Saturday Wordzzle Challenge: Week Seventeen

It's week 17 of the Saturday Wordzzle challenge. Anyone new to the process can refer back here to find out how it works. Three of this week's words (prenomial, vituperative & inexplicable) came from Jay Simser. If anyone else wants to send me some suggestions, I'm more than open to them... or if someone wants to take responsiblity for picking all the words for any given week, I'd love that too.

The words for this week's ten word challenge were: prenomial, inexplicable, tangerine, masks, chocolate cake, panorama, librarian, Stonehenge, meek, florid And for the Mini Challenge: vituperative, bunny rabbit, house warming, sanitation, triangular

Here's my ten-word offering for this week.

The whole thing was inexplicable to her and Gloria hated that. “What the hell is all this about? Prenomial? Who wrote this crap? I’m an actress, for God’s sake, not a librarian. She was working her way up to a full blown tantrum. “Where the hell is Charlie! Get me Charlie NOW!” she bellowed in full diva voice. “And Where’s my chocolate cake? I want my damned cake! And make sure it has tangerines on the side this time, not oranges. Is there not one competent human being left on the planet? CHARLIE!” she shrieked even louder. Meek and mild-mannered, the aforementioned Charlie – who had the misfortune of being both Gloria’s manager and her husband - glanced pensively around the panorama of the huge theater as though looking for a means of escape. Looking at the huge Stonehenge set currently under construction, he muttered softly, “Oh to be in England…” Then, trying to mask both his anxiety and his irritation, he glued a huge smile onto his face and entered the arena. “Gloria, magnificent one…. You bellowed?”

And here's my mini challenge:

Building a house deep in the country had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now that it was completed, some of the romance of living in the country had begun to fade. The gala house warming two weeks earlier had been a great success, but continuing days surrounded by only crickets, crows and bunny rabbits was beginning to wear on them. Since she had discovered that Triangle Sanitation did not offer garbage services as far into the country as their little “retreat,” Marsha’s enthusiasm for country living had waned considerably and her hostility towards her husband Howard had taken on an increasingly vituperative tone. For his part, Howard, who had envisioned country living as idyllic, was hoping that maybe Walmart or some big gas company would offer to desecrate his land and free him to return to the miseries of city living.

And the mega challenge:

Looking around her new home as she prepared for her house warming, librarian Paloma Parker felt inexplicably happy. The citizens Triangle Township had welcomed her with open arms and kind hearts. The vituperative slander and scandal of her previous job was behind her and had turned out to be more of a gift than a tragedy. Despite seeming meek and diffident, she was actually quite an adventurer. A look at the collection of exotic masks and other art piece that decorated her walls as well as the photos from her travels gave quick evidence that she was quiet in demeanor only. Of her travel photos she especially loved the panoramic view of Stonehenge which she had taken on a recent trip. She also had hung some more unusual shots. Her favorite of those was of a building and garbage truck, each labeled with the peculiar name Prenomial Sanitation. She loved words and had always wondered who had named that company and why. Alas, research had proved fruitless and nobody at the company had known either. It was one of life’s unsolved mysteries. Next she cast a happy eye on her collection of porcelain bunny rabbits from around the world and gave a sigh of contented pleasure. She felt truly at home here. With a last check of her banquet table, she gazed the assortment of foods from deviled eggs to tuna salad to her signature triple heaven chocolate cake decorated with slices of tangerine and strawberries and felt very pleased. Then, moving to answer the door bell, she gave a quick smile to the florid-faced woman in the portrait on the wall and said, “It’s a new day, Mom. And a better one.”

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This week's vanity wordzzle used the words: antennae, paper bag, schmuck, devotee, brass tea kettle, cactus, Rubbermaid dish drainer, rocking horse, buried treasure, fleet of foot, nomenclature

Peter's imagination had always been bizarre. He could not help it. Even as a small child he had seen things differently. His sister saw a rocking horse, but Peter saw a grand stallion, wild and untamed, fleet of foot. Even now he simply saw things differently. Where some people saw a cactus, Peter saw a plant creature waving a greeting. His wife - whom he had also seen differently when he married her - thought he was a schmuck. "Grow up you weirdo," she had shrieked at him only this morning. Harry, his agent and an ardent devotee of Peter's art, had told him it was only a matter of perspective and then had changed it to nomenclature. "One woman's schmuck is another man's genius. Buck up, Petey and see what you can do with this lot. Harry had gone hunting again for buried treasure. Once a week he would go to the city dump and haul back three or four large paper bags full of magical items for Peter to transform into new wonders. He loved the anticipation of wondering what Peter would come up with. Tonight's haul, he thought, was exceptional: an old dented and burned down brass tea kettle, a large yellow Rubbermaid dish drainer, two brown and two green glass bottles, and a bent TV antenna. He loved to watch Peter's face - like a child's opening presents. And then, either right on the spot, or a few days later, Peter would work his little miracles. The dish drainer would become a dragon or a rhinoceros, the antenna and bottles part of some giant bug. Things like that. You just never knew what Peter would do, but one thing you could be certain of was that it would be unexpected and that was what delighted Harry so. When Peter was around, ordinary things became extraordinary, and because nothing was mundane or predictable, life took on just a little extra sparkle. In Peter's company, Harry felt his own imagination perk up, pay attention and be glad. Harry could hardly wait for his next trip to the dump.

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Next Week's Ten Word Challenge will be: solitaire, pathological, grackles, alternative life style, manifest destiny, polarization, ugly duckling, folding chairs, flibberty-gibbet, hand grenade

And for the Mini Challenge: marathon, the butler did it, curtain, hand cream, flatulence

Thanks for playing. For those who are new, here are some guidelines to make the process more fun.

Enjoy! See you next week.

DON'T FORGET TO ADD YOUR NAME TO MR. LINKY!!!!!