Tag: Challenge

In a word: Keep

Yes, this is an easy one.

I want to keep the car.  Especially if it’s a Lamborghini and it didn’t cost $500,000.

This form of the word simply means to hang on to something, or up the proper definition, to have or retain possession of

Paring it with other words is where it gets complicated.

For instance,

Keepings off, make sure that the ball doesn’t get into someone else’s possession.

Keep it to yourself, yes, here’s your chance to become the harbinger of secrets and not tell anyone else.  Not unless a lot of money is involved, or a Lamborghini.

You guessed it, the car is the running joke on this post.

How about, keep a low profile, been there tried that, it’s a lot harder than you think.

What about keeping your cards close to your chest, yes, this had both a literal and figurative meaning which makes it sort of unique.

That might follow the second definition, to continue, or cause to continue a particular state.

Another way of using keep is by delaying or stopping someone from doing something or getting somewhere; ie, I was kept waiting at the doctor’s surgery because he was late.

There are any number of examples of using the word keep in tandem with other words

One that specifically doesn’t relate to all the former examples, is simply the word keep.

What is it?

Usually the strongest part of the castle, and the last to fall in an attack.

At least, that was the theory.

Conversations with my cat – 73

This is Chester. He has suddenly become delusional.

I’m not sure if a cat can become so, but since I gave him a role in one of my stories, he’s started acting weirdly.

I’m sure if he could wear sunglasses indoors he would. As it is, it’s head in the air, looking straight ahead, ignoring everything and everyone around him.

I think about opening the concertina doors that lead into the dining room just to see if he crashes into them.

He thinks, no doubt, that I think he’s just sniffing the air to see if there are any mice to be caught, but I’m on to him.

As he strolls past I say, “Perhaps I might turn that role into a walk on.”

He stops in mid step, and turns his head.

“You can’t. I’ve read the latest chapter. I’m integral to the plot.”

I smile. “You do realise often the best roles end up on the cutting room floor, or in this case, perhaps I’ll start editing early. There’s such a thing as the delete key.”

Smug, or is that haughty, look gone.

“Just go back to being your usual self,” I say, “and I’ll reconsider your role.”

“Does that mean no fresh fish for lunch today?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

I’m sure cats can’t shrug, but he gives it his best shot, and continues on his way minus the attitude.

For now. Who knows what tomorrow will bring

In a word: Nobody

This is sometimes how we must feel when overlooked or ignored, like a nobody.

And some people will treat you like a nobody, i.e someone who is just not important.

That’s just one use of the word.

Another might be…

Who did that to your room?

‘Nobody’ is the plaintiff reply.  The infamous Mr. Nobody.  We’ve never met him, but he’s always there.  And, what’s more, he seems to be able to be in more than one place at a time.

Then there’s that time when there’s nobody in the room, nobody agreed with me, hell, that happens all the time, and when I rang your phone nobody answered.

Nobody?  Was I expecting Mr. Nobody to answer?  Surely the response should have been, ‘and you didn’t answer’.

Of course, let’s not delve too deep here, lest we might find out something we didn’t want to know.

I went to your house last night, but nobody was home.

How is it we refer to the people whom we know live in that house as ‘nobody’.  Shouldn’t we be saying, ‘none of you was at home’?

It seems nobody is one of those words we often use in vain.

Writing about writing a book – Day 9

Blogging, Social  Media, and other stuff.

 

Aren’t there more important things to do like writing?

I think reading the 101 things to do to establish your author brand is finally getting to me.  I leave this to read the last thing before I go to bed and it’s beginning to give me nightmares.

So, for starters, I’ve created a twitter page but I’m not sure what to do with it.  Yet.

Then I created a Facebook page but there is one for authors and I think l have created the wrong one.  It’s very confusing.

And reading 10 things an author shouldn’t do, one of them was not to use Facebook.  Who to believe?

Now I’m lingering at WordPress after googling writer blogs and got a choice of so many, some free, others quite expensive, and I’m not sure what half the stuff is they’re offering.

There’s also Site blog, and there’s collaborative blogging.  Perhaps it’s time to get back to the easy stuff like plotting and writing my book!

That might have been easy if a little voice in my head wasn’t screaming ‘you need a website’.

Once again I’m googling my fingers to the bone trying to decide if I want a free one or pay.  At least if I pay there might not be ghastly ads for porn sites.  That’s one criticism I read that can be a problem.

