characterized by widespread musculoskeletal pain, fatigue, sleep, memory and mood issues.  It is believed that fibromyalgia amplifies painful sensations by affecting the way your brain processes pain signals.

Symptoms sometimes begin after a physical trauma, surgery, infection or significant psychological stress. In other cases, symptoms gradually accumulate over time with no single triggering event.  My symptoms began after I had an injury.

Women are more likely to develop fibromyalgia than are men. Many people who have fibromyalgia also have tension headaches, temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders, irritable bowel syndrome, anxiety and depression.

There is no cure for it.  It is something that won’t kill me, but it sure can make me miserable.  I have pain every day, but the real frustrating thing for me is the fibro fog which affects my memory.  Sometimes while I am talking I just lose what I am saying.  It drives me crazy.

I have found changing my diet to a paleo one has helped alleviate the pain a bit which in itself is reason enough to stick to eating the paleo way.  I do have to take medications which keep it manageable.  Weather also affects my symptoms.

At my age I have the luxury of picking and choosing what is worth aggravating my symptoms and increasing the pain, and I can tell you that cleaning my house is low on the list.  🙂  My hobbies come before any housework and spending time with my family, especially my grandchildren, comes before them.  I feel that if I am going to hurt, I want it to be over something I love doing, not something that isn’t fun.

Take yesterday for instance.  Dottie, Frank and I spent the day at Sea World in Orlando. We met her ex-brother in law who had his grandchildren with him.  They are the cutest kids.  John 13 and Julia 9.  It rained most of the day, but we walked all over the park. Julia wanted to sit down close when we saw the Shamu show.  I sat right down there with her and we go soaked.  We laughed so hard.  I rode the roller coasters with them and we petted the rays together.  We got back to the house around 8 o’clock last night and I can tell you I was exhausted and I was hurting.  But I was also happy and excited about how I spent the day.

That’s the thing about fibro.  You can’t give into it.  You have to keep moving and doing what you enjoy.  Like I said it’s not a condition that will end my life, so I don’t intend to let it dictate what I can do either.

Wanda

Re-purposing

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Daily Prompt:  Toothbrush

I was brought up by my grandmother who survived the Great Depression.  Consequently we never wasted anything and we often re-purposed things to be used as something else. For example, we never threw away our toothbrushes because they were used to clean the small grout areas of the tile in the bathroom and kitchen.   Since we learn what we live, I followed suit.

When we were moving I was cleaning out the cupboard I used to store my cleaning supplies and I came upon dozens of toothbrushes.   What was I thinking?  I had enough toothbrushes to supply the US Army for when they put recruits on latrine cleaning duty.   I decided that I didn’t need to take so many with me on the move, so I threw most of them away.

Fast forward to a few years later when I was going to re-purpose toothbrushes again since the last of what I had were finally shot.  To my dismay, I realized that the new toothbrushes were substandard.   Their bristles were falling out and did not support the pressure placed on them when I used them to clean the track in my sliding glass door.  I hadn’t realized this when I was using them for my teeth.  I guess I should be happy my teeth didn’t fall out.  Right?

So, after all of these years of saving things to be re-purposed for uses other than what they were intended, I have decided that somethings aren’t worth hanging onto especially if they have been made in the last 30 years.

Wanda

Patience

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Daily Prompt:  Pest

Part of our journey on this earth is to learn patience.  We are all pestered with people and things that we cannot avoid.  Lets face it, our own children can become the biggest pests there are.  We love them, but often we find ourselves out of patience with them.

I find that as I have gotten older my patience has increased.  I can tolerate the same things my kids did when my grandchildren do them.  Although I am not sure if this is because I have learned to be more patient, or if unconsciously I am some how getting even with my kids.  I love this saying.  “Grandchildren are God’s reward for not killing your own children.”  I am not sure where it is from, but I have seen it on many things and places.  It is a humerus take on the reward for being patient with your kids.

My oldest daughter was the one who gave me a run for my money.  I was a young mother of twenty.  Looking back now, I realize that it was more inexperience on my part than actually being impatient.  And, we are so much alike.  Two very independent, strong willed, often rigid people.  I have mellowed so much, but it took me much longer than it took her.

Kelly has grown into a loving,  patient mother of three beautiful children who are the light of my life.  She also entered into motherhood later in life than I did.  Which I think is the key to her earlier success.

Make no mistake, her little ones become pests to her too.  Her famous saying when they are driving her crazy and she hears herself say the same things to them that I said to her is:  “Are you happy now?  You have turned me into your grandmother.”  I love it.  They look at her and say “You aren’t Grami.”  Then I get the phone call from her saying thanks ma, I did’t get one like me, I got three!  Like I could control that.

I saw this pillow today and had to grab a shot of it.  This is what my Kelly says to me all the time.

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Yup, she’s still a pest.  🙂

Wanda

 

The Deep

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Daily Prompt:  Shallow

It’s always exciting
My first dip in the pool
It means that summer’s arrived.

Get out of the deep
And into the shallow
Mama then called to me.

No mama I can’t
I’ve waited all year
To jump into the deep end.

Life takes courage
Takes heart
I responded with glee.

She gave me the look
You know the look
As her color turned very red

Then smiling I said
Come on mom jump right in
And you’ll see it’s much more fun in the deep.

©Wanda M. Williams

 

 

 

 

 

Hidden Dangers

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Daily Prompt:  Hidden

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It was around 5 o’clock in the afternoon yesterday that I looked outside to see it drizzling. I had planned to mow the grass for Frank and Dottie, but realized I would have to wait a little longer.   About an hour later I walked past them both saying I was going to cut the grass.  They both looked at me and said OK.  Out I went.

