#NaPoWriMo 2023 Day Twenty

File Archive

Old Ticket Stub Inquiry

Tape crumbles
Loosening old ticket stubs
They fall, haphazardly
at our feet…

Christmas semi-formal
Semi – half, partial
Formal – a dance or ball
or an evening gown

This raises several questions:
How does one perform a half dance?
Or did one attend this ball in half a dress?
And who or what is a Christmas?

Brittle pages, xanthic with age
Offer a small glimpse into a past life.
There is much to be learned
from these archaic images
at our feet.

NaPoWriMo Prompt – And now for our (optional) prompt, once more taken from our archives! Have you ever heard someone wonder what future archaeologists, whether human or from alien civilization, will make of us? Today, I’d like to challenge you to answer that question in poetic form, exploring a particular object or place from the point of view of some far-off, future scientist? The object or site of study could be anything from a “World’s Best Grandpa” coffee mug to a Pizza Hut, from a Pokemon poster to a cellphone.

Good morning and welcome to day twenty of #NaPoWriMo. This is my second attempt to post. You know this new fangled digital technology doesn’t always work well. This was inspired by an old ticket stub I found last year looking through my journals for a different prompt – Someone I once knew.

A few days ago Gretchen brought up when we went to see the first avengers movie and how she fell asleep. I replied how the reclining seats at Estrella Falls are very comfy. She replied, yeah but we saw the first avengers movie at the Palm Valley cinema; Estrella Falls wasn’t open yet. She tried to prove her point through digital technology and googled it. Except she kept finding the opening times for the present and not when the cinema opened for the first time. So I said, I know where to find the answer. I actually found the paper stub taped into one of my journals and showed it to her. And she was right it was from Palm Valley cinema not Estrella Falls.

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#NaPoWriMo Early Bird Prompt 2023

Remove cataract  
Perfect vision in right eye 
Cannot drive at night 

In the category of not so fun fact: a person is not supposed to drive at night after cataract surgery. A fact I mentioned not being informed about until I met the surgeon for my surgery. When he finally uttered the restriction and I replied, Well since I don’t drive during the day; it’s probably best I don’t drive at night. But yes this little “fun” fact should be mentioned at the beginning before one even gets to their meet the surgeon appointment. My surgeon mentioned it as an aside because most of his patients are quite a bit older than me and have already stopped driving at night as cataracts impedes night vision long before it affects how you see during the day. Of course my problem ties into another fun fact – people with cerebral palsy age faster than normal. And as today is the last day of cerebral palsy awareness month that’s a good fact to share for the #NaPoWriMo early prompt.

Today, we’d like to challenge you to write a poem that plays with the idea of a “fun fact.” Your fact could actually be fun – or the whole point could be that it’s not fun. Maybe you have a favorite wacky fact already, but if not, Mental Floss’s “Amazing Fact Generator” is here to help!

Calling All Early Birds

Last Day of March

Good morning readers. I’ve been on the road on vacation up in Oregon since March 18. We are now making our way back home, but I won’t be back until Sunday. Of course I have signed up for #NaPoWriMo this year so the first two days maybe a little late. In the meantime, check out issue 5 of Free the Verse – I don’t want to talk about it.

https://www.free-the-verse.com/i-dont-want-to-talk-about-it/#twice-married

And I hope everyone is prepared for the craziness that is also known as April.

Happy Valentine’s Day

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More than thirty years
High school sweethearts' nascent love
Grows stronger each day

Two hearts beat as one
Attraction returns tenfold
True redamancy

Last week I combined a #haikuchallenge word – nascent with the #mmpoetrybattle theme – redamancy. And then I shared the poem with Shawn, because it works well for Valentine’s Day.

Check out all the poems featured in the #mmpoetrybattle week of 2/10/2023

My Love for Star Trek Keeps Growing

Photo Credit – Memory Alpha

In search of solace
Before grief consumes your soul
Move to Nepenthe

A few days ago the #haikuchallenge word was Nepenthe and my readers know there was no way I was going to pass up writing about Star Trek. I loved seeing Captain Riker and Commander Troi together again. And later this week when Picard season 3 premieres, they’ll be reunited again. I can’t wait.

A little known fact in 1989 my mom bought my sister and me tickets to attend our first Star Trek convention. It happened to be on our 16th birthday in Buffalo, NY and Wil Wheaton was one of the stars in attendance. Needless to say, Kati was excited (I was too but Jonathan Frakes was my favorite. I had to wait until 1994 to see him at a convention). Still it was fun to go to our first convention and Kati stood in line to meet Wheaton. I never thought we would have the opportunity to keep seeing these characters on the screen over 30 years later. Back then the original cast had only been out 20 years past their television finale. Of course the fact The Motion Picture put TOS on the big screen and paved the way for TNG and all the other Star Trek spin offs, its longevity shouldn’t have been that surprising. As the third and final season of Picard is getting ready to air, my love for the franchise keeps growing. And the person Wil Wheaton has become is one of the reasons – his appreciation of Jonathan Frakes is also a big reason.

