The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Dennis looked over Charlotte’s shoulder at her bulky pickup list. “Wrecked bicycle. Check. Commodore computer. Wait! Not my bench!”
“Anyone who sits on it risks getting a butt full of splinters.”
“I’ll take my chances.” He sank down. “This is where I used to sing Abby to sleep, help her with her homework, and wait for her to come home from her dates. My claw marks are still on the armrests.”
A small boy crawled onto Dennis’s lap. “I want to sit on Grandpa’s special bench, too.”
Charlotte crossed out bench. “You win.”
Dennis frowned. “Now, about that Commodore computer.”
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Despite my husband’s protests, I gather seashells along a Massachusetts beach. They are my favorite souvenirs from my travels.
I pick up a rock and hold it in the palm of my hand. Awhimsical drawing of a cat smiles at me.
Later as we have lunch at Theresa’s Stockbridge Café, I show my find to our server.
“Oh!” she exclaims. “You don’t see many of those on the beach these days. That’s an Alice original.”
My heart pounds. “You mean as in the Alice?”
“Yes!”
Suddenly I find myself singing, “You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.”
The photo prompt this week is mine and while it’s true that I can’t resist collecting shells on the beach, the ones pictured came from St. Thomas, Florida, and Wilmington NC. I’ve never been to Massachusetts. 😉
Click the images below for the full pictures:
Genre: Tribute – Non Fiction Word Count: 100
II REMEMBER ALICE?
Alice’s Restaurant wasn’t really a song about Alice—or a restaurant. It’s just the name of the song.
As the story goes, “It all started two Thanksgivings ago…”
Rock stations across the United States play Arlo Guthrie’s classic narrative every Thanksgiving which falls in late November.
While she enjoyed cooking, Alice Brock never expected fame or fortune to come of it. In recent years, she reminisced how, thanks to her “funny looking friend with the guitar,” and his eighteen-minute ramble, she became the “living legend Earth Mother.”
She left us this year, a week before Thanksgiving. Rest in peace, Alice.
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Please, be a pal, and identify yourself in your comments. I kind of like to know to whom I’m replying to. Thank you. 😀
Genre: Hysterical Faction Word Count: 100
HONEYMOON PHASE
I gave my parents a tour of the apartment and said, “Only $85.00 a month.” Mom glared through tears at the black and red kitchen cabinets. “It’s a dump. You’re only eighteen. Please reconsider this.”
After our wedding, my husband and I moved into our first home—a four-room apartment in the attic of a turn-of-the-twentieth-century two-story brick house. The paper-thin walls allowed us to hear every word spoken by our pothead next door neighbors—usually uttered after midnight.
I could be a romantic and say that to us it seemed like a palace. Nah. It really was a dump.
This is the only picture we have that was taken inside the apartment. (December 1971) Sadly you can’t experience the end tables made of old barrels (speakers inside them) with cast-off marble tops. Between those was the green naugahide couch. Across from them was the portable black and white TV on rough board shelves propped up on cinder blocks.
Once satisfied that I wasn’t in a family way, our parents gave us six months….53 years ago. 😀
he next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Ettore patted Jerry’s head. “How’s it going small fry?”
Twelve-year-old Jerry squared his shoulders, stretched to his full four-foot-three-inches, glaring up at his six-foot-tall eighteen-year-old brother. “Who you calling ‘small fry’?”
The youngest of eleven siblings, he’d always be the shortest.
Over the years his lack of height served him well as an actor and a stuntman. His hand and footprints appear in front of the famous Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood.
Puffing on his cigar, eighty-year-old Jerry Maren reminisced about his part in The Wizard of Oz. “Great times. That mangy mutt made better money than us Munchkins did.”
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
My brother has always had a vivid imagination and a penchant for fabricating tall tales. This time I thought he’d gone too far.
“Too many sci-fi comics, kiddo,” I said. “If extraterrestrials had arrived on this planet, it would be all over the news.”
“I saw their spaceship land. They’ve set up weapons of mass destruction.”
At his insistence, we hiked to the site where I expected to have the last laugh. But now both of my hearts stand still as I watch the two-legged creatures in shiny suits lumber about their craft.
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Mae West said I was all wood and a yard long. Don’t remember her? Use your little fingers and do a Google search. That is, if you’re smart enough to use a computer.
(And they call me the dummy).
I don’t say much these days. I just watch the passersby at the Smithsonian Institution. I miss my buddy, Edgar who passed away in 1978. He treated me like a son. Some say he treated me better than his own daughter. To be fair, he only included one of us in his will. I’d be upset, too, if I were her.
Please, please, sign your comments! Most of your names are coming through but there were at least five last week that were marked “Anonymous.” I really like to know to whom I’m replying. 😀 Thank you for your participation and reciprocation. Shalom,Rochelle
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Dale folded a blanket and laid it in a box of linens. “I hate moving.”
Rochelle taped the top of another box and labeled it Bedroom with a marker. “Ever wonder who invented them?”
“Invented what?”
“Cardboard boxes.”
“No.”
“Robert Gair, who came to the United States in 1853 from Scotland on a ship by himself. He was only fourteen at the time. Can you imagine what that must’ve been like? Later he fought in the Civil War and after that, he worked in a paper factory.”
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Clarabella climbed onto Alfred’s lap. “Tell me about Jacob, Grandad.”
“I was a lad in 1842, not quite nineteen, serving with the Coldstream Guard in the Canadian colonies. One of me mates had rescued a goose from a fox whilst on sentry duty. After that, the bird made himself quite at home, so we named him Jacob.”
Clarabella clapped her hands. “One night, Jacob spied some French rebels sneaking through the snow to attack. He squawked and flew at them. Your regiment showed their gratitude by making hiim an officer.”
“I’ve told you this story before, haven’t I?”
“O-Yes, Grandad.”
Some things you just can’t make up. CLICK HERE to meet the real Jacob
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
“It was a matter of time,” I told Lois. “The man was evil personified. He cast a dark shadow on everything and everyone. It boiled down to where and when.”
Lois looked up from her register. “How did you end up doing it?”
“Derringer at close range.”
A gasp interrupted our conversation. I turned to see a blue-haired lady clutching a cantaloupe, her eyes wide and mouth agape.
Busted! My cheeks blazed. I flashed a sheepish grin. “Sorry, I didn’t realize anyone else was listening.”
“Not to worry,” Lois pointed at me. “She’s just a crazy writer.”
It’s not exactly fiction. An author needs to be careful what she says in public. 😉 Believe me, this character really did need killing.
