Blizzard

Pixabay

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Jayden stood at the living room window and watched the falling snow. It was steady with large fluffy flakes that seemed to settle quickly into a thick blanket. There was already over eight inches on the ground, an accumulation virtually unknown in his region. His boss had phoned about a half an hour before to say that they would be closing the workshop today. Closed, Jayden mused. It had been the first time since his divorce that he had had a weekday off. Since the divorce, flashed through his head. He pondered the circumstances of of it. She had said he was a workaholic and never had time for her anymore. Was she right? Why am I feeling so wound up by a few flakes of snow? I just want to get to work. Is that too much to ask? Jayden checked himself, and took a deep breath, How could such a tranquil scene as falling snow bring on such a blizzard of thoughts?

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Padre

Tuesday Writing Prompt 

The Apologist

Pixabay

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Donna King was an apologist.  No not that type of apology, but rather she a woman who knew how to construct arguments.  The partners of Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe, struck a virtual gold-mine when they hired her fresh from some Podunk law school in the Midwest.  But now she was proving herself in spades.  To say her constructions and syllogisms were complex would be a true understatement, as most of them had more edges than a tiger shark’s smile.  A King summation was a thing of be beauty and generally left opposing counsel baffled, and an occasional judge too.

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Padre

I have purposely added a few clichés to this route to setting up a alternative to Multifaceted.

Tycoon

Photo by Flo Dahm on Pexels.com

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Peter Carlson stepped lightly from the Paris hotel where he had just had an important business meeting. He tucked a document securely into his inside jacket pocket, and tapped it twice for good measure before hailing a taxi.

The real estate deal he had just completed brought back memories of his first so long ago in New York. He had been a young man then with only his college tuition money to his name, but he risked it all on that first big buy. He had never looked back.

Now he was on his way back home to the Jiffy Lube, of which he was franchise holder. This Paris deal was going to complete his portfolio. He couldn’t wait to hang the deed to the Eiffel Tower next to his certificates for the Brooklyn Bridge, Mount Rushmore, and the Leaning Tower.

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Padre

Photo Challenge #351

A Message Through Time

Maria Orlova at Pexels

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Kelly enjoyed search through the lesser used volumes in the stacks. There was something about the “relationship” with a book that hadn’t “conversed” with someone else in decades, if not longer. As she look down a leather bound tome from the shelf she was surprised that a handwritten manuscript fell from its pages. At first she thought she had damaged the book, but it was clear that it had been placed in the volume as a bookmark some years ago. It bore a date over a hundred years old, and while it was “historical,” it was far from valuable for anyone other than its author and the initial recipient. It now spoke to Kelly as well, as she teared up on reading its simple and painful message of love lost. Dated 15 October 1917 and citing its place of composition as Passchendaele, Belgium, it spoke of a young man’s desire to leave the god-forsaken place and to return to “his Daisy’s” side. The letter concluded in a different hand merely stating, “I am so sorry, Peter has fallen.”

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Padre

“Snow Day”

Pixabay

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Holly and Tim booted up their laptop and prepared for another day of online phonics and fractions. As the computer came to life, there was something unusual on the school’s Google Classroom links. As they went through each of their lesson slots they saw that the connection was down. It seems the entire server had crashed – the Covid lockdown equivalent of a “snow day.”

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Padre

Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge #101

Loggerheads

Sunday Writing Prompt 

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“Let’s have pizza,” Rich suggested, knowing fully that she hated anything that even hinted at cheese or Italian.

“We could do Chinese. I could really fancy some kung pao prawns,” Sarah said.

I bet that’s not the only thing she’s fancying right now, Rich said snidely in his own mind. “No, we had Chinese last week,” he said allowed.

“Well, I really can’t face pizza, it’s always too greasy and you know I hate basil and oregano.”

Well to bad, Rich thought. You can’t possibly hate it any more than you throwing yourself at Will Dayton at the party last night. “Hmm, let’s just stay in and have sandwiches then.”

“But there’s nothing here for sandwiches except cheese, and I already said I don’t want cheese or pizza,” she replied. “Besides it’s date night. We really should go out.”

“Where then if not Pizza or Chinese?”

“We could just go clubbing and snack as we go,” she suggested.

Just so you can chat up more guys, Rich thought. “Okay, sounds good,” he said after a pause. Two can play at this flirting game, he thought with aflush of excitement.

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Padre

Sunday Writing Prompt

The Cupcake Raid

utroja0 at Pixabay

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A single cupcake left on the tray

As the children are told to “go and play”

Little Andy – for it does reach

A clear violation of “just on each”

The tenacious chap has a plan

To swoop it up blaming it on Gran

Caught in the act he is sent on his way

Glancing back longingly at the tray

Should he now just relent?

That’s not the way his next hour was spent

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Padre

Weekend Writing Prompt #192 – Tenacious in 73 words

Defending the Frontier

Craig Sybert at Unslash

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Captain Ezekiel Talbert mustered his men outside the bastion of Fort Frederick.  A war party of French aligned Shawnees had been spied near the Potomac and he and his detachment of the Maryland Forces were going to intercept them before they could get up to any mischief. 

His trusty band of volunteers were going to more than enough to deal with the Shawnee threat, after all they were well equipped with the latest Brown Bess muskets from Japan, and most understood the rudiments of Bland’s Manual.  Now all he needed was for his sergeant to finish his phone call.

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Padre

January 14: Flash Fiction Challenge – In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story about dressing up. It can be a child or another character. Be playful or go where the prompt leads!

With regards to all reenactors everywhere.

Distance Learning

Pixabay

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Gigi assembled her planners, her calendars, her pens, pouches, and post-its before her on the desk and stood over them like a general surveying maps. Useless, she thought to herself. If she were indeed a general she would have called a retreat. What good was all this stationery in a world of e-Learning?

Pushing it all to one side, she opened her laptop and scrolled to find the tutorials for Google Classroom and Google Forms. She also cleared away some clutter from behind her desk to give a more professional background to Monday’s upcoming “live” lesson. It was going to be a long weekend, and General Gigi now knew how Napoleon must have felt at Waterloo.

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Padre

First Line Friday

Warren

CCC #114

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“The entrance is around here somewhere,” Thimblebud said.

“That’s what you said ten minutes ago,” Niggletwist observed.

“Well it’s not my fault that it snowed,” Thimblebud retorted.

“Yes. But it was your great idea to leave the Fairyhold in the first place. ‘Oh, let’s go slide on the frozen pond. It will be fun,’ you said. Well it wasn’t. It was cold and I got my shoes wet, and now we are lost.”

“Wait, there it is,” Thimblebud said.

“Where?” Niggletwist snapped.

“Right there.”

“You mean that rabbit hole?” Niggletwist replied snidely. “This is the last time I am every going out with you again. You have the worst sense of direction of any Pixie I have ever seen.”

“You find it then,” Thimblebud said coldly.

“Well, I um.”

“I thought not,” Thimblebud said. “We will just have to wait with the rabbits till the snow melts.”

And that’s how the Pixies came to live in High Warren.

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Padre

Crimson’s Creative Challenge #114