Advent Prompts 4451-4475  

31 December 2015 - 22:35

4451 I am 7,000 feet up and this lake is twenty miles long

4452 A joy of grandchildren

4453 It's a bright, cheerful town

4454 Various ancestors

4455 I don't like the look of those birds

4456 A dull pain behind the ear

4457 By the side of the road on the way to Aberdare

4458 Sale Now On! SALE now on. Sale no ON!

4459 When he laughed you could smell salt

4460 NOW I'm tired

4461 A story about boys drowning

4462 GORSE

4463 That was what he did, day and night

4464 A caravan at Trecco Bay, Porthcawl

4465 I knew a bloke called Jones, tallish

4466 I have a clean apron on. Am I sexy?

4467 Fish swim through the attic

4468 Various men come here. They don't stay long 

4469 You have been gone 34 days

4470 Church? Why not?

4471 Consider the weight, the quality

4472 At a rough guess, this is dying

4473 How do you cope with the smell?

4474 Ok, then, off you toddle, Sunshine

4475 Why should I care about some far-dead stranger?

Update

17 Stories --
33 Flashes --
16 Poems -- 
10 Articles --
27 Diary --
00 Subs --
00 Rejects --
00 Hits -- 

85,801 Words 

December (25 Days)

Advent Prompts 4426-4450 

31 December 2015 - 20:18

4426 We had to have the cat put down. Sad.

4427 Once, in a tea shop, she broke my heart

4428 Playing old vinyl, The Stones

4429 The standard Hollywood depravity

4430 The Mother of all queues

4431 Worms, undercover operatives. Slugs, terrorists

4432 It is impossible for me to live here.

4433 It's a long list, a lot of names

4434 He tastes nothing but his own bile

4435 The unicorn, quite rightly. said fuck this

4436 In the best stories, the baddie fights dirty, still loses

4437 He knew everything, but only from books

4438 I am resting between breakdowns

4439 He was imprisoned, I believe, something to do with a child

4440 We all sit close, pull the pin, pass it round

4441 Whoever is holding the grenade -- when -- dies

4442 The afternoon regulars, 19p cake, free hot drink

4443 He's a big man, he'll take it

4444 Since you left the rooms are smaller and more empty

4445 It's wood but not wood. Not plastic either

4446 She licked him to death

4447 I would like to fly, to sail beneath oceans, see the future

4448 Tomorrow is cancelled. sorry

4449 Do I have to keep talking?

4450 Lock me up. See if I care!

Advent Prompts 4401-4425

31 December 2015 - 10:00

4401 Come on Down, Girls!

4402 Time's elasticity varies in inverse proportion to need

4403 We had point signatures. elbow. wrist

4404 CHICKEN

4405 I am never sure what people mean by "stranger"

4406 Probably in KL or Singapore

4407 My mother's thimbles, needles, cotton, false-teeth

4408 genuine Faux

4409 There is something exquisite in a perfectly-ironed pillowcase

4410 But they are not US

4411 I was just passing through

4412 A B&B in Portmadoc or Harlech

4413 It was a conception in reception

4414 A shallow bath heavy Dettol yellow

4415 You could be my son. Would you like to?

4416  It is barely four, there is an odd buzzing of the light

4417  Cheese

4418 Maybe there is a man who'll lift you up

4419 Reading about Gurkhas

4420 If something started it'll have been in The Red Lion

4421 We can walk along backstreets expecting to be mugged

4422 My Lambretta Vega 76cc

4423 I suspect she knew all along

4424 Old barmaids, stooping. incredible beer

4425 Late, as more and more lights go out

Advent Prompts 4376-4400

31 December 2015 - 06:34

4376 I think I will go for a walk 

4377 Anyone would think I'd been away long

4378 I woke and the house was crying

4379 How do you like my mask?

4380 Filing halfpennies for the meter

4381 Just how fast did I get this fat?

4382 Two men waiting for a train

4383 Barefoot but immaculate

4384 It is unfortunate that you have seen my face

4385 You're shouting now. Please stop.

4386 Imagine pitching a tent on an iceberg, attaching an electric motor then visiting Africa

4387 It's the Vinyl Countdown

4388 Black Candle, Black Flame

4389 I have a dog who hates women dressed in green

4390 Come home. come back in, there's a kettle on

4391 Large print always makes me think of rip-off

4392 I shall invent tea

4393 The world might end tonight, but then doesn't it every night?

4394 You were always one for jumping out of things

4395 I bought my wife a pea-green suit

4396 One man says something ti another man

4397 I suppose I am bitter, but I am not malicious

4398 There's ANOTHER fucking year?

4399 Why woman smiles in her sleep. I do not know where she is

4400 Fuck Rudolph, bloody Commie

Advent Prompts 4351-4375

31 December 2015 - 04:20

4351 She fails to see Larry walking past the church

4352 Pereq was very handsome in his uniform

4353 JINGLE

4354 Larry wakes at 03:50. takes a piss

4355 A meal, a beautiful white fish, but he is sad 

4356 Her under a street-light thumbing

4357 In the Blue Bung, they went this close

4358 Well, bugger me, I'm dead

4359 Tin Can

4360 His face have been full of worry

4361 My little three-wheeler

4362 When we all went out, picking blackberries

4363 Always one eye out through the class window

4364 I asked nurse if I could marry Maria

4365 I picked apples

4366 When a bullet goes by, it's like a buzz

4367 Particularly day, particularly cold

4368 When I was a little boy I had a small truck that carried bricks

4369 From the water the moon is half cloud-rubbed, half cliff-hidden

4370 It is an over-eagerness in him, not rudeness

4371 The moon above the island

4372 The woman was fat. Her can was pink

4353 Friday afternoon, very cold

4374 She steps from the train, waits for the crowd to swallow her up

4375 Happy as Larry

Advent Prompts 4326-4350 

30 December 2015 - 20:20

4326 The leaves about our feet

4327 Carrying her luggage

4328 Harry Fucking Potter

4329 Old Vinyl

4330 We didn't meet at Paddington 

4331 A far better thing

4332 She has to work but she loves to polish

4333 I wouldn't say I was vicious

4334 I feel the nakedness of men abed

4335 This is a life I pretend to like

4336 A dirty bar close to the bridge

4337 Damn you Capulets!

4338 The Milk Train home

4339 Dreaming of dark trees swaying

4340 I once dated a dentist

4341 Welsh? Me? Non, Monsieur

4342 GIRDER

4343 Earth has nothing to show more shitty

4344 The tribe will not fail to take revenge

4345 I do not rile easy Sir, but do not rile me

4346 I seek a house that looks so warm at night

4347 Just Kill it and go

4348 A photograph of his dead children

4349 We came from a little town where honour was the norm

4350 I would like a house on a crumbling cliff

Advent Prompts 4301-4325

 

