My Dog Milica (Yes you pronounced it wrong)

So I have this dog.
I have this stupid, fat, rectanglular, cream and white pastry of a dog named Milica. I know how you're reading that name right now. Please don't read it like that out loud. If you do, a Serbian somewhere in the universe cringes.
It's pronounced Mee-Lee-tsah, and don't forget to stress the "Mee" part.
My mom named her. More out of spite for the way every Serb she has ever known will name his farm animals common American names like "Linda" or "Sophia" or "Roscoe". Her vengeful mind came up with a common Serbian female name that means "dearest". Honestly my sisters and I only agreed on the name because it sounded cute. Our Serbo-American pride loved the fact that it screamed we are serious about our heritage.
So we got her from an acquaintance of mine in my Ceramics class. I had come home one night from class unable to stop yapping about how a classmate of mine brought in a puppy of a few weeks old, trying to showcase the litter of pups her mother's friend was trying to find homes for.
"Mom! I heard her offer the puppy to my professor for free! They're free!" The cost of a puppy was always a worry of my mother's. It turns out false advertising was all it ever took for my mother to fall in love with the idea of finally owning a dog.
$300 and 2 days later, we had finally fulfilled our dream of having a dog! My mother was enamoured with the timid, shaking ball of white fluff. As a pup, she was lousy at barking but evoked the heaviest guilt with her crying, so much so that cage conditioning was not even an option. She followed us everywhere. Lived and breathed for nobody but us, and it was not too a rare phenomenon that she even chose our love over food itself!
She was, is, and always will be the camera-shy, Elvis-lipped, bath-loathing potato on sticks with paws that smell just like Fritos.

Flipped (An Original Poem)

Please don't hate me

For the way I see the colors in the sky

Don't despise me 

For the mark that's on my chest

Nor for the book

I have written on my heart

Extremely lazy

Do the tears fall that I cry

It is not easy

Being me but I do my best

So quit your look

Before the colors start 

To run down

Run down

Run down

Until it's all brown

Swallow your pride

I'll swallow mine

Let my truth be my truth

I'll let yours be thine

Believe me when I say 

"I love you"

Trust me when I say

"I'd give my life for you"

Greater love has never

Been known

Been shown

Grace, no sweeter sound

My truth is denied

Where once t'was thine

Keep your "I do"

Drink all the wine

Dance all night and ever

Happy

Please be

Until we all hit the ground

This nightingale sings

Of a freedom still rings

From the very first page

Until a day and an age

My mark is flipped

And my wings are clipped

And my liberty is dipped

In tar

Daily Writing Prompt: Stilett-NOs

If I could un-invent something, I think it would be the STILETTO. Here's why:

1. I've never found a pair that felt like I was walking on clouds.
2. Height ≠ Pain From Being On Tippy Toes All Day Long
3. Lace-up sandals, Converse, and ankle boots are so in right now. 
4. I don't fancy bunions or blisters.
5. I can lose balance naturally, thank you very much.
6. The only dogs that should be barkin' are the neighbors' when the mailman comes at noon.
7. Wedge heels exist.
8. Cinderella didn't need six inches more.
9. When I'm old, I don't want these little piggies to remember what I've done to them.
10. My feet deserve more.

Time To Count My Words

zer0

After the narrative work, I am taking a tiny break, but I will want to get started on something else. Maybe I will expand on my Chapter and develop my characters a bit better. Or maybe I will get started on a new idea altogether. Still don't know yet...

I feel blocked. Sometimes I feel like all the best stories have already been told. I know it isn't true and every story has value as long as SOMEONE can enjoy/relate to it. But I can't help but imagine a timeline and wonder how many stories are being invented right at this second or 20 years exactly from this moment. When I think I have a good idea, I wonder if someone has already thought it up. I think about that other person, who they are, where they live, what time they lived in, what made them and I think of the same things.

Reading...
In Our Time by Ernest Hemingway
I love it! But it is confusing as fudge! Can't wait to see how all the stories tie together. :)

Fire With Ice: Chapter I

I.