I decided to pay a nominal amount but now I strike a new problem, I need to get a domain name such as ‘authorname.com’.

I put in my name and it is taken already so in order not to pay the person who snapped it up in the hope of making a million dollars, or perhaps because he has the same name as me and thought of it first, I have to accept one of the variations.

It then gives me the opportunity to buy right now that particular name because it is free, and I found myself working with a hyphen.  It could be worse, I suppose.

It also offers a few extra web domains with different endings such as .com,.info, etc.

What the hell it’s only a few extra dollars and I’ll worry about what to do with them in two years’ time except for the .com which I’ll use now.

The website started and a month paid for, got a .com to link it to, and now all I have to do something with it.  No, I’m not a web designer even after I picked a template that looked author like.

It can wait.

Social media investigated but looks like its going to suck up a lot of my time.

Better get back to the book and write my page, or 1000 words, or 2000 words for the day.

 

I look over at the rubbish bin and it is overflowing.  It looks like a scene out of a bad movie, where the writer pretends he’s a pro basketball player who can’t shoot.

It’s just not flowing.  I’m beginning to hate Bill as a name.  Perhaps I’ll change it to Tarquin.  No, that’s not quite a name that suits the character.  It leads to a mental debate about what is an appropriate name for a character and sends me off into Google land again to see what various names mean.

The name is Bill until I find something better.

I guess that leads to some introspection on how I see, or what I want, the character to be.  So far he’s been married, and divorced, not been much of a husband to his wife, or children, maybe because of what happened to him when he was in the army, something he knows about in a peripheral sense but is about to learn a whole lot more.

Being shot, ending up in a hospital, sparks a memory, in a dream, brought on by a particular type of painkiller, and he is about to remember who and what he was, stuff that he has previously not realized, or knew about.  Those last traumatic events in the war zone caused his memory to be wiped.

It’s not the sort of memories certain people want to be brought into the open.

OK, finally something to work with.

I need to work on the dream or nightmare sequence.

Pen in hand, I start writing…

 

© Charles Heath 2018-2019

In a word: Tap

There is nothing worse than, when lying in bed unable to get to sleep, you hear every noise in the house and out, but none worse than a dripping tap.

Its often not because someone forgot to turn the tap off, but a washer is on its last legs.

There are taps for the fallen brave, but aside from the fact that is the name of a piece of music, I think it’s also the title of a film.  But taps itself is a bugle call at dusk, and also played at military funerals.

Then there’s that income stream that you can tap into, other than your next-door neighbours power supply.

But what would be far more interesting than to tap into a phone line and listen in?  Despite the fact that eavesdroppers never hear anything good about themselves, you could learn something you didn’t want to know.

Then we can go back to the 1930s and a series of films that starred one of my favourite actors Fred Astaire, who was, of course, a tap dancer, along with Ginger Rogers.

In fact, my middle granddaughter is quite a good tap dancer.

And, lastly, was that a tap on the door, or a tap in the window?

Conversations with my cat – 72

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This is Chester.  He’s finally got a starring role in one of my stories.

The thing is, I tried to keep it quiet so he wouldn’t get delusions, but it failed.

I made the mistake of leaving the page with the ‘cat’ part on the screen.  The screen saver should have kicked in, but I think a well-placed paw brought it back to life.

So, the next morning, I come down and see him sitting on the desk, waiting.

It can either be good news or bad news.

“I see you’ve finally written a cat into the plot.”

“It was only a matter of time.  I think you made your case a week ago by sitting on the keyboard until I agreed.  Now, you’re in.”

“Yes.  I see.  Who’s idea was it to call the cat Herman?  I mean to say, really, Herman?”

“I thought it was a great name for a cat.”

“What type of cat is it?”

“I don’t know.  A cat’s a cat isn’t it?”

“Why not a Tonkinese, like me?”

“Alright, I’ll change it.”

“You made him jumpy, skittish even.  I’m not like that.”

“It’s not you in the story.”

“So you’ve found another cat, who is it.  It won’t last long when I get to them.”

Maybe it’s easier to write him out of the story.  I don’t think I can take this criticism.

 

Writing about writing a book – Day 8

I am painfully reminded that I need to have Social Media presences.

