X- X-Spring and more

Posted on April 28, 2021 by hdh

X – X-Spring and more

As I began to keep a writer’s notebook, I decided to add a glossary section. It wasn’t a dictionary in the real sense. It did list words and define them, however, most of the words that I put in my glossary were not real words. They were made up except some of the words I came across in my readings or science lectures that were so weird I had to add them to my inventive word dictionary even though they were actually real words, such as “frass” which is caterpillar poop. Not a word that you are going to use very often, but a good word to know when you need to scream out profanity and don’t want to offend anyone (except maybe caterpillars).

The bulk of the words that I collected came from my son, probably from when he was between six and twelve years old. 

Here are some of the invented words that I collected and are in the notebook:

X-Spring: looks like and feels like Spring, but it’s not really Spring.  This was a great way to describe warm days in winter. Of course, that led to the words X-Winter, X-Summer, and X-Fall.  So now you know that even though it is officially Spring, when you get a day as we’ve had during the last few weeks, and the temperatures went down to the low 40s and 30s, that it wasn’t an abnormal temperature day for Spring, it was just an X-Winter day.

 

Slits: those travel brochures you see in pockets as you enter a hotel or information center. There are numerous places that have slits just waiting for you to grab and trying to sell you some product or invite you to an event. Even car dealers have slits. My family still uses this word to this day.

 

Sissy bed: This is half of a queen bed. I’m pretty sure this is smaller than a twin bed. 

 

Fizzdorf: feeling like you’re stuck in a bottle of fizz, like shivering when you don’t feel good.   Some peoples’ reactions to the COVID vaccines have definitely suffered from fizzdorf.

 

Dehydrinator: a water machine. It probably should have been called a Hydrinator, I would think.

 

Anti-thermic: very hot. 

 

Danderbed: Anywhere a cat sleeps. No explanation is needed for this word. This was created by my wife.

 

Imaginerate: This makes you imagine. I had to imaginerate today in order to come up with something to write about. 

 

And finally one of my own:

 

Homonot: a typically misspelled word written by students – it looks right, but it’s not.  Examples of homonots would include frist (for what you do before second), gril (the opposite of boy), and stroy (a tale to be told). 

 

I am very curious why my spellchecker has not highlighted all of the words that I have written down as invented words. Feel free to dream up new words or share ones that you’ve already created in your word notebook. 

Andrew Clements wrote a book entitled Frindle. It’s about a boy who makes up a word (Frindle) and decides not only to use it frequently but to get everyone else to use it. Eventually, it becomes a real word. Irregardless of that fictional story. Wouldn’t it be cool if you dreamed up a word or bunch of words and they showed up in the next edition of Webster’s Dictionary or got selected as Dictionary.com’s word of the year?  

Maybe if I can dreamicate my written imaginerations well enough, by next X-Spring I will be a world-renowned lexicographer. 

 

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W – Work Boots – a place to hide

Posted on April 27, 2021 by hdh

W – Work Boots – a place to hide

    Stuart knew he had left his work boots somewhere, but couldn’t for the life of him remember where. That of course was not an unusual occurrence. He was misplacing things all of the time. But in this instance, it was rather important that he find them. 

    Living on his own Stuart was very cautious with his money. He didn’t trust banks and hiding his money in a dresser drawer or under his mattress, seemed too obvious a place to keep it. So of all the plethora of places, he could choose to hide the money, he chose his work boots. No one would think to look there. 

    There was only one problem. Though he felt pretty safe having the money in his boots, he was always changing their hiding place so that if people were watching him they wouldn’t notice a pattern. The problem was remembering where the most recent hiding place was. And today was the day that the landlord was coming for the rent. 

    Having no bank account, meant no checking account. It also made his credit rating rather weak. If he didn’t pay his rent he would be kicked out and his landlord was a stickler for punctuality. When the rent was due, you were to pay on the date with no exception, especially since the landlord did not trust the mail. He collected the money due exactly on the day it was due and at the same time, 11:22 a.m.

