101/1001 (Week 100)

It has been almost four months since I last updated you on my 101 tasks in 1001 days challenge, mostly because it takes almost four months to write out the name of the challenge.

Do NaNoWriMo

I did do NaNoWriMo, sort of i.e. I got bored and gave up half way through.  I suspect than means I won’t complete the next challenge on the list:

Win NaNoWriMo.

English: Animated cartoon on a exercise bike (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Ride my bike twenty out of thirty days

We are at Day 708 of the 1001 days and I have ridden my bike a total of zero times.  

On the plus side, I have told 708 jokes.

Expose myself to twenty new experiences (12/20)

Only had one new experience in sixteen weeks: wore a granny outfit and then shared the look with the world.  My post on the velour track suit refers.

Hit 250,000 visitors on my blog (289,099/250,000)

I completed this challenge and posted a photograph to prove it.  Things have slowed down since then: WordPress made it possible to comment on blogs via email, without having to visit.

Nice, WordPress – find a way to reduce everyone’s stats; I’m sure we all love you for it.

I need to set a new target; what do you think it should be?  There are 43 weeks left so please make it realistic, given WordPress’s propensity for scaring away actual visitors.

Free verse poem about loo roll theft, toilet, the office, Hackney, London, UK (Photo credit: gruntzooki)

Write 1001 new poems

I have written 688 so I am only 20 poems behind.  I usually catch up in April, which is National Poetry Writing Month.

This is the one challenge above all others which I am determined to complete.

*

Make thirty submissions to competitions or publishers (29/30)

I have submitted five times in the last sixteen weeks, counting multiple poems to the same publisher/competition as one. If I have had success, you’ve heard about it.  I’m not one to hide my light under a bushel; I’m more likely to set the bushel on fire in my enthusiasm to share.

Films & Books

I reached my target and then some to watch 101 new films (114/101), but I am only halfway to my target of reading new books (51/101).  I have done lots of reading, but it tends to be of books that I love.  If I want to reach my target, I have to read 1.15 books a week between now and the end of the challenge.  It’s doable, but I’ll have to give up movies.

the Biggest loser strategy (Photo credit: HikingArtist.com)

 

A Belated Happy Birthday, Janet!

I feel terrible.*  Janet’s birthday was on 12/12/12.  She mentioned it on her blog and in my comments but I didn’t read either in time to respond.

I am quite literal: because Janet is too polite to say, Oi!  I want a poem! I didn’t write a poem for her birthday.  Remember, if you want a nonsense birthday poem, you must tell me in the comments or via email.  Maybe I need to set up a separate page.

Fortunately, Janet got over her politeness to demand, Oi!  Where’s my poem?

I first met Janet when she emailed me out of the blue to tell me that my gravatar was not linked to my blog.  We’ve been firm friends ever since.

Janet’s first language is Chinese but you’d think it was English.  She has a lovely, clever son of twelve, called Ben, who has his own rather impressive blog.  He could teach us all a thing or two about history.  Janet is sweet and kind and well worth a visit.

Happy Birthday JANET (Photo credit: ali eminov) You can find anything on the internet – even virtual cakes for friends!

A Birthday Apology To Janet Williams

Not elated
I’m belated
She’s deflated

On her birthday that’s not good
I’d time travel if I could
I know she’d understood

Battling with my tenses
This poem is nonsens-
ical’s my consensus

The kindest girl on the planet
is my dear, sweet Janet
whose name rhymes with ‘pomegranate’  

Umm, one more thing, chum:
you are a great mum
I mean it, by gum!

Happy birthday, Janet.  You have the honour of receiving my most nonsensical poem yet.

*Don’t worry: I can assure you that Janet will assure me that I have nothing to feel terrible about.  She’s that kind of person: kind.

Happy Birthday, Janie Jones!

There sure are a lot of birthdays in December.   I guess we know what bloggers’ parents like to do in March.

 

 

This is Rosie the Riveter.  In America, she’s a famous World War II icon.