29 December 2015 - 23:05

4301 The eyes of a rattler

4302 I have a few farthings

4303 I have lost weight lately and I tire easily

4304 Tomorrow might be possible 

4305 We bought a water bed and started to drift apart

4306 After sixty a man should not worry over trifles

4307 I told my dog about you

4308 Give me a bad haircut please

4309 My wife would like to have luncheon with you

4310 I am very, very tired. Tired enough to die

4311 So pleased to hear you are returning

4312 I'm doing an experiment

4313 The Zen of Washing-Up

4314 I shut the door

4315 I am in bed, outside it rains

4316 The lamps are being re-lit

4317 How it is in the valley

4318 I am waiting for the moment. It will come

4319 At Euston Station

4320 I got married when I was seventy-three

4321 The view when we open the French window

4322 Behave!

4323 I'm just a bloke in a dust-coat

4324 A man contemplates a wall

4325 Rise above it, float

Advent Prompts 4276-4300

29 December 2015 - 04:32

4276 At thee same time, that suggests you are perhaps obsessional

4277 and we believe long-distance running helps

4278 I am thinking of daffodils, and those little blues and purples and whites

4279 There is a stillness filling me up

4280 While we recognise it is the law

4281 While we appreciate the removal of your womb

4282 Perhaps a small curtain under your desk

4283 The people I knew, like tired sheep trudging home through fog

4284 and the necessity for a separate bathroom

4285 A tight bodice to eliminate any suggestion of a breast

4286 Please make my grave a circle with a roundabout beneath

4287 Could you change your name?

4288 It is possible, however, that you may disturb certain members of staff

4289 Consider, too the conversations at tea

4290 I apologise to whoever today's God is

4291 Your qualifications are undeniable

4292 The gentleman have a certain way, various habits

4293 The weightless perfection of a kiss

4294 We prefer, if possible, to minimise bodily functions

4295 and "undulations" too

4296 But if I'm asked did you get what you wanted from this life, I'll say no

4297 Chepstow, Raining

4298 I like the word "dolorous" but I won't use it in this poem

4299 Please fee; assured we will be writing again soon

4300 My new yellow wellies

Advent Prompts 4251-4275

28 December 2015 - 04:27

4251 Just me and my mother, walking to the shops

4252 I am thinking Tate & Lyle and Golden Spoon

4253 There was  song like that, very sad, and if you heard it it bounced around your head

4254 Six dollars and nineteen cents

4255 Tap shoes and hard fists

4256 This is the time of too many things

4257 My Father, My Uncle Tom

4258 Sputnik

4259 Not everyone has an elder sister

4260 If there are this many girls, the same of boys, and all inclined the same way

4261 Why would anyone make pasta?

4262 When they have italic explanations before line one

4263 We squeezed into a taxi and set off in hope

4264 Too many Ws for sure

4265 These are important things but too soon other important things overtake them

4266 Surely a God would ban floods at Xmas

4267 A disinterested God, and yet in summer there's less news?

4268 Make every bullet count, whites of their eyes

4269 The bar full of Belgian soldiers, wolves, bears

4270 Face it, this is a dirty rotten life

4271 It was World War Three

4272  I dream of head-scarved women working at oily looms

4273 Some of the daddies maybe, a few gay

4274 We have failed magnificently and that's enough

4275 I sing the song of a woman I have never met

Advent Prompts 4201-4225 

27 December 2015 - 11:20

4201 I do not imagine tongues or light, but relations, that would be kind

4202 Where is the life, in the flower or the bulb?

4203 Perhaps we become great buildings

4204 We could try summoning birds, communing

4205 At the circus maybe, in the jaws of an angry lion

4206 Whatever, there are other forms, different times

4207 Treat each time we wake as a promise

4208 It is different from all the ways they said

4209 If suddenly I did not exist, as far as you knew

4210 It is important that you stay between the lines

4211 We will trick the nurses and slip away

4212 It is a kind of late winter, when you need to sleep a while

4213 I am not dead, I may not be dying, I'm probably not even sick

4214 This is the face of my family, a kidney, a little marrow

4215 Whose is this empty place?

4216 Slow horses, moving steadily

4217 Sleep son, sleep. It will be all right

4218 Fear to live instead!

4219 My great grandfathers sleep and their fathers. It is song

4220 Suns die and we are much smaller

4221 From the train so quickly naked to the showers, no ceremony

4222 And the water accumulates, I become larger

4223 is yours a hungry bear, a snake, or a vulture stealing bits of you as you rot

