WordPress Is Awesome

Every day WordPress has an utterly vast selection of prompts that readers who are also writers can choose from.  A writing prompt becomes an idea which readers can focus on as they write and this helps them from starting out with a blank page and prevents them from wandering off the topic.  The readers are supposed to come up with some worthwhile material as a response.  I rely on the prompts for inspiration, as most days, I have no idea what I am going to write about, the only thing that is certain, is that I am going to write something.

I am pretty predictable and I have my go-to sites where I get writing prompts from.  I usually make a reference to all the prompts, before I decide to write anything and hopefully that way, I can make them all fit together.  Some days it feels like my cup is running over with prompts, but I am always glad to have them, as the more the merrier, so there can never be too many writing prompts.  I figure that if I try hard enough, there are always ways to deal with them.  When I near the end of my post, as it comes down to the wire, sometimes I need to cram some of these prompts in that did not seem to fit just right.

When I first started my blog back on April 23 of 2017, I had no clue what it was going to be about, but since then I have published 1,842 posts and they ended up being about everything.  I found this site called the Daily Post which featured prompts and I wrote 268 times for that.  This allowed me to connect with many other bloggers by reading their posts.  The Daily Post on WordPress stopped publishing prompts in the end of May 2018 and a bunch of dedicated bloggers jumped in to pick up the slack.  Sheryl was one of the first to step in with her Daily Word Prompt and Roger Shipp came along with his Daily Addictions.  I don’t know much about the Daily Spur, but it has a word prompt and a picture prompt every day.  Fandango at This, That, and The Other is a very versatile fellow and he hosts four different challenges every week, a daily word prompt, a weekly flash fiction challenge, a weekly provocative question and a weekly flashback of his previous posts.  Michelle has monthly writing prompts on her puttingmyfeetinthedirt site which are always interesting.

The Ragtag community is a combination of seven individuals and they host a daily prompt with the poet Sgeoil going on Mondays.  This is followed by drkottoway, KO Rural Mad As Hell Blog a doctor mom having a crack at this on Tuesday. On Wednesday the nutritionist, dancer. runner, bibliophile and polyglot Curious Cat has her turn.  Thursday is split between two Australians, Tracy from the Reflections of an Untidy Mind site and Brian who writes on Bushboys World. Friday is reserved for Emily a cat person from Victoria, Canada on Zombie Flamingoes.  Punam who lives in India I think writes beautiful poetry has a site titled paeansunpluggedblog and she is the host on Saturday.  Gizzylaw of Talkin’ to Myself wraps things up on Sunday for the Ragtag group.

Di on pensitivity101 is the current host of the Three Things Challenge and she is also the co-host of Fibbing Friday.  The Word of the Day Challenge is a group of four bloggers Dee Kelly a single mom that is Thriving Not Surviving, Kristian from Tales from the mind of Kristian, Cyranny an award-winning writer with Cyranny’s Cove and Kira a guest artist who does Sunday Scribbles.

Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie is the name of the group of writers, but there is also a blogger Candice named mindlovemisery aka Yves who hosts the Sunday Writing Prompt and the Monday Wordle.  NEKNEERAJ hosts Photo Challenge that is featured on Tuesdays.  Blogger Chèvrefeuille hosts Heeding Haiku With Chèvrefeuille aka Kristjaan every Wednesday.  Michael of Morpethroad is the host of Tale Weaver for Thursday.  Another blogger named weejars aka Sarah hosts the Saturday Mix.  I have the honor of splitting every other Friday with Dylan Hughes who hosts First Line Friday and then I have the MM Music Challenge.  Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie describes itself as a dose of fetish, good friends, an incomparable muse, so it is a curio of sorts. I also host Song Lyric Sunday, so make sure to check your calendar, so you don’t miss that.  There are many other challenges that I write in, so please don’t feel excluded if yours was not mentioned, as I only wrote about the ones that ones that are here everyday.

