#SoCS: Running

image courtesy of Wallup.net

It’s Saturday Sunday(!) again, and as always, time seems to have flown by since my last Stream of Consciousness Saturday post.  Time for a new one (with a new prompt I daren’t use here[against the”rules” this week, you see])…  especially since this week isn’t my WeWriWa post week and I missed my Wednesday WIPpet too.

Mostly I’ve been running away into an imaginary world created by Victoria Thompson in her Gaslight Mysteries novels.  Why I’ve been running?  Life has been…  interesting lately.  Not bad-bad-bad, but more emotionally difficult than I needed right now.

It’s my propensity for chasing after windmills and trying to fix problems that aren’t my own.

There are times I’d like to trade places with those that I am helping, to be the one receiving the help and not offering, not feeling obliged to give it.  And I do feel obliged…  not so much because I was asked to help (oddly, I’m less inclined to help when I am asked as when I sense a need and am not).

Eh…  I shouldn’t dwell on the crazy.  It’s almost a new week and, deals with God not withstanding, I don’t have to keep going this way.  Don’t have to look back to know what I need to do to go forward at the moment…  the path is clear (muddy, but clear).  The moon is lighting it well…

#SoCS — Oc(a)

This week’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday comes to you from the letter O and C and an idea perpetuated by Linda G Hill.  Additional support can be found at The Friday Reminder for SoCS, January 19.

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Varieties of Oca from Pintrest

Oca is the “oc” first word my computer dictionary (Wordweb) gave me.  Kind of obvious, really. What wasn’t obvious was that it was a traditional Andean food, though…  when you say the word, it feels right.

What I found interesting was that Oca is a kind of wood sorrel, the same group of plants commonly sold as Shamrocks (not the same as a true shamrock, which is actually a clover).  They do have pretty flowers, though the variety we find around here are very sour to the taste (from the oxalic acid in the plant, a mildly compound that can cause damage to the kidneys in high doses).

If you’re hungry though, it’s high in vitamin C and fiber and other nutrients.  The tubers are starchy (they weren’t imported to Europe as a substitute to the potato without reason).  Another common weed, like (the very tasty tubers of) nutsedge, that I explored for “survival foods” for a time when two of my characters must journey in the wilderness for a few years.

Oca…  it’s an interesting word.  It inspired a lot more thought than the first one that came to mind: occipital

#SoCS: The 6th,7th & 8th

I almost didn’t do a SoCS post today, but as it’s my week off from the Weekend Writing Warriors, I figured I should post something for the weekend.  That, and…  given this week’s quirky prompt and the piece of paper next to me (the summer camp form for Shakespeare & Co.), it seemed a fun fit.

And…  some fun would be a good thing for today.  It’s been a very…  different day.

Anyway, here is the SoCS prompt from Linda Hill’s blog:

Your prompt for #JusJoJan and Stream of Consciousness Saturday is as follows: read closely. When you’re ready to sit down and write your post, look to the publication (book, newspaper, permission slip from your kid’s teacher, whatever you find) closest to you, and base your post on the sixth, seventh, and eighth word from the beginning of the page. Enjoy!

Just so you know, I fudged here, since the 8th “word” was actually 2018. So instead I took Riotous, Company, and Enrollment as my three words.

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Instead of getting this post out sooner, I spent over eight hours in a crowded event hall with a riotous bunch of middle school kids while engineers and judges prowled between aisles of tables and chairs, asking questions, getting photographs…  it was the regional competition of Future City, and my son was part of his school’s team.

What’s that saying?  Neither rain nor snow nor heat…  Well, it seems those are child’s play when it comes to designing the city of the future for some.  This was the first year our son’s school didn’t offer the competition as a general elective for the 6th, 7th and 8th graders (it’s odd that this prompt fit today in so very many ways!) but instead made it a volunteer after school activity.  Seems that playing SIM City 4 and having to write an essay on what would be your ideal future city wasn’t cool…  and then all that designing a model?  That’s some hard stuff there…  especially the democratic process these kids had to use to get their ideas from the page onto the display.

At least, the sleet and freezing rain only made us late for the competition.  It didn’t damage the kid’s project, and no one got hurt getting there.

The competition was fierce.   We didn’t win, but… our little Catholic School won two awards for the great transportation our kids designed.  Maybe news like that will help increase enrollment in the program next year.

After that, a few families headed out to Five Guys for burgers and company...  and to discuss the projects we saw, the possible awards to aim for next year, and the upcoming basketball game at the school later in the evening.