 

My friend Janie Jones, who has a birthday today, is not really called Janie Jones; it’s a pseudonym.  She uses Rosie the Riveter’s picture, sort of: it’s a facsimile she drew to make sure the nasty SOPA people (remember them?) can’t lock her up:

 

 

I can see her building planes and munitions because she’s tough, after the things life has thrown at her; though she’d rather tell a joke – usually dreadful, and therefore hilarious to me.

 

I have always liked her blog but I liked it even more way back when I was awarding Cowabungers (remember them?) for the blogger who left the best comment of the week in here.  To stay clear of the SOPA police (you must remember them), she didn’t use the image that was her award which I had stolen from elsewhere on the internet; instead, she drew another facsimile:

 

 

Janie put it in her sidebar and gave it the title:

 

Winner of the Coveted CoWAbunger Award, October 10, 2011

 

See that?  COVETED.

 

I like Janie Jones a lot.

 

*

 

I Like Janie Jones A Lot: A Birthday Poem

 

I like Janie Jones a lot.
Of plenty she’s not got.
She works real hard
though it be ard
uous to raise alone a tot.
Dedicated parents are scarce
in this selfish universe,
but selfish she is not.

 

I like Janie Jones a bunch.
One day I’ll buy her lunch.
I might even tease her
with a single Malteser
she won’t be allowed to munch.
Dedicated poems can be ard
uous to write but not hard
this time.  This line is the punch.

 

Sorry for the weak ending, Janie.
I know it’s kind of lamey.

 

Happy birthday, Janie Jones.  I hope the future’s rosy.

 

Happy Birthday Single 7″ (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Happy Birthday, Benzeknees!

Benzeknees left this comment a while back:

Since hubby forgot my birthday last year, maybe I can at least get a birthday poem. December 4 is my birthday.

To ensure he doesn’t forget again, I have written a cautionary tale. 

Candles spell out the traditional English birthday greeting (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A poem sung to the tune of, When Santa got stuck up the chimney

When hubby forgot her birthday she began to shout:
You naughty boy won’t get any toys when your day comes about!
My birthday’s flat
My mood is black
My fist is itching, too
Because you forgot my birthday:
Yes you, yes you, yes you!

It was on the night of her Big Day
When Benzeknees began to sway
Into the chimney she pushed her bloke
He felt smothered, began to choke
Oh, what a terrible plight, no joke
She left him there all day

Her hubby she pushed up the chimney
He began to yell
I’m so sorry
But don’t you worry
I promise I’ll behave well!
My head was up there in the other where
I know it made you blue
I’ll no more forget your birthday
Love you, Love you, Love you!

Happy birthday, Benzeknees!  Hope it does the trick.

If you would like a nonsense poem for your birthday, leave a comment with some details.

Happy Birthday, Bluebee

English: A Blue-banded bee (Amegilla sp.) collecting nectar from a Lantana camara flower.  (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Bluebee lives Down Under.  I’m not smart enough to be able to turn this text upside down so she’ll have to make do with being backwards instead:

Eebeulb ,Yadhtrib Yppah

Or this:

Bluebee, Birthday Happies

Maybe this:

H
a
p
p
y

B
i
r
t
h
d
a
y
,

B
l
u
e
b
e
e

That last one came out like this at first:

H

a

p

p

y

B

i

r

t

h

d

a

y

,

B

l

u

e

b

e

e

It was an easy mistake to make – there are a lot of open spaces in the outback…

Australian Blue Banded Bee (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Bluebee matches interesting photos to interesting poetry.  She is always worth a look.

Happy Birthday, Bluebee.  Here’s your Birthday Poem

Happy Birthday to you
Bluebee don’t be blue
Be Smilebee, be Laughbee,
Be Grinbee, not sad
You’re older, you’ll moulder,
Be bolder, be glad.
Happy Birthday to you
Dear Bluebee, woo-hoo!

(Hey, if you want great poetry, you’ll have to write your own)

PS I couldn’t use your image because you are obviously an evil genius who won’t allow anyone to lift your picture.  

Kudos.