    Stuart tried to retrace his steps from the day before. He had come in from work, he was a carpenter for a local building supply company, took off his boots, and put them in the closet as he usually did. These work boots were identical to the ones he kept his money in. He had supper, watched some TV, and then went to bed. He usually checked in on his money work boots before going to bed, but he couldn’t remember doing it the night before. 

    He woke up that morning, got dressed made eggs and toast for breakfast, and then remembered about the money. It was now 11:00 in the morning and he was panicking. He remembered from a mindfulness seminar he had taken, that when you feel stressed what you need to do was focus on routines and things would become clearer. He couldn’t think. 

The landlord would be here soon. As Stuart walked through the kitchen he noticed that his breakfast dishes and dinner dishes from the night before were still sitting dirty in the sink. He decided that washing dishes was as routine as he could get. He wished out loud that mindfulness would help him find his boots. 

It only took one dish for things to clear up the problem, for as he opened up the dishwasher to put in the dirty plate, there staring up at him was a pair of old work boots, just waiting to be found.

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V – My Vacuum Sucks!

Posted on April 26, 2021 by hdh

V – My Vacuum Sucks!

It was a steal. I should have known right off the bat that there was something wrong with this vacuum. Who buys a state-of-the-art Roomba for $150.00? Well, I did. How could I not at that price?

Setting it up was pretty easy. Then came the learning curve. I’d placed it in the middle of my living room and set it to clean. It was fun watching it in action. It would cross the room, just come short of the wall and move in another direction until it found another obstacle. It wasn’t long before the whole living room was vacuumed, and I didn’t have to do a thing. It only took me three days for the Roomba to learn all of the rooms of my ranch house. 

On reading more instructions from the manual, I discovered that I could program the Roomba to clean the house even when I wasn’t there. It was smart enough to start itself, vacuum the rooms, empty itself if it got full, and even knew when to recharge itself when its battery ran low. I scheduled the Roomba to clean every day when I was at work. What more could I ask for? 

What I could have asked for was the identity of the person who had sold it to me and if he had a criminal record. 

It was about 2 weeks after I purchased it that I realized that I was beginning to miss things. First, it was that expensive Apple Watch that I had bought last year and left charging during the day at home because I hadn’t charged it the night before. Then there was cash. I kept a large quantity of emergency cash in a file cabinet in my den. I came home one day, needed some cash for a date I was going on that evening, went to the den to get some, and all the money was gone. The envelope was there, but the cash was gone. After my 55-inch Ultra High Def TV and my iMac got taken, I decided to involve the police. 

They immediately suggested that it was someone I knew since there didn’t seem to be any signs of a break-in. My house runs on electronics, I have electric locks on every door. I have security cameras at every door and all sorts of alarms. Someone would have had to be a very good hacker to bypass all that security. It turned out that someone didn’t have to be a good hacker. They just needed an inside accomplice, which they had. Its name was Roomba.

It turns out that this particular Roomba had a lot more sensors than it should have had. It had visual and auditory capabilities which allowed it not only to hear everything I said but also see everything I did. I tend to talk to myself a lot, living alone, so it heard me every time I mentioned I was going to get cash. It heard me saying the numbers aloud as I unlocked the door to my house. While the Roomba was cleaning my house it was also transmitting the layout of my house and all the visuals and audio recordings to the said thief. The Roomba was very efficient in connecting to my home network and controlling the camera shots, which happened to blank out when all the thievery was done, not to mention unlocking the doors to the house and disabling the alarms. 

Once the police got involved, it all came out. The biggest clue was that the Roomba was missing. Who steals a vacuum cleaner? Police Computer forensics were able to determine the location of the hacks, which was the Roomba, but not where it had transmitted its information, without the Roomba itself, which as I stated was the last thing stolen. So far, the police have had no luck in finding any of my things. 

So here’s a word of caution for you all. Be careful when looking for a great deal on a robotic vacuum cleaner. What might look like a great deal, might just clean you out.

