Did You Get Everything?

When you’re getting ready to go on a trip, or just getting ready for work or school, don’t you tick off a mental checklist of what needs to go out the door with you? Keys, phone, ticket for that thing you gotta pick up, coffee mug, snack bar, et cetera, et cetera. You with me? So you’re heading out the door and someone you love dearly asks you — with a straight face — “Did you get everything?”

If it’s me and someone I dearly love asks me that casual question…it gives me pause. Because, how should I know? If something I need to get is something I didn’t remember to get, then I probably didn’t get it and how would I know I didn’t get it if I didn’t remember that I need to get it? Do you follow?

So my usual answer is, “I sure hope so,” because what is the logical answer? You know if you reply, out of a fount of unfounded hope, “Yep, I think I’ve got it all,” and you ain’t got it all, and that evening a loved one asks about that thing you were supoosed to pick up because they desperately need it now and there’s that dang ticket languishing on your desk because you didn’t get everything …. you’re going to catch so much flack!

It doesn’t seem to the questioner that they’ve asked such a loaded question. They’re just trying to help. They don’t know what “everything” is, after all (any more than you do).

There not only is no logical answer to, “Did you get everything?”, it’s actually foolish to reply at all! One time I answered , “Sure,” with a grimace that went unnoticed. I didn’t forget anything pertinent. However, I realized later that I had set a precedent that suggested to loved ones that it could be expected of me to actually be “sure” of all my responsibilities right down to the last item on my frantic mental checklist of things to go out the door with me.

But I get it. I don’t want to ask the loved one who is glancing around uncertainly, “Want to share your mental checklist with me so we can both be all about collecting your stuff together while my mental checklist goes unattended?” When I’m certain that I’ve got all of my own “everything”, though, I’m usually just as guilty as anyone else of asking, “Did you get everything?”

“Sure!”

–//–

Haunting The Haunted Traveler

Through the end of June my poem, “Ghost in the Greenhouse”, is being featured online on The Haunted Traveler ezine — along side other wonderful indie authors and poets. Check us out at  https://www.weaselpress.com/hauntedtraveler. Happy  haunted reading, neighbors!

This Is Me – Is That You?

Sometimes when I’m trying in vain to recall  something like a person’s name or a movie title or a street name, it feels like an evil gremlin in my brain rolled a boulder over it — a boulder I can’t budge.  And only after I give up and move on down the road so to speak, will that nasty gremlin shove the boulder away and holler,  “Hey, goofy! Were you looking for this?”

Is that you too?

Then there are the past/present fact re-arrangers. Those little devils like to entertain  themselves by switching up facts for me.  Say, for instance,  I met a neighbor who introduced himself as Al and I thought he said it was short for Allen.  Two months later I learn that my neighbor’s name is actually Alfred.  Ok no problem.  But days later someone asks me what that neighbor’s name is and I tell them, “It’s Allen — but he goes by Al” because the fact re-arranging devils dashed back to the Old Info files and grabbed the Old “fact” and slapped it on top of the new fact so all I saw was Allen and not Alfred!  Now there’s mass confusion.

Is that you too?

And some brain gremlins definitely delight in the hilarity of Confusion. They will make you say the opposite of what you mean to say, causing you to mis-direct your pastor’s wife to Hooters instead of Tony Romo’s.  Or your ride will wake you up at 5 a.m. on Saturday to get you to that 5:30 P.M. (!) thing!  Yeah, the Confusin’-is-Amusin’ crew will turn midday to midnight, pull it up to pull it down, add a half cup to add a half pint or transmission fluid to brake fluid the nano-second before the words hit your tongue!  You blush and the brain gremlins get a rush.

Is that you too?

I’ve concluded that my brain stores information like a computer but my search engine needs some fixes and updates…leaving me open to retrieval of irrelevant and erroneous links.  But hey, I’ll bet there are already AI gremlins too!

So how’s your brain running today?

The Dragon’s Petition

Me:  Hey Fluff. What’s with the sign?

Fluffy, the bearded dragon:  I’m protesting!  I’m stuck in this so-called habitat.

Me:  What’s wrong with your habitat?  You have 5 levels – 5 rooms – all to yourself.

Fluffy:  Have you looked at my floors?

Me:  Well yeah. Some of it’s woven beachmat – pretty cool stuff – and some sand, etcetera.

Fluffy:  Etcetera? I didn’t hear anything about tile.

Me:  Tile?

Fluffy:  Yeah, tile.  Like you have — tile floors I can’t get to on my own.

Me:  I get it, Fluff.  It’s mid-summer and you wanna cool your dogs…so to speak.

Fluffy:  Oh-my-gosh you’re quick!

Me:  Nobody likes a smart-ass Fluffy.

Fluffy:  Whatever.

Me:  Ok, chick.  Just don’t blow any fire on me and I’ll help you to the tile floor.

Fluffy:  Gee-but-whiz it’s all I ask of life!

Me:  So dramatic,  Fluffy!  Here ya go.  Fluffy’s free!

Fluffy:  But not cheap!  Take the sign will ya?  It’s heavy.

