De's word list for Wednesday

A Wednesday word list for the online writers' group, Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, was presented today by De Jackson.

It's a wonderful list. In fact, it's so wonderful that I was tempted to take the words just as she listed them, to use them in the order they appeared. Delightful fun to string the list, like a bowl of beads, into couplets:
*

sketch screen march snowberry

elder tawny bergamot meadow

(the first 8 words on the list)

*

shunning shallow thorns on sapling

leave twisted indigo adaptations

(the last 8 words on the list, with "on" added)

*

 The other words in De's list of 20 were:

ivy stout-stemmed cluster  zigzag

  

So, I did write a poem using many of the words, but I am not at all sure it can beat, or even measure up to, the original list.

 

bergamot, a balm for the bees,

the shallow roots of sapling trees,

the zigzag paths of passing deer

leave twisted routes for walking here.

shunning more familiar places

avoiding thorns that grab shoelaces

I stopped to sketch a meadow then

where ivy grew on trees stout-stemmed.

I started with bergamot (monarda, or bee balm) because I recall trying to grow it in a too-cold climate. It grew, and was lovely, but unable to over-winter.

The pictures here are the ones shown on De's prompt, apple and blossom, jack-in-the-pulpit, and trumpet vine, from The Book of Wildflowers which she found on ebay.

Partaking: Succinctly Yours meme

Once a week, at her blog Grandma's Goulash, Grandma posts a picture, and has her daughter Calico choose the word of the week before she sees the photo. This week, Calico chose "partaking" which is difficult, but not impossible, to apply to this week's photo.

Our job, then, is to write a short story of no more than 140 words, or a short-short story of 140 characters or less, including spaces and punctuation, using the photo as a prompt, and including the word of the week if possible.

It's good to be back, Grandma, because I might have become verbose rather than succinct if I had remained in Italy, where communication involves many, many words, facial expressions, and a plethora of gestures.

Photo provided as prompt

My brother was joining the Canadian Navy, but first checked out how other sailors fared.
He didn't want to partake of the bottom one's fare.

(140 characters, including spaces and punctuation.)

"Hurry up, lads, we'll soon be going to Italy and partaking of some fabulous food and rich desserts."
(101 characters)



Thinking of partaking of the challenge offered by Succinctly Yours? Click the link below to join us.
(100 characters, not including the link below.)

Posted for Succinctly Yours

Spain and Italy for Our World Tuesday

Above and below, Cinque Terre,
five hillside towns on the northwest coast of Italy.

Photos by Kay Davies and Richard Schear

Florence, Italy

Above and below, near Malaga, Spain

Rome

Not a leaning tower plus tree in Rome,
just a leaning tourist on the top deck of a hop-on-hop-off bus.

Carnival masks were still on sale after Carnival in Venice

Posted for
Our World Tuesday

Open Link Monday at the imaginary garden

Here I am, back from the mid-Atlantic and from Europe, back to my old ways again for Open Link Monday at the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads. All I have to offer is a limerick I wrote for Madeleine Kane's blog.
However, it is the second anniversary of Mad Kane Limericks, so I did take more than five minutes to write the following, and I scrambled through cyberspace for a drawing, if that makes any difference.

Wikimedia
Commons

A fellow who wanted a raise

proceeded his new boss to praise

but his boot-licking

earned him butt-kicking

when his own work was appraised

I'm still not thrilled with my use of "praise" and "appraised" but there we are, it's Monday and my brain is on strike. Again. Tsk. As I always say, no one warned me I'd turn into an old lady.

For Real Toads: food can be challenging

Posted for Grace's food challenge at the

IMAGINARY GARDEN WITH REAL TOADS

Thanks, Grace!

From fruit to nuts

and everything

halfway in between,

European markets

offer good things

to be seen—

European shoppers

buy fresh every day

with small refrigerators,

that’s the only way.

Chocolate is tempting

but so, they say,

are fish—

whose faces

are so ugly

I’d not want them

on my dish.

Spices and rices,

ham and lamb

and all kinds

of sausage,

sliced and wrapped

before your eyes

like a birthday package.

Olives and capers

seasoning things,

seafoods familiar

and scary,

not to be tried too hastily

by visitors unwary.

Stop for a snack

if you have time

to eat it, every bite,

then shop some more,

refreshed for hours,

and gladdened by

the sight of flowers.

