Zip Thru Autumn 2

For September 28- October 4, the suggested prompt is Xenodochy in blogging, Why blog. I had to look up xenodochy and it means, according to most online dictionary, the reception of or extending of hospitality to strangers or foreigners. I guess xenodochy in blogging might mean strangers accepting our blogs with hospitality or we accept strangers to our blog with hospitality. Let's just use those meanings.
    When I thinks of blog readers, I don't exactly think of the readers as strangers. Somehow, I just accept them as friends even if I've never met them because if I think of them as strangers than I can't quite accept any interaction with them. I suppose if you think of your blog like a booth on a sidewalk or street where strangers can come and talk to you about their day or what they prefer on their hot dogs, you would be weary of them but on the web, you don't see their faces, you see the words they say or will say and that's quite easy to accept. I'm not saying I would blindly accept strangers just because they happen to visit my blog, I'm just saying it's easier to accept strangers if I don't see their faces.  I try not to think too much on this because if I did, it would stress me out.
    The second prompt, why blog, does suggest a lot of things to me but after blogging for so long, I no longer know why I blog, I just know I want to.

If you're a blogger, do you accept readers into your blog just like that or do you have to think about it? And do you need a reason to blog?

Thursday Art & Dinner Date With Rain: Hair

windswept

I'm joining in Rain's Art & Dinner Date with this week's theme, hair, so naturally I draw hair. It's not quite finish but it's close to it. Click on the images for a larger view. For more art and dinner, visit Rain's blog here.

windswept closeup

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Update: Here's the finished piece. Not really all that difference but I really do like the result. Click on the images for a larger views.

windswept, final version

windswept, final version, closeup

Zip Thru Autumn 1

Over at Blogging from A to Z blog, they are holding a Zip thru Autumn event. The idea is to post (in reverse from Z to A) on a bi-weekly schedule with whatever topic you want or you can use their prompts. I thought this is a good way to sort of prepare you for the A-Z challenge next year or just something to keep you blogging. For this, I'll probably just write random stuff that get unstuck from my head or whatever I thought to write at the moment and I'll use the prompts because I'm too lazy to think up new ones. More about the event here.
   
For September 21- 27, the suggested prompt is Zero excuses, Yearn to. It's rather lazy of me but I don't do a lot of blogging and have zero excuses for it other I didn't want to. I think it's sufficient to post twice or once a week. Every now and then, I had some yearnings to post more but the idea just went out of my head every time I think about it. Yes, it's nice to post more but I don't like to blog just so I can blog.
    I had posted (on this blog anyway) over 150 posts which I thought is pretty decent for almost two years. But I have noticed the amount each month are barely over seven posts which I suppose if I'm to calculate it, it's four posts per month which is still decent I think. But that's something I doubt I will ever change. If you're a blogger, are you posting more or less or the numbers doesn't matter?

Fiction: A Simple Quest

For Rachel's Tolkien Blog Party, she devised a Roll Your Own Middle-Earth Adventure Party Game where you use a six-sided dice or an online number generator to get numbers that corresponds to a statement and then you put together a tale. If you like to play go here.
    I had put together the results but I decided to write a long version using Words for Wednesday's prompts which for this month are provided by David M. Gascoigne and hosted at Elephant's Child's blog over here. This week's words are illustrator, judgement, insignificant, friend, creative, married and/or, myriad, quilt, product, lip-service, assemble, bask.  I didn't use illustrator, product, lip-service or creative.

I used random generator and the results are these:
You - #4 - Men
Your Quest - #3 - To find your family's lost heirlooms
Your Companions -  #1 - Aragorn, Legolas and Gimili
Your Adversary -  #6 - Shelob
The Outcome - #5 - You succeed, but just barely, and spend the trip home debating whether it was all worthwhile.

