Hell and Wheels

I recently wandered too close to the edge of the earth and fell off. A family member suddenly became ill and I was whisked away to the magical land of Waldorf, Maryland (major claim to fame: the emo-screamo pseudo-punk sensation, Good Charlotte) for several days. I rushed out, sword-in-hand (spare pants still on bed), to rescue my kin from a victimizing demon of a hospital surgeon and then stuck around as she was fixed by a new, human doctor. Now she’s recovering from surgery nicely and I’m home in time to celebrate the first sultry week of fall.

After days of making it my mission to hunt down nurses for IV changes, spare towels and clean bedsheets, and shuttling non-driving family members the twenty mile distance to the hospital and back, it’s safe to say I’m a little out of the writing loop. In my hasty packing, I’d neglected the luxury of changes of clothing, yet somehow remembered to bring along a giant backpack filled with potential work. At one delusional point or another, I had envisioned quiet nap times filled with productivity. Reality, though, ensured I only got to drag around the shoulder-dislocating monstrosity like a lost Sherpa, doing little more with it than opening it to read a few paragraphs of Weird U.S. from time to time.

Tomorrow, hopefully, I’ll be able to jump back in and reacquaint myself with my routine. I’ll also try to provide a more coherent, entertaining entry in the next few days and make my way around to the blogs of my friends, who I have sadly and regretfully neglected.

Madeleine L’Engle has died at age 88. As one of the millions of children who discovered a path into a different world via the Wrinkle she created, I wish her a peaceful, most deserved rest.

Here’s an interesting quiz (taken when I should have been working). I like my results, although anyone familiar with my brief foray into sales as a ‘Diamond Dirt’ retailer in a mall kiosk at age twenty would know I certainly do not possess anything close to a gift of tongues:

“Excuse me, does this stuff work?”
“Well, this plant’s not dead.” Gestures to the limp, scraggly bit of foliage submerged in the aqua-hued gelatinous goo.
“What does it do?”
“Lets you put your houseplants in a clear vase so you can see the colored gel the roots are stuck in.”
“Is it better than dirt?”
Once again eyes the plant that’s psychically screaming for an end to its tortured existence. “Probably not.”

You are The Magician

Skill, wisdom, adaptation. Craft, cunning, depending on dignity.

Eleoquent and charismatic both verbally and in writing,
you are clever, witty, inventive and persuasive.

The Magician is the male power of creation, creation by willpower and desire. In that ancient sense, it is the ability to make things so just by speaking them aloud. Reflecting this is the fact that the Magician is represented by Mercury. He represents the gift of tongues, a smooth talker, a salesman. Also clever with the slight of hand and a medicine man – either a real doctor or someone trying to sell you snake oil.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Thanks again to X, who sent me yet another amusing item to put up here. I just want to know who has ever fried maggots? And why?

These are The Worst Analogies Ever Written in a High School Essay:

They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

She caught your eye like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and would fly up whenever you banged the door open again.

The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup.

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and “Jeopardy” comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30.

Her hair glistened in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze.

Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.

Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake.

He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.

The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like “Second Tall Man.”

Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.

John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play.

His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

(Original post can be seen here)