“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!” (https://lindaghill.com/2018/01/12/the-friday-reminder-for-socs-jusjojan-daily-prompt-jan-13th-2018/)  These Jots are not only my 500-words a day challenge, but also part of my  Ultimate Blogging Challenge challenge (http://ultimateblogchallenge.com).

Ok, the prompt for today, which is also the Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt, tells me to look at the “publication”, which I will call a piece of paper with text on it (although, I guess “publication” could be something electronic, like an e-book or a Facebook post…) closest to you (I am guessing closest in physical proximity, not as in a closest to my heart kind of way), and base my post on the sixth, seventh, and eighth word from the beginning of the page.  Page – ok, that kind of presumes something written on paper.  Although I guess you could think of a Page in a less traditional sense.  I have found the concept of a “page” much more challenging when looking at resources online, you know, like e-journals and e-newspapers. You can “like” a “page” in Facebook too, but I don’t know what that has to do with this prompt.  Luckily the prompt refers to the beginning of the page, which I presume to mean the page that you can immediately see upon looking at the “publication”.  It does not refer to “page 7”, or anything specific like that.

Anyway, back to the prompt.  The 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th word from the beginning of the page…yada, yada, yada.  “The versatility of”.  Yes, those are the words.  They are pretty good words to begin this prompt, don’t you think?  Or are they??

I’ll be honest with you.  I cheated.  The 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th word from the beginning of the page on the piece of written-on paper closest to me was “received on your”, which is from a description of the final assignment I am supposed to submit for my course this weekend.  I can’t think of anything more boring than that.

Except that this was a cheat too.  These are the 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th words of the Description section which is the first fully written out section in the assignment.  If I were to REALLY count the 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th words from the beginning of the whole page (including the title and the table headings), I would get “Profile Reflection Assignment”.

Ok, let’s be really honest.  Here is what I see on this page:

• Assignment #2C – Course Profile Reflection” – this is the title
• Then, the next line (which is a table row) says:
• Assignment Title (cell 1), Course Profile Reflection (cell 2), 5% (cell 3)

Which words are the 6^th, 7^th and 8^th?  Do you count the # sign as a word? I mean, it stands for “number”, after all.  And what about “2”?  It is a number, AND a word.  And the letter “C”?  Is this also a word?  I am so confused right now.  Which is why I thought cheating would be best.  I mean, who would ever know?  I could tell you that the closest piece of text to me was Chapter 15 of War and Peace.  With my luck, War and Peace doesn’t even have 15 chapters, but who would check up on me?

Well, that’s the end of my 500 words. Guess you will never know which were the 6^th, 7^th, and 8^th words on the paper closest to me this morning, or how I would have used them in a prompt.  That’s life!  Back to coffee…

Today’s prompt is “brought to you by Fandango, is “Aggravation.” Use it any way you’d like in your post. And make sure you visit Fandango at his blog, “This, That, and the Other” to read his post and say hi! Here’s Fandango’s blog: https://fivedotoh.wordpress.com/ ” (https://lindaghill.com/2018/01/12/jusjojan-daily-prompt-january-12th-2018/)  These Jots are not only my 500-words a day challenge, but also part of my  Ultimate Blogging Challenge challenge (http://ultimateblogchallenge.com).

Aggravation

Remember the post a couple of days ago about writing, what I hate and love about it?  Today is about aggravation, which for me today is being aggravated about participating in this challenge and having to write 500 words tonight, a Friday night, after a long week at work, when its dark and cold and only 5:30pm, about aggravation.  That is aggravation!  Oh, I know it’s good for me…to challenge myself and follow-through with a challenge in spite of just wanting to sit back and relax, and maybe take a nap since it is dark, and the fireplace is warm.  Yes.  But, isn’t it aggravating sometimes knowing you should be doing something because it’s good for you when all you want to do is NOT do it?

You know what else is aggravating?  Daylight savings time.  Why, why, why?  Although I guess it probably doesn’t matter all that much since there will still only be so many hours of daylight, but I would sure rather have that extra daylight AFTER work, not before work.  I am fine going to work in the dark (although yes, it is aggravating to get up in the morning in the pitch blackness), but I really don’t want to feel like it’s bedtime the minute I get home from work.  It’s not very motivating to do anything after a long day at work when the lack of light in the sky tells me it’s time to call it a day.