I have one prompt remaining and I want to talk about pumpkins, because this is the season for them and everyone is using them in recipes.  Pumpkins are usually ready to harvest but they must be collected before the first frost or when night temperatures are expected to drop down into the 40s for an extended period of time.  The cold weather is heading to Clermont, FL where I live, as the highs are expected to drop down by 15 degrees by tomorrow.  I bought some pumpkin cake and it is yummy.  I heard that there is a pumpkin cider, although I have never tried it, but that is not because I am worried about getting a hard cider hangover.  Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins wrote the song ‘Thirty Three’ in 1994 when he was 27 just after he got married, and moved into a new house.  A friend of his who read Tarot cards said that when he became 33, his life was going to change completely and he felt that he was ready for that now.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Reference, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Wire, for the Daily Spur prompt – Selection, for FOWC with Fandango – Rely, for November Writing Prompts – Hard cider hangover, for Ragtag Community – Vast, for Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt words – Cup Calendar Curio and for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Utterly.

Egyptians Worshipped Cats

Cats were able to keep ancient Egyptians safe from dangerous beasts like asps that hid in clay jars, rats that thrived in and around grain stores, and venomous scorpions that crept under cradles.  Cats are, first and foremost, natural-born hunters and highly skilled predators born to stalk and hunt.  Cats have a superior ability to see in the dark and I would not want to run into a rat, scorpion or a snake in the light, but it would be all that much more frightening in the dark.  Since cats could keep the Egyptians safe from all of these monsters, its no wonder that the Egyptians started to worship them.

One of the earliest deities of ancient Egypt was the goddess Mafdet, who was regarded as the protector of the home because she took care of venomous animals like snakes and scorpions.  Later the Egyptians began to worship the goddess Bastet who replaced Mafdet as the feline goddess of choice.  Like Mafdet, she was regarded as a fierce protector of the home (and especially of children and royalty), largely because of cats’ renowned ability to kill snakes, scorpions, and other vermin.  Her followers called her the “Eye of Ra,” the sun god, and believed that she fiercely watched the world and guarded Egypt against invasion.

Cats likely started hanging around farming communities in the Fertile Crescent about 8,000 years ago, where they settled into a mutually beneficial relationship working with humans as rodent patrol.  Cats were caught by pandering to their appetites, and feeding them rendered them tame, they remained perfectly gentle never setting upon their benefactors.  In exchange for comfort and safety, the cats were willing to give up some of their freedom, leading to them becoming domesticated.  People began to recognize that households with cats had more food, less sickness, and fewer deaths.  Cats are known for their ability to protect their young, and the Egyptians saw those qualities as signs of divinity.  Cats’ fondness for napping in the sun led to early associations between the cat and the sun god, Ra.  A cat’s pupils could change from crescent to round, which meant that they were sacred to the moon.

The goddess Bastet was the daughter of Ra, the sun god creator of everything and she was usually represented as a woman with the head of a domesticated cat.  Cats were sacred so anyone deliberately harming a cat was in deep trouble.  In the beginning, only the pharaohs were allowed to keep them as pets, so all the cats were protected by law.  The death of a cat was serious business for the Egyptians even if the cat was killed accidentally and if they saw a dead cat in the streets, they would run in the other direction to avoid being accused of the crime and suffering a conviction that could be punishable by death.

The Egyptians do not have an official cat breed, but they do have the Egyptian Mau which has a spotted coat and large green eyes, and looks like a miniature jungle cat.  In ancient Egypt, cats were mummified and buried in cat cemeteries with jewelry.  If the great desert of Sahara is in whole or part merely the yellow shroud which Time has kindly placed over a limitless cat cemetery, there is no reason why the products of Egypt, should not woo the cotyledon from its parent bean, which is defined as the embryonic leaf in seed-bearing plants, one or more of which are the first to appear from a germinating seed.

Cats are meat eaters, they need protein from meat in order to maintain a strong heart, good vision, and a healthy reproductive system, so you should feed them cooked beef, chicken, or turkey.  Chocolate can be lethal for cats, but they do like to nosh on a cooked carrot.  Next to birds, cats possess the widest range of vocalizations of any domestic pet.  They are best known for their meows, purrs, hisses, and growls and they can make sounds like a kettle boiling water, or even water glass whistles.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Conviction, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Bean, for the Daily Spur prompt – Worship, for FOWC with Fandango – Official, for November Writing Prompts – Water glass whistles, for Ragtag Community – Deep, for Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt words – Chocolate Carrot Chicken and for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Light.

