tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-60097634951858894392024-03-05T18:47:55.445-08:00Views on News... About language, writing, politics, health, science, parenting, and moreLAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-9270219207550446382011-11-30T12:54:00.001-08:002011-11-30T13:03:30.628-08:00Transgression SmackdownFiction
Copyright © 2011, By C.L. Smith
Word count: 200
Your blue-jeaned legs were too long for your boy’s torso. You were hot to prove to everyone how high you could roundhouse to kick the top of Mrs. Johnston’s doorway.
“I take karate,” you puffed.
Your eyes were as pale as your skin, as still as your soul as you budged desk after desk aside with your hips. Occasionally a scrape skittered LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-26141456216112463822011-11-30T12:37:00.001-08:002011-11-30T12:48:36.255-08:00Girls Run WildFiction
Copyright © 2011, By C.L. Smith
Word count: 200
As we stretched, I overheard Jason chiding another guy: “You run like a girl.”
That’s when the girl who was once so helpful as to be verbally savaged by a blind man surged into vigilante mode.
“Oh, yeah? That’s a compliment.”
In some cross-country events, both genders blast off simultaneously. This was one of those races. It was also LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-9376746124593245562011-11-28T14:28:00.001-08:002011-11-29T13:11:59.065-08:00Our Canvas Runneth OverWe heart art. We're daft for crafts. And we most definitely have a crush on the paintbrush. But if the kids receive one more coloring book--thankful though I am that you have given pause to consider the rug-art-rats--I just may be able to wallpaper the entire house in a pastiche of princesses, Potato Heads, and pandas. And, if driven hard enough toward the starry-nighted precipice (some might LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-8141755053936349672011-08-16T14:49:00.000-07:002011-08-17T13:37:16.951-07:00Nationwide ground beef recall for Escherichia coli contamination hits Walmart, Sam's Club, Publix, Kroger, Winn Dixie storesWhere's the beef? For your health's sake, I hope it's not in your refrigerator--or, worse yet, in your or your child's gastrointestinal system--if it came from National Beef Packing Co. LLC, of Dodge City, Kansas.
In a news release from 12 August 2011, the United States Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), noted that the aforementioned company is recalling LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-14090995359974190732011-08-04T06:12:00.000-07:002011-08-04T06:17:10.706-07:00Ten Children Dead So Far This Summer in the Gunited States of America"A gun kept in the home is 43 times more likely to kill someone known to the family than to kill someone in self-defense." (American Academy of Pediatrics)
I’ve got a bur under my saddle, and I aim to pry it out.
Amigos and compadres, we’re officially living in the Gunited States of America.
And in the G.S.A., the Summer of the Gun has started off with a bang. Several of them, unfortunately.LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-63035161809231159022011-07-20T11:01:00.000-07:002011-07-20T11:06:00.028-07:00Wanderlust Wednesday
"An agreeable companion on a journey is as good as a carriage." -- Publius Syrus
An ode to the summer traveler. What was it Twain snarked so long ago about traveling?
Oh, yes. Here it is. "I have found out there ain't no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them."
Are you on the cusp of real-world travel? Perhaps you're a writer like Twain, even LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-22981777730406514762011-07-14T14:19:00.000-07:002011-07-14T14:24:56.799-07:00Do Good Fences Make for Good Writing?"Writing free verse is like playing tennis with the net down."
-- American Poet Robert Frost
I suspect that if Robert Frost stopped by my words on a snowy evening--or a summer morn--he would squash them under his heel like they were the proverbial fat, white spider.
That said, I find that I work better in my writing life by having the "good fence" provided for me.
What do I mean by the good LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-68089041823079803512011-07-12T13:35:00.000-07:002011-07-12T13:35:35.912-07:00To Beet or Not to Beet, That is the Legal QuestionThink a moment of the American Dream, evolving though it may be in these turbulent times. What did you envision? It probably had something to do with home-ownership, yes?
So, let's say you're living out that dream. Oh, let's just pick a location. How about Oak Park, Michigan? That's about as "Americana" as it gets, don't you think?
Now, enter mom Julie Bass, who perpetrated a travesty by LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-48656249371378258282011-07-07T09:50:00.000-07:002011-07-07T09:50:24.008-07:00If Social Security's on the Table, What's under it?
