Swimming Upstream

Your Messages - Theme for Day 13

On the map of my life I have coloured in a long, blue river. It runs underground in places, forcing its way through rock, but ahead, always, the open sea.

My response:

The Grand Canyon's an awe inspiring place. One tiny river carving its way through rock - a sliver here, a micron there. Down the millenia. I need to explore its depths.

For once, I thought of a second response based on the map part of the theme:

I've no compass, or map. The signposts are worn, indistict, confusing. I've no guide, so muddle through my life as a consequence. The shining horizon beckons - promising a better future.

Dreamboat

Your Messages - Theme for Day 12

Are you day-dreaming? Yes, it's lovely. Come with me. Hop on this elephant, see the colours of the birds, listen to the river. Lift your face up. Feel the sun.

My response:

Dreaming's a wonderful thing. You're in the wildest of places, meeting the most marvellous people. It's a great use of imagination, but living? That's the real story.

Well, maybe tomorrow.

Day of the Triffids

Your Messages - Theme for Day 11

The plant rooted itself in her garden overnight. Not a weed. Or a seedling. It should worry her, but she likes how the smug roses now look fearful, petals trembling.

My Response:

Once rooted, the idea took complete possession of her. Its tangling branches spreading far and wide destroying all her joy, laughter and hope. What remained was a deep, desperate despair.

Bah - JAS beat me to my first idea around The Day of the Triffids, and of course came up with something better:

The next morning they (and the stately delphiniums) had been embraced into a tangle of voracious tendrils. All that remained was a single cobalt petal and a scattering of thorns.

Cum on Feel the Noize

Your Messages - Theme for Day 10

She had gone to the shop to buy some noise. She wanted disco dancing, pounding feet, screams. But then she saw the bottle of green cool silence on special offer.

My response:

She never could resist a BOGOF, no matter how useless. Once home, she opened both bottles.

Remember maths at school? Two negatives make a plus. What ensued was a riot.

Before the Storm

Your Mesages - Theme for Day 9

Each season the garden smells different. The heavy emotions wait in every corner to pounce. The roses store up grief, daffodils hope. The honeysuckle is the only one to cling.

My response:

In summer there's the smell of rain before a storm, accented with roses, lavender and tingling electricity. The earth opens up to greet them as the first heavy raindrops fall.

Half Century Not Out

My Messages - Theme for Day 8

After fifty years she ran out of curses. Just like that. She opened her mouth… and silence. It was the first time since her childhood that she couldn’t taste ash.

My response:

She rushed upstairs to the mirror. A new face blinked at her. New, but still familiar. Same wrinkles and greying hair, but radiant. The ugly duckling was now a swan.

I Have no Worries, so Why am I Worried?

Your Messages - Theme for Day 7

He worried about: bed-wetting, not being picked for the team, crying, then acne, finding a clitoris, the last of which turned out to be the least of his worries.

My response:

"Tell me your greatest fear."

He spared her no detail.

"Now close your eyes and relax. We'll make that fear your strength. So you can conquer the world, Herr Hitler."

What's in a Name?

Your Messages - Theme for Day 6

Janet and John taught me all the essentials of English. Madeleine and Pierre took over in French. My life would have been so much easier if I'd been Susan and Someone.

My response:

Janet spoke eight languages fluently and used them daily in her role as an interpreter at the Foreign Office.

But to her husband John, she was always speaking in tongues.

The Word According to God

Your Messages - Theme for Day 5

When God decided to write a novel, instead of just his usual private journal, he began to realize the importance of audience. And beginnings. And endings. Endings were really tricky.

My response:

Rules For Good Writing:

• Have a knockout opening and ending
• Avoid cliche
• Think about 'what if'
• Use surprise...

God sighed. All these rules. It was easier when he just created.