If you would like a birthday poem written in your honour, leave your date in the comment section.  Please write the month because different countries have different ways of writing dates (are you listening, America?).

 

Viv’s Not Dead

This is a first for me: an epitaph about someone who is not yet dead, nor likely to be (stray buses permitting).

*

Viv’s Epitaph

She arrived.  Survived.  Made those around her smile.
Whatever age she was when she died,
it was too young.
Her many friends mourned.

She tried; she often succeeded.
Sometimes not: she made mistakes, like anyone.
But none her friends – so many friends -
ever needed to forgive.

She tried it if it was new,
if it was interesting, if it was fun,
if it was challenging.
If it was necessary.

She made things: beautiful things,
lots of things – quilts and poems
and children and devoted friends,
so many friends.

She was never mediocre.
Tart, upon occasion; and also kind, generous, warm.
Valuable and valued.  More will remember than will
ever forget, this great loss to so many friends.

*

Viv is my next interview subject and I include this poem to give you a flavour of her before we start.  Viv wrote her own epitaph in response to a prompt and I felt she was too hard on herself.  I took her various statements and put my spin on them.

Viv and I met through the Open University.  In 2007, the year we both took the OU’s Creative Writing course, another OUer set up an online critiquing forum. Which means the first thing Viv and I probably said to each other was, That doesn’t work; try this.

Viv writes lovely poetry.  She excels at traditional forms, forms that I’m afraid to attempt myself.  They often come almost perfect from her pen and don’t need much tweaking.  She has been published quite a bit.  And she only took up poetry in her late sixties.

Viv makes the most sumptuous quilts.  My family owns three of them and covet more.

She has a real joie de vivre, which I knew online for four years; and finally enjoyed in person, when we met last year: Viv and her charming husband Jock invited us to visit their lovely home in France.  We laughed the whole time and it was as if we had never not known each other.

I apologise that I don’t have a photo of Viv by herself.  I don’t know how that happened; I probably couldn’t bear to be away from her.

Let’s find out a bit more about Viv:

How many colours has your hair been?  

Brown, pepper and salt, reddish, blondish, white = 5, of which all but two came naturally.

Who is the most annoying celebrity?  Why?  

Does that twirly-moustached idiot on the Go-Compare ads count?  We have to mute the TV when he comes on.

How do you cook eggs?   

Let me count the ways!  Boiled, poached, scrambled, fried, omelettes, French toast, in Scotch Eggs,  baked in cakes and meringues,  broken into  a well in a sausage pie and… and…  Or were you after a teach-in?

[See what I mean about tart?]

Karaoke: with or without alcohol?   

Never been, so I’ve no idea

Can you do a foreign accent? 

Yes, I’m like a sponge for picking up ambient accents.

Will you share an embarrassing moment?  

Off the top of my head?  Lost in Somerset, leaning out of the car to ask a passing pedestrian the way, IN FRENCH.

Tell us something about yourself you haven’t yet shared in your blog.

Could there be such a thing?  It’s all there for the world to see.    Ummm, I used to smoke.  Any use to you?

What would you give up rather than your computer? 

Alcohol – but I hardly drink at all these days, so that would be easy.  Is that cheating?

How do you feel about misplaced apostrophes?  

Rabid, and I blush down to my toenails if I find I’ve done one inadvertently.

[See why I love her?]

Tell us why we should read your blog. 

I don’t know.  It’s a mystery to me how I get so many readers.  I do my best, but it’s not funny, there’s nothing special about my poetry and  it’s a bit of a mish-mash of: (mostly) poetry prose, pictures, fiction, food and (I hope) some fun.

**

*

For those of you interested in history, Viv’s war memoir is worth a look.

Go visit Viv at her blog, Vivinfrance, and then come back and thank me.  I nagged her into starting a blog so I deserve all the credit for unleashing this lovely woman onto the world.