4224 Nothing is lost until we give up looking, and even then..

4225 You would have to say that death at the wrong time is a bitch

Advent Prompts 4176-4200

27 December 2015 - 08:00

4176 When she died and her parents insisted, I had to remind myself she was a white witch

4177 I am at stage 593 of grief

4178 had once danced naked under a Lundy Moon

4179 It is the softness of these dim drums, their gentleness

4180 Hey, Mr Spaceman!

4181 I leave a cow and my eternal hatred

4182 Do I think I can ever sit outside a sunstruck cafe again?No

4183 What is worse than losing a child? Seeing your child lose hers

4184 I hear pieces of laughter, all of the same. her cut up, upon a table, giggles rising

4185 Bad weather

4186 Pile the snow high after as much soft earth as you can find

4187 I would be a widow, but first there must be a husband

4188 We need relief, something jolly

4189 I am faithless but I like hymns and goldfish

4190 This is the difficult part, the sordid facts

4191 It is worse when it is sunny

4192 His was large, solid, open; a good soul

4193 No Dominion: Not gone there gentle.

4194 We die, of course. It is not the leaving but the being left

4195 They died in the same crash, I pray they did not know the other

4196 How does she fill the room with the screaming fact she is not here?

4107 We float, we fly. We are simply not bothered holding on ay more

4198 Nothing now, nothing ever will have a point

4199 Imagine he is in Butlins

4200 In the sky, great planes streaming smoke

Advent Prompts 4151-4175

 

26 December 2015 - 23:59

Boxing Day V

4151 When you've been alone a while longer...

4152 Chinese White

5153 Like lambs without the knife

4154 Big tits, sells oranges

4155 You have the right face for me, and heart

4156 The History of Lego

4157 Oh, no, it isn't!

4158 There is a cold field, and as the mist rises...

4159 Call it dead.

4160 The kids called it Aber Mountain

4161 I cannot stay awake

4162 The world cracked open, air rushing in

4163 Maggie tried to kiss me

4164 I'm late, but at least I'm here

4165 Try not to tell the truth

4166 Slugs, Slugs, Slugs, Salt

4167 It's like perpetual February

4168 A Big Yellow Bus

4169 Dad's Army

4170 I have never been here. I am not here now

4171 We must stay aware of winter

4172 We are almost done!

4173 I have fallen off

4174 We just couldn't help it -- we sang and sang

4175 Summer is too hot, Autumn dull

Advent Prompts 4126-4150

26 December 2015 - 21:05

Boxing Day IV

4126 We drank tea together in Fearis's

4127 Catastrophe! Our President is dead.

4128 Ugly tables, ugly people, ugly food.

4129 Ah, this growing old.

4130 It is not a good day

4131 I am greatly troubled by certain dreams

4132 Not a good word spoken about anyone. Very funny

4133 A heavy cloud hangs over Europe

4134 I would like an extra egg

4135 Try to avoid complications, dear

4136 Thatcher has gone!

4137 His company has gone sky high, many debts

4138 They have run away together, to Anglesey of all places.

4139 This is not so and never can be.

4140 Nottingham. Horrible undergraduates

4141 A woman with a face like a dead squirrel

4142 People like different books at different times

4143 I am not convinced about kissing

4144 Several cold baths

4145 At night walking through Covent Garden

4146 My husband has become his mother

4147 A Pitiable Show

4148 With Colonel P, consumed a lot of port

4149 A pain which made him vomit twice over

4150 These are the sorts of things careless people say

Advent Prompts 4101-4125 

 