Photos by Richard Schear, February, 2013

Some market photos from one of our long-time favorite ports-of-call, Barcelona, Spain, as part of the final cruise of the Carnival Destiny, from Miami, Florida, to Venice, Italy, with stops at Malaga and Barcelona, Spain, as well as Livorno (for Florence and Pisa) and Civitavecchia (for Rome).

The ship is being refitted and renamed, thus the maiden voyage of the Carnival Sunshine will be in November, from Barcelona to New Orleans.
I met a lovely yellow Labrador Retriever at the market, and I know our dog Lindy would have loved to be there, too, but as she's unused to such bounty, she would have gone into sensory overload.

Camera Critters, Cinque Terre, and Venice

In Italy, or at least in the part of it on the northwest coast called Cinque Terre, children feed the seagulls and chase the pigeons away.

Photos by Kay Davies

Farther east, in Venice's famous St. Mark's Square, my husband chatted with a pigeon, explaining why we didn't bring food for these critters, who have no fear of humans.

Posted for
Camera
Critters

Weekend Reflections in Cinque Terre

I'm still waiting for my intrepid photographer's photos of our recent voyage, so I have only my own few pictures.
It's impossible to avoid looking for reflections, thanks to James of the popular meme Weekend Reflections, so here are two from northwestern Italy's rocky coast and scenic towns known as Cinque Terre (pronounced cheen-kway tare-ray).
It's a beautiful area to visit. We used the local train from our temporary base in La Spezia, and were able to see all five towns, plus one or two others.

A placid inner harbor for fishing boats provides more chances for reflection photos than the open sea beyond the breakwater. (Kay Davies photo)

This opening in the rock that supports the houses actually leads to a beach on the other side. Of course my husband had to go through there, hunched over, to investigate. I stayed behind, and caught the reflection of the sun on a pool of water left by high tide. (Kay Davies photo)

Real Toads interpretation: Yemaya Oshun

Artist, Chelsea Bednar
Photo, Margaret Bednar
(Copyright)

goddess of all waters, 

Yemaya Oshun!

rivers, oceans,

lakes and streams—

many dreams

the fishers dream there:

dream of you

and bounty flows—

fish to feed

Africa’s families,

fish to feed

Africa’s dreams.

ponds for frogs,

wetlands for toads,

goddess of all waters—

your bounty

gives us hope,

gives us health,

so take our dreams—

mayhap one day

you'll give us

prosperity,

and Peace.

At the Imaginary Garden with Real Roads today, Margaret's Artistic Interpretations challenge features a photo of her daughter Chelsea's body painting. The subject of the painting is the African goddess Yemaya Oshun.
Margaret assures us we can look forward to more of Chelsea's work in future challenges.

For Real Toads: a work of love

Izy's Out of Standard Challenge is a two-day event this week at the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads but, unusually for me, I am writing this on the first day. Out of standard, indeed.

Izy challenges me to think of the worst job I ever had, make a list of words or phrases describing the job or how I felt about the job, and use those words in a poem that is not about said work.

Whew, a challenging job indeed, Izy, but here I have risen to the call—as a phoenix rises out of the ashes, so do I rise out of the mind-numbing stress of reporting my stolen wallet, eager to present fellow Toads and other poets with barely-poetical nonsense once again.

It's good to be back, too. We cruised from Miami, Florida, to ancient Venice, and had a wonderful time, except for the theft on the train from Naples on the second-last day of our unguided tour of Italy. I loved going to Europe by ship. As the phoenix and the other birds say, it's the only way to fly. And there are ships traveling to Australia from Vancouver, the city in whose environs I spent my working life. This gives me to think, indeed.

*

my angel, my darling,

for you do I long,

hours out of every day

and all the night...

Wikipedia image

there is no help for me.

I will always love you,

I cry while my poor

pained heart yearns

for the responsibility

of caring for you.

there are dead lines

on my forehead

as I double shift

my sports car past the house

where once we lived,

where once we loved.

Day 2 of Izy's challenge: I am reminded I forgot to include my list of job complaints:
long hours
poor paying
no help
double shifts
deadlines
responsibility (without corresponding pay, of course)

The crime and fall in the Roman Empire

Here I am on our transatlantic cruise from Miami, Florida, to Venice, Italy. I received a lovely gift from our wait-staff on Valentine's Day...a dessert I didn't need.

Sunset behind the Carnival Destiny, now being refitted to emerge as the Carnival Sunshine.

Florence, Italy. I found a lovely little restaurant for lunch nearby.

The cathedral and its famous tower in Pisa.
My husband climbed it. I didn't.