Words & Pictures

On the Park

 

on

    the

         park

        on

    the

park   the dogs will bark big dogs slim dogs

           fat dogs lap dogs dogs you want to pat dogs

                   brown dogs black dogs blonde dogs pack dogs dogs dogs

            try to chase a cat dogs chase another dog dogs

         chasing off the birds dogs  dog poo dog wee

        try to         chase               chase                where            

        chase         me on              me on              the dogs

         me              the                  the                   will

        dogs            park                park                  bark

*

I said I’d tell you about the time I had a poem turned into a piece of art work.

I entered a writing competition called Wherefore Art Thou?  It was run by Stockport Art Gallery.  There were no prizes as such, but the winning entries had their work converted into a piece of conceptual art by the artist Nicola Dale.

There was some confusion over the notification email and I wasn’t convinced I was a winner; but my friend emailed to ask them on my behalf and they told her I was, so I went along to the exhibition launch.  The worst that could happen was that I would be there to support four members of my writing group who were also winners.  We were rather proud of our tally: one-third of the winning entries.

By the way, don’t think I was being dozy about the email: one poor girl had been notified that she was a winner but there was no art work for her poem.  She was mortified.

I didn’t know what to expect when I arrived at the gallery but I had an unexpected WOW! moment when I turned the corner: Nicola had made physical what I had tried to do on the page.  I loved it instantly.

Here is a pic for scale:

Each piece of art work had some, many or all of the words of the original texts in some form: a poem called Entwined had every word on a label attached to a long thread of wool and the whole entwined on its plinth; my friend’s poem about Guernsey evacuees to Stockport had key words on a Scrabble board.  Another piece was words on t-shirts.  There were also audio and video works.  

I’m not a fan of conceptual art – I always think of Tracey Emin: too lazy to clean but smart enough to get others to admire her detritus and pay her a fortune for the privilege.  Or Damien Hurst: pickled cow?  Please!  But it was interesting to see how text can be interpreted by an artist.

Another interesting facet of the exhibition was that many of the texts were inspired by art works in the gallery; then they were turned into art works themselves: full circle.

I had a pleasant surprise: the winning entries were included in a glossy brochure that accompanies the exhibition and, although only one was turned into a piece of art, all six of my submissions were printed in the brochure.  But…I wasn’t happy:

• I had completely re-written one poem by the time of the exhibition and the version in print reads like an early draft.
• On The Park used coloured fonts for effect but was printed in black.
• A three-part poem had sub-headings and <gasp!> no spaces were used between the sub-headings and each first line.
• The layout for one poem was all wrong.
• The title of another was incomplete, which can obscure its meaning.

Judges beware!  Don’t select my poem/s if you can’t do it right.  If I say I’m a little precious about how my writing appears on the page, that’s like saying a hurricane is a little squall.

However, I was satisfied with the sixth poem, which was laid out perfectly in the brochure.

We stayed a couple of hours at the launch and I had a glass of wine to insert spine so that I was able to read out On The Park to a bunch of strangers.  It got a decent reception, thank goodness.  It is a poem intended for children and needs to be read aloud for effect.  It came from a workshop at the art gallery last year about rhythm, run by the Scouse poet Terry Caffrey.

Here are some of the other installations*:

*See!  Right there!  That’s exactly what I’m talking about – you can install toilets or light fittings or new kitchens, but art?

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

We asked the gallery if they would sell my piece but they said ‘no’.  This is where the Hub comes in.  Never let it be said that he can’t make happen that which his wife desires to happen.

No, really; never let it be said: that last sentence was execrable.

The Hub and Tory Boy put their heads together: the Hub arranged for one of his photos to be enlarged and put onto canvas; and Tory Boy paid for it.  Don’t I have the sweetest family in the world?

And clever: they put the picture up in the kitchen, as a means of forcing me into it upon occasion.

Booking The Trend

Books (Photo credit: henry…)

I have neglected you all this week.  I’m sorry.  I never call; I never write comments…it’s as if I’ve been busy with something other than blogging.

Ridiculous, I know.  But true.

I have been working on…I blush to admit it…I don’t know quite how to say it – if I say it, it has to be true and I have to do something with it other than work on it and talk about working on it and not read other blogs or answer comments because I’m working on it…

I have written a book.

