Charlie Brown Understood

I was going to post this yesterday - but I got all caught up in spending time with my best friend who's in town for the holiday's and completely forgot! Oh well, since this is my response to last week's Creative Nudge it counts as posting a piece of my writing right? Plus, just look at this coffee mug she got me! It's perfect for today's post - and just ignore the coffee drips at the top that are evidence of how much I'm enjoying using it.

(In case you can't read it: "Every Time You Think Things

Can't Get WORSE They Get Worse!)

It is said that art and life often imitate each other, and while I have found that to be very true, rarely has it been more true than this week! I assigned the writing prompt, "have things go wrong!" and then quickly got busy so it didn't get tackled as quickly as I would have liked. I had a few vague ideas about how I was going to tackle it, but nothing super concrete beyond, "take the characters from my story, Jemnath, drop them in the woods, and have something go wrong! Probably have them attacked."

Yes, brilliant. I know. Well thought out to eh?

I never could seem to get to writing it though.

Why? Well it started the day I assigned the post. I had spent half of it taking care of car troubles. Our car's fuel pump was failing, and dealing with it took up my entire day on Saturday as I rode the bus down to Wilsonville with my hubby (he had left the car there the night before), got it towed to the mechanics, and then waited to find out what was going on and how much it would cost me.

Then I was ambushed by Christmas. I think that's something that all of us have been dealing with in one way or another, but it seems like everything I've tried to do for Christmas this year has gone wrong! My Christmas card idea failed, shopping took way longer than I had expected, and I literally went to 12 stores on Tuesday trying to track down a couple of simple items that I thought would be easy to find. Boy was I wrong...

That's not so bad however, the real kicker that day came when I tried to make dinner. I was exhausted from shopping so I planned on making some taco salads (or a burrito for my hubby if that's what he wanted. Now, to give you some background, burritos were a staple in my house growing up. Along with spaghetti, there's no meal I've made more frequently. So I shouldn't have been able to ruin it right? Wrong.

I was absent-mindedly throwing spices in (I don't have to measure for this dish) and kept thinking, "huh, why am I smelling cinnamon?" I was turning my lazy-susan spice rack trying to make sure I hadn't missed anything when I spotted the chili powder. "Wait, I thought I..." That's when it trickled into my exhausted brain that this was NOT the shape of the bottle that I dumped at least a tablespoon's worth of spice from (thinking it was chili powder of course). Right behind that thought came the realization that this could have something to do with why I was smelling cinnamon...

Now, I'm told that a hint of cinnamon in taco meat can be quite good. A tablespoon mixed with lots of garlic and cumin? Not so much! That got thrown in the trash, and when I picked my hubby up from the bus stop later I petulantly explained that we were having fresh pizza from Bellagio's because I was so tired I had managed to fail a can't-fail-meal. He was amazed that I could fail at burritos...until I explained to and he started laughing so hard his face turned red.

Ok, so looking back on it, I can see why he laughed. At the time I was considering grabbing the frying pan when we got home and then eating all the pizza myself.

To top it all off, Wednesday morning I took the car back into the shop to have it fixed (our car guy had shown us how to keep it working for a short time, basically by beating the gas tank if the car wouldn't start) and discovered a curb on the way to the bus that I didn't know was there! I ended up on hands and knees with a fire starting in my ankle. Best part? There was a guy walking nearby who kept walking after I told him that no, I was most definitely not alright!

I may have to be nice to my characters for a few weeks, obviously my love of mischief in writing has decided to visit my personal life! And yes, Charlie Brown most definitely had it right.

BTW - my ankle is healing just fine :)

~ Ruthie ~

Love Creative Nudges? Check out the picture I used for this week's Nudge!

Creative Nudge Week 2 - Things Happen

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Time for a new writing prompt! No, it's not about cars. Car issues are simply my inspiration. You see, apparently my car has developed an issue that means every once in awhile, if the stars align just wrong, the car won't start. It's rather annoying and figuring out what was wrong with the car has taken up my entire day, left me with sore legs from walking too much with the bus, and in general driven me nuts. The end result? Other than an extra layer of insanity in my life? I'm scrambling to get a blog post up!

So.... Instead of posting up my response to last week's prompt, I'm simply going to give you this weeks. I'm tired, I haven't edited my response to last week's yet (I was going to do that this morning before... ya), and I'll post up my Christmas memory on tomorrow's blog post.

Also, instead of calling this a writing prompt I have decided it's a Creative Nudge. Same thing - one just sounds boring and like something a teacher would assign - and the other sounds fun and inspiring!

Creative Nudge - Week 2:
Have something go wrong! There are many different approaches to this, and you don't have to involve a car, so feel free to have fun wrecking havoc! If your in the middle of a longer project (like a novel), I dare you to have something go wrong in your story. Or to take one of your main characters and write a short piece where something goes wrong in their life (you might be surprised what you'll learn about them!). If your not in the middle of a novel, then congrats, you have the entire world as your play ground.

How this works:
1. Go write your response to my creative nudge - do so in the next day or two or life will get in the way!
2. Post it on your blog.
3. Come back and leave your link in the Mr. Linky tool below! If you responded to last week's prompt feel free to leave that link there as well.

Have fun!
~Ruthie~