I find it aggravating that I get aggravated about things like these.  I mean, I can’t control the weather or the fact that we subscribe to Daylight savings time, but I guess I can control how I deal with it.  That’s aggravating too.  I just want to be aggravated and take a nap, but now I’m feeling aggravated with myself because I am not getting out into the pitch blackness for a run.  Which would aggravate me because I can’t run along the ocean path because it’s pitch black outside and there are no lights along the ocean path.  I would be aggravated because I would have to carry my running light, which has aggravated other pedestrians who, although they should be happy they see me coming, have complained that the “light is too bright” (insert whiny tone of voice there….)  And now I’m aggravated with myself for being aggravated with myself.  All around aggravation.

Finally, here I am aggravated because I still have almost 100 words to write for a 500 word challenge, and I am finding it hard to write about aggravation anymore.  I was just considering that there are many other things that aggravate me, but I am not prepared to write about them in a forum that will be read by many people, known and unknown.  Some aggravations of a more personal nature just don’t need to be shared – it’s just better for everyone!  Then there are some aggravations that others don’t need to be reminded of because they are likely aggravations shared by others, you know, like the current American political situation.  Sorry for mentioning it.  I think on that aggravated note, I will bid you adieu!

Today’s prompt is “brought to you by the very wordy Jim Adams, is “Humiliate.” Use it any way you’d like in your post. And make sure you visit Jim at his blog, “A Unique Title for Me” to read his post and say hi! Here’s his link:  https://jimadamsauthordotcom.wordpress.com/” (https://lindaghill.com/2018/01/11/jusjojan-daily-prompt-january-11th-2018/)  These Jots are not only my 500-words a day challenge, but also part of my  Ultimate Blogging Challenge challenge (http://ultimateblogchallenge.com).

Humiliate

Today’s Just Jot prompt word is “humiliate”.  What a loaded word!  Some people can be so easily humiliated by the simplest things.  Like realizing suddenly when you look in the mirror that you have something on your face, or in your hair, or in your teeth.  Humiliating!  And what about when you get a bad grade on a paper when you thought you did really well?  Humiliatious!  Or maybe you said something incorrect and have to go back and correct what you said to a room full of people.  Humliamungous!  But why, I ask myself, am I so easily humiliated by things that in the end don’t matter at all, while other people who do far worse just move on with life, blaming everyone else for the stupid crap they say and do?  Am I talking about someone in particular?  Yes, yes I am.  And not just the person you are thinking of, although that person should be living in a state of permanent humiliation.  And what’s the difference between embarrassment and humiliation anyway?  Humiliation sounds much worse.  Like it’s something that goes deeper and lasts longer than a red face of embarrassment.  Hmmm…I never thought about it that way.

Anyway, my thinking is that it’s ok to be embarrassed or to feel bad about making a mistake, but you should keep thing in perspective.  Apologize for mistakes that affect others, but move on.  Forgive yourself.  Don’t beat yourself up because everyone makes mistakes.  But I do think it’s important to own your mistakes and to apologize for them, because there are too many people out there who don’t take responsibility for anything, and think that there is always someone else out there who is more responsible than they will ever be.  I am, however, thinking more and more that it is not appropriate to ask for forgiveness from others.  I know from my own experience that forgiving someone for something they have done (when it is really bad – most of the time, forgiveness is easy because people generally don’t do things that I feel need to be forgiven, if you know what I mean) is PERSONAL.  Yes, I used all caps.  I needed to work through a lot of things myself before forgiving people who harmed me, but it was my choice, and it had nothing to do with letting them off the hook (people need to be held accountable), or wanting to be around them ever again, or trusting them ever again (trust needs to be earned, and once it’s lost, may or may not ever be earned again – it has NOTHING to do with forgiveness).

Anyway, I didn’t mean for a post about humiliation to become a rant about forgiveness.  How humiliating!  What I’m trying to say is that sometimes you just need to let go of perfectionism, forgive yourself for being human, and apologize to others if you need to.  Embrace your mistakes, celebrate your humiliation, and get on with your life!

Time for beer!