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U – Utopia

Posted on April 24, 2021 by hdh

U – Utopia

There is a place that I’ve heard of

It has flowers that bloom all year long

Its buildings historic and modern

Build a life that welcomes us all

It’s filled with people all different

In color, sex, shape, size, and belief

Yet they all work together

In harmony as one and in peace

Our differences make us much stronger

As we spend our time trying to hear

What each side of an issue is saying

Without malice or lies to spread fear

And when we’ve heard all the discussion

And a decision has to be made. 

We can look for a spot in the middle

So that each can accept and’s okayed.

This is how we’ll survive and we’ll flourish

For me, there was never a doubt

That this is the place we’ve all heard of.

The one where we all want to be.

Though some say that it’s only a dream.

You can wish all you want.

It’s a lie.

But I know for sure that it’s out there

But to get there you really must try.

Not only to believe its existence

You must also be willing to act

And to listen and share and be helpful

And accept each for who they are

So we all can live with each other

Be productive, and happy, and proud.

Now let us create what we dream of

A Utopia that exists the world ‘round.

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T – Teaching – What a Nightmare!

Posted on April 23, 2021 by hdh

T – Teaching – What a Nightmare!

Being a teacher, I have had lots of experience with kids. Over the 33 years of teaching, I’ve had good classes and not-so-good classes. I’ve managed to survive all those years intact and still enjoy working with kids and watching them learn. 

There is one particular class that I do hate the most. It was the most unruly, uncooperative, and mean-spirited class that any teacher would dread being part of. The only difference though, between this particular class and all of the others that I have taught and subbed in is that it doesn’t exist. 

I have this recurring dream, that I have been placed in this class and am left there with no support. The class is usually made of students I don’t know, but on occasion, there are kids from any of a number of classes that I have taught in that class. 

I’m always the one that is trying to teach a concept or some skill and never get the opportunity to succeed, for I am always trying to take power away from the students who control the class. They are screaming, throwing things around, running around the class, and usually confronting me with either taunts or total disregard. At no time do I get control and succeed at anything I’m attempting to do. Waking out of the dream is my only solace and even then, the memory of it haunts me for hours, before I totally forget the dream, as I do most dreams, as it fades away into the lockbox of dream storage. At least, until it crops up again, for this class can’t even follow the protocol of staying in the lockbox as a one and done. 

I had a lot of these dreams while I was a teacher. The weird thing about them is that I am still having them, even though I’ve been retired for over 14 years. On the plus side, they are less frequent. Now, the dreams usually involve me in subbing situations. 

This is not to say that I haven’t had any good teaching dreams. Those usually occurred when I was looking for an idea on how to teach something or I was remembering a point in my teaching career that I was successful and I came up with a new idea. But those dreams follow the dream rules and are one and done which means I can’t remember any of them.

This teaching nightmare dream may have different characters and situations but the actions are always the same, and it is the actions that I remember and the dread of going into those classes when the dreams occur. 

Luckily for me, for the most part, these teaching dreams have never become a reality in my life as a teacher…At least not yet.

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S – the Storyteller

Posted on April 22, 2021 by hdh

 


S – the Storyteller

Once there was a story. It was a simple story about a king and a queen. They were unable to have children and wanted an heir. As in most tales, they made a deal to have a child. Of course, the condition agreed upon required them to give up something valuable when the child reached a certain age. The condition didn’t concern the king or queen when the agreement was made, however, when the child came of age they needed a way to break the agreement. The story unfolds and a quest is taken until finally, all things work out in the end except for the proposer of the deal. As I said a simple story.

But now our story begins, because that simple story had nowhere to go. Yes, it was created. There was a wonderful beginning and a happy ending, but until it could be shared it had no life.

—

He was short with no distinguishable physical features. He was soft-spoken and generally blended in when in a crowd. What he had was a passion. He loved to talk. But his life was so uninteresting. No one shared his interests, No one cared to know how he spent his time. But that was about to change.

What do you do when you like to talk, but no one wants to listen? You disappear. Not in the sense that he became invisible to people. As far as others were concerned he already was. You leave. You seek out new places. So he left his village and went out into the wide world, for he wished to seek… his future.