Fiction: A Simple Quest
"Bask, I am a simple man but sometimes I wish I could go on an adventure or two," said my friend Myriad but those might also be my thoughts exactly with one word different. Assembled there like a group of tired wanderers, Myriad, myself, Chase, Ranger and Nippip, sat around the table at the local pub after a long day of work.
    Never did I think I would have an adventure of my own but last week changed that. Last week, my father left this world. But he also left a bequest to find our family's lost heirloom but he did not specify what that was, only that we would know it when we see it. This bequest would have fallen to my elder brother but he had a limp and could not travel far and aside from that, there were his six young children, his wife, and an elderly mother-in-law to think of while I was untethered. At twenty, I was still considered a young lad with my round and youthful face.
     I was ecstatic about going on an adventure and yet, I did not know if I want to go alone or with others. I told my friends of my quest. They placed no judgement on me. They too, were insignificant, mild folks, who never never took journeys nor did anything dangerous. We lived each day as ordinarily as possible though why we thought ordinariness was a good thing, we did not know. Our imaginations rarely led us astray. Of the five of us, only Nippip had any type of adventure three years ago. A carriage ran over him while he tried to escape bandits as he was traveling with his family to visit his grandmother. But he complained it was not worth losing a leg for which he said marred him for life for no woman wanted to be married to a one-legged fool. He kept complaining about it every time he got some drink in him.
    After awhile, having drank enough and having no luck of what to do about the quest, I shuffled out of the bar and started home. My mind was not quite sober but I could still think almost clear enough to make my way home. Then I collided with someone.
    The man had pointed ears. He simply smiled and bowed. But this somehow caused anger in me and I insulted the man but then I apologized for being rude and began to move away. Why an elf would wonder through our little village at night, I did not care to wonder. He stopped me before I took another step. Perhaps I might liked a small talk with him about my troubles?
    Having no good sense, I agreed and we sat down on a little bench in front of the bakery. It was closed for the night as was every place. He was a good listener, this elf. At the end of our conversation, he advised me to get the help of Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli. Before he left me, he added, "None of us are perfect but we can be perfectly honest with ourselves." I was confounded by those words but I brushed them off and continued homeward.

The Tenth Annual Tolkien Blog Party Tag

This week (Sept. 18-24) is the Tenth Annual Tolkien Blog Party hosted by Rachel at The Edge of the Precipice. This is in celebration of all things related to J.R.R. Tolkien - the books, the movies, the world of Middle-earth. I'm not a big fan but I am somewhat a small fan ever since I saw the movies. I only read The Lord of the Rings this year. Today, I decided to answer the tag. For more about the party, go here.

1. Who first introduced you to Middle Earth? 
I have no idea but I probably saw a commercial for one of the movies. The Lord of The Rings movies were my first time that had anything to do with Tolkien.

2. Has your love of Middle-earth affected your life?
Not that I can say but I do appreciate the idea of such a place in existence even as a fictional place.

3. Have you ever dressed up like a Tolkien character?
No, but if I were to dress as one, I would prefer dressing as Lady Éowyn in armor.

4. What people in your real life would you want in your company if you had to take the ring to Mordor?
None I can think of as I do prefer to have people who knows magic and someone knows how to use a sword and can fight really well. I don't know anyone who could do those things.

5. What Middle-earth location would you most like to visit?
Rivendell? But only because it's the one I can remember aside from the Shire. The Shire sounds like a good place for a quiet visit. I think any place but Mordor, even if the evil people are gone from there, I doubt it would be a pleasant place for a visit.

6. Are there any secondary characters you think deserve more attention?
Treebeard, I really like his people's way of not rushing through things, never hasty in making decisions.

7. Would you rather attend Faramir's wedding or Samwise's wedding?
Sam (I always call him Sam) because there would be lots of food and one would not feel like they have to be too careful about what they touch or say. Let's just say Faramir's wedding would be a far too serious affair for one to truly enjoy.

8. How many books by J.R.R. Tolkien have you read?
If you count The Lord of the Rings as three books, then three, if not, then one.

9. Are there any books about Middle-earth or Professor Tolkien (but not written by him) that you recommend?
None that I can say.