Hey Baby, I'm the Telephone Man

Your Messages - Theme for Day 4

The message came in the night. 'Hey Rabbityroo, Graham-mahem here.' It's a wrong number, but she spends the day pressing replay, listening to Graham-mahem saying how much he misses her.

My response:

Graham was her first, her only love. She took him home for tea, but she never understood why her family teased her so much.

They were just five years old.

Losing It

Your Messages - Theme for Day 3

Among the things handed into the lost property department today were: four pairs of spectacles, one laptop, three library books, six sets of keys, one red stiletto shoe.

My response:

He opened the handbags - a lottery ticket caught his attention. Must check that later. Now the laptop. The screen glowed with the MOD's logo.

An average haul for the day.

Ghost Trains

Your Messages - Theme for Day 2

The railway station is haunted by the mother of a baby snatched from there in 1955. As the train pulls in, listen hard. In the sound of the brakes, crying.

My response:

Disembodied voices, urgent whistles, slamming doors. Reunited families, hurried travellers, separated lovers. Steamy smoke, sweaty bodies, smelly cafe. Nothing escaped her frantic search: all evaded her. Everything fades. Nothing remains.

I'm not going to explain all of my responses, but I want to jot down my thought process for today, otherwise I'll forget how I came to write this. I firstly came up with Sound, Sights, Smells. These are the first 3 sentences - evoking what the young woman looking for her baby would be experiencing and trying to have a similar pace to a travelling train. I struggled with the next sentence - showing her looking everywhere, but fruitlessly. Halfway through that struggle, the last 2 sentences came out of thin air, demanding to be written down. So I did.

Coming Up For Air

Your Messages - Theme for Day 1

Scientific studies show that women can hold their breath underwater for longer than men. Don’t challenge any man to a competition though. Men underwater are far more dangerous than women.

My response:

Down, down, down into the deep,
Shiny irridescent pearls the prize.
Only she could reach them
With one breath.
He watched for her return,
So cunningly he could take them.

Awards and Tagging

My regular blog, Veg Plotting becomes a year old on Sunday. Little did I realise when I took my first faltering steps I would be here now with 3 blogs in action and one of them nearing its 500th post. In the early, grey days last November, I couldn't stop the posts tumbling out of my head, though visitors were a bit harder to come by. Then little, by little they did and then some of them even left comments - my most treasured blogging possessions. Thus have a number of valued blogging friendships been born. Soon I noticed various tags and badges being awarded around the blogosphere and longed to join in. It felt like I was back at school - in the playground with all the kids, but no-one wanting to play or pick me for their team. Eventually that has changed and I've had the pleasure of joining in several tagged memes and been given several awards over the year.

I've also seen the nastier side of blogging. Thankfully this had been rare, especially when compared to the warmth, friendliness and generosity of most bloggers. However, the bad times can be depressing (and made me think about giving up on a couple of occasions), so this post is a reminder of all the good times to counteract all of that, nicely bundled up into one shiny package.

Some bloggers don't like to join in with tags and awards. They may be too busy to do them, or feel they don't fit with their blog content or style; they may not like the handing on and linking back aspects; or they may have had them so many times before, they feel they have exhausted the topic or friends to hand their award on to. I respect that, but so far I've chosen to join in. However, my tag or award is always given without obligation - no matter what 'rules' the originator may have given to their tag or award. It's may way of saying thanks to a blogger for the pleasure they've given, or to say I'd like to get to know someone better.

Displaying the awards given is also controversial. Some tags and awards have 'rules' which ask you to do so. I've chosen not to, except for a couple of awards I've been given after being nominated and voted for. An award from an entire section of the blogging community is a somewhat special after all! The others I've chosen to show as part of a post as I believe this still acknowledges the gift of the bestower, whilst ensuring my sidebar is kept relatively clear.

So without further ado here's my summary of my tags and awards from the past year over at Veg Plotting.

Voted Awards - also displayed at Veg Plotting

Sadly there's no glittering awards ceremony to accompany these, but they're much appreciated all the same.