—

He traveled for days; he traveled for months; he traveled for years. And at each new place, he found instead of talking, he listened. He heard stories of joy, stories of sadness and hardship; he heard stories of luck and misfortune. And as much as he had loved to talk, he was silent. Until he came upon a village, high up in the mountains where there were no stories. Townsfolk were very protective of their tales and experiences. They did not wish to share. And in not doing so, no one had ever shared with them.
They all watched this stranger carefully, for he was no longer invisible. They wished he would go away. But he did not. So they gathered around him as he sat cross-legged in the middle of the village square and began to speak in a loud but melodious voice, “Once there was a king and queen who wished for a child that they could not have…”

—–

Sometimes you need to be careful what you wish for, for you may get what you wish for and don’t want. But sometimes, not getting what you wish for, gets you much more of what you really need. If you don’t believe me, ask any storyteller.

 

 

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R- Really‽

Posted on April 21, 2021 by hdh

R- Really‽

My wife and I were driving in our car on a beautiful Sunday afternoon to a friend’s house not far away. We live on Long Island in New York. We were on a two-lane road, one lane in each direction with a solid line between them. You know where the rule is you’re not allowed to pass over the solid line. As we were driving, someone in a van behind us decided that we were going too slow, actually, we were going about 5 miles over the speed limit. Driving about a foot from the rear of our car, I guess was their signal to us that we were hogging the road and should speed up. Our choices were to ignore the van behind us and hope we didn’t have to make a sudden stop, speed up to increase the distance between the two cars, or try to pull to the side of the road and let the idiot pass us. The decision was taken out of our hands when the driver decided to pass us anyway at approximately 15 m.p.h. over the speed limit. Really‽ Are you f-ing serious? Why did they possibly need to go that fast on a pleasant Sunday afternoon or any afternoon, morning, or night for that matter? Were they late to get home for the start of a baseball game?

Unfortunately, this is the way of life here in New York. This is not an isolated incident. All these drivers, who obviously don’t remember what they were taught in driver safety school or what the actual laws about driving are, lie to themselves by thinking, “What a good driver I am.” It’s the attitude of, “I’m the most important thing on the road, so get out of my way. If you don’t floor the gas pedal when the light changes to green, be assured my horn will remind you of exactly who has priority here.” 

These speedsters join the yellow/red traffic light runners and the “What Stop sign?” drivers that frequent our travels in the car. 

My wife who was born and raised in Iowa, says that it’s only in New York that this type of driving exists. At least these types of drivers didn’t exist in Iowa. Is that true? Am I living in an isolated area of egoistical, lunatic drivers? Let me know in the comments.

I’ve ranted about these types of drivers before in a 2017 A to Z Challenge and even came up with some fun solutions back then. Feel free to read that blog if you’re interested. https://www.hdhstory.net/Storyblog/?p=875 

 

The longer I drive a car and the more irresponsible drivers I come in contact with (figuratively not literally), the more my brains seem to dream up new ways to deal with them.  Here are some new devices coming to a car near you:

 

  • The M.P.H. Regulator will be installed in every motor vehicle starting in late 2021.  This new device which will be mandated by law is able to read speed limit signs and lock your car’s engine so that it can not go over that speed limit. No matter how fast you want to go, your car just won’t let you. Certain exceptions to this will be made for emergency vehicles such as ambulances, fire and police cars, and me if I’m doing an ice cream run. 

 

  • The Floater – This device is not set to be employed in cars until 2022. This allows a driver who is driving at the correct speed to activate a switch on the steering wheel which will direct a short cushion of air burst at any car that is getting too close to them or passing them at excessive speed. That burst of air would surround the speeding car and lift it off of the ground, frozen in position above the other cars in the road until the speed of the tires either matches or is less than the maximum speed limit and then will slowly release its hold on the offending car, lowering it back to the road when it is safe. Unfortunately, this method requires another shot by a safe driver, should the speeder try to speed up again.

 

  • And finally, The Homing beam. Utilizing this device on an offending driver basically returns them back to the initial place that they started, or to the local police car pound, depending on the number of times the car has been hit with this beam over a period of time. 