There!  I said it!  Now I have to do something with it.

I am doing something with it.  This week, I have been working on my first re-draft.  I’m a thirteenth or fourteenth re-draft before I’m satisfied kinda girl, so it may take a while.  Each morning, when I should be visiting you and replying to you, I have been editing me.

I sort of wrote it two years ago, on my short-lived blog about living in South Africa during and after Apartheid; some of it was written before that, over many years.  It is in part a collection of poems (stop yawning at the back), but also a memoir (wake up, the rest of you).  I lived during an exciting period of history and it left me well-balanced and not a stress head and if you believe that, you haven’t been reading this blog for long.  The book is a catharsis.  Should be fun!

I intend to go down the e-publishing route because, if I’m honest, I can’t imagine a publisher wanting to buy it; why would they?  Apartheid is long dead and there’s no money in poetry.

However, I have this story in me that wants to be told.

I know many of you don’t read poetry, but I will share one you might enjoy; it may or may not make it into the final draft, but it will give you a flavour of the book’s tone.  Background: in 1994, just before the first free and fair South African election, a new flag was unveiled:

The Old Flag

Flag of South Africa, used between 1928 and 1994 known as the Oranje-Blanje-Blou. From the xrmap flag collection 2.9, with modifications by Denelson83. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The New Flag

Flag of South Africa (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

*

Let’s Hear It For The Bunting

*

Orange and

green must

no more

be seen.

What a

drag.

Raise your

cup as

they run

up our

new

Y-fronts

flag.

*

*

*

For the boxer generation – these are y-fronts:

Y fronts (Photo credit: stringberd)

No Comment

 

Tilly (Photo credit: Stuart L Ruffell)

I haven’t been around the blogosphere much these last few days.  I haven’t visited many blogs, or even my own – comments have been left  unanswered, unapproved, unspammed.  Having a life outside of blogging is really irritating sometimes because it gets in the way of my real world.

tilly (Photo credit: ParsnipSoup)

 

Time I would normally have given to you was spent on my poetry blog this week.  Here’s a snippet from last Monday’s post (apologies to those of you who have already seen it):

…on 12 May it was the 200th anniversary of Edward Lear’s birth. I adore his poems and he has been an influence on my writing [...] I have decided to hold my own event to celebrate, and you can expect a nonsense poem a day for the next week, written by me, not Mr Lear.

And here’s a snippet from yesterday’s post, when I wound up the celebration:

I have a confession to make and I’ve been putting it off.

You know how I’ve been celebrating Edward Lear and his nonsense poems all week, by posting nonsense poems of my own? I made the first post on Monday and then I had one of those middle-of-the-night moments when you sit up in bed and shout, ‘Oh no!’

I had suddenly realised that when I read it was Edward Lear’s 200th birthday, what my brain heard was ‘Hillaire Belloc’, who wrote those wonderful cautionary tales of naughty children and was the actual influence on my own writing, not Edward Lear.

What a delicious irony: my posts have all been nonsense, because I have been celebrating the wrong poet.

Once the shame fades, I will try to catch up with your blogs and comments, but please accept my apology if I don’t get to you straight away: I am going to work backwards down my email inbox because I tend to miss things otherwise.

*

 

Tilly (Photo credit: Digitalorthodoxy)

I found a great typo this morning in an article I read; the author was discussing slugs in her garden:

…I saw a trail of slim…

Wish I could get me some of that.

She must have found the spare ‘e’ because she stuck it on the word ‘mar’ later on:

It will mare one’s character.

A horse!  A horse!  My slimdom for a horse!

I shouldn’t laugh; I bet she knows her poet from her pot.

*

 

Tilly (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I heard about another Tilly Bud from Siggi of Maine.  No relation, although she is also in the Manchester area.  There’s nothing to tell and I wouldn’t have mentioned it except that I discovered yet another Tilly Bud this morning.  Actually, Tilly and Bud. 