September's inaugural Blotanicals saw my nomination for two awards - Best UK blog and Best Agrarian blog. I was delighted to be voted Best Agrarian blog and fourth for Best UK.


During May a lot of fun was to be had over at The Garden Monkey where a variety of humourous and teasing awards were up for grabs. I was nominated for a number of these (Favourite Way of Wasting Time, What's New Pussycat - well Skimble and Jess were, and We Are All in the Gutter), and carried off the award for Bad Poetry. I even wrote a poem to celebrate!

Judged Awards

In August the delightful Emmat held a virtual village show to coincide with the opening of my virtual garden fundraiser. There was plenty of fun. mayhem and stretching of the rules. It may have looked like any village produce show on the surface, but Emsworth was much better and just as keenly fought. I entered as many categories as I could which in turn garnered me the Emsworthian Medal for Achievement Across All Categories!

Nominated Awards

Authorblog has a regular Post of the Day slot where someone can nominate a post from other blogs they feel to be of particular merit. I've yet to make top spot, but I'm glad to have made runner up on several occasions for Signs of Tinsel Town, Hollywood Inaction and Strange Brew.

Passalong Awards


My first ever award! Given to me by my dear friend Threadspider in January. Hot on its heels a couple of days later came this one from another early friend, Flighty.


A month later, fellow ABC Wednesday contributor Dragonstar gave me this:


It went quiet for a couple of months, then the following arrived in quick succession:

A dual award this one - from the delightful Prairie Rose and Violtje.

Somebody knows me only too well - Suburbia this time!

This one came from Deborah, who used to live near here, but now is up to far more interesting things in France.


Finally in July, Victoria saw fit to give me this to put in my trophy cabinet.

Update - November 2008

I received this completely out of the blue from a blog that's new to me. Naturally I called the post about it A Gift From a Stranger :)

Playing Tag

Quite a lot of the tags I've been given are based on a random facts meme. My first one from Lisa last December asked for eight; three others (from Simon, Violtje and Gardening4Life respectively) asked for six - you can peruse them here and here and even here. A variation on this was a tricky questions meme from both Suburbia and Growing Our Own. I've seen several other versions of this tag too.

Tags don't have to be facts or questionnaires. I wasn't specifically tagged for this, but I did enjoy responding to A Life With a View's general tag (another idea for if you want to respond to a tag, but don't want to hand it on to specific recipients) to show off my screen saver. That brings me to another reason why I enjoy tags: they can be a great idea for a post. So why not use them as writing/photo prompts even if you haven't been tagged yourself?

Memes

There's lots of these on all kinds of topics. I'll be writing a guide to some of them at some point this winter. There's one-offs and regulars. Most of them have a shiny badge awarded to show completion or regular participation. An exception to this is Garden Bloggers' Blooms Day. I wrote a general guide to memes including this, plus another of my regulars here. Another exception to badge awarding is Garden Bloggers' Design Workshop - I participate in this, if I have a suitable contribution to make to the month's topic. By the way, badges aren't the reason why I decide to participate (else they'd be there cluttering up the sidebar on Veg Plotting), it's whether I have something to say that's the key thing for me.

However, here are my badges:

A double award - firstly badge for participating in February's Garden Bloggers' Geography Project...


...and the Blue Poppy Award from Bloomingwriter as a thank you.

ABC Wednesday

Round 2 - Completed July 2008, hosted by Mrs Nesbitt

ABC Wednesday Round 3 - in progress (Q @ 12/11/2008)

Garden Bloggers' Muse Day, hosted by Sweet Home & Garden Chicago on the first day of each month.

April Flower Shower

April's sidebar slide show and first Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day post on 15/4/2008. All pictures were from my garden except the Cherry Blossom from around the corner and my next door neighbour's magnolia tree taken from our side of the fence.

Update - October 2008: This and the rest of my monthly flower slideshows can be found on my Open Garden blog.