Key to the Universe

Is there an all-encompassing, coherent theoretical framework of physics that fully explains and links together every physical aspect in the universe?  A Theory of Everything would have to include the standard model of particle physics along with general relativity and at the same time be able to calculate the fine structure constant or the mass of the electron, define how the electromagnetic and weak forces merge, explain dark matter, dark energy, cover string theory and the multiverse and state how the universe will end.  If we ever found a Theory of Everything, then physicists could make sense out of all the weird and wonderful things in our universe.

Even though I am fascinated by particle physics, many other people couldn’t care less about things like supersymmetry or tachyons.  Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking are pioneers in astrophysics and this theory, but neither one was able to work out all the details in their lifetimes.  I am basically a clown compared to these guys and I will never do anything that could compare to Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak, Wilt Chamberlain’s 100-point game, or Ronnie O’Sullivan’s 147 maximum break in snooker.  I have never been to a hotpot restaurant, but one day I would like to taste those Chinese dumplings with a studded leather lover while listening to music, as that could be something for my diary.  I hope that would not make me a prisoner of pomp or a slave to circumstance where there comes a point in my life when I feel completely jaded like I did when I had to sell my Mackintosh speakers.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Aspect, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Clown, for the Daily Spur prompt – Music, for FOWC with Fandango – Diary, for November Writing Prompts – Studded leather lover, for Ragtag Community – Pomp, for Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt words – Snooker Hotpot Mackintosh and for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Jaded.

Beer Taster

Drinking beer is not very hard to do, so you could say that I had a cushy job, but somebody had to do it and it might as well have been me.  I worked as a beer sommelier, a trained professional, a beer quality technician and I was also called a cicerone, working in the hospitality and alcoholic beverage industry, specialized in the service and knowledge of beer.  The money was not all that great, as I only grossed around $45,000 per year, but I got all the free beer I could drink.  I never matriculated in college, so I didn’t have any marketable skills, but I was drinking beer from the time I was old enough to walk, so that made me qualified to hold the position.  My taste buds were able to tell the difference between hops-based and malt-based beer and after a little practice, I was able to pick up on the identifying characteristics that defined each brew.

I was a lager man, not really caring for ale, but the job required me to taste a variety of beers.  I sat up in my ivory tower till the batch was ready and then I would dip a pitcher into the vat.  The first thing I looked at was the head, making sure it contained the right amount of froth.  If the beer did not measure up to standards, I would have to tell the brew master to put a sock in it and then he would dump the whole batch.  Usually the brew master would suggest that I drink another pint to make sure, but if the temperature was off, I didn’t have to do that.

I always thought that I had the coolest job on the planet and when visitors came to the brewing facility I would say, “Greetings from earth”.  Jesus turned water into wine, but brewing techniques for beer were perfected by Friars and Monks, although there is nothing saintly about making beer.  I recently changed jobs and now I am working on an airplane that is specializing on improving their inflight beer.  I am also writing a weekly post in Aeroplane magazine that is all about beer.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Suggest, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Airplane, for the Daily Spur prompt – Variety, for FOWC with Fandango – Ivory, for November Writing Prompts – Greetings from earth, for Ragtag Community – Cushy, for Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt words – Post Sock Money and for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Saintly.

Baghdadi’s Underwear

The FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorist ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead and Kurdish spies stole his underwear and obtained a blood sample to acquire his DNA in order to help confirm his identity after his body was blown up.  He was a real bad guy who liked to dish out pain and many people are ebullient about this news and Baghdadi should be ashamed for killing his three children along with himself by detonating a suicide vest during the raid.  ISIS has distributed passports to their fighters that state the holder can only go to heaven, but it is clear to me that Baghdadi will not be enjoying a sunset setting topped with six-inch stilettos.