Marilyn told me that if I was on ‘Facebook’ I would have been able to follow her ‘adventures’.  If I was on Twitter I could acquire reading followers, and Instagram, to share photos of book covers and my travels.

I drag out the dusty laptop computer, the one that had an email account that goes back to the early days of the internet, and used a VT52 mainframe interface, or at least that was what I think it was called, and fire it up.  The operating system is out of date, error messages on top of error messages.  Thankfully the desktop works, but it too, is out of date, running Windows 97.

Even my mobile phone is more powerful and sophisticated than both my boat anchors.

Time to get into the ‘real’ world!

My writing is now on hold.  Shopping for a new computer, and updating operating system software, is a priority.

 

I am pleasantly surprised at just how inexpensive reasonable good laptop computers cost.  I looked at tablets from Apple, Samsung, and the Surface.  All very nice, but a computer, as big and cumbersome as it is, is still the cheapest option.

My afternoon is taken up with installing windows 10, setting up a Gmail email account, investigating, and signing up for Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.  I also take out a cheap subscription to Microsoft Office.  I need Word for manuscripts, and Excel to budget, Powerpoint to dazzle.

I take to reading the information about ‘creating an author presence on the internet’ and see that perhaps I need to have a ‘blog’, whatever that is, and a website.

There’s free and there’s not so free.

Damn.  A day wasted in computer and social media land.  They even had something called the ‘cloud’.  I think I have been out of the computer world too long, having transferred into middle management just as the next phase of the computer technology started making an impact.

Tomorrow I tackle blogging.

 

I can’t sleep, not without writing something for the day.  My thoughts have been swirling around Bill and Jennifer, and it’s time to bring them together, and by, guess what, a calamity!

 

I start scribbling:

 

Hospitals were places I rarely visited.  Like others who shared my fear, it would take a rather compelling reason to get me there.  On this occasion, it had been a compelling reason.  If I hadn’t got to the hospital when I did, I would now be dead.

When I woke, it was to disorientation and confusion.  I didn’t remember much of anything that had happened after having lunch with Jennifer, and running into Aitchison.

When I finally came from the depths of unconsciousness and returned to whatever version of reality that was running at the time, I found myself in a position where any movement, including breathing, was painful.

It was dark, the shapes were blurry, and some moved.  As objects slowly came into focus, activity increased, and more people arrived.  My major concern at that time was the sensation of immobility, and of how difficult it was to breathe, or, more to the point, how painful.  Muffled voices spoke in a strange language.  After a short time, consciousness slipped away, as, mercifully, did the pain.

It was another week, though it seemed like a month before I realized where I was.  It had taken a while, but it was definitely a hospital.  One of the shadowy figures also became recognizable.

Jennifer.

She, too, had a number of bandages, and the black and blue look of a person who’d just survived a hit and run.

Then I remembered.

Aitchison.

Outside the restaurant.

When my eyes finally came into focus I looked at her and saw her smile.  Another realization, though it became clearer sometime later, was that my hand was in hers, and as she squeezed it gently, I felt it give me strength.

“Welcome back.”  She was quite close, close enough for her perfume to overpower the clinical disinfectant.

“Where did I go?”  My voice was barely above a whisper, my throat dry.

“We’re not sure.  You died once.  Now you only have eight lives left.”

It was odd that I’d heard it before, somewhere in the distant past, so I believed I had fewer lives to spare.  I looked at her.  “Aitchison?”

“He didn’t make it.”

“You?”

“I got caught in the crossfire.  So did you.  The police said Aitchison was the target.  We were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

I’d heard that before, too.  I think that was Richardson’s problem, and he’d suffered the same fate, but his end result was terminal.

The conversation had exhausted me, and the pain returned.  It was still difficult to breathe, and I dared not look where most of the tubes were going.  Tears ran down my cheeks as the pain became unbearable.  I heard her call a nurse, and not long after the pain receded.  So did my consciousness.

 

Enough, it’s time for sleep.

 

© Charles Heath 2016-2019

In a word: Anonymous

Which is how I feel sometimes.

It can be a paradox in that an ordinary man may strive to be recognised, that is, to rise above his inherent anonymity simply because he feels he has something more to offer mankind than just making up the numbers.

But sadly, that desire will often be met with staunch resistance, not because there’s an active campaign against him, it’s just the way of the world.

The fact is, most of us will always be anonymous to the rest of the world, but in being so in that respect it’s that anonymity we can live with.  However, it’s far more significant if we become anonymous to those around us.  And, sadly, it can happen.