Trevi Fountain, "somewhere in the heart of Rome"!

The weather may have been grey, but I felt sunny just being in Venice.

Waiting for Dick to register at our hotel in Milan.

Too many beautiful views from which to choose in Cinque Terre, Italy.

The same can be said for the Amalfi Coast. There was beauty everywhere we looked. Here my intrepid photographer prepares for one of the thousands of photos he took in Italy.

We tried to pack light, but it was a month-long holiday, so we still had a lot of luggage to carry around Italy, getting on and off trains, and sometimes to and from hotels. However, we came home with less because the big suitcase on the right was stolen from the train in Naples.
Photos by Richard Schear and Kay Davies

Yes, it's true. We wuz robbed.

On the last of several trains by which we travelled in Italy, we lost some luggage. Dick had to make a report to the carabinieri in Rome. They gave him a form to fill out, shrugged, and said, "Oh, Napoli. Si, Napoli." That was pretty much what the hotel staff said to us when we finally arrived there. "Oh, yes, Naples. You have to be very careful there."

It seems Naples is not the place in which to leave any of your luggage unguarded while you put other pieces into the overhead bins.

Unfortunately, for me at least, I had absentmindedly tossed my wallet into the large suitcase when sleepy the night before. It had just been in my way on the beside table, and I didn't mean to leave it in the suitcase. However, in the morning, I forgot all about it.

I had only taken one credit card with me, and when I phoned to cancel it, I discovered someone had tried to use it while we were flying home, but failed because they didn't, of course, have the PIN number. Whew, thank goodness for chip cards and PIN numbers.

However, the wallet also contained photocopies of my birth certificate and our marriage certificate (because we have different surnames, I thought it would be good to have my husband's name on me if I'm ever hit by a bus).

Now I'm frantic about identity theft. I've been hearing about it for years, but the details didn't sink in. Can these items be used for someone to pretend to be me? If they have my mother's maiden name, can they take out other credit cards in my name? Our address is on the tags on all our luggage, in case an airline loses it, and I am always wary of purse-snatching, but theft of a large suitcase containing our end-of-vacation laundry, hadn't occurred to us.

So, I'm not washing clothes today, but I am definitely fretting.

*

So, there you have the crime, but what of the fall mentioned in my heading?

Oh, that was me, too. If I don't watch my feet while I'm walking, I trip over things.

I came off an elevator and was talking to Dick as he opened our hotel door about 10 feet away from me, which meant I was looking at him and not at my feet. The doorway from the elevator lobby to the hall had a two- or three-inch lip, and I knew about it, but didn't see it because I was looking at my husband instead of watching where I was going.

Splat!

Down I went, and I didn't go quietly. Dick says I screamed, but I know I didn't. I did make a whole lot of loud squeaky noises, however, because I came down on my right knee, the one with an old, old scar that still hurts when hit, as many scars do.

"Ow!" I said, and, "ooh, ooh, ooh" several times, perhaps more than several.

It took one husband, two chambermaids, and a chair to get me up, and once I got onto my bed I had no intention of going anywhere very fast.

So I missed a second day in Rome. We had checked out the sights (wow, the sights!) from the hop-on hop-off bus, visited the Trevi Fountain, and had lunch in a non-touristy restaurant nearby, but left the more intense sightseeing until later. Dick had to go by himself, of course, while I lay down until I felt well enough to get up and eat the chips and cookies from the mini-bar. By evening, I was functioning again, and able to limp out for a delicious dinner.

More photos will, I'm sure, be coming up. So far, I only have the ones taken with my little camera.

Posted for

Our World Tuesday

Also posted to

Open Link Monday at the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads

Arrividerci, Roma

In 48 hours or less, Dick and I will be home and so will Lindy, and you will be able to read all about it right here.
Thanks for all the comments while we have been away.
Developments have developed and all is not as it seems, dear readers. Mysteriouser and mysteriouser.
Please stay tuned.
K

Each new day, a new breakfast surprise

Today the breakfast surprise in Siena, Italy, was coffee yogurt. What a wonderful idea. Lets us have coffee and eat healthy, too.
On our way to Napoli today. Dick is thinking of climbing Mount Vesuvius. I say climbing the mountain that is the city of Siena was sufficient. This town is uphill in all directions. Once we reached the top, the hotel receptionist asked why we didn't use the escalator that comes up from the train station!!!
I am not usually given to using three exclamation marks, but it beats killing myself or someone else. Sigh.