26 December 2015 - 13:55

Boxing Day III

4101 To bed early, with mistress

4102  Why is poetry so much an older man's comfort?

4103 Only solution defenestration

4104 Bombings, murders, physical assaults still continuing

4105 These sad little coastal towns on the North Sea

4106 The tension makes me physically ill

4107 All those women growing old

4108 I have touched jane Austen's desk

4109 High has been obliged to go to Nice for ten days

4110 Dined with the Johnsons at their villa in Naples

4111 Little doing -- long bath

4112 Elizabeth went off this morning to visit with Harold. I am in agony

4113 New Yorker rang. Did I have a story?

4114 She is about forty, with a cute but strained face

4115 Amazing caterpillars, brilliant blacks and yellows

4116 The Japs will sue for peace now

4117 An old admirer has died

4118 I would like to join the Irish Flea-Keepers Association

4119 A mix of elation and terror

4120 The papers are full of this doomsday bomb

4121 Oh, I have had such a miserable night.

4122 Long-haired brats with head lice

4123 A fat mother opposite with a horrible bawling baby

4124 A boy-child refusing to open his eyes

4125 JB had a headache, then a full-on, terrible brain haemorrhage 

Advent Prompts 4076-4100

26 December 2015 - 08:05

Boxing Day II

4076  Full fathom five (fucking deep)

4077 A man, naked, blue, his picture in a cave. I was here!

4078 I may have to return to New York

4079 Kick a Nazi in the trousers

4080 Frankly it was an exceedingly dull read

4081 He sees what other see but differently

4082 I have nothing of importance to say

4083 A land where they laugh

4084 A man called Sullivan, sells brushes and polish for to door

4085 I was the toast of Newport, Mon

4086 This little thing inside, tick, tick, tick

4087 November rain is different. It wants you.

4088 The I gave my lecture

4089 Extremely funny postcard sent!

4090 Throw me a child

4091 The Football Pools, BFPO 19, Breast of Lamb

4092 These fat, ugly, ugly feet

4093 Just before Christmas, bronchitis, not good

4094 My wife in another room, the long long insult

4095 Sweating for the last number

4096 The Welsh? They have poets but Jesus, all that coal and gloom!

4097 So what if we go that way instead?

4098 Martin Fucking Amis

4099 At least I don't come from Cardiff

4100 I'm planning to read War & Peace, a page a day

Number of People Given Emergency Food

From Trussel Trust Foodbanks

2005-06 2,814 Labour

2006-07 9,174 Labour

2007-08 13,849 Labour

2008-09 25,899 Labour

2009-10 40,898 Labour

2010-11   61,468 Conservative

2011-12 128,697 Conservative

2012-13 346,992 Conservative

Advent Prompts 4051-4075

26 December 2015 - 06:11

Boxing Day

4051 So O'Keefe leans in and says 

4052 We've never really been close

4053 You are not you without your glasses

4054 You cannot paint a moving river

4055 I shall refer to myself in the third person. There is a third person in this marriage.

4056 I am pissing blood

4057 Your three letters are now to hand

4058 Pomegranate green tea, a street-cleaning machine outside

4059 I caught a fish made of stone

4060 Message to my grandson

4061 The man runs a dismal painted-furniture shop

4062 I have no problem with who he loves, only the manner

4063 We have brought you up on iPads. You try to swipe pages

4064 The Zulu is a fiendish fighter

4065 People with cancer are selfish, mostly

4066 The red Coat, I suppose, and the Martin Henry, and that long bayonet

4067 I feel I might write more if I left the bank

4068 The biggest boil on my arse

4069 So this, this is poetry

4070I feel the need to say something learned and profound

4071 I am afraid you may have become anxious. So sorry

4072 This be fucked

4073 Dad, I said, don't die while they're still playing

4074 Can you be tempted up to town this evening?

4075 Orbison was a strange looking fellah

I have been summoned



I have to rejoin the human race

Advent Prompts 4026-4050

25 December 2015 - 09:10

Christmas Day II

4026 It is lovely here, quiet, green, heavy with light

4027 Something about a chap called Prufrock

4028 All of the crew are drowned

4029 I will try my best to do something for the wretch

4030 A chevy at ninety then upside down

4031 I can only cite my own case to show that all things are possible

4032 A long knife in her leather belt

4033 Acquaintances made at Oxford will help

4034 Six swans with guns

4035 Various friends have plugged away at law, medicine, prostitution

4036 We went to see the dentist this afternoon

4037 Pardon this detail

4038 It is 9:09 on the 9th of the 9th

4039 I wrote to mother yesterday. She is still suffering with her nerves

4040 I need a head and neck massage from a Turk with fingers like bullets

4041 There is a Torpedo Boat in the harbour

4042 Has someone trumped?

4043 He lacks tact, I would say

4044 Confined spaces are deadly to certain dispositions 

4045 This last month I have been busier than most men are in a lifetime

4046 He hides his grin behind a smile

4047 The battle will still go on

4048 And so it goes, and so it goes

4049 He majored in deflowering virgins, I believe 

4050 Nevertheless

Advent Prompts 4001-4025

25 December 2015 - 07:00

Christmas Day

4001 You must hear the rhythms first, and then if you really must, add words

4002 FUCK The Grouch and the damn Cafe Royal

4003 It is very cool here

4004 Coopers, Fletchers, resting whores

4005 I have broken my microscope and damaged my tray of butterflies

4006 Actually I do not care what your Christmas will be like

4007 Charlotte found an empty birds-nest

4008 Poppycock, Darling

4009 I do not know if in my last note I was sufficiently explicit

4010 Some murderers are innocent

4011 It is a fairly technical philosophical idea. I will not bore you.

4012 Throw in a little Anglo-Saxon

4013 Would it be possibly to visit with you and confer on the matter?

4014 Call a Spade a digging implement

4015 Occasional in-your-face remarks

4016 Maman, where is Cricklewood?

4017 BALLS!

4018 I have just heard from your secretary that you are out of town

4019 MI7

4020 Sir, I do not participate in sports. We have nothing to discuss

4021 Alcock & Brown

4022 I have been furnished with a delightful, rock-solid steamer-trunk

4023 Paris Underpasses, suitcases, wardrobes

4024 As soon as I have perfected arrangements with you, I will close matters with Cambridge

4025 And who do you suppose stears all this?

Advent Prompts 3976-4000

24 December 2015 - 21:30

Our 4,000th Prompt of the Year!