See How We Are

I just hope no one says, fire at will; because my family likes to pick on me whenever anyone utters that line in a Star Trek episode or movie.

Super Bowl Weekend

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Bills will not be here
Super Bowl fifty seven
Laudable season

Sunshine and blue skies
Chamber of commerce weather
Majestic weekend

Super Bowl 57 is this weekend here in Phoenix. I told Shawn we’re going to take advantage of having the big game close to home for photos. Last weekend we went over to the Goodyear Civic Square to take photos of the LVII sign – much more laid back than trying to get into the NFL experience in downtown Phoenix. No crowd or lines to contend with and I wanted to go before the big game, because on February 11th Goodyear is hosting a super bowl party there. It definitely will be chamber of commerce weather high near 80 tomorrow and they’re predicting 73 for kick off on Sunday.

Family Fun in Wonderland

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Stuck in Wonderland
Queen of Hearts not junoesque
Yells, Off with her head!

Fall down rabbit hole
Kaizen – change is gradual
We’re all mad here

The last weekend in January we had a fun adventure with the Alice in Wonderland Experience in downtown Phoenix, following the map and clues created by cluedupp. After four hours we successfully freed Alice from the clutches of the Queen of Hearts. It’s a great way to spend time with family and get in your daily steps 3+ miles walking. I’ve purchased another scavenger hunt activity in Phoenix we’ll be embarking on soon.

Haiku in October

Celebrate our love
Frolic late into the night
Rainy Saturday

Since our anniversary fell on a Wednesday, Shawn and I did not go out to dinner until the weekend. I’ve been wanting to check out Barrio Queen in Avondale for a while and we finally had a good excuse. Then we went over to a friend’s house for a combined birthday and anniversary celebration.

Barrio Queen Avondale Oct 15, 2022

Toast – Salud Oct 15, 2022

This week one of my haiku is included in the Haiku Pea podcast – S5E20 In Depth. Thanks to Patricia for her continued hard work, sharing her love and knowledge of haiku.

My loyal readers will notice I wrote about the palo verde again. I do love how every April the green tree blooms yellow flowers of course the clean up is not so fun.

Backyard Oasis

Twenty-Six Years in Photos

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Our life together
Look back through musty pictures
Before digital

Good morning and welcome to October. Tomorrow Shawn and I will be celebrating 26 years. The traditional gift for your 26th anniversary is pictures. So I’ve been posting photos of us throughout the years. Our wedding 1996; Our 10th anniversary 2006; Our 13th anniversary in San Diego 2009; Our 15th anniversary in New Mexico 2011; and last year’s big 25th anniversary.

Our engagement announcement

17th anniversary

20th anniversary

19th anniversary

#NaPoWriMo 2022 Wrap Up

Good morning and welcome to May 1st. The evil twin tried to tell me it was May already yesterday. But I told her it was still April. I completed 29/30 prompts. I missed day 3 because we were busy with family and the glosa form is a large undertaking. I did sort of write a glosa on April 8th. If you count the #HaikuChallenge poems on Twitter, I still wrote more than 30 poems this month.

Backyard Palo Verde

After I wrote my cento haiku yesterday, I realized it would pair well with the palo verde as it blooms yellow flowers in April. I have written poems about the palo verde in our backyard almost every year. I realized I didn’t write one this year. Of course now the yellow flowers are dropping and making a big mess. After I posted my photo to Instagram, Shawn worked on some cyanotype. He did one of my eye poem and then he combined my poem with his photo.

Collaborative Cyanotype

That was an interesting project. FYI Shawn exposed the first one for 5 minutes. The video he watched about it recommended setting it in the sun for 7-8 minutes. Shawn figured we were working with the Arizona sun so he cut it down to 5, it was too dark and you couldn’t see the poem. He then shortened it to a 2 minute exposure.

NaPoWriMo Wrap-up – All of this year’s posts and comments will remain up and available for your perusal, and I will leave this year’s list of participants’ site up until we begin our housecleaning early next year in anticipation of NaPoWriMo/GloPoWriMo 2023 — which will be the project’s twentieth year! I can hardly believe how it’s grown since 2003, when it was just me writing poems by myself in my bedroom, to the present day, when there are participants all around the world!