Mandsikjhfeuidfgyireifgsdfgwrgfwrifgi

I swear, the title of this post is extremely accurate. It reflects *exactly* what is going on in my head at the moment. What went on in my head yesterday, when I was supposed to post this. Topical Tuesday. I even had a topic (St. Lucy's Day), or exams (very topical for me, since I am going through them at the moment, albeit in a very different way than I've ever done before because I'm not taking them this year, but rather grading them... I swear, I'd rather take them!), or even the weather (we're having spring, I'm sure - all our lovely snow seems to be melting! Drat!)

But no. Before I had the chance to transfer my ideas to paper (or, more accurately, screen), they ended up in fhegiakfiutygihbhjgilwdjafgyg and *poof* I forgot the whole post. Until now. When I write it, it will still be up for an hour and a half before the next one (and much better one, I'm sure) ticks in. Not that it is a huge loss. I'm sure today's actual post will be much more thought-through and well-written than this one, not to mention the topic will not be lkhjefiudshfjkhfuiryifkdghfshdgfj.

In the meantime, though, let me muse a little over cbnsdjkghdgcsdcuhjasdgj:

Papers that need to be graded, need to be graded.

Jobs that need to be done, need to be done.

In English, you cannot write "they claims" and expect to get away with it. It are annoying!

Sometimes you have to make sacrifices. Sometimes they suck.

Friends are essential.

Suck it up!

Can you have your cake and eat it too? Won't we always try?

What's in a smile? When a person lights up when seeing you, should you draw hasty conclusions?

We want what we can't have, we hold on to what we don't need, and sometimes it's impossible to see the difference.

It doesn't matter what you believe in. Believe.

Yoga and boxing.

Wsdofhudgfiuweyjkcfjdyfuweudpqwuiryfwyfuvjgai.

TGIF

So I have about half an hour to cobble something together for today's post before I have to get ready for work. Yup, as usual, I have procrastinated until almost the very last moment before opening up Blogger. *shifty* You may notice that we have a new label today - 'Friday Free For All' - which is brilliant because this means I can ramble about anything. *shifty once more*

We are back to our regular five-a-week schedule at last! This is excellent news for me because, while the summer break was probably a very good idea for all involved, the lack of posting obligations has made my writing efforts of the last couple of months virtually non-existent. *shifty for the third time in a row* 

Anywho...

There are several things I could ramble about today. I could remind everyone of the two WriMo challenges which are on the horizon. Next month's NaBloWriMo, and the infamous NaNoWriMo in November. But I'm pretty sure that there are going to be infinite blogs spouting WriMo info at you during the course of the next few weeks.

I could put together a few paragraphs about my relief at resuming a fairly normal work schedule, not least the fact that I have returned to the relative freedom of only working 16 hours a week again. *sighs blissfully*

I'm pretty sure that wouldn't interest the majority of you, though.

I could, perhaps, venture on the subject of the imminent Facebook changes, which made 'big' news yesterday. I could wax lyrical about the inevitable complaints that will spring up in people's status updates over the next few weeks (until everyone gets used to the changes and completely forgets about how the 'old' Facebook looked like anyway).

Again, I foresee a good amount of blog posts covering this topic in the very near future, so I don't think my efforts will be required.

Maybe I could witter on about the fact that I don't know what I should blog about (as usual), and so I am just typing and typing and hoping a post will come together at the end of it.

Shoot. That's what I always do. *is four times shifty*

Anyway, here I am, it is Friday, and I have stuck to form and rambled about nothing in particular (which strangely fits in quite well with our old 'Who Am I Friday?' label). And so Burrowers, Books & Balderdash presents its first 'Friday Free For All' post for your (dis)pleasure. It's not much, but really, what do you expect to get when something is free? *is surely not going to say 'five times shifty' here*

*coughs*

Anyway... it really is nice to get back to our five-a-week schedule again, and I'm honestly looking forward to composing some tidy posts (apart from this one, obviously) in the future.

Have a great weekend, everyone, and see you all next week!


Image borrowed from here.

Just A Few Words...

Hmm, we are back at the 'Who Am I Friday' thingy, are we? Last time I fudged my way through the subject by giving you a fairly detailed account of a typical Tara Day. That was one of my better ideas, I have to admit. So what do I do this time? Well, after having spent a virtual day with me, I figured another good way to 'get to know' me would be to throw some adjectives at you, and some alphabetised adjectives into the bargain too. *nods* Youknowzitmakezsense, like innit?