3976 Forgive me, Father, for I am going to sin.

3977 I want a fat red biplane, spraying mists of oil

3978 Perhaps some merriment?

3979 I may need to rest half-way

3980 My Xmas Jumper

3981 We will suffer, we will survive a while, and then we will die

3982 She paints divinely, with transparent colourless paint

3983 The cat is in the microwave

3984 Throwing snowballs at the moon

3985 The captain suggests a quick death here. I prefer to procrastinate

3986 I woke, bloody, in a ditch

3987 You know Crocodile Dundee? I'm Hamster Jones

3988 My father paid the ransom, my wife outbid him.

3989 I Accuse Henderson!

3990 Please remove my skin

3991 I suggest you lock the door, have one stiff whisky, then slit your wrists

3992 Bit of a bitch that volcano in Leeds

3993 It is working men together that I miss, the going home to wives

3994 I am considering a book

3995 We make love only on days ending y

3996 There is something wrong with my phone

3997 And NOW, Ladies and Gentlemen...

3998 I have cashed the birthday cheque, raided the piggy, scrabble down the backs of chair

3999 No houses, too many dead, but they have perfect 4G

4000 And then that plague of frogs in Leominster

Advent Prompts 3951-3975

24 December 2015 - 09:44

3951 If the sky was like the sea and yet we breathed below it

3952 I would like a striped coffin, a false dick sticking through

3953 A day too soon, a minute to late, a bridge too far

3954 You smelt of smoke and something else

3955 Madame, I detest poor punctuality

3956 The clocks are stopped but the seconds tick on on iPhones

3957 Steep roads, the better when we return

3958 They are teaching the prisoners violin

3959 On my knees, red polish under my nails

3960 Pick me, from a hundred thousand and one

3961 I am going to stop milking cows and marry a man from the city

3962 Budgerigar Wharf? Why does that sound ridiculous?

3963 The women come, the women go, and it is never light

3964 Very well, we will call it even.

3965 I would like to repair old things, and then myself

3966 That is what piss-poor means

3967 With his marmalade under his hat

3968 Every policeman is a helmet.

3969 Dog shit to make my lady's leather so.

3970 Blocking out the sun

3971 It is difficult to live in Sarajevo

3972 For the show-and-tell this week we all made bombs.

3973 I would like a new hammock and a good strong knife

3974 We think Ahmed's father helped. It is not fair if that's his job

3975 I am opening up a marshmallow mine in Peru

Advent Prompts 3926-3950 

24 December 2015 - 04:44

Christmas Eve

3926 His horses confused, gazing at their shit

3927 Why don't we run away together and be a hermit?

3928 Amis bored me shitless.

3929 No one quite knew what to make of it

3930 I fell in love with the daughter of a butcher

3931 The neurotic rooftop crying, "It's Slate, It's Slate, It's Slate!"

3932 That nice one where everyone thinks he's waving, "Look at me!"

3933 It may be amazing, but first you have to drown

3934  I went back to my father rutting, stopped all this

3935 It has been a perfectly ordinary day at the office (apart from that)

3936 The children love too play on the pylons. Freedom to explore is a right

3937 You have killed the wrong Jones

3938 He collapsed against some well, expired unceremoniously

3939 She is dead in that puddle, water lapping in and out her nostril

3940 Fire, acid, poison, and those who survive have a healthy disposition

3941 Aliens landed in Brussels, departed

3942 My great-grandfather, his throat cut in the kitchen, missing where he was from

3943 You'll go wrong on the way, but arrive nevertheless

3944 They will hang me. Their sons and their daughters will pray for me.

3945 Some men beat up the sweet-shop owner

3946 The sea children are back, singing in the square

3947 Two months, give or take the deaths of half of you

3948 They should film our operations, for us to watch in recovery

3949 Beautiful aircraft, staring with sky

3950 Don't go out, child, though I am paralysed

 Advent Prompts 3926-3950 

 23 December 2015 - 18:45

3926 Meeting you made my dreams pathetic

3927 I am taking my wife to Oxford for a short holiday

3928 Bloody people KEEP telephoning

3929 Everyone was terribly square

3930 I'm sorry to pester you

3931 Bloody awful old life isn't it?

3932 I would reply differently if I were a different sort of chap

3933 You exhaust me but please don't change

3934 Delighted to hear you sounding so jolly

3935 Do they know the cause yet?

3936 Dearest Pigeon. Now THAT was a sparky day!

3937 We haven't spoken since you buggered off

3938 I have a new typewriter, absolutely spiffing

3939 The biggest tits I've ever seen on the hoof

3940 Are we still on for the 17th?

3941 Those French-speaking fuckers!

3942 And a happy 1964 to you, Sir!

3943 I had left Swansea by then, so was unreachable

3944 I hereby resign

3945 I can assure you I am not "playing hard to get"

3946 We strained every nerve to get to see you, but the damn car!

3947 You were very understanding about "the business"

3948 I have done a little thinking 

3949 Weather marvellous, company excellent

3950 First chance I've had since it happened

More Prompts

Sometimes I wonder about the inside of my head...







Advent Prompts 3901-3925

23 December 2015 - 07:45

3901 This needs to be a good one
3902 I was drunk last month, drunker in October
3903 You took the best bit of me and threw it out
3904 I never had a cuddly bear, just soldiers made of tin
3905 The common, two labradors, cruise missiles, USAF, the women

3906 Gravity is a con. You just have to want to float and then believe
3907 Imagine paying tax. No, really, just for a minute
3908 Like you fell in this fresh grave, midnight, walking home. The sides are wet
3909 I have filthy nocturnal habits but I shower in the morning
3910 A man, having finished his coffee, has started screaming

3911 This incredible moment
3912 I will build a church upon a frozen lake and we will pray to keep it cold
3913 Why, exactly, does snoring disgust us?
3914 I put out a sign, Jehovah's Witnesses Welcome
3915 Trying to dry myself

3916 I am hoping to reach Tuesday for then the lights come back on
3917  I read once, this story about the sky coming down a little more every day until
3918 I have fallen in love with a fish
3919 Shoes, sandals, boots
3920 A terrible tragedy, only the children saved

2921 This is forbidden, that is forbidden, you are forbidden
3922 The land that is only land at low water, what does it think?
3923 I would rather absorb than be absorbed, but it is close
3924 This is an emergency, please send a poet.
3925 I wish I could just mend boats, somewhere where the sun is always kind