Xayn sat in a rickety wooden chair, but he paid the unstable seat no matter. He lifted the glass of rum to his lips and knocked his head back. Slamming the glass back down to the table's surface, he waved over a maid holding a bottle. Whether rich rum or weak wine, he would have anything. All intoxicating substances were welcome for a day like this one.
Smiling, the maid filled his cup, set the bottle on the table beside his glass, and then sat upon the corner of the table, lifting her many skirts and folding them atop her lap displaying with undue self-confidence her ankles, calves, and knees.
"You know what would go good with that wine?" she asked him, stroking his face. Xayn pulled his face away, never even making eye contact with the woman much less glancing over at the bare legs crossed at his right.
He sighed. "Away, wench," he muttered.
The maid slipped off the table and back on her feet. She bent her torso down to rest her head into her hands, trying to see into Xayn's piercing yellow eyes. Then she grabbed his face by the locked jaw and looked therein for a minute more. A knowing smile settled on her face.
"Does the scoundrel have a heart for another woman?" Xayn jerked his head from her grip, growling to himself. The maid laughed. "You, Xayn Qennison?! You're in love?!" He shushed her, glancing frantically across the room, knowing everyone had heard his secret.
"Shut up, woman!" he whispered sharply. One could see the steam drift slowly from the top of Xayn's head. The hag continued to laugh as she walked off, shaking her head at her unfathomable discovery.
Xayn hated this. He had never felt so much as a stitch of acknowledgement for anyone before. He had decided long ago that he would live for no one but himself. Having known no family, no home, not even a dog for a companion, Xayn did not even know what feelings were.
Feelings? Xayn told himself. These are not feelings, kid. This-this is simply infatuation. He looked deep into the flame of the candle before him. He could always sympathize with fire, the way it raged, the manner in which it devoured all in its path leaving nothing but mountains of dust and ash, worthless and dead. The way every single soul ran from it, screaming...
He reached a hand over to the candle and flicked the flame off of its wick. The flame shot across the pub and landed upon the shiny bald spot of a man, who after a moment realize what sudden heat he had felt upon his head...was feeling...
"Yooowwwww!" His first reflex brought his hands right to the lightly burned patch of skin on his head. His second grabbed his neighbor's water glass with a shaky yet swift hand and poured it on his bulbous dome. His third whipped his entire body around to glower at Xayn, eye twitching, jaw clenched, massive fists slamming the table as he bellowed "Qennison!"
Xayn had taken one glance over at the commotion, but, only slightly, amused had gotten right back to drinking until his troubles drowned in spirits. Now he lifted lazy, charcoal-lined eyes up to the brute who was walking over to the young man's table. The hefty giant dropped his hands onto the table surface, leaned over, and glared down at Xayn, who chuckled up at his opponent.
"You better watch yourself, you fire-flicking freak!" At this, Xayn's face immediately changed. His slight smile had fallen into a glare of warning. As he slowly arose from the chair, orange flames splashed across his pupils.
"What did you call me?" The casual way he asked it made the giant's trunk-sized legs quake nervously.
"I-I-I only meant--" the man stammered. By now he had back away from the table ever so slowly.
Xayn smiled with glimmering eyes as he snickered to himself. Then, in what seemed like a split second, Xayn in his fury swept the candlestick, his glass, and the bottle from the surface of the table. The crash of it all echoed in the room which had immediately become silent at Xayn’s noisy over-reaction.
"Were you planning on saying your last words today?" By now, the rage was visible as Xayn gasped with anger and his skin steamed. His thick black locks became blue flames waving with energy and a ball of fire formed above his palm.
"Everybody run!" the bar-owner shouted as he and many others ran out of the building. The large victim attempted to escape as well, but when he turned away from Xayn, he came nose to nose with the inflamed youth.
Unable to flee, he shrunk and took weak steps backward, lacking the ability to peel his gaze from the monster. Xayn cornered the man, raised a fiery hand, and--
The heat left his hand. A frozen, wet object fell into his palm. He looked and sure enough a ball of ice sat in his right hand where his ball of fire should have been. He dropped it to the floor and scanned the room for power source, but there was not one soul present.
"Did you do that?!" When he turned to look back at his victim, he realized the man was scrambling away. As Xayn started after him, he felt a tap on his shoulder. Confused, he turned around only to receive a blow to his right jaw-
Pain...
Ground...
More pain...
Blackness...