So... *clears throat*:

I can be very annoying. Really, I can. I think my most annoying foible is saying 'in a minute'. I'm pretty sure I drive my kids and the hubby loopy several times a day by uttering this lie, because it is a lie, trust me. Whenever I say 'in a minute', I actually mean 'sometime today, when I can be bothered'. *shifty*  I'm also pretty bitchy. It's a horrible trait, I know, but I just can't help myself. On the plus side, my bitchiness is usually fairly humorous (except for the person it is aimed at, obviously), so at least I provide a giggle or two. Which can only be a good thing, because I need laughter to counteract the moodiness. Yup, I get really cranky, and far more often than I should.

So three adjectives in, and none of them are pretty attractive, it must be said. Good job we're on 'D', cause I like this one. *grins* As most of my friends - cyber and real-life - will tell you, I'm pretty delusional. And proud of it, too. We all need a little crazy in our lives or we'd go, well, crazy, ifyouknowwhatimean. Being delusional is good. *nods*  Being efficient is good too, as well as being fair, and I'm pretty sure I'm both of those. At least, I try to be at any rate.

Keeping with the nicer stuff, I am also giggly. Extremely giggly, in fact. I find humor in almost everything, which can sometimes lead to trouble, especially seeing as I have a bit of a dirty mind. Oh alright, my mind is almost always in the gutter, I admit it. But it's just so damn funny down there with the dirty. *winks* Plus being giggly goes pretty well with being humorous, which while not my strongest 'talent', is certainly worth a mention. 

Back to the not-so-nice stuff now I guess. You see, I can be very irritable. Some days something as stupid as rushing to tie my shoes with my suddenly ten-thumbed hands sets me off, and the tiniest of things will continue to bug me for the rest of the day. I suppose that's similar to to being cranky, but 'i' is a pretty tough letter, you know? But not as tough as 'j', which I can't think of anything at all, apart from 'jolly', which reminds me of Santa, and I'm not sure I like comparing myself to an extremely overweight elderly bloke with a white beard. Hmm, tricky.

Moving on to the letter 'k', and I think I'll go with 'kind' on this one. Not trying to blow my own trumpet or anything, but I'm generally a kind person. Aside from the bitchiness part of me, obviously, but that is only saved for people who really deserve it, and luckily I haven't come across many people like that over the years.

So that I don't sound like I'm stroking my own ego here, I'm going to dive straight into 'l' and tell you that I'm lazy. Very, very lazy. Not in the shirking work kind of way, but in the There Aren't Enough Sleeping Hours In The Day kind of way. If I could sleep for twelve hours out of twenty four, I'd be very happy. I just love to sleep. Probably because in reality I find it hard to sleep more than four hours in one go, so sleeping for twelve hours straight is a bit of a fantasy. Still, I am lazy.

I guess for 'm' I'd have to say I was maternal. Even before I had my kids I was mothering people, it's just in my nature to look after everyone. *shrugs*  Along with my mothering instinct is my urge to nag. I'm a natural-born nagger, it has to be said, and honestly, it's kind of a motherly thing to do for the most part, because generally my nagging is for the good of the person I am nagging at. *nods firmly* Again with the motherly stuff, I'm over-protective. There's not much to add to that except to say that any parent out there will know what I mean.

Most of you know already that I'm a procrastinator, so nothing really needs to be added to that, and I've also been described as 'quirky' (mostly after people have read my Taff blog posts, to be fair), but I'm pretty sure most of you know that by now too.  And although I have debated in the past about the true so-called randomness of being random, I've been called that a fair number of times too.

But what may come as a surprise is that I am generally quite shy, at least, on first meetings at any rate. It takes a while for me to feel comfortable enough to say more than a few words. Which is probably good now that I think about it, because once you get to know me I don't know when to shut up, so these initial times of virtual silence should be enjoyed while they can. You see, I'm very talkative. I can prattle on about anything and everything, without even knowing what I am prattling on about half of the time. My mouth runs about three seconds ahead of my brain too, which isn't always the best of things...

Now we get to 'u', and I'm not sure whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, because all I can think of is that I am a very understanding person. This works out well in some ways, but not so when I am overly so. It gets that I can be so understanding that people walk all over me, and while I know this isn't a good thing, I don't always do anything about it. I enjoy a quiet life, you see, with as little disturbance as possible. This shouldn't really be such a problem for me, because I can be really vile when I want to be. It links back to the whole bitchiness thing. Sometime even I can't believe the nastiness of my own thoughts. Thankfully, being the cautious person that I am, I am wary of speaking these nasty thoughts out loud for the most part, so I get to stick to my quiet life.

