Saturday Wordzzle Challenge: Week Twenty-One

(Please scroll down for Project Black and Sky Watch)

This is week 21 of the Saturday Wordzzle challenge. Anyone new to the process can refer back here to find out how it works. I just want to say that whoever came up with this particular set of words should be taken out back and given 50 lashes. Oh wait… it was me… Umm… Maybe I should just be fired and the job given to someone else who will not come up with such an insanely mis-matched, demented set of words. What was I thinking? If I wasn't the host of this thing, I think I would have chickened out this week. Whew, I had a hard time. But enough whining...

The words for this week's ten word challenge were: gouged, symmetrical, Spanish moss, ATV, parallel parking, Luscious, origami, amphibian, turkey, gravy train And for the Mini Challenge: pouring rain, mastiff, church bells, wedding dress, stock car races

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

Lavender Luscious had failed her driving test four times – not only because she found parallel parking completely impossible - the concept was too symmetrical and she hated anything symmetrical – but because she also had a penchant for driving very fast, ignoring stop lights and chatting amiably with whoever was sitting next to her. This was not such a major problem driving an ATV on wilderness roads, but here in town such methods did not sit well with driving inspectors or other drivers. The last inspector who had taken her out for her test had growled at her, his face red with fury, “This is a driving test, young lady, not an audition for the stock car races.” He was originally from Turkey and those words with a Turkish accent had struck her so funny that she had burst out laughing. Needless to say, he had not passed her. Tomorrow was her fifth and last chance to get a license and her nerves were frayed to the breaking point. In an effort to relax and distract herself, she had tried making origami frogs (she loved amphibians) but she was so nervous that she had gouged holes in everything until all her attempts looked like so much Spanish moss. The last thing she remembered before falling asleep was a commercial for Gravy Train dog food. Waking, she remembered that in her dreams she had sped through the test flawlessly holding an adorable puppy in her lap and that after it was over that same man who had mocked her bowed his turbaned head to her, salaamed and declared in his mellifluous voice. “Congratulations. You have passed.” Maybe, she thought, it’s an omen. I hope so.

And here's my mini challenge:

“No, Go away! I’m never coming out!” Marigold wailed from behind the locked door of the cathedral bathroom. If only it had been a nightmare… But it had not: the church bells had been ringing loudly as she arrived. It was pouring rain but she hadn’t cared. She was getting married to the man of her dreams in the gown of her dreams. She was aglow with happiness and she felt beautiful. But as she stepped from the limo in her beautiful wedding dress, a huge black mastiff broke loose from its owner and came joyfully jumping on her with huge muddy paws and knocking her down. To make matters worse – (who’d have thought it possible) just at this moment a cab went by at speed better suited to stock car races, raising a huge wave of muddy puddle that surged in her direction. No longer a beautiful bride, she was a figure of mud from head to foot. And as if all this wasn’t enough the stuff of nightmares – the photographers had caught it all. Her humiliation was too great. There would be no wedding. In fact she was never leaving this bathroom again. Unless, perhaps it was to kill that stupid dog...

And the mega challenge:

Lucinda Montgomery had always dreamed of getting married to a gravy train husband in an elegant cathedral, with chiming church bells, and a luscious satin wedding dress. She had envisioned bride’s maids, beautiful flowers, and a magnificent banquet. Her beautiful ten layered cake was to have been decorated with origami cranes and real violets. And in her dreams it had always been a glorious sunny day. But here she was, standing in the pouring rain next to the gouged out trunk of a huge old cypress tree hung with Spanish moss that looked like time-worn, shredded veils. There were no shiny limousines either, no streets with parallel parking; instead the open field held half a dozen ATVs and a few beat up cars and trucks that looked like rejects from the stock car races. The choir (yes, she had wanted a choir) consisted of a chorus of wild turkeys, crows and croaking amphibians whose noisy chatter was punctuated by the loud barks of Charley’s six huge black mastiffs. Charley’s face did not have the handsome symmetrical features of her long imagined groom, either. But it was the kindest face she had ever known and reflected the kind and gentle heart of its bearer. Standing beside him in the rain, dressed in blue jeans and a sweater, holding a bunch of hand picked wild flowers, she could not have been happier. She was in love and the wedding of her dreams paled beside the reality of this one.

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This week's vanity wordzzle used the words: tattered pages, language, bark, resistant, altar, grapple, rain, wait, patterns, honey

I bent over the tattered pages like a supplicant at an altar. Whatever ancient language these pages were drawn in seemed resistant to every trick in my codifier's bible. I had been grappling with the intricacies of its subtly nuanced pattern of strokes for months now and it continued to defeat me. I am not accustomed to defeat and I do not like it. The old priest says there is a lesson in this for me and I must wait for it to be revealed. My own techniques have failed me. I am at a loss for what to do. I will try his way, I guess. I will sit here on this bark-covered log he calls a bench and listen to the silence and the beating of my heart. This space smells of honey, which I do not like in ordinary life, yet here, somehow it is comforting. The rain outside beats a kind of music on the leaves and grass. "I am listening, God," I cry, "What is the message?" And I don't know if it is imagination or a trick of the night, if it is the sound of rain on the breeze or if it really is a voice which whispers, oh so lovingly in my ear: "Not every mystery, child, has an answer and some mysteries have more than one solution. Remember that it is the journey not the destination which matters and be at peace."

Next Week's Ten Word Challenge will be: cardboard box, liquor cabinet, ostrich feathers, longitudinal, hamburger helper, partnership, laundry detergent, magnificent, San Francisco, prognosis

And for the Mini Challenge: worst case scenario, marginalia, water fountain, specialized, fortitude

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!!!!!