Videos still won’t work on this blog – WordPress Unhappiness Engineers please take note – so you’ll have to check them out yourself, here. 

I’m a little afraid to send you over there, because I think you will prefer that Tilly and Bud to me.  In fact, I guarantee it.

*
*

They Almost Got Me*

Image by Ian W Scott via Flickr

Over on my shockingly neglected poetry blog, I was delighted to read this comment from a new visitor:

Its like you browse my mind!

Every poet hopes to touch their readers in some way, to speak a universal truth.  Then I went to return my perceptive reader’s visit: at genitalwarts.

Spam.  To misquote Tom Arnold in True Lies (he was referring to women):

Spammers!  Can’t live with ‘em; can’t kill ‘em.

At least it gives me a laugh now and then.

*

*The spammers; not the genital warts.  Thought I’d better clarify that.

Out-Poemed By The Hub!

 

 

Artist Martin Waters is creating a drifting field of poppies through Holy Trinity Parish Church, Hull, during November Remembrance 2011.  He wanted poems to support the installation.  The Hub and I submitted.  I heard nothing but the Hub’s poem was selected. 

I’m thrilled for him. 

No, really.

Honest.

WelldoneHubmutterthroughgrittedteeth.

 

The Proud Hub

 The proud wife:

 

 

101/1001 (29)

And (28), (27) & (26).

I have neglected my challenge duties for a month.  My excuse is procrastination: we now have 25 101/1001ers and I had to add their links to my blogroll: admin time always comes second to writing time.  Today, however, I got on my behind and caught up where I was behind. 

If you are interested in taking part or simply prefer to read about people with more get up and go than you (the list below refers), check out the list on the right.

What have I been doing these past four weeks?  Not much, as it happens.  Instead, I will tell you how my ongoing challenges are going on:

• Learned four new words.  (Words: 16/26)  Don’t blame Word of the Day from dictionary.com; I already know a lot of words so I have to actively seek them out and I’ve been too lazy to do that. 
• Received 7,991 visits in the last four weeks, mostly from one person. Thank you, my biggest fan; you know who you are. (84,689/100,000)
• Devised a cunning plan to make everyone feel special without naming names.
• Had 1512 comments (15,633/30,000)
• Submitted one poem. (12/30)  Don’t judge me too harshly: in four weeks I’ve written only 15 poems. (210/1001)
• Blogged 67 times.  (545/1111)
• Read 3 new books.  (18/101) It doesn’t sound like much, but I have also read old favourites, as well as starting a few new books and not bothering to finish them.
• Watched 2 new films.  (32/101)  Not much, but I had to squeeze them in between favourite tv series.
• Told 28 jokes.   (203/1001)
• Not played on King.com for one day (37/101)
• Had five new flags (212/101) and seven new countries (150/101) visit me.  Not bad for someone who spends all her time reading, playing games and watching telly.
• Walked the dogs for twenty hours and five minutes. (169.15/1001)  That was a long day…

I added one challenge:

Leave my poems in 101 locations. (0/101).

This was inspired by a post of Viv’s, who told us to stick our poems on bumpers/under windscreen wipers/on supermarket shelves/blue-tacked to park benches/slipped between novels in the library.

I’m going to do it.  Watch this space.

*

101/1001 (23)

These updates are getting later and later.  I blame the Hub.

When people ask me, ‘Why do you always blame the Hub?’ I think of Sir Edmund Hillary’s famous quote about climbing Everest: ‘Because he’s there.’  What’s the point of marriage, if not to have a spouse to blame?  To sum up:

• I’m late; I cry
• Why?
• Hub/Fall guy
• On standby
• Thereby
• Not my fault I’m late
• Great!

So, what have I been doing?  Not a lot, as it happens: Tory Boy coming home for a while meant that this week Spud and I had to excavate his room of all our junk which put me in a bad mood with the Hub because it’s really his junk and I was happy when I couldn’t see it but now it’s all over the house again and you know how I feel about a cluttered house….

