About Me

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United Kingdom
I've been creative writing all my life, though with various haitus(es) along the way. IFrom 2010 I started this blog and enjoyed sharing writing and other information with everyone. illness and bereavement supplied the more recent hiatus.

Thursday 31 March 2011

The Final Count Down



It starts tomorrow, the one month challenge (except Sundays) hosted by Arlee Bird.

I have a special button on my right side bar so that everyone can follow the other blogs taking part created by
Writing Wordit Many thanks.

I have pre-scheduled the first seven posts and intend to:

1. Write on the theme of writing.

2. Post a general response to comments unless a specific one is needed.

3. Visit everyone who leaves a comment.

4. Try to visit as many other blogs from the blog roll using my snazzy new buttons as I can, bearing in mind my Über tiredness at the moment.

 
 
However, I have found if I do 'Ctrl A' the screen goes white and writing changes to blue. Hoorah!

Some blogs seem to crash when I try to leave a message or view them or the word verification pop up box bounces about for several tries before I can leave a comment, so that maybe why I might not be able to follow you back, though I try my best.


How about you are you up for the challenge?

 

GOOD LUCK TO EVERYONE TAKING PART

Wednesday 30 March 2011

Paradox Haiku



This week's theme: Paradox

This one was a toughie!




 

Monday 28 March 2011

Wiped Out

Hi everyone. I'm just posting to let you all know that I'm a little poorly at the moment.

Being the kind of person who soldiers on I've been feeling increasingly awful over many, many months (= years) and initially thought it was my age. Then I began to think I had CFS/ ME, but after blood tests I have been diagnosed with hyperthyroidism, which explains why I have been feeling so utterly wiped out recently.



I'm somewhat behind with my W1S1 as a result, but I have started to schedule my A-Z blog posts for next month and will get around to visiting all your blogs again soon.




Wednesday 23 March 2011

Rooted to Haiku

Jenn at http://youknowthatblog.com/

Has selected this week's theme: Roots

Finding ancestors
The roots of our family
Closet skeletons
Woven through the soil
Drinking in their nutrients
Tapestry of roots



Wrenched from their homeland
The horrors of slavery
A true life story

With roots to dye for
A little colouration
Not quite natural

 


Rooted to the spot
My feet seem stuck to the floor
Paralysed in fear.

Sunday 20 March 2011

2nd Crusader Challenge and Microfiction

Write a FLASH FICTION story (in any format) in 100 words or less, excluding the title. Begin the story with the words, “The goldfish bowl teetered” These four words will be included in the word count.
Once you’ve posted your Challenge post on your blog, pop back here and link directly to it in the linky tool below (make sure you include the direct link to that post, not just the link to your blog!).
Entries in the Second Crusader Challenge will close next Friday, March 25th (at 11.59pm EST), so make sure you get your post in the linky link before then. 


I've loosely based my 100 word piece on a real incident with my brother's school goldfish...



Miraculously, the goldfish survived the ordeal.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Instead of a book blurb I'm doing a Microfiction as Susan seems offline at the moment
The challenge to write a story in 140 characters or less.
I borrowed the image from Lisa's Book Blurb Friday at Writing in the Buff



George's retirement party had been going swingingly until he got up to find the men's room; then his head was going swimmingly. (126 characters with spaces)

Friday 18 March 2011

Can you Crack the Puzzle?

Don't tell me it's too hard?


Okay so I placed a list of three truths and one lie for you to guess in the previous post

Some of you may have already guessed correctly

As a fun challenge I have put all the truths in the word search below. The lie is the only one missing from the wordsearch.

How many can you find? NB: The words may be in any direction.

Okay I'll relent and give you The Answer:
19.03.11

Thursday 17 March 2011

Memetastic Award

My thanks to Lynn for passing this award on to me.

In my research I noted that most recipients comment that they don't know what memetastic means, so I decided to find out and this is what I came up with:

A meme identifies ideas or beliefs that are transmitted from one person or group of people to another and is a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena.
When you add ‘tastic’ to a word, it’s another way of saying 'fantastic’. So thank you Lynn.

RECIPIENTS SHOULD
1. Thank the person who gave the award 
2. List 4 truths and one lie about myself (oops maths was never my strong point)
Then your followers must guess which is the lie by leaving comments below.
3. Pass the award on .



I'd like to pass this award on to: Liz at 8 bit words
                                                      Angela at My Poetry and Prose Place




Thank you for all your well wishes, my cold is on the mend, thankfully.


Wednesday 16 March 2011

Integrity Haiku

Our moral compass
Consistency of action
Honest and truthful

Sorry I'm feeling rough today, so only one haiku. I used to get really bad colds and then they became really mild, but this one is a stonker!

Hello to my new followers and thanks to established and new followers for dropping by and commenting.
Normal service will be resumed soon, I hope.


SEE POST BELOW...

Tuesday 15 March 2011

Star Blogger- YAY!

MANY THANKS to Dom from Writes of Passage
for this very special award.
I am delighted and honoured.

Here are the "rules"
1) Link back to the person who gave you the award and share something about them.
2) Nominate a new recipient and tell them how special their blog is to have been singled out for this exclusive award
3) Share ONE thing that makes you laugh,

Matt Harvey's The Hug


ONE favourite thing
You all know it's Costa Coffee

and ONE place you would like to visit.
New Zealand


So who shall I pass this award on to?