Um, I can't think of anything for 'x', so I'm going to pretend that you didn't read this bit. *shifty* And as for 'y', well the only adjective that springs to mind is 'yummy', but that probably has more to do with the fact that I'm still digesting my Chinese take-away treat of an hour ago...

And as for 'z', well there really is only one word that can be used to describe myself that starts with that particular letter, and that is 'zany'. OK, so this is basically the same as 'delusional', but I've been awake since half four this morning, it's now half eleven in the night, and I have to be up again at four thirty tomorrow (which is actually 'today' for you guys seeing as I wrote this on Thursday night), so I think I can get away with it. *shifty once more*

And that's all folks. Not even a picture for today (that would be my lazy streak), but I spent a little time making my adjectives bold and colourful, so I'm not going to worry too much about pictures...

Happy New Year! And may 2011 be fruitful for one and all!

Delusional Thursday - Doomed

Before I go any further, I should probably warn you that this post is filled with doom. Not just any old doom, but the doomiest doom in the history of doominess.


OK, maybe it's not as bad as all that, but I can be a Drama Queen when I want to be. And I have a habit of exaggerating, not to mention taking things just ever so slightly out of context.*shifty*

Anywho, 'doom' is the word of the day (actually, it's the word of the month for me apparently). *nods* I could tell you that I've already failed NaNoWriMo (I know, there's still a few days left in November, but honestly, I really don't see me writing 30k words in the next five days), so that's pretty doomy. Though to be truthful, quite how I was supposed to write a 50k word novel while my hubby decided to get knocked from his motorcycle, my son got himself kicked off his course for threatening someone with a hammer, my daughter decided to turn into Regan from The Exorcist (seriously, I swear I saw her head rotate last week), my two cats almost died from toxic poisoning from the stupid 'flea repellent' that I used on them, the house was suddenly flea infested, AND my health decided to take a holiday for the past four weeks... well, it just wasn't happening.

See, this is my life. If something bad happens, you can bet that several more bad things will swiftly follow. And sometimes these things are so bizarre that they honestly couldn't happen to anyone else. Or at least, that's how it seems to me. Obviously I am doomed.

I'm a bit odd when it comes to doom. Well, a wee bit evil to be perfectly honest. I enjoy spreading doom, it brightens my day. Oh, not serious doom - I'm not (nor ever have been) naturally inclined towards cruelty - but when it comes to writing stories, I like a good dose of doom to be included. And if I can make a few people cry, all the better. I'm just evil that way. There's something about doomy books that calls to me; some people call these books 'dark', but that doesn't sound nearly as fun as 'doomy', and frankly, 'dark' suggests seriousness, while 'doom' (and my personal variations of the word) can be interpreted in a number of ways.

e.g.:

Doom - Bad. Very bad.

Doomy - Bad. Very bad, but with the possibility of comic tones.

Doominess - Still bad, very bad, but most likely will contain elements of a slightly moronic nature.

DOOMED - This one shouldn't be confused with 'doomed', as, like 'doom', 'doomed' is still 'bad, very bad', but by capitalizing the word. we have 'DOOMED' instead, which is the Elrond of Lord of the Rings kind of doomed. You don't know what that is? Well, you are obviously doomed. DOOMED I say!!

So anyway, as I was saying, I like to include doom in my writings. I also like to include humor as and when I can, and sometimes include both if at all possible. But doominess is my very favourite thing to write. Probably because my life often feels full of doom. Or even DOOM sometimes (which is slightly more doomier than 'doom').

Anywho... howzat for delusional? Youknowzitmakezsense! See you next week, when I am scheduled for the 'Who Am I' post? That should be fun. I think I'll need to research a bit for that one...

Image courtesy of publicdomainimagesdotnet

Delusional Thursday - What Will I Blog About?

Yes, I know - the title is hardly inspiring, but it does exactly what it says on the tin (as we say here in the Kair of Diff). As usual I am having slight (major) palpatations because it is my turn to write for the Burrowers. It doesn't matter what the pre-selected subject is, I still panic when I have to come up with something for this blog. Being a bit of a nutter, Delusional Thursday blog posts should be right up my street, but I always feel a bit of pressure when I write for the Burrowers. I mean, if it was just my own blog, I wouldn't care - take me as you find me anallat (youknowzitmakezense!) - but I at least try to be a little bit sensible when I'm representing my writing group.