10. List up to ten of your favorite lines/quotations from the Middle-earth books and/or movies.
There are many but I'll just list two from the books:

"I almost feel that I dislike you both, but do not let us be hasty." - Treebeard to Merry and Pippin, The Two Towers

"There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even though the end may be dark." - Aragorn, The Two Towers

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here are the questions if you want to answer the Tag:
1. Who first introduced you to Middle Earth? 
2. Has your love of Middle-earth affected your life?
3. Have you ever dressed up like a Tolkien character?
4. What people in your real life would you want in your company if you had to take the ring to Mordor?
5. What Middle-earth location would you most like to visit?
6. Are there any secondary characters you think deserve more attention?
7. Would you rather attend Faramir's wedding or Samwise's wedding?
8. How many books by J.R.R. Tolkien have you read?
9. Are there any books about Middle-earth or Professor Tolkien (but not written by him) that you recommend?
10. List up to ten of your favorite lines/quotations from the Middle-earth books and/or movies.

Fiction: The Queen's Hot Air Balloon

This September's Words for Wednesday prompts are provided by David M. Gascoigne and is hosted at Elephant's Child over here. This week's prompts are laboratory, devoted, ridiculous, happy, tenderly, sick and/or encouragement, diseases, formidable, unruly, vaccine, cricket. I used all the words but vaccine, just couldn't fit it.

Fiction: The Queen's Hot Air Balloon

Cricket, as she was known by her dearest families and friends, led a life devoted to her people, her family, her pets and her many varieties of interest. It was a life of ordinary but happy days.
    As the queen of Glanden, Cricket did not accept ridiculous or unruly behaviors. For her fur children, she gave some allowances but as for her family and everyone else, she demanded a serious demeanor.
    One day, the queen's family heard through their servants who heard it from other servants of grand people, the queen had purchased a hot air balloon. This, of course, roused Cricket's children and various relations. They gathered together and held a meeting in one of their houses. During the talk, they had hot pot and beer though they weren't dared if the queen had been present.
    By the end of the evening, the family had all voted in the negative. The queen must not be allowed to own a hot air balloon. She would be ridicule and perhaps even had her title taken away. Unsurprisingly, they were quite shocked by the price of the balloon. It was almost enough to buy a house. They could not bare having their inheritance spent in that way or so they all said but if they were being honest, they liked the idea and would have loved a ride in the balloon if allowed. They ended the meeting having selected the queen's favorite granddaughter, Queenie, to go and talk her out of it and perhaps return it and get the money back.
    Meanwhile, in her tea room, Cricket was pondering over the purchase. It had been an impulse, a sudden attack of want instead of need was what her grandmother would have put it. But it wasn't quite impulsive. They took a week to build to it and in that time, Cricket could have changed her mind several times.
    She took a sip of her mid-morning tea and sighed. Bright sunlight from the skylight filled the spacious room. There was a table, a few chairs, a large bookshelf with her favorite books, some portraits of her ancestors and a large comfortable couch. It was all hers. No one was allowed in the room without her permission aside from Gideon, her butler/man of all duties and her bodyguard, Stillman, a quiet woman in her late twenties. 
    Cricket put down the cup and looked up. From the skylight, she could see bits of gold. Yesterday morning, Master Jack, the owner of the balloon making shop, had personally shipped the hot air balloon to her roof and now it was guarded by two servants. The envelope was of a bright, golden color with random red birds - gold and red were two of her favorite colors. The basket was of similar gold and large enough for ten to twelve people. Cricket was not certain why she chose such a large balloon except that she wanted it be grand. No respectable queen would have a tiny balloon.
    Looking out the windows at her garden she tenderly caressed the British Shorthair on her lap. For a moment, she was distracted by Ginger's soft purrs but there was no forgetting the hot air balloon on her roof. She could pretend she was sick or caught some rare disease that caused her to purchase the balloon. No, she could not make such false claims. It was exactly the kind of behavior she was against. Then what good reason had she to purchase something so expensive, so unnecessary and so damm impractical? Sometimes she thought of herself as a rat in a laboratory being studied for whether she will misbehave or not. But of course if a rat was restrained one too many times, she would, of course, want to rebel.
    But the image she projected was a formidable, headstrong, respectable and calm individual. Not this indecisive person. She shook her head. It was impossible to pretend she had not done a foolish thing. If she was just another person without a title, if she was not a queen, she wouldn't regret it though her regret, if such thing was to be measured, it would be at 0.01%. So yes, it was a slightly mad thing that she had done.
    Standing quietly in a corner, Gideon stood with his eyes downward. He had always knew when to wait and when to leave.
    "Gideon, get my coat. And my goggles!" Cricket said and smiled.