When not in Rome, post anyway

Hi again, all. Not much time left online but want to say Venice has met and exceeded our expectations! Rome was magnificent and Florence was lovely. My intrepid photographer climbed the Leaning Tower in Pisa and a wonderful time was had by all.
More soon, now packing to head for Milan by train. Flying home from Rome March 4 and hope to post a note before then.
Luv, K

Strange sailing for February

Hi blogging friends, fans, followers, etc., just a quick note to say the Carnival Destiny had calm seas from Miami, Florida, to the south coast of Spain. We're docked at Malaga, an hour and a half (by car) east of Gibraltar. No, we didn't see the Rock, because we passed it at 3am.
Barcelona next, then Florence (Livorno), Rome (Civitavecchia), and finally Venice.
We're both well and having a good holiday so far. I'm getting lots of rest and Dick is getting lots of exercise, just what the doctors ordered.
New news soon, probably from Venice next week.
Cheers!
K

Cinquain for Marian at Real Toads

Here I am, in a rush, up to my eyeballs in suitcases, backpacks, clothes for different climates (surely, however, there will be lifejackets in our cabin?) but wanting to contribute to one last Real Toads challenge before we head off tomorrow.

Marian Kent photos

This might be our most exciting adventure yet, crossing the Atlantic by ship in February, although a nice young lady named Gloria at Carnival Cruise Lines said the weather should be good this time of year.

Marian has selected the cinquain for the first Sunday mini-challenge of February and has given us many examples from her own oeuvre. She has also given us some photos from The Big Apple, in case we “abhor syllable counting” and prefer a photo prompt.

Ah, but, Marian, the photos spoke to me in a cinquain sort of way, although ignoring the traditional nature image the cinquain inherits from haiku and tanka.

And so, as I may be contributing nothing to the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads for the rest of the month, here is my cinquain. It adheres, you see, to the five lines (by the very nature of cinq) and syllable count of 2-4-6-8-2. It also has a strong title. Imagery, not much, and Mother Nature, not at all.

BIG CITY HEART

I heart

New York, I heart

its t-shirt shops and all

its many postal boxes, too,

I do

Kay L. Davies, February, 2012

Weekend Reflections: passing Passau

Cruising on the Rhine, Main, and Danube Rivers in November was a wonderful opportunity for us to photograph reflections. This shot was taken from the river cruise ship Viking Danube in Passau, Germany.

Posted for Weekend Reflections
hosted by James, wherever he may be. Thanks, James!

Camera Critters and Pet Pride: dog cousins

These are Lindy's dog-cousins: Jasper and Roxy. They live with Lindy's people-cousins a few miles away from each other on the coast of British Columbia, so Lindy hasn't met them yet. Jasper is the senior dog cousin in the family, and Roxy is the junior one. When Roxy visits him, Jasper protects her, so she really looks up to him. We are hoping to visit them both, late this spring, or maybe early in the summer.

Posted for

Pet Pride hosted by Lindy's friend Bozo and

his family at their Pets Forever blog in Mumbai, India,

and also for
Camera Critters hosted by Misty Dawn

Skywatch Friday: golden dome

As the sun was setting over the Pacific to the west, this patch of gold appeared in the eastern sky, illuminating the trees and casting warmth across the South Surrey suburb of Ocean Park when I was visiting last month.
It was so beautiful, I took one photo, and my sister-in-law Caroline used my camera to take another. I don't know which of us took this one. I know Caroline saw that the sun was setting, and told me about it. She is an observant person who loves the natural world around her, and teaches young children about it several times a week.

Posted for
Skywatch Friday

A word with Laurie, for Real Toads

they say it’s a movie, a game, or a show...

whether they’re right, though, I’ll never know

phantasms scare me, frighten me sick—

like nightmares that feature that devil Old Nick

everything’s moving

flickering

shimmering

pushing and shoving

dickering

glimmering

while, in a cauldron,

something is simmering

phantasmagoric phantasmagoria

surely the opposite thing to euphoria

fantastic phantoms

oozing and gory

...ah...

aarrgghh

...ugh...

  

somebody wake me up!

wake me up now!

I can’t think

I can’t breathe

I can’t help myself

ow!

 

who’s there?

who is that?

mom, is that you?

mom, it is you,

and daddy, too,

I’m so glad...

a bad dream...

but I’m okay now

Laurie's word this week
at the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads is phantasmagoric.
Of course, Laurie always offers words we use every day.

Not. Definitely not, but she did provide the definition and,

after that, she left us to deal with our own nightmares.