This may sound naïve, but I purchased the underwear from Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab who is better known as the Underwear Bomber, the man who smuggled a bomb in his underwear aboard a commercial airliner on Christmas Day in 2009.  I just saw that Baghdadi’s underwear has been put up for sale online and since it was no longer needed, it was given back to the Kurdish spy.  I am going to put in a bid on his Caliph style underwear, but I am reluctant to buy anything that is covered with skid marks, however if I procrastinate, I am sure to lose out.  When I was younger, I used to dream about being Captain Underpants, the superhero who fights crime while wearing only underwear and a cape, however in my dreams my underwear kept falling down.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Ebullient, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Dish, for the Daily Spur prompt – Ashamed, for FOWC with Fandango – Procrastinate, for October Writing Prompts – A sunset setting topped with six-inch stilettos, for Ragtag Community – Falling and for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Naïve.

A Bird Pooped on My Car

You dirty bird with a brain the size of a pea, I will not mither about this, as the rain will probably wash it off.  You may have some brilliant colors and you can sing and fly and lay eggs, but that pooping has to stop.  I realize that birds serve a useful purpose, by eating up many pesky insects and you may even eat some snakes that slither on the ground.  When a sower sows seeds, some fall on the edge of a path and birds can eat that.  Some will fall on rocky ground so roots can’t grow, the plant may flower, but it will wither.  Birds are known to be meek and sometimes they will dither and maybe that prevents two of them from being killed with the same stone.

I hope you know that people are doing their best to protect birds and in 2007 the Bald Eagle was removed from the list of endangered species.  We are taking action to reduce bird deaths, by making windows more visible to prevent the precious birds from crashing into them.  We must get to the bottom of this to prevent any more species from becoming extinct and ascribe to doing the right thing for all the birds.  Birds are losing their habitats because man keeps on developing new housing, and we must break out of this bubble.  Natural disasters, and climate change are also not helping the bird population and this is enough to make me scream.

I just purchased a new spotting scope which should help me see the birds that are far away.  I plan to visit the Green Mountain Scenic Overlook and Trailhead at Lake Apopka where I can scour the park to find different birds.  There is a three-story tower that I will climb to get a better look.  I am a bit afraid of heights, so I will take a rope with me to make me feel more secure, as I don’t want to cower and scare the birds away.  I read that birds are actually much smarter than they are given credit for, as some birds that are able to talk are moving ahead with the new technology by activating Alexa and fooling Siri.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Ascribe, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Right, for the Daily Spur prompt – Brilliant, for FOWC with Fandango – Ahead, for Ragtag Community – Scream, for Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt words – Precious Bottom Meek, for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Bubble and for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Bonus Wordle Rhymes, hosted by Yves where the prompts are Mither Dither Wither Slither Scope Rope Hope Cower Tower Flower Scour Far.

Revealing Photos Almost Leaked

Catherine (widely known as Kate Middleton) is the Duchess of Cambridge, a member of the British royal family and she is known for her shy personality, her beautiful babies and her flawless skin.  If William becomes the King of England, then Kate will become the Queen consort which is the wife of a reigning ruler, but she will not share in the king’s political and military powers.  One brisk day, Her Royal Highness Princess Catherine went out for a stroll in the gardens where she got stung by a bee, which made a blemish that looked like a pimple.  This made her all jittery, because she had a photoshoot later that day and she did not want to neglect her duties.  She wanted to tell the media about the bee sting, but at the same time she thought this might lead to upsetting the queen, so she made up a story about her skin having broken out because of hormonal fluctuations, stress, and diet issues.  Her new dress created a show stopping pause for the paparazzi and the media, but they did not seem to buy her story, instead they considered it to be futile fabrications of a fashion queen.  One photographer got a close up of her blemish, but the royals were able to squash it before it was published.

Written for Sheryl’s Daily Word Prompt – Brisk, for Roger Shipp’s Daily Addictions prompt – Family, for the Daily Spur prompt – Pause, for FOWC with Fandango – Ruler, for October Writing Prompts – Futile fabrications of a fashion queen, for Ragtag Community – Broken, for Di’s Three Things Challenge prompt words – Personality Pimple Lead and for Word of the Day Challenge Prompt – Jittery.