Trying Me Some Tanka

Thanks to Jem Croucher’s reply to Charles Robert Lindholm’s poetic plea for help with his haiku addiction, I have a new wordy thing to play with…the Tanka. More syllables to fill but still a challenge. See what you think (yes, I did use pencil and paper to compose them).

I THINK ON PAPER

I think on paper,

with pencil and eraser,

better than I do

on a digital device —

until eraser wears down.

OH PENCIL!

Oh pencil! You are

Versatility itself

Enabling me to

Re-phrase without marking through

‘Long as your eraser lasts!

Oh my dusty brain!

I post so seldom now. I think I’ve psyched myself into a decidedly lackadaisical attitude. I read others’ posts with interest and comment too. And contribute very little else. I feel like the spark is gone. Dear me!

I began this blog to share some of my writing…short stories, excerpts from longer works-in-process and poems. When I don’t have any new work to post, I just don’t post. I realized that was becoming a lazy writer….deluding myself that I was reserving my time for offl-line composition….so I created Luney Lundi (Monday morning posts featuring lune style poems accompanying short fun essays relating to the moon) to goad myself into posting at least weekly. Turned out I’m not much of a task master of myself…I skipped a lot of Lundis!

Monday comes weekly / But my lunes / Come sporadically

And btw writing on my iPad has its limitations — like I can’t keep it from double spacing when I hit return before the end of a line.  Please bear with me. The laptop is down.

So I’m thinking of de-structuring,  so to speak, my posting policy and going basically themeless but posting daily no matter what. In other words there’s no telling what you might read on my blog on any given day, but there will be something…I’m really seriously and determinedly shooting for daily postings! Seriously. Now I wouldn’t mind if my WordPress buds here became a bit demanding. Like maybe commenting something like “‘Sup dude? Where the heck’s your post?!” or “Really, Robbie? No post today? You’re slipping! Get busy!” or even “What the hey was that?! You call that a post? Getting lazy, Rob!”

After all, writing is writing, and not writing anything at all because my muse is dosing is only contributing to the dust collecting on the creative part of my brain! So there it is, fellow WordPressers. It comes down to this..

No more delays, Rob / Write something / Polish brain daily!

See you here tomorrow!

Lune-y Lundi — my Monday indulgence

“Impending Dark”

Treasure the sliver
of moonlight —
the dark night’s coming!

   – a Kelly lune by me, Robbie

Tonight we will have a little sliver of Moon visible, but by Thursday our Moon will be “dark”– the New Moon.  Keep some coins in your pocket and jingle them when you first see the New Moon.  According to some European Moon lore, doing so will increase your fortune!

We know that the Moon has been worshiped all over the world but it wasn’t always a female deity in the cultures that worshiped it. Mesopotamians’ Sin, Japan’s Tsukoyami, and apparently all of the Teutonic Moon deities were male — as was the Hindu Chandra who rode his chariot across the sky.  Most Moon goddesses seem to have originated in Eastern Mediterranean lands.

I confess that I never wondered about the birth of our tradition of candle-lit birthday cakes!  Have you?  Well now you’re gonna know…the ancient Greeks honored their Moon goddess Artemis on her birthday with Moon-shaped cakes adorned with lit candles that they offered the deity with a prayer (a wish?).

“Artemis Day”

Remember me with
cake and fire — I might
grant your plea.

– a Collum lune of mine

And then there was (is?) that silly belief that the Moon, especially when full, can cause lunacy.  It’s true that in a South Texas neighborhood bar I once joined some folks on the porch to howl at the full Moon.  If you’ve never howled at the full Moon — well, you’re going to have to wait until May 10!  Plenty of time to practice.

Hey dear readers, if you have a lune to share — even if it’s not about our little satellite — I wouldn’t mind a bit if you posted it in the comments below.  To remind: a Kelly lune is 13 syllables — 5 in first line, 3 in second, 5 in last line, no other rules.  A Collum lune is 11 words — 3 first line, 5 second, 3 in last line, also no other rules.  Not as challenging as a proper haiku, but challenging — and addicting to some of us!

Check out these great sites where I gleaned some info for this little post of mine:
metastudies.com, article “Moon Magic and Lore” by Anita Burns
infogalactic.com > List of Lunar Deities
timeanddate.com > Sun and Moon

Until next week….

Howl on, my little Moon-dawgs!

Lune-y Lundi — Moon and Lune day!

Lune-y Lundi is my Monday indulgence — both a celebration of the poetic form known as Lune (similar to the Haiku) and my fascination with the heavenly body for which this day w

as named.

Dig that crazy beat!
Line us up
And sing ‘Syzygy’!
– a Kelley Lune by yours truly…Kelleys are 5 syllables 1st line, 3 in 2nd line, 5 in 3rd.

Today, April 10, the Moon is in it’s Waxing Gibbous phase, which basically means it’s nearly in it’s Full Moon phase.  It also means that it will appear to the naked eye to be full already!  But tomorrow the Moon will be Full because it will be on the opposite side of Earth from the Sun — almost exactly opposite. The Moon and Sun won’t be exactly opposite, though, but about five degrees off because our Moon’s orbit around us isn’t exactly in line with Earth’s orbital plane around the Sun.  You got all that?  Guess what?  Exactly opposite occurred last February 11 and will happen only once more this year on August 7.