Advent Prompts 3876-3900 

22 December 2015 - 20:15

3876 Where you are is important, what you are is vital

3877 Ten years ago this week my father went headfirst into that river

3878 I remember him now. He was the one with the scar

3879 I found an old Argus, the headline wasn't pretty

3880 And the soil in my hands is bloody

3881 Read the script. In the end you die

3882 We have him on a poetry drip, staring with milk Haikus

3883 A perfect lawn

3884 Sometimes I think I've caught the rhythm, but then it shifts

3885 She actually liked Marmite

3886 We can make an accommodation

3887 I am not renowned for my sense of direction

3888 Lozenge

3889 Your hand in mine; but then I throw it in the river

3890 Basically I'm raw material. Use me.

3891 A town full of green men

3892 My name is Alice Springs (unfortunately)

3893 I owe too much money to the wrong men

3894 She looked a million dollars and was only fifteen

3895 We could meet in my father's shed, have sex on the fertiliser 

3896 That's the thing about candles

3897 Coracle

3898 My name is Benjamin Pope, recently deceased

3899  I will get there eventually

3900 Just bluster, wait for the cavalry

Advent Prompts 3851-3875 

21 December 2015 - 21:56

3851 Do you bite your thumb at me, Sir?

3852 Is it because I'm Irish?

3853 His stronger foot, his weaker arm

3854 A husband beats a wife

3855 Quoting Jay Gatsby

3856 'S' called inter-fucking-course

3857 Hope, the seed of insanity or inhumanity

3858 There was a young man called Hunt; who most of the time was a decent bloke

3859 DON'T CONTACT SAM

3860 Nothing sharper, more aroused than the man before his death

3861 The forensic analysis of loneliness

3862 Talk to me of war after you have seen a dead man

3863 The Martian

3864 A Small Lie

3865 To be beautiful and a fool

3866 The fundamental theories of human statistics

3867 They build you up, your mother, your father

3868 Losing 1-0 away, ten minutes to go

3869 The neon beauty of The Emirates

3870 Ish Cwishmas

3871 The precise definition of bravery

3872 OOPS!!

3873 Fuck this for a bunch of soldiers

3874 Just say something that nobody will understand

3875 My daughter doesn't quite get the point...

Advent Prompts 3826-3850

22 December 2015 - 10:15

3826 How dark the world becomes when silent

3827 Can we discuss your deformity?

3828 Now that is a quite marvellous interjection, Sir!

3829 It is quite possible to live without a heart

3830 And all the bells and whistles dear, don't forget

3831 Seventy-Five Trombones

3832 The other side is shadow. This side is dark

3833 Uncaring, unknowing, blind

3834 I reckon, in this old life, I've had four gardens, maybe five

3835 The circumstances we are in might be called difficult

3836 I did that. Look, it's almost level

3837 A sprout has escaped

3838 My father sang Volare, my mother never sang

3839 Pinafore 

3840 The Devil's off-duty and we are out on the piss

3841 I wish I'd had a name like Alistair Wellbegood

3842 Twelve very long months

3843 Cordwainer, Higgler, Executioner's Assistant

3844 Letter.

3845 Before the day is over, something bad will come

3846 When I was ten, I fell in thorns

3847 I would quite like martyrdom, to be a note in Wiki 

3848 Draw the curtains, be quiet

3849 It was cold so we set fire to the headmaster

3850 We are wrapped up, walking towards the summit

Target Demolished!


I am very pleased to say, at 08:21 this morning 

I have SMASHED the 50,000 words target.


Started 7th December 05:25

That's 15 days and three hours, 

50,626 Words

Advent Prompts 3801-3825

22 December 2015 - 06:35

3801 And, when you think of it, it's in black and white

3802  We called it a mountain but it was slag, high over the school

3803 "Starless and bible-black"

3804 It is a filthy, dirty business and there i evil in every owner's heart

3805 Crabtree Cottage

3806 But then I think: To begin at the beginning

3807 Pat adjusts his shoulder straps

3808 and we are blind too, not moles, not dead captains

3809 We slave for beer-money, by the wife a dress

3810 No, not really, my grandad was from Somerset

3811 131, The Celyn (these are huts)

3812 England, Wales and Monmouthshire

3813 Evans caught it while taking a shit

3814 Our exercise books has a map on the back

3815 Was a time when coal ruled the waves

3816 Newport, Cardiff, and other large places

3817 I think of you, of course, but I'm usually half-drunk and it's raining

3818 Sorry, I didn't mean to. Run it under a tap

3819 I seem to be getting a bit Welsh. I need to stop forthwith and apologise

3820 Tony Martin scratched his leg

3821 I am going to build a library in Cwmbran and fill it with poetry

3822 Out from the pits to be mown down in France

3823 The only Welsh poet I know is English and lives in Scotland

3824 I went to Mynndyslwyn but it had gone

3825 I might as well stop now

Advent Prompts 3801-3825 -

21 December 2015 - 21:56

3801 Do you bite your thumb at me, Sir?

3802 Is it because I'm Irish?

3803 His stronger foot, his weaker arm

3804 A husband beats a wife

3805 Quoting Jay Gatsby

3806 'S' called inter-fuckinng-course

3807 Hope, the seed of insanity or inhumanity

3808 There was a young man called Hunt; who most of the time was a decent bloke

3809 DON'T CONTACT SAM

3810 Nothing sharper, more aroused than the man before his death

3811 The forensic analysis of loneliness

3812 Talk to me of war after you have seen a dead man

3813 The Martian

3814 A Small Lie

3815 To be beautiful and a fool

3816 The fundamental theories of human statistics

3817 They build you up, your mother, your father

3818 Losing 1-0 away, ten minutes to go

3819  The neon beauty of The Emirates

3820 Ish Cwishmas

3821 The precise definition of bravery

3822 OOPS!!

3823 Fuck this for a bunch of soldiers

3824 Just say something that nobody will understand

3825 My daughter doesn't quite get the point...

Advent Prompts 3776-3800

 

