What A Whole Load Of Nonsense

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What A Whole Load Of Nonsense

In all of the writing groups I have involved with, there were always certain questions posed. The most common being, "Excuse me where are the washrooms?" Or if you are from south of the border, the restrooms. Then there's the good old Brit who'd ask for the bog or the loo.

Yeah, the bog I get, but the loo? The English have different names for everything, but considering they've been around six or seven years longer than the entire North American Continent has been discovered and they've got the Queen on their side, which overrules everyone.

But I digress, otherwise my title does begin to make total sense. A very common question is, "how do I pull my readers in, lock them up and throw away the key." Well the last bit I just made up. So if I said the following;

From atop the plateau overlooking Machu Picchu the couple gazed. The old stone buildings glinting in the sunlight. Air so rarified it was hard to breathe. Overhead eagles cried out. Julia-Rae licked the salty sweat from her lips, as his calloused hand brushed along her arm, sending a shiver through her. She inhaled, smelling that pungent, masculine aroma oozing out of his pores.

Did that pull you in? If not, stop reading and beat it, I'm wasting your time and mine. But, if yes, then what did I do to engage the reader? ..... waiting!

Some are probably now thinking, is this guy crazy? Yup. Does he drive his wife and his publisher crazy? Yup, and double yup. Does he make much or any sense at all?

Bang. You've got it. Senses. I used all of them in that paragraph; sight, taste, touch, smell and hearing to engage the reader. If you can make the reader experience all of those in a scene, you've got them involved. And if this doesn't work for you, try gardening; then it's just you, dirt and weeds. Doesn't get more basic than that.

Or you could use my next favorite tactic to engage the reader, grab your book and whack them on the forehead with its spine. They'll either be engaged or unconscious and when they come to, you will definitely have their (and most likely their lawyers as well), attention.

Oh, before I finish and just in case you're wondering, Loo? Where the hell did that come from? Some say it came from the shortened term - Waterloo- the English bathroom company that manufactured toilets and urinals. Or, I really like this one, and no, I didn't make this up. In the late eighteen hundreds the Earl of Lichfield loved to entertain people, only he had a most miserable wife, "Lady Louisa." After meeting her, many guests replied with, "nice chap but she's anything but a lady." Back then, the posh people would put the visitor's name on their bedroom doors. Two rather inebriated gentlemen decided to switch her name plate with the bathrooms. Later guests laughingly told everyone of "going to visit Lady Louisa" or today "going to the loo."

Was it serendipity or a higher power? By Sandy Semerad

As I reflect on certain events in my life, I can't help but wonder. Did these things occur by chance or was a higher power at work?

Tell me what you think after you've read this:

 Years ago, I worked as a reporter for the Marietta Daily Journal. The phone rang in the newsroom, and I grabbed it.

“Where can I turn to for help?” a woman asked. “It’s almost Christmas and my children still believe in Santa. We’re running out of money for shelter and food. I’ve called the United Way and all the churches. No one will help us,” she said.

I listened to her plea. Her husband and two young children had driven across country to relocate for her husband’s job, she said. He’d been offered a better position, as a trucker for a local transport company.

On the long drive to Atlanta, their car broke down. They spent most of their savings on repairs, she said.

When they arrived in the city, they found a motel they could afford. The room was grimy and scary, but she told herself, it was only temporary. Once her husband started his job, they'd be able to afford a better, more permanent home.

Her husband, being protective, didn’t want to leave his family alone and unsafe. So he took them along with him in his truck. When the company found out, he was fired.

“We have never asked for a handout before,” she said. “I used to criticize people who begged for handouts. Now I know I was wrong to judge.”

Her story touched me. It rang true.

I wrote a feature article about her family’s dilemma. The story ran, with their photo, in the next issue.

The following day, I was in my kitchen, and the phone rang. I started to let the machine get it, but something told me to answer the call.

“Are you the lady who wrote the article about that poor family?” a man asked, and then described in detail what he'd read.

“Yes,” I said.

“Do you think these people are dependable?” He asked.

“Yes.”

 “I have an apartment, and I’m thinking of letting them live in it for free until they can get on their feet,” he said.

“That would be great,” I said.

A year passed. I was working as an editor for American Health Consultants in Atlanta. Christmas was approaching.

The phone rang in my office. I answered it.

It was the desperate woman, who had called me a year ago. She said she got my new work number from the Marietta Daily Journal. “I had to call and thank you and let you know, we’re going to have a wonderful Christmas this year.”

Her words touched me to tears, but it was years later when I began to wonder. Why was I in that exact spot when the phone rang in the newsroom? Why did I decide to write the story? And why did I answer the phone when that generous man, with the apartment, called?