 

These are but a few of my wishes and dreams I would like to have as options at my disposal every time I am out driving in public in addition to the ones from 2017. Granted, I might even be caught in one of those situations from time to time, by some other driver, but I’m a quick learner. I’ve already learned not to roll through stop signs and make a full stop when I’m making a right on red (the only two times I’ve been ticketed). 

Having these options might make our world a little safer and people might even get to enjoy the scenery on their rides. 

Hey, you never know.

 

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Q – Questoria

Posted on April 20, 2021 by hdh

Q – Questoria

I like to travel to exotic places whenever I can. The more unique a place is the more likely, I’ll want to visit it. Early in 1992, my wife, Christina, set out on a 40-day research cruise to the Arctic for work she does for the State University of New York’s Marine Sciences department. That left me with some time on my hands, so I decided to take a trip. 

My travel agent found a hidden gem. It was a small unknown island kingdom in the mid-Pacific called Questoria. You won’t find it on any map. I was surprised that my travel agent could find it. Needless to say, I booked the trip. I left 3 days after Christina took off for Iceland. 

Here’s some information about the kingdom of Questoria. It is ruled by Queen Quix. She had been queen for at least 30 years at the time and came from a long line Quixes going back to the 15th century. Their last name befitted the queen’s rule as she was quite quixotic. 

The queen believed in quests, which she constantly sent visitors on, some real and some totally farfetched. I was okay with being sent to the mines to unearth the rare golden quartz gems. That was actually fun. But to be sent on a quest for the mythical Quetzalcoatl, which the queen was certain was to be found somewhere in the jungles of Questoria was a bit too much and almost cost me my life. But that’s a story for another time that someday I might tell. 

The kingdom’s official sport was Quoits. Now I’m pretty good at horseshoes and thought that I would do pretty well at quoits. Not even close. I was knocked out of the first round of the tournament I entered. I’m sure those quoits were rigged. 

The queen’s favorite food was quinoa. She mixed it in everything she made, except for the desserts. Questoria’s desserts all contain quinces: quince meringue pie, quince butterscotch pudding, quince mousse, you get the idea. While I don’t mind having Quinoa and quince on occasion, after 3 days one gets rather tired of that diet. 

Most of the inhabitants of the island are quadrilingual. In addition to their own language, Quixian, they speak Japanese, English, and for some odd reason Klingon. For the most part, we could understand each other. It was quite interesting when I went to one of their marketplaces and witnessed a customer and the seller in quite a quandary. Their dispute revolved around the quantity of items purchased and the amount paid. It was quite a quagmire. Each claiming different numbers. What made it interesting was their quarrel took place using all four languages interspersed with each other. 

There is so much more I could tell you about my trip to Questoria, however, I had to sign a non-disclosure agreement  (NDA). 

I got home after a week there. And because of the NDA, I was not allowed to tell Christina or anyone else about it on her return. 

Unfortunately for the residents and island of Questoria, they all came down with COVID last year. The numbers were pretty devastating but not as devastating as when Mount Quenora erupted and sank the entire kingdom, which is why it no longer shows up on maps. No one survived the eruption. The destruction of the island, of course, released me from my NDA which is why I can write all that I’m sharing with you now. 

I’ve been asked on numerous occasions when talking about Questoria, whether or not what I’ve shared is true. My answer is always the same, “Would I lie to you?”

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P – A Pen in the Hand

Posted on April 19, 2021 by hdh

P –  A Pen in the Hand

It used to be that when you needed to remember something, all you had to do was get a pen, grab a piece of scrap paper, and write. That was usually a simple task. Pens and paper were always easy to find. 

As a writer, I would carry around a notebook with me and when an idea came into my mind, I would just take the pen that I carried in my pocket and write it down. My writer’s notebooks are filled with ideas and stories that I have created over the years. 

There were even times if I was in the right place, at the right time, and I had access to a typewriter, that I could type out my thoughts and stories. Some of you remember the manual typewriter, don’t you? It was the one where the period and comma keys would type a period or comma whether or not you held down the shift key at the same time, instead of getting a greater than or less than symbol when you hold down the shift key as all keyboards do today. 