21 December 2015 - 14:45

3776 In the clouds, suddenly, but near to God

3777 I am from silt and made of silt. I cannot drown

3778 The coast a faintly more solid blue, clouds black and low

3779 We're done here. Right, who's next?

3780 We start again tomorrow. If that doesn't work we start again the next day.

3781 Listen, that is Hell. Hear my wife bickering.

3782 Slip me a fag, Nigel, and I will love you forever

3783 Halle-fucking-lujah!

3784 As cars pass, and lorries pass, and finally, a big red bus

3785 If you can't be nice, try travel

3786 It wasn't me, Miss!

3787 At a guess I'm two weeks old

3788 A character black is ever a character black.

3789 Is every flower better uncut?

3790 Seven o'clock, minimum wage, walking home to save the bus-fare

3791 I am here to bury Lazarus

3792 Not oozing juice or tall enough to salute 

3793 I am burning ice. I am a talking tree

3794 It is not January 12th

3795 I am not talking to my mistress

3796 Almost clever bon mots, almost decent wine

3797 Born by a wrong star, the moon at its ugliest

3798 Head, shoulder, lay. Now!

3799 Who speaks for me?

3800 I am an accident of my birth

Update

Started

05:30 7th December



Time now

 09:38 21st December



Time available

13 Days 2 Hours 8 minutes (Day 14 just started)


24 Flashes
07 Stories
07 Poems
03 Articles
05 Videos


47,188 Words. Daily Average 3,394 Words

Repeated for 365 Days = 1, 238, 810 words a year

Advent Prompts 3751-3775

21 December 2015 - 09:30

3751 The street fills for midnight, decays quickly after one.

3752 This state of mind, mine, displeases me

3753 There is something quite splendid in a friend mortified

3754 You leave me undone

3755 I am a little bored. Would you care to fornicate?

3756 There is something vaguely sexy about your double standards

3757 "Oh would I might wander" or something

3758 After the first shock, there comes a recognition, a kind of re-assessment

3759 I am red-blooded; you are all white-cells, choking

3760 You walked here; I can feel it

3761 That's the thing about sexual intercourse: it can't be done dry

3762 The female poet doesn't Sitwell with me

3763 Somehow he stares from every painting

3764 Yes, it's still fucking raining. No, we are not there yet!

3765 Once brown men here, barefoot but with the planet in their hearts

3766 Vote? Lie down in the shit if it pleases you.

3767 Listen, have a party, but then it's OK to forget me.

3768 I'm sixteen, wanting to buy her a locket

3769 The more superior person books an appointment, stays not a second too long

3770 The sweating garbage puked out from distant countries

3771 Goes by initials, very secretive

3772 An incident is being reported in Rhyl, North Wales

3773 Your writing is hard to decipher

3774 If swans were black and ugly

3775 Picasso has had an accident. Details sketchy.

Advent Prompts 3701-3725 

20 December 2015 - 18:20

3701 When Mail Trains clacked across the night

3702 I am bloody, I am bowed, but I am not yet beaten

3703 The dogs are used to it

3704 She was a famous ventriloquist, a nun with a nymphomaniac dummy

3705 You have made an end of it

3706 I remember the face of my father

3707 Cruellest weeks are not in April

3708 A drip, an ocean, a grain of salt, the world

3709 As we walked back home from the mine

3710 No longer the roar of the falls, a stream near home

3711 Six lads, only one machine-gun

3712 We bought eight Blackjacks and then Isobel kissed me

3713 Gone away, to silence, peace

3714 And the moment, fourteen, racing to the tape

3715 She's taller, I'm the Lower Watha

3716 The way hard, the mud crying, the rain vindictive

3717 He remembers the college, soft grass, shadows

3718 Just think of it as a transfer to Hartlepool Reserves

3719 The boat leaked and they hadn't set out yet

3720 A tall white ship, the sun by day, at night the North Star

3721 What did the Romans ever give us?

3722 From where he lay, something rose up 

3723 Our favourite painters, bits of music

3724 She is like a perfect pizza, pepperoni

3725 Like a perfect summer day, the lightest breeze, like a kiss

Advent Prompts 3676-3700 

18 December 2015 - 21:30

3676 I would not mind it if the evening was a little cooler

3677 We are going on a long journey

3678 My desire for women disturbs me

3679 Good night's sleep. Feeling far more chipper!

3680 Spent the morning forging papers.

3681 The newsboys are saying The Titanic is sunk!

3682 Burden Park, Ibrox, Hillsboro

3683 Limp sandwiches, Coca-Cola

3684 Some sort of siege at the Spaghetti House

3685 Many South Vietnamese drowned

3686 Virginia: coffee at The British Library

3687 The great tragedy of the South

3688 The Fuhrer is a great admirer of the Greeks

3689 Dreadful news from Paris

3690 The negro problem

3691 I have a private audience with the Pope. Me and 5,000 others

3692 No writing this year. I am readying myself.

3693 I came home to a wife dressed in black, surprised to see me

3694 It seems I always arrive just as the train has left

3695 A tiny, doll-like girl, a face far too white

3696 My father, a corporal, three airmen, a yellow bulldozer

3697 He had volunteered but he was black.

3698 My head pounding, I am older

3699 Behind all those bobbing, docile faces

3700 Fear is the basis of love

Advent Prompts 3651-3675 - 

18 December 2015 - 00:30

3651 My jacket stole, only a button on the floor

3652 He had eyes like frosted glass in a cheap toilet

3653 The censor had blacked out ever word except "cock"

3654 Burke hanged this morning

3655 I have finished painting and I need to recuperate

3656 People are far too optimistic

3657 So I'm in The Hard Rock between fat agents and big-totted starlets

3658 I am not in the best of tempers, Sir, I warn you!

3659 Nothing happened to day. Nothing. In diary wrote, "Nothing Happened today."

3660 I really we feel we ought to kill someone.Let them know we are serious

3661 One dead, four saved, three more missing, presumed drowned

3662 Thank you for your note which I read carefully, but I see no reason to apologise

3663 TEDIUM

3664 It seems the king is smitten by an American whore

3665 These are the SIXTIES, Darling!

3666 You will have received my wire by now

3667 He was something of an athlete, and self-centred

3668 I heard she fucked a bobby in an alleyway in Kew

3669 Very Glum!

3670 The faux friendships of Americans

3671 I have been considering what might be done

3672 Balderdash, Sir! Absolute Piffle!

3673 She spends her days sweating as Minnie Mouse for ugly children

3674 Really, I ought to be in bed, preferably accompanied

3675 I am guilty. I must be guilty of SOMETHING

Advent Prompts 3626-3650 

17 December 2015 - 11:45

3626 It is my 41st birthday but I'm lying about my age

3627 The Welshman, the Drunk: Whatsisname

3628 We hope to meet the Maharajah

3629 The fifty-two fallen children of this parish

3630 Mumsy, there is a strong smell of poo here

3631 Watching her dance, even while naked, inspires little sexual arousal

3632 AVOCADO

3633 Have you eaten?

3634 Wednesday: Zoo

3635 We drove into the country looking for a good butcher

3636 Read two books on sexual abnormalities: Good.

3637 We kissed in a cab as we left The Savoy

3638 It depends a good deal on one's education