I don’t know.

There have been many other examples I could share. I’ve included at least one of those instances in A MESSAGE IN THE ROSES, a novel based on a murder trial I covered in Atlanta. The book is primarily fiction, but as a professor once told me, “Fiction is the lie that tells the truth.”

Truth is a relative term, I know. We strive for truth, but don’t always achieve it. As to the truth about what causes certain events to occur, I’m still wondering. Do these things happen by chance—serendipity--or is a higher power at work?

What do you think? 

To find out more, visit my website: http://www.sandysemerad.com/ 

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Life and Lingerie by Ginger Simpson

http://www.bookswelove.net/authors/simpson-ginger/

Lingerie has certainly changed over the years.  Now, the more skimpy the better, but I can't fathom wearing a thong at my age, or ever.  I'm bad about even flossing my teeth.

  Back in the old west women were modest, but now things have really turned to the opposite side.  You just aren't hip if you panties and bra don't match, and of course that old adage, never go out without having on clean panties, is still a rule of thumb.  You never know when you might be in an accident...or fall as I recently did.  I'm changing several times a day, just in case.

While I'm sitting here picturing women of the old west in their bloomers, camisoles and sometimes even a corset, another story comes to mind.  I've shared this one before on my own blog, but it certainly bears repeating.  Watch how you say things to your friends.  :)

Don't the women in the picture to the right look comfy?  Well, remember  the ladies often wore bustles and hoop skirts.  Yuk.  I can't imagine wearing those these days since I trip on air.  You know, they didn't have hip replacements back then.  I'd be in big trouble.  I don't walk well with a cane let alone an aid fashioned from a tree branch.

But on with the post and the reason I choose this topic:

forums.mtbr.com

My friend , Rita,shared a joke today about sayings...
things you wish you could take back.

I was reminded  NOT of something I'd said, but
 something that was said TO me.
 I can laugh about it now, but at the time,
it wasn't all that funny. :)

I'd worked with a woman for years,
discussing her recent shopping trip and
 all the year-end bargains she'd found.
While discussing her purchases, the topic turned
 to the panties she bought.
Her dialog went something like this:

"I bought the same panties I've been
 getting for years. Same size as always,
 and I got them home, took a shower and
 put on a pair. I was shocked, absolutely shocked.
 I checked the label twice to make sure
 they were my size, but although the tag said they were, they hung on me. They were huge.
 The legs gapped, the seat sagged, and the waistband was evidently made to fit
 someone obese. I should have held them up before I bought them. I certainly would
 have noticed something wrong, because I don't think I've ever seen anything soooo big in my life."

Without blinking an eye, she turned to me.

 "Do you think you could wear them?"

Although I was taken aback by her comment, I came up with a pretty smart answer.

 "Well, if I can't, I can probably cover my car with them."

The sad ending to the story: They fit!!!  Note to readers:  They weren't
the size of those shown in the picture, just described in that fashion.

Perception: A Formidable Writing Weapon by Stuart R. West

Perception’s a funny thing. It fascinates me when people are confronted with the same visual, audio or mental stimuli and interpret it differently.

Recently, I had dinner with my brother and his daughters. We had a heated discussion about the approximate size of Mickey Mouse. Yes, we both need to get out more.

He insisted Mickey Mouse is the size of a real mouse. Defiantly, I stood my ground and patiently explained that Mickey Mouse is about five feet tall.

Let's weigh the evidence. Mickey has a dog named Pluto. Mickey's larger than Pluto, keeps him on a leash and appears to be a relatively good dog-owner. At least he doesn't dress Pluto in Halloween costumes. Plus, I believe I've seen Mickey drive a car in cartoons.

My brother's defense? He said Mickey Mouse on Ice is not indicative of the character’s size. He stared at me disbelievingly and said, "Those guys on skates aren't real. You KNOW that, don't you?" He said this in the solemn way one tells a child Santa’s not real, a dark and sad secret unveiled.

(I didn’t even bring up the paradox of Goofy. He's a dog as well. I think. Yet, he walks upright, speaks (unlike Pluto) and appears to be a well-adjusted--yet, slightly stupid--individual.)

This argument has thrown everything I thought I knew into a tizzy. I lay awake at night, pondering the size of Mickey Mouse. Surely, a sentient mouse who walks a dog is human size. Yet...in the back of my mind, I find myself questioning it. 

