Daily writing prompt

Share a story about someone who had a positive impact on your life.

View all responses

Come on, guys. You’ve given us this question already. I answered with the “I gotta take a walk” story from when I was a young, impressional guitar playing high school student. I think I might have mentioned my third grade teacher too.

Man, I don’t want to write the same thing again. I know it’s difficult to come up with original questions, but can’t you do better than this? Ugh. These daily prompts are supposed to help me get my brain ramped up to speed in the morning and instead today it’s just making the grumpy old man feel grumpier. Ugh, again.

Okay. We were either still in high school or it was shortly after high school and I was in the Music School at the University of Lowell, shortly before it became UMass Lowell. Mike the Bass Player, who was my band’s bass player in high school and is still my band’s bass player today, had a house party and we played. One of his friends, that I didn’t really know, had had too much to drink and came up to me and, in a very slurry voice, said, “you’re the best guitar player in the world.” That might not be the exact quote. It was 100 years ago and he was a little hard to understand. There may have been an F-Bomb or two that I left off the quote. Also, it was objectively, demonstrably, untrue. I suck. I am not the worst guitar player ever (back then or today) but I am so far removed from good. If he had said, “you’re the most adequate guitar player in the world” I wouldn’t have laughed at him the way I did. I would have thanked him. As it were, it was just a silly ego boost that stuck with me for a while. I had forgotten about it over the decades until just now. It’s a stupid story that is meaningless, but I’m grumpy so that’s what you’re getting.

QED, or some shit.

Daily writing prompt

What does freedom mean to you?

View all responses

“There is more than one kind of freedom,” said Aunt Lydia. “Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from.”
― Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

A little clarification on the quote. In the context of the story, what Aunt Lydia called “the days of anarchy” was our current society, at least at the time of writing which I believe was the 1980’s. The “now” of which she speaks is arguably the most brutally oppressive religious dictatorship western fiction has ever dreamed up.

You know what would be nice? It would be nice if women had control over their own healthcare. My wife and my daughter, my sister, my niece, my friends, my neighbors, all women. It would be nice if freedom meant they made their own decisions about their own bodies.

You know what would be nice? It would be nice if freedom was not dependent on something as idiotically arbitrary as the color of your skin. If people with one color skin had the right to a fair trial when they are accused of breaking the law, while people with another color skin are shot in the street like animals by those who claim to be upholding the law for even the most minor legal infractions. That would be nice, wouldn’t it?

You know what would be nice? It would be nice if our rights were not dictated by where our ancestors lived or how they choose to practice religion (or not). It would be nice if people in our society had the same rights whether they were descended from people in western Europe, or people in the middle east, or people in the far east, or people in Africa. That would sure be nice, I think.

Okay. I am stopping now. Today’s daily writing prompt has seriously pissed me off and I am going to start writing the word fuck a lot if I don’t stop writing now.

Daily writing prompt

What public figure do you disagree with the most?

View all responses

I asked the jetpack AI assistant this question:

Define the phrase “loaded question”

A “loaded question” is a type of question that contains an assumption that, if answered, implies agreement with that assumption. It is designed to provoke a particular response, often by creating an unfair or false association. This type of question can be seen as manipulative or deceitful because it aims to push a particular agenda.

Yeah… that’s pretty much what I thought you’d say, Mr. AI.

What public figure do I disagree with the most… yeah… You don’t have to scroll too far back on this stupid little blog page to find the answer. I don’t often say his name directly anymore because it makes me sick to use those five letters in that particular order. I don’t enjoy putting name to evil, but I’ll do it. Instead I refer to his cult followers by the name he sort of gave them. The maga cult. Lowercase letters because fuck them all, they don’t deserve capital letters. Scum.

I am talking about that neo-nazi who is running for president as the republican nominee, because there is no republican party anymore (still with the lower case letters because capital letters imply respect). I am talking about the orange pile of fascist goo who calls himself trump.

Do I disagree with the nazi? You bet your ass I do. Everything he stands for. Everything he thinks. Everything he does. Everyone who follows him. Fuck them all. He is the physical manifestation of evil in our universe and the so-called christian right follows him as though he were the second fucking coming.

I don’t believe in hell, but if I did I would believe that he comes from there. No question.

Fuck him and fuck everything he represents.

Daily writing prompt

What is your career plan?

View all responses

Adults are always asking kids what they want to be when they grow up because they are looking for ideas.

Paula Poundstone

My career plans are pretty much set. Work in lower management until I die. Simple. I mean, I could possibly move up to middle management or something like that, but really there aren’t many different options at this point. I’m too old to be making plans to hop around. On July 12th I am going to hit the 20 year mark at my company. Right now, that’s the only career plan I’m thinking about.

I get the feeling that this question of the day was geared toward the younger folks. I’m looking forward to reading through other posts because, as Miss Poundstone* suggested, I’m always looking for new ideas.

*Wasn’t Paula Poundstone black balled or something? Didn’t she do something awful, or was accused or suspected of doing something awful? Oh yes, the google clued me in. Three counts of lewd acts upon a girl younger than 14. I used the quote because there was a point when the Comedy Central network used it in a commercial that ran about 20 times per hour and it seemed to fit my point for today. Apologies for quoting a potential child molester. I suck.

Daily writing prompt

What was the last live performance you saw?

View all responses

In my younger days I went to clubs to hear live music all the time. Almost once or twice a week. It was basically my social life. As I got older the frequency was vastly reduced. After the pandemic hit the frequency dropped to a hair above zero.

I went to the Letters to Cleo annual Thanksgiving homecoming show back in November and it was pretty much perfect. That was the last live performance… until four days ago. Scroll back a little, you’ll see it. My daughter, Bellana, performed with the Vermont Symphony Orchestra four days ago and you bet your sweet music loving ass I was in the crowd having my mind blown by the Mozart and being so overcome with pride for her that I was close to spontaneously combusting. Literally. Boom. It was amazing.

My step daughter… that little kid I first met when she was six years old and in first grade… one of the two people who have allowed me to be a part of their life as they grew from little person to adult… the woman who used to be the girl who I’ve been blessed to be able to hear sing for most of her life… sang in the choir with a freaking symphony orchestra performing a Mozart masterpiece.

That was my most recent live performance, all of four days ago, and damn it if that is going to be tough to top.