3639 Colder then ever

3640 She rejected me somberley and without the slightest ambivalence

3641 Your spectacles and wallet are in the fire

3642 Pink and Fizzy Please

3643 The cook is called Bertha and she is very fat

3644 We stopped between Jacksonville and Mississippi 

3645 Every day, as I awake, my first thought is, "Why am I here?"

3646 The housewives of Baltimore need us

3647 He has a huge Newfoundland, and a raven. They are in love

3648 Ten eggs for two reels of cotton, pound of ham for a little wool

3649 They are draining the pus this afternoon

3650 Everything I look at reminds me of you.

Advent Prompts 3601-3625 

17 December 2015 - 07:30

3601 Am I right in thinking that your father married my mother?

3602 Says I to me, George this is a bad do.

3603 Prince Charming no longer charms us

3604 We took tea in a frantic café resplendent with busted dowagers

3605 An excellent afternoon. Four guns, seven hundred rabbits

3606 Walked back to the commons in the rain

3607 I have turned down a handsome offer to play opposite Lemmon

3608 For a day, only a day, I would like to be a servant.

3609 Perhaps I was becoming a little smug

3610 Tried to write about art. No good

3611 A jangle of starlings

3612 No lights bright enough to breach the fog. Drums on the shore

3613 Dusk echoing with the tramp of boots

3614 The character of John Bull.

3615 There is a man upstairs in bed with my wife. You must all leave forthwith.

3616 I was a secretary there, but only briefly

3617 They take their sex lives seriously

3618 I will spend evenings before the mirror asking how I am

3619 We took a Greyhound to anywhere

3620 A voice that frightened pigeon

3621 Ireland is perfect, except it is Catholic

3622 Just Fuck Off, December!

3623 Subjected to some abuse. They called out Yid and Yad, but no windows broken

3624 Have just got back from analysis. I am clearly barking

3625 I felt it was time to go home and speak to my wife

 Advent Prompts 3576-3600 

 16 December 2015 - 23:00

3576 We have found ourselves in a hut, sleeping in bunks

3577 He is  a most cunning rogue

3578 She is Hobson's widow and relentless

3579 We discussed various matters of aviation and the fact his daughter was a whore

3580 She is particularly ugly, but efficient

3581 I am the financial edge.

3582 Girls are problems, simple!

3583 There is nothing more sickening than living of the heroism of others

3584 Nervous, agitated, with the movements of a stick-insect

3585 The death sentences have excited the villagers

3586 My grandson watching Star Wars 99

3587 I am concerned with the plight of the men

3588 I am up to here with frivolity

3589 A slightly better prostitute accosted me

3590 Only solution the window

3591 The best gentlemen have left town

3592 My mare bolted, caught by two Billingsgate boys

3593 The salt baths were dirty with occasional pubic hairs

3594 After dinner, we set off for the beach

3595 Her family thinks she is a button-girl in Woolworths

3596 The theft of a butter tub: Guilty

3597 I believed I may have touched a tender spot

3598 We met soon after prayers

3599 Nobodies should be despised

3600 There was no First World War for Kafka

Going Well


The purpose of The Advent Flash, was, obviously, to get Boot Camp writing.

There's a problem for the writing soul when holidays come round and when "I'll Go From There" dates loom in the calendar.

What could be more natural than to think, on December 1st, ""Starting New Year's day I'm going to really hammer. I'm going to get up at silly o'clock and write XXX a day."

Sure. 

But even if you DO manage this and your pronouncements are not self-delusion, what about December?

I know from jaded experience that output from Boot Camp drops away in the holiday month.

WHY?

We are either writers or we are not. 

A writer is someone who wakes every day, EVERY day, and first-off thinks, "How will I find the time to write today?"

Every blank day is a day nearer your death.
Every blank day is a day nearer your death.
Every blank day is a day nearer your death.

You do not get blank days back.




In days-past Boot Camp "Started the New Year" on Boxing Day, December 26th and I stressed to every Boot Camp Member, that they should THROW THEMSELVES at their work. 

They should hammer hammer hammer and go for big numbers on the 26-27-28-29-30-31, six days of December.

Easily, EASILY they could write 12,000 words or more in those six days, then, on January 1st when they get out of bed, maybe hungover, maybe not, they would have 12,000 words in the New Year's Bank.


But, ATM, Boot Camp is under-populated, and such under-population tends to make the place work in fits and starts.

IMO the minimum number of members is about 16. That way, if half the number are seriously active that week we have eight people producing stories, the anonymity level shoots up, there is more variety of style, and a far better buzz.

But with Christmas approaching there was a danger that everyone would back-slide (November was fallow) and then, come January we would need to loosen stiff joints and get back into good habits.

That would effectively mean a month (December) lost, and then a week of the New Year.

Consider that for a second. You have lost 10% of your annual possibility. TEN PER CENT!

You are STARTING where, no matter what, you are working of a 90% maximum. That is CRAZY

Or, you can "Blast" in December and actually produce 2-3-4 times the average, GAINING percentage points.

So in BC we started the Advent-January Blast.

The idea was to over-produce in December in the 24/25 days to Christmas, build up a healthy bank of work, then, take Christmas day off, hopefully do SOMETHING on the 26th, then go full-on at it again on the 27th.

It is really dumb to procrastinate. DUMB DUMB DUMB.

For personal reasons, and health reasons, though I was posting 25 Flash Prompts every day (often more) I wasn't writing at the start of December. I just couldn't get going.

So, kicking my own arse, I set the alarm for 05:25 on the 7th December, got up, generated some prompts, and wrote a flash.

That flash, easily publishable, a good shot at a prize (125-135 in BC terms) was entered on the spreadsheet at 07:45

By the end of the day (not even the end) I had written FIVE flashes and a total of 2,890 Words

Now we are on Day 10 (sorry, I am on Day 10 playing catch-up). If this blog entry counts (and I don't count prompt-lists) then I am on piece No 38 and 32,003 words. 

By 07:00, while the guests are still all abed, I will pass 37,000 words for December. In my case that is 32,003 words in 10 Days, 3,200 words a day.

Five Stories, 17 Flashes,  six poems, a few articles.

If we had not had the two-stage Advent-January Blast I seriously doubt I would have written a word. And I will bet you now, that this dramatic push, this “over-production” will produce 28/28 publications (if I ever get round to subbing, which is a separate story) and there are AT LEAST four prize-winners in there.

You may not see these results for six months, such is the way of the world, but my publication/prize targets for 2016 HAVE ALREADY BEEN ACHIEVED, that is by 06:45 on December 16th, 2015. I merely have to send the stuff out.