Perception. A peculiar concept, particularly on how it forms people’s personalities. Was my brother wrong? Depends on which side of the argument you land on, I suppose. But how can anyone’s perception be declared definitively wrong when, to them, they’re right? You can't change people's perceptions, particularly when they involve anything regarding religion, politics or Game of Thrones, I've discovered.

One of the last standing monuments in Picher, Oklahoma, the basis for my book, Ghosts of Gannaway.

As a writer, I like using perception to form characters. In my new suspense thriller, Ghosts of Gannaway, the mining magnate villain, Kyle Gannaway, perceives himself as a hero of sorts, the savior of the little town he founded. Which is true in a way. But Kyle justifies his actions which include murder, perceives it as a means to an end, for the greater good of everyone. Is he wrong? Well, yes. But not in his mind. Perception can be a writer’s secret weapon, something to bring what might be a clichéd character to vivid life.

Dennis Lipstein is the hero in the 1969 portion of the novel (yep, there’re two different timelines), an environmental scientist tasked with studying the now ravaged wastelands of Gannaway, Kansas. Even though Dennis is confronted with empirical evidence of ghosts and a haunting, he refuses to believe, chalking it all up to science. A matter of perception, a writer’s source of conflict. 

In 1935, Tommy Donnelly, hero extraordinaire, has his perception muddied by rose-colored glasses. He’ll do anything to help his men in the mines, naively refusing to believe that anyone could possibly be evil. Noble to a fault, it’s a hard lesson Tommy learns. Because of his misperception.

Finally, there’s Claire, Tommy’s wife, a truly ferocious force of nature who’ll do anything to protect her family. She makes some bad decisions to attain her goal. Which have consequences. Is she wrong in her perception that nothing matters beyond her family? Absolutely not, not to her.

Comedies (particularly romantic ones) are built upon a series of misperceptions. Suspense thrillers rely on misperception as well, sometimes to have humanly flawed characters make very bad (and dangerous) mistakes. Perception’s a great way to unbind characters trapped with one foot into cliché-land, a writer’s secret weapon.

But I’m still pondering the size of Mickey Mouse.

Ghosts of Gannaway can be purchased now for the limited sales price of .99!

Brand spanking new and creeptacular trailer: http://bit.ly/1Icbj0N

 Stuart R. West's BWL author page.

Stuart R. West's Blog: Twisted Tales From Tornado Alley

Poetry Reading at Stephan G Stephansson House by Nancy M Bell

Nancy reading from her work and the work of Stephan G Stephansson.

Sunday July 12, 2015 I had the privilege of attending a poetry reading at the Stephan G Stephansson House north of Markerville, Alberta. Stephan G was an Icelandic settler who lived and homesteaded in the area. He was a prolific poet with hundreds of verses to his credit. Incredibly, he wrote most of his poems at night after the work of the day was done. The house is lovingly restored to the way it was in 1926. Stephan's writing desk still stands in the lovely front room with the bow window. The inkwell and pen still waiting for his hand.

The reading took place outside on the long front lawn with the herd of cows lazing under the spruce trees in the field beside us. The MC commented that since they hooked up the audio system for the readings last year that the weather had co-operated and not blown up a storm. She felt that Stephan wanted to hear the poetry and without the amplification in the earlier years he had called up the storm to chase them inside where he could hear. It is true that you can feel his presence, especially in the room with the writing desk. Poets were invited to read from their own work and to share some of their favorite Stephansson poems. Poets included: Margrit DeGraff, Melle Huizinga, Alvin Boragar, Nancy Bell- that's me!, Rebekah Branson and two other local poets who dropped in. Brian came up from the Markerville museum to share his poetry. Kate McIver treated us to some beautiful harp music and the Branson Family regaled us with some inspiring songs. I am so happy the organizers reached out and invited me to join this event. It was a lovely way to spend a July Sunday afternoon. The lovely ladies of the house gifted me with a hand bound personalized journal which they made themselves using Stephan G's bindery tools.

The poets standing in front of Stephansson House July 2015

Some lovely photos of the house.

Beautiful writing set

The room as you enter by the front door.

The wind up record player still makes beautiful music.

The front room where Stephan G wrote.



To learn more about Stephan G Stephansson and Stephansson House please click here.

To learn more about the man himself, please click here.

If you'd like to read some of my poetry, you can find Through This Door by clicking on the title.

The poems I read on Sunday were:

By Stephan G Stephansson

Evening written in 1899

The Prophet's Son written in 1914

At Close of Day written in 1883

Toast to Alberta written in 1893

From Through This Door by Nancy M Bell

Never Linger

Summer Evenings

Maybe When

Twenty-Six

The Last Breath

Until next month, enjoy your summer and stay safe!