***

"Hello? Hello?" Xayn felt all the pain rushing to his face and his head all at once. "Wake up, sunshine!" Xayn frowned as the source of the voice moved to reveal rays of brilliant mid-day sunlight, forcing him to squint as he opened his eyes to a blurry figure of brown. He groaned from the pain. Pain. Something he only felt if he had done something stupid enough to get himself hurt. This pain felt different. It belittled and mocked Xayn, and he hated it. 

"Yeah, sorry about that, but, uh, I had to teach you a lesson." The voice was young and full of energy, and anyone other than Xayn would have found it charming. But Xayn found it annoying and then he found it incredulous that this was the voice of his conqueror, as the events leading up to the smart he was feeling on his right cheek began coming back to him. He made motions to get to his feet, but quickly realized that something, something extremely cold and wet yet not totally uncomfortable, was keeping his feet anchored to the ground. Xayn looked down at where his feet should have been, but a block of ice was there instead. He heard a slight chuckle, and then the idiotic stranger's pesky voice.

"Whoa, there, buddy," he said. Xayn turned his head up, but still could not quite make out the face with the sunlight shining down on him from behind the figure. He could hear the smile in the words. "Not so fast, now. You gotta rest that head first, and maybe a bit of that anger while you're down there."
Xayn raised a hand up to the sky, attempting to shield the sunlight from his eyes to better see the stranger. "Who are you?"
The stranger slowly knelt down to Xayn's level and without any blinding rays behind him, Xayn could make out the face. Xayn's face crumpled into shock, confusion, and doubt all at once. That was his face! That was his own nose with a slight bump in it! Those were his dark eyebrows and that was his floppy black hair! That was his mouth with a perfectly white set of teeth in it! The only traits this character lacked that made any difference between them at all was Xayn's pale skin tone, yellow eyes, and edgy style. The "Xayn" that knelt before him had sun-kissed olive skin, light blue eyes, and did not share Xayn's fascination for black leather and charcoal-lined eyes. He had a clean face although tinged with enthusiasm, and wore a brown wool sweater and a dark grey pair of trousers with his brown leather boots. His ears were pierced with two silver-engulfed sapphires matching the gold and ruby ones in Xayn's ears.
An Iceling. How was it possible?
All these thoughts and more flooded Xayn's mind before the Iceling could say, oh so matter-of-factly, "I'm Rhemi, your brother."

Not For Sale (An Original Poem)

There is just so much to run from

In this crazy world of ours

And you ask 

"Why don't you fight some?"

And I say

"I pick my battles like flow'rs

and make a grand bouquet 

of scars I've had 

and bruises bad

enough to make you grimace.

It's called My Soul

It's worn and torn 

Like a garment centuries old

Do cast your lots 

But I am Not

Ever To Be Sold."

*Note: I almost changed the word "grimace" when I realized I was kind of rhyming, but I decided to keep it. In a way it is saying, "If I were to show you my scars and bruises, you would react in a way you yourself would not have expected to."

Word Count Wednesday #3

So I have been working on my narrative, and I'm done for.
Being part of House Wishward, I have the closest deadline and way too many ideas as to how I want this novel to go. It could be so mind-blowingly awesome if I could just organize my thoughts. I am really going to have to figure out what the blooming buns I am up to with this work.

There is really just so much going on with it. I want it to be an amazing piece with inception and a world with crazy rules and exceptions that bring about the conflict. All ideas for organizing my thoughts are welcome! I also wouldn't mind a sympathizing "Happens to me all the time!" either. ;)

Thanks, y'all! And have a great weekend!

Ode To Frozen Milk and Sugar

Today as I was walking to my car, I realized I was unintentionally stalking a girl heading in the same direction. I also realized she was on the phone with a friend and after a few moments, I realized she was trash-talking my best friend: ICE CREAM!!!

"Yeah, I don't know. It's just like I realized it's like frozen milk and sugar, and I don't want that going in my body, ya know?"

