Cedar Sanderson

Week 35 of Odd Prompts

Sometimes life offers us things we don’t know what to do with. Sometimes we use art to process those things. Sometimes we practice our skills with prompts, when we’re too overwhelmed with that real life to get the imagination firing.

Welcome to the Odd Prompts. We’ve been doing this for a while, but if you’re new, step right on in. No one here bites… much.

Prompter Prompt Prompted
Cedar Sanderson If you had Brownies in your house, what would they do? Leigh Kimmel
Anne and Jim “She kept trying to send in her application, but they wouldn’t accept it. They kept saying her address was invalid.” Becky Jones
Becky Jones The dragon floated on the inflatable raft in the middle of my pool. Fiona Grey
nother Mike There was a silver chain hidden in the leaves of the tree. He pulled it…
Cedar Sanderson
Fiona Grey The row of vultures perched high upon the cloud, peering down through a pink, leopard-spotted cloud. Anne and Jim
Leigh Kimmel Hearing the Rolling Stones’ song “Jumping Jack Flash” when you didn’t know the British idiom “it’s a gas,” so you were trying to understand the lyrics in American English. nother Mike
And if you don’t want to commit to a prompt challenge, issued and responded, check out the spare prompts! No pressure. No wordcounts. Don’t even have to finish it. These are intended to spark the mind into a flight of imagination. Hm. Mixed metaphor, sparking and flying, unless we’re talking the Phoenix or Firebird.
Spare Harold was widely known as the founder of a chain of vacation spots for zombies. (suggested by https://www.thefarside.com/2020/08/19/0 )
Spare A wildlife tour, upon which a gryphon is spotted.
Spare The ad said, “Staff needed for Vampire Cruise Lines. All blood types wanted!”
Spare When the coffee is too caffeinated, what happens?
Spare “Seems our centaur either has or had a biped housemate, or frequent biped guests.” “What makes you say that?” “Ever see a centaur use a stepstool?”

32 comments

  1. OddPrompts? Hey, you should see the OddResponses! Over here, https://moreoddsthanends.home.blog/2020/08/19/week-34-of-odd-prompts/ last week we saw…

    A talking squid named Calamari? Little green Celtic figures and a giant cowboy hat? Following your dreams literally? A truck, a raccoon, bones, and a dragon (another episode in the Cursebreaker tale!)! A king cobra in the continuing adventures of the perambulating hatrack? A body with flies? An oversized closet and the Crowned Inspector? And the dance goes on and on…

    Go, read all about it! You’ll be glad you did!

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  2. Maybe this is Even Prompts. I took two spare prompts from Week 34 and put them in this story set in the 4 Winds/Collegium Universe. We get to see a little bit of Robin’s past as well as some real world history.

    [Prompts: You’re doing yard work in the back yard. As you finish up you notice that at the back edge of the yard there is an interesting little group. Three raccoons, a couple of squirrels, and an opossum are sitting there. One of the raccoons has a piece of paper in its hand and waves you over. You approach and the racoon hands you the piece of paper. What is on it? & When they kicked the leg of the body laying in the underbrush, a swarm of flies flew up into the air.]

    While it isn’t necessary, you may wish to read Initiation first, it may make one scene a little clearer.

    https://undomesticatedfeline.wordpress.com/2020/08/29/odd-prompts/

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  3. I really liked this one. I had an ex-boyfriend whose parents and grandparents spent about 2-3 years in the Manzanar Relocation Camp, on the eastern edge of the Sierras. They got lucky in that their neighbors moved their teenaged boys onto grandparents farm to take care of it until the family was released.

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    • Thank you.

      Yeah, I’d agree that that family was lucky and spared the boys that trauma. What the American govt did to Americans of Japanese decent is a blot on our honor.

      I learned some interesting things doing the research, including the fact that the Akimel O’odham didn’t want the Internment Camp on the Gila reservation. Nor was the Poston Camp welcome on the Colorado River Indian Reservation. But our govt ignored them and put the camps there anyway.

      I don’t know about any of the other camps, but I also learned that the memorial Robin and Carlos visit at the end is pretty much all that is left of Butte Camp. Canal Camp, the second half of Gila River Interment Center, located a few miles away, appears to have even less. (both are hard to find on satellite images) But the local tribe does try to maintain the memorials, even though they’re pretty much closed to outsiders.

      {sorry if I rambled at bit, couldn’t help sharing some of my research.}

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  6. Leigh Kimmel prompted…

    Hearing the Rolling Stones’ song “Jumping Jack Flash” when you didn’t know the British idiom “it’s a gas,” so you were trying to understand the lyrics in American English.

    Hum. Better start by checking out the lyrics…

    It’s a gas… funny, strange, amusing. Of course, it isn’t a reference to petrol, which is what your car runs on…

    Okay, here’s one shot at it…

    Jumping Jack Flash
    By Mike Barker

    I heard it again today, and a shiver ran down my spine. I haven’t worked the gas pumps in years, but somehow, that old British song always brings back that night. I mean, you see a pickup roll in, a guy start to pump gas, and then somehow… FLASH! Jumping Jack Flash! It’s a gas… and he’s going up in flames right there, with the gas pouring out of the hose, and spreading a lake of fire. With the radio blaring out that song over the speakers… I saw it, I heard it, and I ran.

    I ran. I know folks have said I should have done this or that, should have tried to push that guy out of the flames, but watching those flames shoot up against the dark, and that poor guy jumping and waving his arms around, and the flames seemed to be coming for me. I just ran. Put my head down, and pumped along.

    I turned in my resignation the next day. Boss said I could keep working, even while they were rebuilding the station, but I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to be anywhere near it anymore. It’s a gas? Not to me.

    So I never really liked that song. Oh, sure, I know people who love it. Strap across your back, drowned, spike in your head… It’s a gas, right? But not for me. Not since that night, watching that man burn in the gas.

    I’ve even talked with Brits about it. They tell me petrol, that’s what I’m talking about. Gas, man, that’s a joke. But not to me.

    It’s a gas. Flames shooting up into the sky. Jumping Jack Flash.

    Not for me.

    (cut off at this point…)

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  13. “When the coffee is too caffeinated, what happens?”
    I believe Sir Pterry answered that one. When Commander Vimes needed to sober up in a hurry, they brought him a cup of Klatchian coffee. It creates the opposite of a drunkenness, a state of mind where everything is much, much too clear.

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