I did add a new task:

Find another 64 challenges for the list.  (28/64)

Have the courage to play the drums in church.

There are several bongo drums up front in church and the children are invited to play along to the singing.  I thought about grabbing a little kid off the street because parents help the younger ones to bong, but kidnap might not be considered an act of good Christian witness, so I decided against it.  I am dying to get my hands on those drums, though.  This morning, the children were all in Sunday Club and the vicar invited the adults to have a go, but I bottled it.  Like every other adult there, as it happens.

As I cowered behind my notice sheet, I decided right then to add this task to my list, because now I have to do it when the opportunity arises again.

Submit thirty poems to competitions or publishers (11/30)

I sent off three poems this week.  I was going to up the number from (8) to (9), because they all went to the same competition, but I checked the wording of the task and it reads Submit thirty poems, not, Submit to thirty competitions.  I can always increase the number at a later date.  The good thing about setting your own tasks in this challenge is that you can cheat as much as you like.

Blog 1111 times (444/1111)

I only tell you this because I like the numbers.

*

We now have eighteen members in the 101ers club, and my list to the right is sadly out of date.  I will try to update it in the week but for now, here are some links.  Mine is only included because I don’t know how else to do ‘Related Articles’.  I have a lot to learn about blogging.

Related articles

• 101/1001 (21) Another Late Update (thelaughinghousewife.wordpress.com)
• http://sarsm.wordpress.com/2011/08/26/the-haves-and-the-have-nots/
• http://sillywrongbutvividright.wordpress.com/day-zero/
• http://manchestermeanders.wordpress.com/2011/09/02/five-down-ninety-six-to-go/
• http://sillywrongbutvividright.wordpress.com/day-zero/
• http://kasilou.blogspot.com/p/101-in-1001.html
• http://vicrace.blogspot.com/p/101-in-1001.html
• http://the-gingerbread-house.co.uk/day-zero/

101/1001 (19) A Re-Think

I have been forced to re-think some of my targets because I have reached and even surpassed quite a few.  Not this first one, though; I may have set my sights a mite too high on this one:

Ride my bike twenty out of thirty days. (0/30)

Decorating, an absent child and several migraines mean I have barely been out on my new old bike; certainly not enough to say I have started this challenge.  I tell you this in an effort to shame myself into getting back in the saddle again.

Find another 64 challenges for the list.  (27/64)

I have a new challenge, inspired by Elizabeth of 1sojournal, who did it with poetry:

Find 26 unfamiliar words, one for each letter of the alphabet; then use them in a post a day for 26 days. (Words: 5/26)

Expose myself to four new experiences (3/4)

This week’s enjoyment of baking was definitely a new experience for me!

I think I set my target too low for 1001 days, so I will adjust it to twenty new experiences.

This challenge is related to

Try out three new recipes (6/3)

I didn’t expect to complete this one so soon, if at all, so I will up the target to 15.  I don’t want to put too much pressure on me; who knows when I’ll next feel like cooking?  The urge may never come around again in my lifetime.

Submit thirty poems to competitions or publishers (7/30)

I sent off a poem this week; and I plan to send another to a different competition.

The poem I sent is probably too lighthearted for the judges; but I adhered to the theme and it was free to enter, so I sent it anyway.  If only to stop Viv nagging me.

Read thirty books (15/30)

I’m already halfway through this challenge so I think I’d better up the ante to 101 books.

This week I read the last Dick Francis; and finally finished a book I started two years ago and came across when I was rearranging the bedroom in an effort to locate the power lead for my netbook.  I failed, but the book was compensation.

Called Dear First Lady, it’s a selection of letters to and from, well, American First Ladies.  A fascinating insight if you’re into that sort of thing, which I am.  And a reminder that my husband buys the most thoughtful presents in the world.  If only I would stop misplacing them.

Write 101 new poems (153/101)

We are at Day 133 of 1001 and I have already written 153 poems.  I think I may have underestimated my poem-writing capacity just a little.  As a result, this target is going up to…drum roll please…1001.  A poem a day.

Gulp.