And I could not help but think, No, I don't know. Please help me to understand. So here is a poem that I wrote to appreciate ice cream. (Consider this an "I do believe in fairies" ritual.)


Ode To Frozen Milk & Sugar

There you sit upon your waffle cone throne
Three scoops of vanilla
Plain but pure and rich

I buried you beneath whipped cream blankets
and sprinkled particles of rainbow sugar
upon thee, O Delicious Delight

You tasted perfect today
You were not too icy
Nor too soupy
And though I know you attack
My teeth, my gut, my heart, still
I scream for ice cream

How To Be Human

<Beep Beep>

Attention Cyborg Fleet:

As you have all been programmed to know, you are scheduled to be integrated into society in two weeks. As you will be living among the citizens of the United States to attain information undercover, you are required to live, act, speak, and feel as any other human would. Failure to carry through with the Assignment will lead to your Termination.

In order to remain perceived as humans, you must:

-Eat food and drink liquids. Do not worry. The process will be safe for the interior of your bodies.
-Slouch and stumble. If your posture and movements are too perfect, you will be suspected.
-Squeak and stutter. Perfect voices are prohibited.Your Cyber accents are not to be used while in company with the Subjects.
-Maintain proper hygiene. We have inserted a B.F.P. (Bodily Fluid Producer) into each of your systems. Though it is not something you are accustomed to, you will emit certain odors and/or sounds in order to convince the Subjects that you have bodily systems within you. If you do not mind these odors and/or sounds, you will draw attention to yourself.

These are the least difficult requirements for the Assignment. Mastering Human emotion will be a challenge unlike any other you have ever experienced.

-When you make a mistake (and you MUST make mistakes) or you disappoint another, apologize with the words "I am sorry" or "I apologize." This means you are not proud that you have made said mistake. Exhibit regretful behavior with a shrink in your shoulders and a bow of the head.
-When you do or say something out of the ordinary in front of others, you must be embarrassed. Launch an N.C. (Nervousness Code). Your cheeks should blush (they may heat up a bit), your hands will sweat, and your mouth should dry up. Do not worry. This is completely normal to the Subjects' bodies.
-When you are treated wrongly or situations do not resolve the way you had desired them to, you will need to be angry. If you get into an argument, or an intense conversation with conflicting opinions, you will need to frown, sigh, and raise your voice. A clench of the fists may also help your claim.
-When you form a bond with another, this is called Friendship. The citizens you form these bonds with will offer you their Trust. You will take it, but there is absolutely no guarantee you will not destroy it.
-Any relationship stronger than Friendship is strongly prohibited. You have not been programmed to love. Warning: Falling in Love will lead to your Termination.

<Beep Beep>

Word Count Saturday

In median res was a new and simple yet helpful experience. I practiced "pantsing" my readers as well as myself and finding out more about my protagonist. I wanted the scene to be dramatic and cruel to the main character at first, but inspiration by the hero from the comedy Psych inspired me otherwise, and the quirky spy/vigilante emerged victorious at what became a resolution to an episode of crime-fighting. I was quite confused at my own silly, Shawn Spencer 2.0 character (if there was ever such a thing), but then realized I had never tried writing a comedic piece before. I found it thoroughly enjoyable, though going back and reading it, I was not sure if I myself found it that amusing.


I suppose this is a wake-up call for me to practice my comedy writing and to experiment with that genre. It is tricky for me, considering I have never had the class-clown sort of personality. But as readers chuckle at subtly-entertaining characters such as Austin's Mr. Bennett, I hope that in my story, I will be able to incorporate some well-baked comic relief.


Short Story Progress: I want it to be as mind-blowing as the egg, but I cannot recall many unique realizations from my many hours spent in pensive reflection. I suppose to be inspired, I will need to go out into Nature, like the good, ol' Romantic poets of yore, or do something maddeningly reckless. Or maybe I will sit and listen to instrumental music and try and put a story to it (and hopefully not come up with anything too cliché, as I so often do when attempting at this exercise). Whatever I come up with, I just hope that I like it enough to read it.