I was listening to NPR a week or two ago and Tavis Smiley was on promoting an American history exhibit at a local museum. Not surprisingly, he said something compelling that has stayed with me. I'll paraphrase from memory:
"First, we must respect him, which we do. Then we must protect him. But, finally, we must correct him."
Neither Tavis nor colleague Cornel West shies from the latter part, toLAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-7351700504442741662011-07-06T07:17:00.000-07:002011-07-06T07:17:41.048-07:00Women's World Cup Wednesday in Wolfsburg
Woo-hoo, it's whooping time. In the form of the Women's World Cup and, more specifically, for Team USA, which faces Sweden in Wolfsburg, Germany, today.
Currently ranked Number 1 in the world, Team USA looks to notch a win against familiar foe Sweden. But don't worry. We've got it in the bag.
Team USA's coach, Pia Sundhage, is Swedish. We enter the match, according to FIFA.com, having played LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-12418530420519248662011-07-05T14:33:00.000-07:002011-07-05T14:43:14.993-07:00Writing it Real and More Criticism of Online WritersThey come at you from every conceivable angle. From well-meaning "oh, I wish I could sit at home and do freelance writing" to "write what you know" or even "make it new," volleys of advice track every freelance writer.
Naturally, it hurts more when a fellow writer stages a smackdown or lobs that most dreaded of bêtes noires: hack. I won’t belabor this point here except to point you to last LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-50516729703040096102011-06-30T13:27:00.000-07:002011-06-30T13:27:39.108-07:00Critter Concerns Egg-revate JFK Travel Times; Terrapins Prompt Teachable Moment
Seeing dead wildlife on highways and byways distresses and deflates me. Just ask my husband. Go ahead; I’ll wait.
The scientist or researcher who someday figures out how to keep wildlife off roads—other than the obvious solution: fewer humans or cars or exterminating wildlife—or devises an underground or over-the-road bridge or effective deterrent will be getting a love letter from me, for LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-6595281227507059992011-06-28T13:39:00.000-07:002011-06-29T10:20:35.946-07:00Online Writers, NYT Scribe Virginia Heffernan Thinks Most of You are Hacks and RobotsFirst, have a few sips of the writer-to-writer vitriol:
"As a verbal artifact, farmed content exhibits neither style nor substance."
"The insultingly vacuous and frankly bizarre prose of the content farms — it seems ripped from Wikipedia and translated from the Romanian — cheapens all online information."
"These prose-widgets are not hammered out by robots, surprisingly. But they are written by LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-65686439773404532242010-10-20T10:05:00.000-07:002010-10-20T10:05:16.760-07:00An Epidemic of Political Proportions: Smearing Science by Stomping on AntsIf you're as interested in science and medicine as I am, you've no doubt noticed the latest rash of political attack ads and, indeed, a conservative culture with a decided strain of anti-science smears.
It's not enough that science has to be constantly justified. No, friends, the ultimate litmus test for entry into the ranks of the GOP might be that a conservative politician must utterly pilloryLAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-47690469871484774642010-08-20T19:42:00.000-07:002010-08-20T20:32:20.513-07:00Musician Peter Gabriel to Appear Free on DIRECTV August 21Blog Post © 1 Woman Wordsmith, Leigh Ramsey, August 2010---I have long been (note: please pronounce it "bean" in true Brit style!) penning my own "Book of Love"-style paean to musician Peter Gabriel. Talk about "Love Town"!So, anyway, when I read a tweet this morning that this--let's be balanced--poetical song-writing genius will be premiering in a Guitar Center "Session" on DIRECTV Channel 101 LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6009763495185889439.post-59025179651737635872010-08-11T22:58:00.000-07:002010-08-12T07:40:05.206-07:00Perseid Meteor Shower, Planetary Alignment This Week Promise 2010's Best, NASA Suggests (Skymaps, Photo)"Then felt I like some watcher of the skies/When a new planet swims into his ken;"--From John Keats, "On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer"___________This article © Leigh Ramsey, August 2010, for 1Woman Wordsmith. All rights reserved.What can I say? I love mythology, and I love the stars. Ad astra per aspera!Both interests have hitched their wagons to me since girlhood.This week, I am sincerely LAR1975http://www.blogger.com/profile/15223891408003341203noreply@blogger.com0