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Play the Kazoo and Win a Jigsaw Puzzle
After I retired, I made wooden jigsaw puzzles for twenty or so years and sold them monthly at a Portland craft fair. I’m now done with all that, but I have a few puzzles left over. Here is one of them: I call it Democrats Gather for Photo Shoot Before Debate. I’m giving it as a prize to the Ricocheter with the most talent.
Here are some suggestions:
Respond with a photo of a tea cozy in the shape of Peter Rabbit you made ten years ago. Or perhaps a quilt you made.
Write an ode to your mother. Or write a rap to your muther.
Perhaps you baked a really fancy cake and took a photo of it. Send it in.
How about a two or four-line poem, perhaps in couplets, that satirizes Donald Trump’s hair?
Can you play the flute or kazoo? Play a little ditty on video and post it.
Respond with a photo of a painting you did a few years back.
Can you touch your nose with your tongue? Take a photo and post it. You could win. I like human oddities.
Play a song by blowing into your cupped hands.
Film yourself doing an Irish jig? Moxie counts a lot in this contest.
Can you sing? Sing the scale or a short song in an interesting way.
Recite a soliloquy from Macbeth. “Life’s a tale told. . . .”
Take off your shirt and pat your head and rub your tummy in a circle at the same time. You probably won’t win, but you will win the hearts of all Ricocheters.
It doesn’t have to be new. Dig up some old thing you did when you were 16. Who’s to know?
Anything you call a talent is a talent. Who am I to judge? Wait, I am the judge.
Here are the rules.
- No poems over the length of a sonnet. That’s 14 lines.
- No prose pieces over 30 lines.
- No videos over 30 seconds. I don’t want to listen to your mouth harp rendition of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony or a recitation of Milton’s Paradise Lost.
- Multiple submissions are not just permitted but encouraged.
At the end of three days, I will announce the winner and send the lucky person the puzzle.
Published in General
Here is a photo I took last summer of the north end of Banks Lank, from atop Steamboat Rock.
Here is a photo I took of some old derelict combines in the middle of Washington State.
Here is a photo I took from Kaena Point, on Oahu, December 2017.
If those don’t win me the jigsaw puzzle I will quit photography forever. (no I won’t)
Spin, you’re in the running. Announcement Of winner in three days.
Can’t I just buy the puzzle?
I’ve recently taken up “Jello art”. You use syringes to create beautiful flowers in gelatin with gelatin-this is all gelatin, no other materials. Here is my latest attempt. I still have a ways to go but was very pleased that I succeeded at all. To see what it looks like in the hand of a master, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SW9VZoyfEm8
You’re just trying to get a rise out of me, aren’t you? Proper sonnets are 14 lines. Limericks are 5 lines, like this:
There once was a fellow named Kent
Whose enumeration was slightly bent.
He could not count high,
Nor even when dry,
And to contemplate it left him quite spent.
I’m sorry, Juliana. I don’t sell them anymore. But thanks for liking my puzzle.
Wow, Mrs. Cat. That’s a hell of a jell/o.
Arahant, I use those numbers just to get a rise out of you. Just kidding. I’m not sure why I use those numbers. I don’t know how many times I’ve said in class, “Students, a sonnet is 14 lines of iambic pentameter with a complicated rhyme scheme.
Pretty clever poem. I’m counting that as a submission.
Oh, wow. I am out of this competition.
You will receive more submissions.
A couple of my art quilts.
I bid up.
No, you have to bid a creative endeavor.
Yikes, the talent! So much for thinking I had a sliver of creativity. Does whining about how un-creative I am count as a submission? I will not put it into poetry form. Unless it’s beatnik poetry. Cue the bongos.
the brain is empty/soul has fled/the cat meows.
I’d settle for more submission.
Kinky!
Way to go, Old Buckeye. You’re entered.
Can I vote, absent any creative skills? Im best at appreciating.
I needlepointed this monogram of my first name:
EB, nice. You’re in the running.
@kentforrester, you are an real artist. @gossamercat’s jello is so spectacular, I can’t even. The photos and other projects here are just gorgeous.
I’m a crafter. Some days I’m better than others. I’m just sharing, not even trying to “compete.”
No Peter Rabbit tea-cosy. But a Peter Rabbit stuffed doll I made for the young son of some friends of ours who loved the stories.
I went through a doll-making and stuffed animal making phase about twenty years ago, and thoroughly enjoyed it. Then life got in the way of my hobbies, and I had to take a break.
But now, I’m quite well known, in my granddaughter’s neighborhood, for my Halloween costumes. The earliest of them, I think, was made the year after she’d first seen Rudolph on TV, and become fascinated with the Bumble, who for a time was her imaginary friend:
Then there was the year she wanted to be a mermaid. The “dress” part of the costume subsequently became part of her “knights and ladies” dress up games, and here she is with a friend (I made the knight costume, too):
Then there was the year she was a chicken. Oh, dear. I only seem to have a photo of one of the feet:
And Benjamin Bunny (with her mother as Peter, note blue jacket. And Benjamin’s trademark knitted tam, which has the requisite red pom-pom which you can’t see):
There have been some real challenges over the years. The “Underworld Peacock” (all black, a peacock with a bit of a Goth affect) “Darth Vader, but a girl Darth Vader” (with a bow and some sparkle.) Every year, her mother looks at her and says, “do you think granny is going to be able to make that.” And my girl says, “My granny can do anything, of course she can make it. And my granny will make me whatever I like.”
The last few years, she’s drawn me a picture of what she envisions, with directions–“Shiny.” “Sparkly.” “Floofy.” “Lacy.” And so on. And it’s my job to make her little dream come true. Off I go to JoAnn’s or Michael’s or Hobby Lobby, with handfuls of coupons and a determination not to spend much money but to have a lot of fun. (I have a pretty robust stash of remnants and mill-ends of fabrics to pull from too.) One of the wonderful outgrowths of these little projects is that her costumes have become so famous in the neighborhood that they’re borrowed by other little kids, so they get quite a bit of use, both at Halloween, and for dress up throughout the year. I love that.
Perhaps my favorite costume (so far) was in 2018, when my little Peach decided she’d like to dress as one of her favorite movie actresses: Audrey Hepburn (heart be still). I was so excited! What a challenge, I thought. The Ascot Scene in My Fair Lady! But, no. What she had in mind was Holly Golightly, and the LBD (she has no idea what Holly Golightly’s lifestyle actually entailed). So, that’s what we went with. Here she is at the age of 10 (shoes and accessories courtesy of her mother:
I really love this little kid. And she’s right. Her granny will make her anything she likes. Right now, I’ve got her wedding-ring shawl on a set of needles. Doesn’t matter if she gets married or not, or if I live to see it or not, she’s getting it anyway. Whether she likes it or not. I hope she does. I think she will. (It’s going to take me years.)
Granny. It’s the role of a lifetime. Love it.
@she, love the Holly Golightly. Thanks for your submissions. You’re in. (I too love being a grandperson.)
I once made a souffle that didn’t fall, but no pictures.
A bit OT, but when I was a freshman at Davidson we played the Australian national team in basketball. When they entered the gym (Johnson Gymnasium, and the bleachers went almost to the boundaries, worth 10 points in any game played there), we freshmen had about a 60 kazoo band playing Waltzing Matilda.
Randy, I would like to have heard that.
Welp, I won’t submit a thing now. I’m rooting for Jello art to win!
I’m hoping that @bossmongo will take a stab at this one. Perhaps incorporating the moves into an interpretive dance routine.
See, that’s the problem with higher education. Corrupting the youth with kazooistry.