As time went on we moved on to electronic and technological gear. Certainly not simple tools, though when you got the hang of them they allowed you to do much more than just write down things. 

My first piece of technological wonder was PDA, a Palm Pilot. I could write in Graffiti which was a Palm script using a little stylus on a screen and it created the words I wanted to put in the note. It also allowed me to keep a calendar, reminders, records, and writings all in the palm of my hand (pun intended). Of course, I had to keep the PDA with me all of the time and it had a very small screen. 

Then came the computers. Keyboarding was a new thing to learn especially with commas and periods and also remembering not to hold down a key too long as it would type an endless string of repeated letters. Computers allowed me much more flexibility in how I could write. I could make my writing look pretty now. I could use different languages, more symbols, fonts, colors, and computers had a big screen. Unfortunately, you can’t carry a computer with you all of the time. 

As technology improved and time moved on, the portability of those devices increased. With iPads and Smartphones now I could have a device for recording, not only writing but audio and video also, with me pretty much all of the time. And all my technology devices talked to each other and sharing with each other everything I did. Having a backup is a very useful thing to have.

Of course, the downside with technology now is that all your equipment needs to be kept charged. And if you are not in a wifi hotspot, you might have difficulty using that device to write/record those notes or ideas down when they come to you. There are times you miss things because you forget what you were going to record. 

The more things improve, the better and more effective they become, but the more problems and difficulties that arise also. And there is always a new learning curve to conquer before it becomes useful.  

What I wish for is a simple tool that you can pick up anytime and anywhere you are; something plain that you can compose on that will record those ideas. Possibly someone could invent it. If it were me, I’d call it a pen and paper.

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The Overachiever

Posted on April 17, 2021 by hdh

O – The Overachiever…If you only really knew him

Larry was an overachiever. Everyone knew it, yet he was still liked and trusted. That was a big mistake. For you see he only gave the appearance of being an overachiever. In fact, he mastered the way to deceive people into believing that he’d done things in his past, that he hadn’t really done. 

Larry was a go-getter in high school. He was involved in lots of after-school clubs and activities. That was probably why he was so well-liked. Everybody knew him. He was on the high school’s championship football and baseball team. Actually, he was the gofer on the football team and the batboy for the baseball team. But that counts that he was on the team. All the players and coaches appreciated all the work he did. So, onto his resume, he wrote that he was on the championship high school football and baseball teams. 

His college credits included a 3.89 average. Granted that only happened during one semester, and that was the semester the faculty went on strike and the COVID shutdown occurred, all of which when resolved allowed students to get grades of Pass/Fail instead of letter grades in any course they took in their major. Larry would have received D’s in 2 of his major subject classes which would have brought his GPA down to 2.13, but by allowing him to take those classes Pass/Fail, his average for the semester was 3.89. No job application ever specified what the college GPA you put down represented. It was assumed it was an average for his entire four years.  He actually graduated with a GPA of 2.57. Yet based on what he put on his application, he was looked upon as a top-notch student.

That helped him get a job with a prestigious securities exchange firm. Of course, they realized really early that his math and economic skills weren’t the best and he was quickly demoted to do menial tasks. The company did not want to fire him with the credentials he professed; fearing lawsuits and the like they kept him on. All he said to others was that he worked for their company, and no one questioned doing what.

And then his great uncle Marvin died. He was a very rich great uncle. Larry had been buttering his uncle up for years spouting of all his accomplishments and the many places Larry had been to. It helped that Larry played GeoGuessr* on his computer a lot. Larry could name places his uncle had never even heard of and he made up stories about all the streets he’d traveled on. If his uncle ever wanted to check to see if Larry was telling the truth, his uncle would have discovered that the places Larry referred to were real. 

So it was no surprise that Larry inherited the bulk of his uncle’s money. Larry quit his job. Now he could do all of the things he claimed he did. But why bother? He liked how he lived. He liked being admired for things he didn’t do. There was no need to change. He just continued his life of luxury and deceit. 

Sometimes living out a lie works. 

——————–

*GeoGuessr is a geography game that takes you on a journey around the world and challenges your ability to recognize your surroundings. https://www.geoguessr.com/

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