Weekend Writing Warriors February 26

Weekend Writing Warriors is a weekly blog hop where participants post eight to ten sentences of their writing. You can find out more about it by clicking on the image below.

Continuing the opening chapter from The Ashes of Home, Shayla escaped two assailants in her room, disguised as servants, by leaping out of her window into the grip of an artificial gravity field. They are held by the field, upside down on the overhanging eaves 70’ above the ground. Shayla has dealt with one, leaving one assassin remaining.

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Shayla backed carefully along the eaves, feeling her way over the joists and decorative moldings adorning the roof line. The wall at her side turned a corner. She glanced briefly upward over her shoulder to where the balustrade of her bedroom balcony hung a few feet above her head. ‘Gingallia’ followed the line of her gaze, and Shayla knew she’d spotted the guards lining the balcony, weapons ready. Their presence so quickly was a welcome sight. Someone must have already alerted them to danger long before the alarm triggered when Shayla used her escape route. Bard Jovin, her guard captain, took up a position just out of sight of her attacker.

Shayla thought she saw a flicker of calculation in the impostor’s eyes. She knows she can’t get off a shot before getting blown away.

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Sweet successes

With all the crap still in the news (Are we already on the campaign trail for 2020? Really?) sometimes it’s best to administer an antidote by celebrating some of the small wins in life.

Success #1

I discovered last year that I write best when I can listen to music on headphones. We have a family subscription to iTunes so we have access to a long list of titles but I’d always been signed in with Ali’s ID which means when I’m listening, she can’t. A family subscription should mean we can both access the store at the same time.

We went through an afternoon of frustration a few weeks ago trying to get this working, sifting through the clear-as-mud instructions on the interwebs (are we signing in or out of iTunes, iCloud, or the App Store, or all three at once? And was that my ID or Ali’s it wants here?) and going round in circles. In best bureaucratic manner we ended up with conflicting messages, first saying I needed to be added to family sharing, then saying I can’t be added because I’m already there. Meanwhile, no music.

Yesterday we had another crack at it, and got it working.

Bliss!

I can now download my own library without having to leaf through a load of artists I have no interest it.

Success #2

As a rule, we go more for savory foods than sweet. I’m much more inclined to go for seconds than for dessert, but once in a while a pudding makes a welcome change. Trouble is, apart from homemade cheesecake, I don’t normally do desserts.

A while ago, Ali’s brother bought us a book called Great British Puddings, full of mouth-watering recipes. I kept getting drawn to it recently, and finally decided to try one of the recipes.

I give you ... lemon sponge.

With custard, of course.

Ali is the baker in the family so she helped out, but the result was very pleasing. Trouble is, the kids enjoyed it too, which is why there’s so little left.

Weekend Writing Warriors February 19

Weekend Writing Warriors is a weekly blog hop where participants post eight to ten sentences of their writing. You can find out more about it by clicking on the image below.

Continuing the opening chapter from The Ashes of Home, Shayla escaped two assailants in her room, disguised as servants, by leaping out of her window into the grip of an artificial gravity field. The three of them are now standing, held by the field, upside down on the overhanging eaves 70’ above the ground. One attacked Shayla, who parried, causing the assassin to stagger backwards ...

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One foot found the edge of the eaves, and he stepped, without thinking, to keep his balance. But he was now half out of the edge of the grav field, and conflicting forces led his reflexes astray. He lost his balance. The planet’s natural gravity reclaimed him and he fell, shrieking, into the night.

The remaining assassin reached into her robes. Her hood had slipped, revealing a perfect likeness of Gingallia, one of Shayla’s senior personal servants. It also revealed eyes filled with fear and shock at her companion’s sudden demise. All the same, Shayla knew better than to underestimate her. She wouldn’t be here unless she was at the peak of her profession.

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Weekend Writing Warriors February 12

Weekend Writing Warriors is a weekly blog hop where participants post eight to ten sentences of their writing. You can find out more about it by clicking on the image below.

Continuing the opening chapter from The Ashes of Home, Shayla escaped two assailants in her room, disguised as servants, by leaping out of her window into the grip of an artificial gravity field. The three of them are now standing, held by the field, upside down on the overhanging eaves 70’ above the ground.

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The first one, the Barras lookalike (traitor or impostor?) swung his rapier. Shayla’s own blade flashed blue and met it with a jarring wrench.

A shimmerblade was a rare and fearsome weapon, highly prized by undercover agents as a weapon of stealth. When activated, the vibrating crystalline edge could shear through anything less than military grade vehicle armor--or another shimmerblade. But when two such blades met in hand-to-hand combat, the results were random and potentially catastrophic for one or both parties.

Shayla’s knife hand went numb. She barely managed to keep her grip on the hilt as she stumbled back against the wall towering over her head to meet the ground hanging impossibly above. But at least she had been prepared. She’d activated her shimmerblade at the last moment and knew what to expect. Her opponent staggered back in the other direction.

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It’s snow joke

I know I’m not an experienced winter driver, but I have driven on snow a number of times in the few inches we typically get around Victoria. I know to take things slowly - only light touches on gas, brake, and wheel - and to think much further ahead than usual. I’ve never had a problem getting to where I need to go.

Until yesterday.

We woke up Friday to an inch or so of snow on the ground, but it was still falling steadily. I got outside and shoveled the driveway clear. By the time I showered and dressed for work you wouldn’t know I’d been out there. Oh well.

We live in a dip at the bottom of a hill. Not normally a problem because our road is a school bus route and they always keep the road clear.

Not today. I guess it wasn’t yet bad enough for them to bother.

Regardless, it was still only a couple of inches. Shouldn’t be a problem. Ali set off ahead of me in the Expedition. That is usually my car but yesterday she needed to get into a parkade downtown so that left me with the much bigger truck. She got out of the slight rise at the end of our drive and made it up the hill.

I followed in the truck. Except I didn’t. She’d warned me that it was light at the back end and prone to slipping getting out of the drive and she was right. Rather than mess around with 4 wheel drive at this point I decided to head the other way. A few yards away there’s a side road that leads back up to rejoin our road - a long but fairly gentle uphill.

Shouldn’t be a problem for a big truck, should it?

Half way up, I realized I was losing speed and the slightest touch on the gas simply span the wheels. No way to keep up my speed. I came to a stop, engaged 4WD and tried to move. No dice. Worse, with each try I was drifting sideways towards the side of the road and a ditch. I stopped again and put my foot on the brakes to consider my next move.

To my horror, I noticed I was slowly but steadily sliding backwards down the hill! Let’s gloss over the next hour of rising panic as I tried to maneuver myself out of danger and back home. I can summarize it by saying I managed to reverse cautiously back to level ground, had another run at it which got me a bit further but not to the top, reversed to the bottom again and headed back the way I’d come only to be defeated by the rise at the exit onto our main road - so frustrating, I was literally across the road from our front hedge but couldn’t get out! I seemed to have absolutely zero traction to tackle the slightest incline. Reversed back to the bottom of that dip, along the way getting stuck across someone’s driveway where I mistakenly though it would be easier to turn around, before finally taking another more level side road and making it back home.

Apart from the sheer frustration, my biggest emotion at that point was profound embarrassment at my dismal failure. One or two smaller cars passed by during my skating exercises, seemingly oblivious to the slippery conditions. There was I sitting in a big 4WD truck completely helpless. I’m sure I must have made good entertainment for some of the neighbors!

To cap it all, I still don’t understand what I was doing wrong or what I could have done differently. Surely a vehicle like that should be able to handle a bit of snow and ice, shouldn’t it? Any thoughts from folks more experienced in those conditions?