Anyway, regarding the subject for today's ramble blog. Yup, it's 'Delusional', which can cover a lot of things, but what exactly do I pluck from the plethora of silly subjects?

First I thought I'd do a bit of Taffing - you know, silly spellings and what-not - but then I realised that I always fall back on Taffing when I can't think of anything to blog about, so I should try something else instead. Which is a right bluddy shame ifyouknowzwharrimean, coz I loves Taffing, I do, I loves it.

Then I searched through the dusty corners of my brain and tried to find something that I haven't blogged about before (on my other blog, that is), but do you know what? I think I've probably covered most of the delusional stuff already (almost every single blog post I have ever written could be classed as delusional for the most part or, failing that, just plain old silly).

I mean seriously, I've covered lamonized limed lemons, wobbly sausages, asteriskisms, made-up words, talking beer bottles.... well, you get the idea. Even typos (which are the bane of my life) have been covered. What's a girl to do?

Of course, this is exactly what I am like with all aspects of writing. Unless I am struck by Inspirational Lightening, I'm usually stumped. When it's fanfic, I tend to read other samples to try and get me back in the fanfic mood, and it usually does the trick. With my original stuff I tend to - when not staring blankly at the screen - listen to mood-inducing music and hope that my fingers will do more than drum to the beat. With blogs, however, I do something different. Or several things different, to be more precise.

My first port of call is Google. Google is fab, it really is. You can find anything on there (which is just as well seeing as it is a search engine). I particularly like Google Images, because there's always that random naughty picture in there somewhere no matter what you type in the search bar, and it always makes me giggle. I'm just odd that way. *shifty*

Of course, when you are searching for a topic to blog about it can be tricky to use Google, seeing as how you need to type something into the toolbar to begin with, and if you can think of something to type, there probably isn't any need to search for a subject. Hmm, perhaps I should blog about overly long sentences. Or pointless Google searches. Anyway....

If Google doesn't help (which is fairly often if I'm really stumped), I start walking around the house looking for something - anything - that could be used to inspire a paragraph or ten. This can really work sometimes. Back last year I was having my usual panic attack one night when I spied my cigarettes and remembered the escapade involving missing cigarettes and possible sightings of Casper the Non-smoking Ghost - hey presto! A blog post! (And yes, I'm a smoker, shoot me now if you like. Though honestly, shooting me would probably kill me, and most people nag at smokers because of the effect on their health, so killing me seems a bit silly. Though if you would like to shoot me because you just can't abide smokers as it is a filthy habit, crack on. I can't stand smokers either, and truly wish I had the will power to give the bloody things up).

Anywho, today Google didn't help me, so I decided to clean (as you do). Going through each room I looked at books, clothes, random objects in the kitchen (the bananas seemed to inspire for a moment or two, then I realised that anything I said about bananas was probably already mentioned in my wobbly sausages post), and just about everything really.

Nothing. Nada. Zilch.

So there we have it. I still don't have anything to blog about. Maybe next time, eh?

Image courtesy of publicdomainimagesdotnet

Why Do We Do It?

So here I am again at the eleventh hour (actually it's the twenty-second-th hour of the day as it's 10pm on the night before this blog post will be published, but you know what I mean), wondering (again) what the heck I'm going to blabber about. It's the same every time my turn at blogging comes around. I never ever have a clue about what it is I am going to talk about. Usually I manage to cobble something together at the last moment, but I am almost out of time here and I'm still pretty stumped. I'm a little twitchy - well, bordering on panicking in actual fact - because if I don't get something written NOW, then nothing will appear at midday tomorrow.

Accckkkk!!

This actually sums up my entire writing history now that I think about it. I dither, I find other things to do (usually some sort of cleaning), I decide it's time to read that book that's been sitting on my shelf for the last six months, I - well, I think you can get my drift here.. Anything will do, as long as I don't have to sit down and do anything constructive.

It's not that I don't enjoy writing, because I do. Obviously I do, or I wouldn't be sat here tonight rambling away. I write for this blog because my collaborators are my friends, and writing friends at that. We joined forces because we all shared a love of creating a little magic with the written word. It just seems a little odd that considering it is something that I love so much, I find it really hard to knuckle down and get to it.

So why do I do it?