Some Favorite Book Dedications

This week's Top Ten Tuesday is Books with Geographical Terms in the Title (Submitted by Lisa of Hopewell) but I'm not doing that. I'm listing some favorite book dedications. There aren't that many creative dedications since most authors just named names. I have read every book on the list aside from #7, #9 and #10. For more Top Ten Tuesday, visit That Artsy Reader Girl here.

01 -

For my housekeeper Mrs. Cuttlefish who I buried in the garden (Book 1)
For my grandfather Plantagenet Krisp, who never saw it coming (Book 2)
For my benefactress, Gwendolyn Greystoke, who was kind enough to vanish at sea (Book 3)
—  Ivy Pocket Series by Caleb Krisp, Barbara Cantini (Illustrator)

02 -

To the monkey and the frog. For an eternity of ten thousand tales.
— My Grandmother Sends Her Regards and Apologies (aka My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry) by Fredrik Backman, Translated by Henning Koch

03 -

For Boots and Sally and Alice and Gandolf, four very adventurous cats
— The Girl Who Sailed The Stars (aka The Girl, the Cat & the Navigator) by Matilda Woods with illustrations by Anuska Allepuz

04 -

To the heroine who saved me
— The Library of Ever by Zeno Alexander

05 -

For all my students
past, present, and future
May we all meet in heaven café
writing for eternity.
— Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg

06 -

For Larry and Danae
With apologies for using their swimming pool as the scene of a murder
— The Hollow by Agatha Christie

07 -

This book is dedicated to the voices in my head, the most remarkable of my friends. And to my wife, who lives with us.
— Anxious People by by Fredrik Backman, Translated by Neil Smith

08 -

For Sophie: look what you started.
— Premeditated Myrtle (Myrtle Hardcastle Mystery 1) by Elizabeth C. Bunce

09 -

To my cat-loving son and his sister, whose first word was "rock." And, of course, to my husband, who applied to be an astronaut. See you on Mars.
— The Lions of Mars by Jennifer L. Holm

10 - 

To everyone who would rather sit in a corner petting the dog than make conversations at a party: this one's for you
— Vespertine by Margaret Rogerson

Do you have any favorite book dedications?

Fiction: Mrs. Blake and the Ugly Immortal

This August Words for Wednesday prompts are provided by David M. Gascoigne and is hosted at Elephant's Child over here. This week's prompts are happen, truck, hollow, daffy, tired, joke and/or relationship, nature, true, home, aphorism, dragged.

Fiction: Mrs. Blake and the Ugly Immortal
Immortals are dreadful was what Mrs. Blake had to say about her experience though she really meant the opposite. She remembered things all too well but now and then, she would wonder if her mind had gone soft that night.
    It happened long ago or so said Mrs. Blake. That Friday evening, Mrs. Blake was walking home carrying three paper bags of groceries because Mr. Blake had been too lazy to have the car fixed and too lazy to go with her. As she walked, Mrs. Blake had thoughts. One was when she get home, she will call her lawyer to draw up papers to divorce her husband. Another was what to cook for dinner that Horace didn't like. A third was why was it the grocery store didn't offer free deliveries unless you spent 100 dollars or more. Mrs. Blake was three dollars short and she offered to pay it but the checkout girl insisted that's not how it's done. She gave Mrs. Blake a look of utter impatience while drumming her fingers on the cash register. There were ten or so people behind Mrs. Blake who were also looking impatiently at her. Mrs. Blake was too timid to go back and get another item which would have only taken her a minute or two but people, she believed, were impatient and more so, they were rude if you so much as delay them even for a second. She had a lot of unwanted experiences in that.

Reasons why I would purchase books for my library

This week's Top Ten Tuesday is Books I loved so much I had to get a copy for my personal library (Submitted by Alecia @ The Staircase Reader) but I will tweak it a bit to Reasons why I would purchase books for my library. When I say library, I meant one skinny bookshelf and I usually like to get paperbacks or occasionally, when the paperback has a really awful cover, then hardcovers. For more Top Ten Tuesday, visit That Artsy Reader Girl here.

