A Quake to Change Your World

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The low rumble barely registered in her subconscious. The small shakes of the bed were enough to pull her from her sleep.

"Great," she mumbled. "Gijs is having another asthma attack."

With a sudden jolt, the bed jumped across the floor and banged into the wall. The teddy bears and dolls tumbled through the air.

Her eyes flew open, able to see clearly in the darkened room. The roar filled the ears and the walls moved sideways. Beside her, her husband snorted.

"My god, he's still asleep!" She swung her arm out as hard as she could on the bucking bed and hit him in his stomach.

"What… What is—"

"It's an earthquake!"

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All writers have to begin somewhere…

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When a writer is asked about how they started writing, the answers are varied. However, if one thinks about it, all writers start their journey at a very young age. In school, we all have those creative writing assignments, even if we dread them.

Recently, I was challenged to find a piece of writing from those early years. Here is just one of the gems that I found which dates back to 1989, when I was in 3rd Form (8th Grade for those of you in the US). I resisted the urge to edit this piece (and it wasn't easy), but even in its raw state, it still made me giggle.

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The Toilet is Historic…

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It's amazing how time just seems to creep by. Before we realise it, months have whizzed by. I feel like that at the moment. So much is going on, and I've only just realised that I still haven't finished my wonderful list of names for toilets. To my readers, I must apologise for this.

Sunrise Comfort Station

Sunrise Comfort Station. Mount Rainier National Park, Washington, USA (Source: Wikipedia)

In doing my research for this particular post, I was thrown by some of the names for toilets. What I thought was just some joking name, making me laugh, turned out to be a real name with historic traditions associated. On this particular list, it was Comfort Station that surprised me the most.

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The Journey Begins…

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For the last few days, I have found myself reminiscing over how my journey into writing all began. If I think about it, I have always made up stories. As a child, I would spend hours with a tape recorder making up plays for my Barbies to act out. Yes, I’m really that old. Shame my mother still doesn’t have those tapes. There were probably some real gems on them.Read More→

Sometimes you have to just laugh, or you’ll cry.

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There are some mornings that you should just stay in bed. I believe this morning was one of them.

This morning, the lovely city of Christchurch woke up to thin layers of ice everywhere. I should probably inform you that my driveway never sees the sun, so every winter, we get ice on the driveway. This morning was no different. My husband had put my truck out on the road (so he could get to his car) which meant the kids and I needed to walk down the slippery drive. My daughter slipped, but luckily stayed upright. We get to the truck and the handles had frozen over. My son and daughter had to combine their strengths to open the back door. It was hilarious to watch. Heave. Ho. Heave. Ho. And fly backward as the door flies open.Read More→