I don't know what it is precisely that drew me to writing in the first place. I guess I was initially attracted because I love to read. I think most writers start off as avid readers. Creating a story, be it a one page short or a 1,000 page novel, isn't something you can do if you don't hold a little love for the written word. It's a thankless task in  most cases. It's not like the majority of us get paid for our work. How many people would go out to work without pay, I ask you. Aside for voluntary work for charities and what not, not many people would keep slogging away at something if it wasn't paying towards their bills.

Yet writing is different. It's not a job, it's not something we need an alarm clock to get us out of bed for. For the serious writer, writing is something that we simply have to do. It could be that nobody will ever read our work, but we still do it. Unless we are incredibly lucky as well as hard-working, it's pretty likely that most of our work will never go beyond our hard drives or that dusty drawer at the back of our desks. Not that I'm trying to depress you or anything, I'm just stating fact.

You would think that this would be disheartening, but I actually think it works in our favour, We can be knocked back many times, and we can maybe spend years trying to hook that elusive agent or publisher, but no matter how many times we get discouraged, there's always a chink of hope, and it is this hope that I believe gives us, as writers, a little edge.  The chance that maybe that day will come when people, beside your friends and family (and in my case, my fellow Burrowers), will read your work and think Damn, that was good! (or words to that effect) keeps us going.

Of course, you have to actually get something written in order to be in with a chance of getting published. *shifty* Which brings me back to the eleventh hour thingy. I can write, I know I can. I'm not trying to big myself up here, but it's true. When I kick my butt into gear and make myself work on something, I get it done. But the funny thing is, I tend to write better when I am rushed. The stuff that I write when I force myself is passable, maybe even good, but when I hit the Panic Stage of a project, that is when I'm at my best and I can churn out thousand word chunks of story in one writing session (as opposed to twenty words, a dozen games of Bejeweled Blitz, and an hour wasted browsing on Facebook in ordinary 'writing sessions').

Although it's annoying to be this way, and I really wish I wasn't so much of a procrastinator sometimes, it's actually quite nice too. I mean, these crazy writing session that, okay I admit it, are a rarity, show me that I'm not being an idiot by thinking of myself as a writer. When the Frenzied Muse strikes I get such a buzz, it really is incredible. I don't think I've ever had such a feel-good vibe happen to me at any other time. Only writing can give me that super-high, and this is what keeps me going, despite the months that drift by without anything really happening on the creative front. It's always there, this writing thing, and no matter how much I dither and find other things to do, it's always waiting for me to return.

Writing, at least for me, is like a friend. I can turn to it in my hour of need (nothing like writing an angsty thousand worder to get things off your chest), I can vent my frustrations by being horrible to a character that truly deserves it, and I can 'spread the love' by penning something light and frothy. And the good thing about this friend is that it never judges me. I could write ten pages of crap, and it won't roll its eyes and me and back away slowly, crossing its arms to ward me off.

And that's why I do it. Yes, my dream is to one day have something in print, but for the most part I am happy to know that if all else fails, I have something to fall back on. Friends can drift away, whether by accident or by force, but writing will always be my companion.

What about you? Do you write to live, or live to write?

Image courtesy of wwwdotpdphotodotcom

Reading Nonsense

It’s Reading Monday. Personally I have never quite understood what it is about Reading that makes it eligible for its own day here on our blog – I mean, we don’t have Bristol Tuesdays or Warwick Wednesdays, now do we? Nevertheless, Reading, Berkshire gets its own day. Understand it if you can.


I’ve never been to Reading, so I can’t tell you all that much about it (other than what Wikipedia informs me, but you can check that out yourself. Unless you accidentally click on some other language in the left sidebar on Wikipedia – you might end up get the page in Volapük [whatever language that is] or something. If you can understand that, you’re better than me! [Though the Volapük Wikipedia page for Reading isn’t all that informative, so I don’t reckon I’m missing out on much]).

However, since I don’t know much about the topic of this blog post I have done a little research in an attempt to assemble as much information as possible.

For instance, in addition to the one in Britain, there appears to be more places called Reading. In the US alone, there are (at least) eight Readings, and then also a North Reading, a West Reading and a Port Reading (I wonder, though, why there aren’t any East, South or Starboard Readings).

There are also a number of people by the name of Reading, most of whom are dead. Such as John of Reading (who died in 1346), Pierson B. Reading (who died in 1868) or Bertice Reading (who died in 1991). There are several people named John Reading, and again, many of them are dead. Not to worry, though, there is a Peter Reading who is still alive, so it is too hasty to conclude that there is a connection between the name Reading and death rates.