Reach 13000 comments on my blog (11,878/13,000)

The rate at which I am reaching this one caught me by surprise.  I thought I was stretching a point by aiming for 13000.  I’m going to double it and add the number I first thought of, to make it 30,000.

Double gulp.

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As you can see, a lot of re-thinking of original targets has taken place.  Either I was unrealistic to start with, or the cake-baking success has gone straight to my head.  Time will tell.

Don’t forget to check out the other 101ers, to my right.  And we still welcome new challengers.  You should think about it – I never had so much fun doing things I mostly want to do anyway.

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Wining And Lining

Image via Wikipedia

I’m a member of Write Out Loud, an organisation that promotes the reading of poetry aloud.  ‘Member’ is a strong word: all that is required is to show up and read.  No fees, no forms, just a love of poetry and a working mouth.  The Stockport group meets every second Sunday of the month at Stockport Art Gallery, upstairs.

Upstairs because the Art Gallery Art Group meet downstairs every Monday.  We don’t mind, because it means we only have to pay 25p for a brew in the break, instead of the 50p that is charged at other times.  Poets tend not to have much money; especially unpublished poets.

The WOL sessions are billed as ‘open mic’, meaning anyone can join in; but there’s no actual microphone at our sessions.  We sit in a circle amongst great, not so great, and, frankly, pretty naff at times, art, fighting the dreadful acoustics as we ignore each other’s work, interspersed with polite clapping and rhubarbing, while we wait for our turn to prove that no one else in the room has talent like we do.  Though that may be just me.

Last night’s session was a little different.  There was a real mic; and an audience.  Dim lights.  No tea.  I knew the Art Gallery was running a festival of sorts and I knew WOL had agreed to run a public session, but it didn’t occur to me that it might be an actual, formal thing, even though I had formally put my name down to read.  What can I say?  I’m a poet: I’m too busy thinking about words to ever listen to them.

I arrived last night to discover that I was to read two poems, eighth on the list, before a microphone.  Gulp.  Double gulp.  Several gulps, fortunately, because there was wine instead of tea (no charge) and my spot was after the break so I had time for a little Dutch courage.

I have always wondered about the phrase ‘Dutch courage’ so, in order to give me time to think about where my next paragraph is coming from, I Wikipediaed it.  I might have known: it is of Dutch origin.  Or Dutch gin, to be precise:

In 1650 Franciscus Sylvius, a Dutch doctor, created Dutch gin in an attempt create a diuretic medicine. This was then used by soldiers in the Thirty Years’ War by English troops and was an instant success for its warming properties on the body in cold weather and its calming effects before battle. Because of the effects of Dutch gin English soldiers fighting in the Dutch Republic in the 17th century apparently called the drink “Dutch Courage”.

Feeling slightly Hollandaised in my Netherlands, I got up in front of the mic, read my two poems, and sat down again.  Aren’t you proud of me?

Every recital teaches you something (my last one taught me how to shout over a heckling, dancing audience); this one taught me to choose my poems carefully if I don’t want to bore people.  My second poem was a fun poke at a A Tale Of Two Cities, into which I have shoehorned every Dickens title I can.  That’s great for an audience of, say, literature graduates or old people who got a real education before the Sixties; not so great for a bunch of twenty-somethings who pass their English exam by being taught certain passages only of a Shakespeare text, never having to read the whole thing.

To be fair, however, I’m only surmising the audience didn’t like it – I never actually looked at them the whole time I was up there.  I have the same problem when I read the lesson at church: I have no idea what the building looks like from the front, because I only see the words and the carpet.  I can’t believe I once dreamed of being an actress.  Though many of them do appear to spend their time looking at the ceiling these days, so I’d probably fit in.

We had more than double our numbers last night, and several children.  A boy of eleven read a wonderful poem that he’d written about being a pirate; and it was better than some stuff I’ve heard by professionals.  He was the youngest to read, and his grandmother the eldest.

It was an enjoyable night, and I’m thinking of moving to Holland as a result.  Their courage is way better than ours.

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