Language of Love

Give me forty minutes, and I’ll whip you up a batch of cookies. Make it an hour, and I’ll throw in a beef vegetable soup. My mother taught me to cook starting at a very young age, and I learned more from my grandfather as I grew older. I have taken their recipes and made them my own. When I feel helpless, I bake for friends. If you are sick, if someone has died, I cannot make your problem go away. But I will listen to you. And I will cook for you. I speak my love in chocolate chips.

 

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Hey!… Read the rest

Studio Time

Nick adjusted the mic. “Testing,” he said. The leader gave him a brief thumbs up. Two other session singers flanked him in the tiny recording cubicle, and they all patted their white headphones. Nick’s felt too tight around his skull, but he didn’t make adjustments.
The leader said, “OK, scratch vocals for ‘Life of Death’” then held up a hand to count down visually.

Nick sang “Death chanced upon me in the hall.”

The women on either side of him echoed “ha-a-ll”.

Just outside the cubicle, the leader kept unnecessary time with the same hand he had used for the countdown, and Nick sang, “But I refused to fall.”… Read the rest

Curve of the tree

When people asked about Johnna’s dark skin and hair and her grey-violet eyes, her mother Manda said,  “She was my surprise baby.” Those traits, especially the eyes, belonged to the Auric tribe, whose standing with the ruling council was never stable. So the askers usually pretended to think Johnna was descended from her stepfather, even though she looked nothing like him or her younger siblings on that side.

Her father, when Johnna saw him once a year, was more honest. “Pfft. Accident,” he said. “The caravan leader had a fetching daughter, and I had a terminal problem keeping up my drawers.”… Read the rest

Friday Fluff February 23, 2012

Dear readers,

Friday Fluff is going up early (even before the linkup is open) because The Jester Queen is moving. It shouldn’t look or feel any different to you. If I’m doing this right, you won’t notice anything different, and there shouldn’t be any downtime. However, the process takes between 36 and 48 hours, and I’m not going to lie and say I’m not scared shitless. If you are used to getting e-mails from me, you won’t get one Friday, Saturday, or possibly Sunday. Or, I don’t know how this works, maybe Saturday, Sunday, and dear god surely that’s all. BUT.… Read the rest

My Life In Music: Whitney Houston

It’s an every other Thursday folks (like that has a whole lot of meaning to you who are not tracking Thursdays) so it’s time for Bella and I to host another edition of My Life In Music. This round is dedicated to Whitney Houston. Bella is a Whitney fan, and, while I’m not,  I have a lot of respect for the lady and a great deal to say about the tragedy of her death. I’ll be adding my actual submission to the meme in a couple of days, but for now, I wanted to get it up and running over here at Jester Queen.… Read the rest

Dine In, Carry Out

Algy jammed everything back onto the last tabletop after wiping it clean.

Edith said, “Easy now.”

“Rob sent me another letter,” Algy told her.

“Did he?”

“He wants me to send him my paycheck.”

“Ohh.” The sound was a cross between a groan and a sigh. Edith went to the cash drawer, counting the money twice over to be sure. Then she asked, “Did you write him back this time?”

Algy grunted.

“You did, didn’t you.”

Slowly Algy nodded.  “I said to ask me nicely.”

Edith counted out several stacks of bills, then went into the office for her deposit slips.… Read the rest

Lost

The day after I wrote  the story where a five year old nearly drowns, I lost Sam for twenty minutes in the Tennessee Aquarium. Irony much? Intellectually, I knew there was no way he could get at the tanks. Everything was encased behind a wall of glass, and no child could sneak through those locked doors. But before security found him two floors above me, trying to escape and get to the car, I ran repeatedly past the same spot, each time looking up into two stories of light infused water, expecting to see my son’s green-coated body floating down.… Read the rest

Dear Armstrong Family

Dear Jon Armstrong and Heather Armstrong:

Don’t worry, I’m not one of those assholes who feels the need to jump Heather’s shit and turn what you are both terming “Recent Events” into a hate fest. I do not blame either of you for the current state of your union, and I do not, in fact, feel like your marriage is any of my goddamned business at all.

But that’s why I’m writing you. Naturally.

I want to talk about this from a fan’s perspective. I follow blurbomat and dooce.com. I feel (although the feeling is false) that I am included in some of your most intimate moments.… Read the rest

Wolf’s bane

“Wednesday Washday,” Mam always said.

She had sayings like that for every day of the week. The only other one I remember is “Monday morning do the darning”, probably because it rhymed. But she died when I was small. Everybody in town says Daddy should have given her at least a month in the ground before he started poking around in other women’s holes. But if he had waited, I wouldn’t have gotten Ona for my new mam, and we’d not have Ruby for our baby. Of course, she isn’t really a baby any longer. She’s got five summers on her, and she can do more every washday.… Read the rest

The Story of The Three Little Pigs

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Those crafty Trifecta editors are at it again, asking us for a retold story in 33 words. Here’s mine. NB: “w/” is one word unconnected with “expertise”. There’s a space.

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