It’s when we take someone for granted.

At the other end of the scale, there is the celebrity, who has finally found fame, discovers that fame is not all it’s cracked up to be.  You find that meteoric rise from obscurity an adrenaline rush, and you’re no longer anonymous.

But all that changes when you are constantly bailed up in the street by well-meaning but annoying fans when you are being chased by the paparazzi and magazine reporters who thrive not on the fact that you are famous but watching and waiting for you to stumble.

Some often forget that there’s always a camera on them, or there’s a reporter lurking in the shadows, looking for the next scoop, capturing that awkward inexplicable moment when the celebrity is seen with someone who’s not their spouse, or worse, if it could be that, they get drunk and make a fool of themselves.

Do I really want to lose that anonymity that I have?

Not really.  It seems to me like it might be the lesser of two evils.

In a word: Rabbit

Have you ever heard of someone rabbiting on, you know, endlessly rattling on about nothing?

That’s just one use of the word rabbit.

The most obvious is the animal, a rabbit.  You know, that burrowing, plant-eating, long-eared, short-tailed animal that goes by the name of Bugs Bunny, maybe.

Nearly every child has a stuffed, cuddly one.

Of course, it’s of some significance at the moment because its Easter, and that there are countless chocolate versions of the so-called Easter bunny.

Then there is that 6-foot high invisible rabbit called Harvey, or not necessarily a rabbit, but a pookah.

We use the expression rabbit ears to describe those old interior television antennas.

There’s rabbit stew, rabbit pie, and white rabbit beer.

But my favourite is when the magician pulls the proverbial rabbit out of a hat.  It’s an expression we also use for someone who pulls off an impossible task.

Writing about writing a book – Day 7 Continues – Jennifer

Jennifer again.

From Bill Chandler’s perspective,

She was a good worker, but extremely private.  Her path had been clear; work, no play, and avoid everyone.  I’d seen her deal with executives and office boys alike, and put up barriers that no one could penetrate.  She made herself deliberately unattractive and unapproachable for reasons unknown.

Over time I tried to penetrate that steely exterior with moderate success, trying to get to know her better.  And, in doing so I discovered she apparently had a bad experience early on in life with someone, and it had affected her deeply.

Of course, it didn’t progress much more than that one admission, not until the divorce.  It was long and problematical because Ellen had chosen to go the hard route rather than just call it off, perhaps to make me realize just what I had put her through.  The sad fact was, there was nothing I could do to make it right, now or in the future.

But because of that, and because it seemed to Jennifer that I needed someone to ‘lean’ on in my time of trouble, she became the only person I could talk to.  It wasn’t difficult.  We were both working long hours in each others company, and neither of us had a desire to go home.

Then three months ago, something happened and everything changed. 

Well, it changed between us, but to the outside world, no one would ever know.  That didn’t mean we hadn’t been friends of a sort before that, it was just we were, well, I don’t think I could describe it.  All I know is I knew my feelings for her had changed, or perhaps they were the same, and she had changed.  Whatever it was, I was glad.  Ellen had been dragging me down for so long; just being with Jennifer was like a breath of fresh air.

I found I could pour out the details of my sad and undistinguished life to her.  She was the one and only person to whom I could talk freely.  And, all of a sudden, apparently I was the only one she could talk freely to too.  From that point, we had become a different sort of friends, and, in the last week or so, a little more than that.

Our last encounter had been interesting to say the least.  I was still not sure of what I said, or how it ended, other than I had apologized to her the Friday night before we parted.  I hadn’t exactly wanted any vacation days, they were thrust upon me, but perhaps it was fortuitous in that it would give us both time to consider our relationship.

After Ellen, I hadn’t thought about getting involved in a relationship, or anything else for that matter, but it seemed that was where Jennifer and I could finish up, despite the fact neither of us were realistically looking for anything other than a friendship.

That very subtly changed on that Friday night.

Now I’d been thrust back into the fire, and I wondered just how I would feel seeing her. 

 

Jennifer is an important character in several ways, as a friend to Bill, and in a way, connected to him in a way he doesn’t yet know.  She will also have some impact when his past finally catches up with him.

I’m still working on her character background, but more will follow soon.

She is about to change, especially in the eyes of Bill.

 

© Charles Heath 2016-2019