Reasons why I would purchase books for my library:

01 - To re-read them in paper form —  I do re-reads when I don't want to read my current books or if I'm feeling particularly wanting to read a book in paper form since I now mostly read ebooks. I definitely prefer to re-read books in paper format rather than in ebook format.

02 - To love them — I don't know if that's true. Can you be loving a book if you just look at them on the shelf once in a while? Or if you flip through them thinking you might read them but end up not doing so?

03 - So I can have them — Yes, it's a real reason. I do have books that I have never re-read, I just have them after reading them only once. I don't particularly love them and yet, I don't know why I can't give them up.

04 - To display them — No one sees the books but me but I guess it gives me a certain satisfaction to see certain books around me. I suppose this is probably the same as #3. But I do only like to surround myself with books I have read and loved.

05 - To read them later — I would purchase books in paper format of books I haven't read before but I am sure I would love them which is a gamble because if I didn't love them, well, I guess it would be a pity. It's very easy to believe you would love a book even without reading them. I don't do this often because it can get very expensive.

06 - Impulse purchases — With impulse purchases, whatever reason I had when I'm at the store, somehow becomes different when I got the books home. Strangely, I haven't any impulses to buy books these days. I guess since I can borrow books from the library, there is no real reason to buy books unless I just go and make up a reason because who needs a reason to buy a book?

07 - 10 — Because they are books — So I really don't have ten reasons to list but for reasons I can't really explain, I just love owning books (in paperbacks or  hardcovers). My collection is small but it's better than not having any books at all. I think I saw in a movie or perhaps read in a book about a girl with a small collection of books that she kept reading over and over because that's all she have and yet, she enjoyed reading them which kind of makes me wonder if everyone has a small collection of books (even if it's just two or three books), then life would be wonderful but sadly, we can't consume books and live on them.

Do you purchase books to put them in your library because you love them or maybe you don't need any reasons to do so?

August With Agatha Christie

A study in murder

August was a stressful month work-wise so I read to sort of make the month easier. I think I was a bit too engrossed in reading to do anything else. I don't know what got into me but I just decide to read a whole lot of Agatha Christie, mostly Hercule Poirot mysteries but I didn't read the books in order since almost every single Christie book at the library has a wait list so I read in the order that is available to me. And I saw some movie/tv adaptations.

The books I read in August 2022:

Hercule Poirot series by Agatha Christie > link

01 - Murder on the Orient Express (A Hercule Poirot Mystery, 1934)
I guess I had too high an expectation but this was a decent read. What I like to know is why are Hercule Poirot's guesses so accurate? It's like he was all prepared or someone told him the answers before he got on the train but that's probably untrue because there are things readers could not possibly know.

Fiction: The Lake View

This August Words for Wednesday prompts are provided by Elephant's Child over here. This week's prompt is this image and/or gentle, ordinary, cards, simple, office.

Fiction: The Lake View
The mist is always there, just above the water, over the trees and blending in with the rest of the landscape. Its gentle screening makes one believe life is simple, ordinary. Or so the woman in 12B believes as she looks down from the windows of a high-rise building. She sits with a hot cup of black coffee and an empty mind. On this gray morning, there is the same light mist over the landscape. A man appears. The knapsack on his back weights him down as he walks. Little by little, he wades into the lake until he is knee deep, then waist deep and soon his head disappears below the surface. Is he really gone? She waits for a bit hoping he would return. But the surface of the water settles into a calm state. There is a beeping sound. She closes her eyes and rubs them. When she opens them, she is lying in bed. It must have been a dream. The clock on the dresser is beeping. It says 6:30.  
    As usual, she gets ready for work. After she gets her coffee, she goes to the windows and looks out. Below, the mist is there. A man appears with a knapsack on his back. He wades into the water. What is he doing? "Stop!" she cries out.
    Knee deep in the water, the man stops and looks up. Has he heard her? How could he have heard her considering the wide distance between them and the window panes are doubled layered. And yet, when he speaks, she hears his words. "Why stop? Can a man take his own life without interference?"