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A Guide to Good Service in a Snotty Restaurant


A Guide to Good Service in a Snotty Restaurant

If you thought I was obsequious, have another think.
I was merely being cordial to get another drink.
The wait staff there was surly so I thought I would be nice,
although it seemed that in this joint, being cuddly was a vice.

There was some ambiguity in regards to being served.
It seems as though they gave the service they thought we deserved.
We couldn’t get attention with our arm-waving and hooting,

but luckily, before we came, we’d done some target shooting.

I put a bullet in the chamber and aimed it at the ceiling, 
and when our waiter heard the blast, he changed his way of dealing
with the placid customer at table number five.
It seems the way to win respect was leaving him alive.

He brought my gin and tonic with nary a snide quip.
He brought my crudités and even brought an extra dip.
And he didn’t raise an eyebrow or even curl his lip
when I left the restaurant without leaving a tip!!

 

Prompts for today are: chamber, blast, cuddly, obsequious and ambiguity. Image by Lefteris Kallergis on Unsplash.

When Last We Saw Zoe. . . .

Click on photos to read the tale.

Heliconia, FOTD May 21, 2022

This is the second bloom on my new heliconia plant.

For Cee’s FOTD

An Apologia for Gasconade*

 

An Apologia for Gasconade*

This poem, per se, is not profound, in fact it’s rather frowsy.
As poems go, I fear that it is going to be lousy.
Pretentiousness in meter, a travesty in rhyme,
I really fear that reading it will be a waste of time.
Its sheets will become linen, its walk a promenade.
The entire verse will turn, I fear, into a gasconade.*
If you see more than this in it, you’re seeing pareidolia.*
If you don’t know what this is, kindly refer to the scholia!.*

 

Prompts today are frowzy, per se, pareidolia, gasconade and linen.

*A gasconade is extravagant boasting or bragging. *A pareidolia is a psychological phenomenon in which the mind perceives a specific image or pattern where it does not actually exist, such as seeing a face in the clouds.

*Sesquipedalian  describes someone or something that overuses big words, as some of the prompt sites have lately.

*Scholia are grammatical, critical, or explanatory comments – original or copied from prior commentaries – which are inserted in the margin of the manuscript.

Blame the “Sesquipedalian” on me, as well as the  “scholia ,” which  was very handy as a rhyme for “pareidolia,” which I’m not responsible for.”

Nomenclatural Revenge

Nomenclatural Revenge

My repulsive nickname is an affront to my pride.
Whoever might have coined it most assuredly has lied.
When I queried who the rascal was, the usual rumor was
that nasty girl Rebecca, and the reason was because

I was dating Walter, the one she lusted for,
but who, because he prefers me, continues to ignore
the bodacious Rebecca, remaining in my arms
just because he prefers my  considerable  charms.

In spite, that bitch Rebecca says the name “Clock Face” should fit
because my face has passing time written all over it!
So I have coined a name for her. I’m going to call her “Lips”
for all the food  passed through them that’s recorded on her hips!

Kiss-off, Rebecca!

 

Prompts today are clock face, bodacious, query, rumor.First image by Glen Hodson on Unsplash. Second photo by me.

Memory


Memory

The excavation of our memories can glue us to the past,
unearthing shards of former lives into which we’ve been cast.
Our mind a virtual theater that draws us through its curtain,
sometimes half-remembering and hardly ever certain
of what is fact and what is mind’s creative fabrication—
the truth eluding us a bit in time’s confabulation.
Its draw narcotic, we accede once more to its allure.

Is it history or fable? How can we know for sure?

 

Prompts for the day are theater, allure, elude, excavation.Second Image by Tsunami Green on Unsplash. All others by me.

CFFC: Triangles and Squares

Click on photos to enlarge.

For Cee’s CFFC Challenge.

The Behavioral Linguist in Love: May 17, 2022

The Behavioral Linguist* in Love

A thoughtful, scientific man, he chose his words with care.
No ordinary words would do. Only ones most rare.
He first spied her in the springtime, finally met her in the fall—

a simply gorgeous maiden—comely, willowy and tall.
But months of choosing his first words seem to have done him in.
What should have been his saving grace turned out to be a sin.

Enthusiastic in his love, he just had to express
his much-gone-over feelings about her loveliness.
He’d formerly determined not to use just any word,
but his final declaration turned out to be absurd.
He should have called her beautiful and just left it at that,
for when he called her pulchritudinous, she thought that he meant fat!

 

*Note: New to the world of behavioral science, Behavioral Linguistics is the science-based use of language to persuade. It’s rooted in nudge theory combined with psychology, sociolinguistics, and principles of marketing. Language is a powerful way to change behavior.

Prompts today are behavioral, enthusiastic, pulchritude, fall.  Images by Fabio Lucas and   Mandy Zhang on Unsplash.

Fuchsia: FOTD May 17, 2021

 

For Cee’s  fOTD

Impressionable Dozer

Impressionable Dozer

The whole house is sleeping—the dogs and the cats
on the chair and the sofa and their cushy mats.
Even the air seems stilled in its rush.
I am calmed by its torpor and lulled by its hush.

Although there are labors I know I should do,
I survey my agenda and plan it anew.
It’s hot in my bedroom, but the sofa looks nice.
I go to the kitchen for water and ice.

Then I grab my computer and spread myself out.
With no one to disturb, as there’s no one about,

I may nod off myself before long, but I hope
that I’ll finish this first, but as you can see…..

Nope.

The dVerse Poets prompt today is to write a Quadrille on the topic of sleep. Ironically, just before looking up the prompt, I had just taken the above photos and was thinking of writing about exactly that topic. Thus, this poem that half-fills the bill. Not a quadrille, but I really did fall asleep before finishing it so I should get double points for succumbing that fully to the prompt..

Now, guess where I am headed?