Just to muddy things up a bit more…you should know that the other exact line-up happens when Moon is exactly between Earth and Sun — a solar eclipse.

These exact line-ups are known as “syzygy”.  Seriously.  Look it up.

Among the many myths and legends about the Moon is the belief that a rabbit lives on the Moon, and a little girl is chasing it.  Hm.  And lots of people world-wide have been convinced for millennia that the full Moon magically transforms some people into strange creatures — like werewolves — or that it makes some folks cray-cray!  The jury seems to still be out on that one, as there are a surprising number of us who still maintain to this day that the bright shimmering full Moon affects our minds.

How are you feeling?

Oh, by the way, this month’s full Moon is also known in North America as Pink Moon because of the Spring-time appearance of the pretty pink blossoms of Pink Phlox.  April’s Moon is also known as Grass Moon, Egg Moon and Fish Moon.

It’s a good time to
wet a line —
under the Fish Moon!
— a Kelley by me

A Column Lune (3 words 1st line, 5 words 2nd line, 3 words last line):

Wax on, Pink —
show me phlox blossoms tonight,
April full Moon!

If that’s clear as mud, try this one….

Pink phlox flowers
shine under April’s full Moon —
Spring’s Pink Moon.

That’s all my lune-y-ness for this week, my little Moon-o-philes.  Catch me next Monday for the next phase….

For this post I referenced info from the following sites: aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/moon, space.org, timeanddate.com and stardate.com.

Howl on, Moon-dawgs!

 

Lune-y Lundi Lives!

Lune: a 3-line poetic form similar to the Haiku.
Kelley Lune: 5 syllables in first line, 3 in the second, 5 in the third.
Collum Lune: 3 words, 5 words, 3 words.

“Cold Coffee”
a Kelley Lune by Robbie Ann Lewis (my pen name, dudes)

My coffe’s gone cold.
Cool breeze chills
My hands – pen trembles.

To the Moon, Alice!

Have you heard?  Two very wealthy people will be the first private citizens to board a rocket for a trip to the Moon!  They won’t be the first space tourists — American businessman Dennis Tito bought that first ticket to ride, and in April 2001 he left Earth via a Russian Soyuz spacecraft for a six-day stay at the cozy International Space Station.  He was 60 at the time.  A determined 60, he was — who gave NASA palpitations!  But all went well, so since then, six other private citizens have vacationed at the space lab — with NASA’s blessing.

These two new ground-breakers are getting set to take their cruise around the Moon by the end of 2018.  They will round Earth’s only natural satelite aboard a new SpaceX Crew Dragon space capsule.  No Moon landing, just a fly-by…JUST! LOL!  Their identities are being kept under wraps at this time.  Don’t you just know they’re bursting at the seams to share their highly unusual vacation plans (they will be the 8th and 9th space tourists) with everyone they know?

Special note:  Our mystery space adventurers will be the first to go beyond low-Earth orbit since the Apollo 17 Lunar landing mission in 1972!  So let’s hope they take lots of pics!

-/-

To celebrate Elon Musk’s next big step toward colonizing the Moon (Mr. Musk’s main SpaceX  goal), I give you another Lune — a Collum Lune this time:

I’m mooning for
My own cosmical mystery tour.
Let training begin!

Oh, one more, okay?….

Dear Mr. Musk,
I’m saving for a Moonshot.
Hold my seat!

Happy Monday, you Moon-dawgs!

Catch me next Lundi (Monday) for more Moon-shines…

-Rob

For the facts I cited in this post, I referred to:
*Space.com article, First Space Tourist: How a U.S. Millionaire Bought a Ticket to Orbit, by Mike Wall (April 27,2011)
*nbcnews.com article, Look Inside the SpaceX Capsule That Will Take Two Beyond the Moon, by David Freeman (March 3,2017)

I Don’t Want to Talk About New Year’s Eve!

Or New Year’s Day either. Nor resolutions. So I’m shutting up about it right now.

So we have a Bearded Dragon in our house. She doesn’t have wings and I’ve never seen her breathe fire. She’s only a foot or so long. The cat would certainly re-phrase that last sentence by dropping “only”. When the teenage boys brought this lizard home about a month ago, she was nameless. Their dad – my boyfriend – wanted to call her T-Rex. Assumed it was a male. I called it Fluffy. I can’t say why. The lure of irony maybe. “Fluffy” stuck – even before we saw her lay eggs.

Fluffy has escaped her terrarium twice, slipping out an open door and exploring a bit of the yard. Her tail was pointing toward the sky (a sign of lizard happiness) when we found her. We keep the door shut now, and let her explore the house instead. If she spots a fly that tail goes up again…Go, Fluffy, skittit!

Here’s the rest of the story…end of the century, end of the decade, end of the season…Fluffy wants what we all want — a little life!! Stay tuned.