While I would say that Dom is also very much a Star Blogger for the same reasons he has nominated me,
I am going to pass this award on to Ellie Garratt  because Ellie puts a great deal of thought and time into commenting on other people's blogs and participating in Blog fests. Her posts are creative and entertaining, with great graphics and well laid out. That is why Ellie is a Star Blogger

~~~~~~~~~~~~

I would also like to thank Lady Jai and Michelle Teacress for awarding me the Stylish Blogger award


Once again I am honoured and delighted.



I would like to award this to OLD KITTY whose blog is full of warmth and humour and integrity. Oops I have already given her this award, but I didn't see it on her blog.
So I'll also pass it on to Nahno Mclein

Ok so 7 more things about me:
1. I love harp music and wish I could play.
2. I read The Millstone by Margaret Drabble in 4 hours when I was 17yrs old. I haven't read a book that quickly before or since.

3. Some of my fav authors are Andrea Levy, Anita Shreve and Lori Lansens.

4. I've had a nasty cold since the early hours of Saturday morning. My nose blocked completely and as I lay trying to breathe it popped and squelched like a squedgee mop in very soapy water.

5. My cat who we've only had since Oct 2009 had his 3rd lot of stitches yesterday for an injury. We hope this accident proneness does not continue!

6. I love classical music especially Bach, Mozart and Baroque and my fav pop group is Queen.

7. I am old enough to remember when a packet of crisps cost only pence!

Sorry off to nurse my cold again now.




Sunday 13 March 2011

Broken Hearts Blogfest

Broken Hearts Blogfest hosted by Dawn Embers

The broken heart scene can be flash fiction, poetry, non-fiction, anything except 5,000 words are little too long. Shorter tends to be better. The basic idea is to write about a heart breaking or one that is already broken. Show us the wretched emotions, the anger, depression, fear, whatever happens after the happy honeymooon lovey-dove V-day stuff is over and all that is left is a broken heart.

This is taken from my W.I.P. Once Forgotten and is the end of Chapter One

You can double-click the image to read it.



Does your WIP have a broken heart scene?

Would this make you want to read on?

Thursday 10 March 2011

Sixty Sixty

In celebration of reaching 50 followers, Nahno McLein is hosting his first blogfest: The 60x60 Challenge.
Originally the challenge involved writing 60 words in 60 seconds, but the most Nahno could reach was 47. So, Nahno has now amended the challenge to submitting or posting in the comments section of his blog a 60 word piece of writing that contains art in any form.


FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Here is my entry:

NB: hadn't counts as 2 words.

I'd love to know what your imagination thinks Nadine looks like?

Where is she escaping from?

Who is standing beside her?

Wednesday 9 March 2011

Hope Haiku




This week's theme: Hope


A better future
Is he the man to do it
And bring about change?

Making the right choice
Hoping for deliverance
Show me the best way
The results are in
Maybe this time I'll succeed
I really hope so.

Seasons are merging
The planet may be dying
Hope we can save it

Hubby's Haiku:

Hope is my main course
Expectation is my sweet
Not reality

Tuesday 8 March 2011

Back up


Did you back up your precious documents lately?

Check out Ellie's post on the latest virus

I once had my whole computer wiped by the techie people
(documents, emails the lot)
and I cried buckets!



These days you can backup your files online, which is great security for your documents in the event of something like a house fire or burglary.

Or there's memory sticks.
If all else fails...
Keep hard copies


So what are you waiting for?
Go back-up your MS's.

Monday 7 March 2011

Micro Monday Framed


Welcome to another round of Microfiction Monday
courtesy of Susan at
Stony River.
Each week Susan posts a new picture and invites us
to write a story in 140 characters or less.


Trapped inside the picture for over a century, Christopher tried his best to make his descendants realise he'd been framed. (123 characters with spaces)


Grandpa Kent looked suspiciously like Christopher Reeve. Well he had been a super man, after all. (97 characters with spaces)


I'm preparing for the A-Z blogging challenge by planning and auto-scheduling posts
in keeping with my blog site theme of writing, though I'm worried about X and Z!
I look forward to seeing all the other participant's takes on the alphabet theme.

Saturday 5 March 2011

Flowing Fonts Winner

My thanks to
for their great entries


Here's what I came up with but didn't finish:

Arial Black stood in the doorway with his hands clasped around his head.
HELVETICA!” he shouted, the veins on his temples pulsating.
Georgia was used to his outbursts and looked up from her brush script,  AMAZE me!” she replied, her tone matteroffact .
“I feel like I’m running helterskelter  into a chasm ” he explained his face blanched with worry.
 
Vivian  leant me her Book Antiqua  and the Courier took it away by mistake.”
“Do you mean Roland?”  Georgia asked, laying her flat brush on the desk.
“No that Superfrench  woman”
I’ll get on the phone to Commercialscript bt  right away and sort it out” she said, realising the impact of what he’d just told her.
“It’ll be half way to Coolsville by now, I shouldn’t wonder!” Arial sighed  now clasping his hand to his forehead, melodramatically.
“Or Chicago !” Georgia suggested with a sardonic smile, arching her eyebrows.
Arial returned her gaze with a wounded expression and left the room.  

AND THE WINNER IS:
Dom at Writes of Passage  for his wonderful flash fiction tale

Congratulations and do email me your address, Dom, so I can send your voucher.



Friday 4 March 2011

Book Blurb Friday

Lisa from Writing in the Buff  is hosting a weekly fest posting a picture as a book cover.
The goal: Write a book jacket blurb (150 words or less) so enticing that potential readers would feel compelled to buy the book.


MY BLURB:
Rachel and Jake are being watched, but by what? The Eye is everywhere and yet no-one has seen it. They must escape before they, too, are brainwashed like so many of their friends and family. Finding Jeddiah is their only hope of saving the human race before it is too late.

Only 51 words I'm afraid.

Wednesday 2 March 2011

Fantasy Haiku

Theme: Fantasy



Lottery ticket
That holds the winning numbers
What a fantasy!

Fantasy Fiction
With other worldly creatures
In different places

 



She's getting published
Her fantasy becomes real
It's a dream come true.

http://talliroland.blogspot.com/