“Reading” can also refer to certain activities. For instance, in legislature reading refers to “the mechanism by which a bill is introduced”. How clever. In computer wizardness, “reading” is “the act of a computer extracting data from a storage medium”. Speaking of mediums, in divination “reading” can refer to any number of ways of predicting the future. Reading tea leaves, reading palms, reading other types of tropical trees, reading omens and reading cards.

Finally, “reading” is also a process, apparently. Again I consulted Wikipedia: “[Reading is a] cognitive process of decoding symbols to derive meaning from text”.

I have no idea what that means. I think I’ll find a book instead.

It's Random, Jim, But Not As We Know It.

One of the best things about writing for this blog is that every day has a specific subject that all contributors have to adhere to. For someone like me, who dithers about everything and everything, including which subject to blog about on her personal blog, this should be perfect, yes?

Sometimes it is, don't get me wrong - Delusional Thursdays could have been invented for me, for example - but sometimes I struggle. I was almost suckered when I was due to write the Reading Monday post last week, but at the last minute I thought of something. Today's 'subject', being a Wednesday, is 'random'. Now this should be perfect for me seeing as every single post on my own blog could probably be termed as 'random' (on a good day, that is, mostly they are generally insane), but I was (and still am, to be truthful) more than a little stumped. I thought I had a brainwave yesterday (which, as you'll be reading this on Wednesday, is technically the day before yesterday, as I am typing this on Tuesday, which is now the real yesterday, as opposed to the yesterday that I first mentioned) afternoon, but instead of getting my butt on the chair and typing, I procrastinated (as per normal) and ended up leaving it. I still had time, after all, seeing as the blog was not due to be posted until Wednesday, right? Only I work every Wednesday and Thursday morning and am out of the house between 5am and 11am, so writing a blog and having it ready to post by noon is just not happening.

Anywho, getting back to the subject (what was it again? Oh yes, random), I had a couple of ideas this morning. Hurrah! First I thought I'd use the subject literally, and write about what random actually means. But then I realised that I would have to take the subject quite seriously if I wanted to explain it properly, and 'me' and 'serious' aren't usually two words you'd find in the same sentence.

Then I thought I'd use my trusty friend Mr. Google, and type 'random' in the search bar. There's bound to be plenty of stuff to blog about after a Google search, yes? *rolls eyes at self* Only I didn't really find anything that caught my eye, and picking a random 'random' was not really, well, random, after all, so it didn't feel right anyway.

And that's when it hit me. Random rarely is random.

Ask someone to say something random, and you'll probably get either a shrug accompanied with a blank stare, or a few seconds of silence while the person in question tries to think of something incredibly witty to say. Neither response is random now, is it? Sure, there might be one or two random responses in every ten, but mostly the answers are about as far from random as you can get.

I oversee a fanfiction awards thread on a Harry Potter fansite, and every month there is a 'Random Pick of the Month', but strictly speaking, the pick isn't random at all. I have a system of sorts that I use when choosing the 'random' pick; I make sure I pick something from the back pages of the forum that perhaps hasn't been read for a while and needs the advertising, then I make sure that the story hasn't been voted for that month (again because I like to use the random pick to highlight something that needs the spotlight), then I check previous listings to make sure that the story hasn't been a random pick too recently, and lastly I make sure that the story is in fact a story, and not a collection of short fictions/one shots. By the time I've done all this, I'm not left with many stories to choose from, so while I try to be as random as possible (I close my eyes and hover the cursor up and down a page and stop when I feel like it), I end up discarding a few choices every month because they don't fit my system.  So the 'Random Pick' is really the 'The Story That Is Really Good That Hasn't Been Voted For This Month And Fits Tara's Wonky System Pick Of The Month', but that's not as spiffy sounding as 'Random Pick' now, is it?

Random just doesn't really work for me, I guess. It's exactly the same as when someone says 'don't think of an elephant', and immediately you of course think of an elephant. It's just not happening. Random will never be random when you are given time to think. I could have blogged about any subject in the world, but it wouldn't have been random because I would have consciously chosen the topic.

Instead I chose to ramble, which, if you stretched it a little, could be termed as random anyway. And in the interests of trying to stay on the subject of randomness, I propose a little challenge. When you get to the end of this post (if my blathering hasn't completely scared you off, that is), go to the comments section and type the first thing that comes into you head. The very first thing, mind you, so no trying to think of something awe-inspiring or hysterically funny. The very first thing.

Go on, I dare you.

Image courtesy of public-domain-imagesdotcom