The Bag Lady

Fandango’s Flashback Friday — March 20th

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He thought it would be easy. Unfortunately for the rest of us, he learned the hard way. You don’t enter the schoolyard ready for a fight with no backup. He shouldn’t have challenged the biggest, already sore from the last fight, boy in school, especially after calling down all your former friends. But that’s what bullies do; big, crazy boys who think they’re omnipotent.

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The Friday Reminder and Prompt for #SoCS March 21, 2026

Childhood mission, pick some berries
Gathered our pails for well worn trails
Picking berries
Our favorites being
Strawberries tiny
On green grass hills
We knew so well
But no, the order was for gooseberries
Sweet spiky orbs that prick little fingers

**we dared each other to eat them, sharp but sweet😎

Weekend Writing Prompt #460 – Gooseberry

I woke up, unfortunately I was on my way to work…driving…no memory of getting out of bed, dressing, or even a cup of coffee! I panicked and pulled over on the side of the street. At least I wasn’t on the highway! I recognized neighbor Jerry’s, trash can on the sidewalk. The street ahead held an unusual, new, traffic sign. My head started to spin with the worst headache ever and my car just started driving me towards the sign. When closer, I saw a huge circular disk. I was transported inside it, asking, “Is this the Twilight Zone?”

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20 March 2026

Monday Poetry Prompt: Condition, Five, Rapid

This week let’s write a poem with the words condition, five and rapid in it. This is another of those prompts where I randomly choose three words from a list of the top 1000 words in the English language plus a few of my favorites. Post your poems in the comments below.

Never counted to ten or even five

Never thought of risking lives

Rapid as striking a match

Condition red threatening to open a latch

Fumbling fingers a toddler might hatch

Thinking it a game, a winnable dispatch

Sadly for the boots on the ground

And airmen in planes flew around

These lives expendable the toddler thought

His gaming continues as the golf he plays

It was a deal he thought could be bought

And I have to ask, how many days

Will bombs and rockets fly

And we sit at our screens, watching them die.

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My response as https://rugby843.blog to this poetry challenge:

POSTED BY BARTHOLOMEW BARKER ⋅ MARCH 16, 2026 

“You can’t just divorce yourself from generations of family memories. They’re included and accepted with each member relying on love and forgiveness. When you inherit your husband or wife’s family, you also welcome all the personalities, their strengths and their foibles. No matter how you want to miss the problems that may occur, there is an invisible glue that held all these people together over the years.”

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MLMM Monday Wordle #468

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You respond with something CREATIVE. Perhaps an  answering photo, or micro-fiction, or a poem, or just a caption

As before, there are only two criteria:

!!!!! Your creative offering is indeed yours !!!!!

!!!!! Your writing is kept to 150 words or less !!!!!

If you post a link in the comments section of this post I’ll be able to find it.

Here’s wishing you inspirational explosions. And FUN

Crimson’s Creative Challenge #078

Every remark caustic

Buried under inadequacy

Every task a contest

Needed bravado

Each word a challenge

Easy outward manner

Zealous danger

Equal disdain

Reared temperament

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Meeting the Bar: Tell Me Your Name

We are all butterflies. The Earth is our Chrysalis – Goodreads

Trampling spring flowers in the garden

Destroying beauty, an act ardent

Personality fixed so young

To raise a child with all smiles masked –

As if her song already sung

How’s this possible you ask

A parents’ deliberate task

Tiny brain which no love has seen

Intervention now too late it seems.

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Reena’s Xploration Challenge #422

Sara clung to the deck chair as if it could save her. Her boyfriend Jim, yelled, “Jump! The boat is useless and in a few minutes it will sink!”

“Sara, being a pristine young lady with no experience, yelled back, “I’m not going to jump into that dirty water! It’s all muddy and black!”

Jim tried to dash over to help her and that’s when he fell in. He didn’t want Sara to drown, but he couldn’t reach her, the waves too strong. The last he saw of her in the storm was her grasping the wooden chair as if it could help her. It did not.

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Three Things Challenge #MM368