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I got onto the behemoth red machine that reminds me of a pincher bug on wheels.  I affectionately refer to it as Max.  You can imagine my delight as it started right up.  So far so good.  The last time I tried to start it we had to give Max a jump.  I started going back and forth across the back yard making small talk with the two armed machine.  I had to make more than one pass over the rows I was traveling because the grass grows worst than weeds down here.  All of a sudden I attempted to turn and got stuck.  Oh no!  Hidden danger number one.

No matter what I tried I could not get the thing to move.  Then, I looked at where the wheels were and realized I had dug a couple of big holes.  I carried a piece of wood down to the back of Max.  I was thinking I could put it under the tires.  Good idea right? Wrong! Max’s petite physique hid his weight admirably.  I couldn’t lift it.  Hidden danger number two.

Finally, I had to go into the house to let Frank know I just got his new lawn mower stuck in the mud.  Being very gracious Frank said, “It’s OK, I get stuck sometimes too.”  I felt a little better.  But Max was still sitting in the mud.

Then Dottie said to me,  “I can’t believe you tried to cut the grass after the downpour we had.” Downpour?  When did we have a downpour?  Apparently in the front of the house it had just drizzled, but in the back it had poured.  I mentioned to Dottie that I had told her I was going to cut the grass she just said she didn’t hear me.  Hidden danger number three.  With age comes decreased hearing.  I totally get it now when my kids say I am going deaf.   The three of us just chuckled.

So fast forward to midnight.  As I am lying in bed about to fall asleep I hear it raining.   All I could think about was poor Max all by himself in the back yard uncovered getting soaked.  Oh well, it wasn’t like I could go out and get him right?

Today Frank and I decided he was going to try to tow me out of the mud using his electric wheel chair.  Honestly, I was skeptical.  All we needed was to get him stuck in the mud too.  Then we would be in a real pickle.  But, I deferred to Frank and tied the rope around Max and his wheelchair.  I started Max, and as Frank pulled I gave it some gas.  I looked behind me and I see Frank’s chair leaning over on the hill.   Max isn’t budging.  I jumped off and ran up to Frank to tell him to stop pulling.  Repeat of hidden danger number three.  Thankfully, Frank didn’t get stuck or topple over.

Our last ditch effort was using his pick up truck.  I got Dottie to back the truck onto the side yard so I could hook the rope to the back of it.  Frank was positioned between me on the tractor and Dottie in the truck.  I waved to Frank so he could let Dottie know she could start pulling.  All of a sudden Max’s tires took hold and I finally got out of the mud.

We were due to have another rain storm today, so I just stayed on the tractor and cut the grass.  It is storming as I write this post.

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Have you ever ridden a tractor like this?  It is a study in coordination.  You have to move both handles to make it go forward, turn or backward.   Frank likes it because he says it’s got a zero degree turning radius on it.  That zero degree turning is what started this craziness.  Give me a steering wheel any day of the week.

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Here is a picture of the damage to the back yard.   What should have taken a couple of hours at the most tuned into two days of hidden dangers while cutting the grass.

Wanda

Holiday Traditions

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Daily Prompt:  Traditional

I got a call from a friend the other day and somehow we got talking about how we spend our holidays with our respective families.  Maybe because we are both a fan of  the feel good Hallmark Channel’s Christmas movies and the “Christmas in July” week has just ended, or it could have been because we are both quilters and are making quilts for Christmas gifts this year but we did compare notes about the holidays.

Every family has it’s own traditional way to celebrate special events occurring in it. Anniversaries, birthdays, graduations, weddings, births Christenings, retirements and deaths are all mile stones which are recognized in special ways.  Just like holidays, these events often include specific activities like picnics, dinners or parties, etc.

I am watching my kids make these even adjustments with their new families.  Just like Gary and I had to do.  We each had to make compromises about the celebrations that would become our own traditions.  So, we took a little from his family and a little from mine and then we added our own flair to the mix.  All in all, we had some pretty good celebrations which provided all of us with wonderful memories.

One thing that Gary and I were both brought up with is not going anywhere on Christmas Day.  Most times we went to midnight Mass so it never created the situation of pulling the kids away from their stuff.  However, after we had our kids, some of the extended family were upset that we would not visit on Christmas Day.  That is probably the only time we stood fast and didn’t give in.  Our parents were invited for any meal they wanted to attend or they could stay the whole day if they chose but if they wanted to see their grandchildren they came to us.

We always celebrated those special times with family and I am so happy that my kids are continuing with those traditions because it means I get to spend all the special times with my grandchildren.

Wanda

 

Harmony In Motion

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Daily Prompt:  Harmonize

Friday afternoon here in Orlando we had quite a storm.  It rained so hard that the back part of the yard flooded.  Right along the back of the yard is a wooded area fed by a stream and it looked like a small lake with trees growing out of it.

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I have been fascinated with the birds here in Orlando.  I love to photograph animals and birds are one of my favorite subjects.  After the area flooded, I walked out onto the porch and to my amazement a flock of about twenty five white Ibis flew right up to the area to forage for food.  The ibeses in harmonized movements grazed along the edge of the water each taking a turn as sentinel.

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I attempted to get the birds to come closer by throwing out some cheerios in the main part of the yard.  To my delight, they began to head up toward me.

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I discovered that they didn’t really care for the Cheerios and soon turned back toward the water.

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I came into the house to show my friend the pictures I had taken.  As I went back out to check on the birds I caught the last of my visitors, a white crane just standing in the water.

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I was lucky enough to catch the crane taking flight.   Unfortunately, I was not as ready for the take off as I would have liked to have been.  So the shot isn’t a great one, but I still think it’s magical.

Wanda