Weekly Wordzzle Challenge # 228

Almost forgot that it's Friday. I will post my exercises tomorrow. Very sad about the school killings in Connecticut. Very tired in general.

UPDATE:  Angel is getting a new companion this morning - rather unexpectedly - so I may not be able to do my exercises until tomorrow... hopefully then. Very anxious and not feeling very well. Apologies for the delay.

SUNDAY 5:00 PM - well, I almost forgot. Just starting now and my heart isn't in it. Kitty introductions did not go well yesterday. New kitty is secluded in back bedroom. Angel is pretending she doesn't exist. Me too, really. She is being very quiet. She has food and water until my friend can come and put a screen door so they can see and smell each other without actually interacting.  I don't have a good feeling about it, though.  Anyway, I'm tired, anxious and not feeling very well, plus listening too much to the coverage on the sad killing of so many children in Connecticut.  Just looking at the words and I think I repeated pregnant from last week or the week before. Sigh. Hate it when I do that. Thinking I may take a break for the holidays and start again in the New Year. Nobody but me plays in any case and now people will be busy with the holidays as well.

6:16: Done.  I will keep my non-readers posted about whether or not I take a break for the holidays. 


Words for this week's 10 word challenge: caution, spinach, heat, pregnant, carved wooden box, blaggard, garbage, bellow, effort, sapling    And for the mini: charcoal, turtle, impulse, shaft, exaggeration


My mega:

The blaggard who had gotten her pregnant had seemed like the perfect man when she met him, so much so that she had thrown caution to the wind. It was no exaggeration to say that he had seemed capable of reading her heart, of being the healer of all her wounds. Early on he had given her a small carved wooden box which he had told her contained his heart. That it was empty when she opened it, might have given a wiser woman pause, but she had felt no impulse to run, only gratitude for his effort to comfort and nurture her. He had lavished her with praise and poetic gifts - a sapling planted in the yard to be nurtured and grow with their love. Hah. If only she had known. He was the classic abuser. Once she was roped in and pregnant, it all turned to garbage...his attention became destructive, his compliments turned to bellowed cruelty, the heat of his rage so wild she sometimes felt like even her skin (not to mention her heart) was singed by it. Initially she had tried to be a turtle, to pull into a shell of denial and self-protection. At first she had swallowed his poison like some kind of perverted spinach... it was for her own good, he always told her. She dreaded being a single parent, but she knew that the baby growing in her womb was, on some level, her guardian angel, for she had guided her to Dr. Shar Kohl (pronounced like charcoal), who had read the signs of her abuse and pulled - one by one - the shafts of her demented abusers arrows from her heart. Dr. Kohl had persuaded her to seek treatment and the counselors had found her a safe house in which to heal and find herself again. She dedicated her life to healing her own wounded psyche so that her baby would grow up safe, nurtured and strong in spirit.


My mini:

Jason Shaft had purchased the charcoal drawing of the giant turtle at the local flea market on an impulse. He was inherently frugal and not given to such impulses, and his wife - who often went without things that she wanted - was (no exaggeration here) rather irritated by his purchase. She got over it, though, when a few months later, they discovered that the small drawing on which Jason had lavished the extravagant some of $15 turned out to be worth over $100,000.



And the 10-word:

Donna's friends and family were deeply opposed to her about her addiction to hunting through garbage to find lost treasures, some of which she used in her art work and some which she simply rescued from being lost to the world. It was the source of many heated arguments. Her mother cautioned her that it was dangerous and that it was unbecoming a lady. Her father bellowed at her that no man would ever want to marry her. They could not see that her efforts were for her creativity like Popeye's spinach.  The hunt was pregnant with seeds and saplings of artistic inspiration. And sometimes she just found small personal treasures. Her favorite ever find was a carved wooden box with the word BLAGGARD ornately etched into the wood. That little box had helped her work out a lot of anger and those who knew her work knew that you could often find the world blaggard hidden in the curves and shadows of almost every painting or work of art she created. It took 20 years, a loving husband and a great career for her parents to come around to her way of thinking, but eventually - when her first painting was purchased by the Museum of Modern Art - they did.

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Words for next week's 10-word challenge:  children, drastic, guns, preparation, moved, knit, spare, lesson, blanket, wink 

And for the mini: escape, plastic, gravity, sarcasm, giggle

Thanks you for playing.  Newcomers can check here for some guidelines to make the game more fun. There are no rules, just some general guidelines and tricks.