Now We’re Talking!

When I was growing up we did not have a land-line at home. I think I was around thirteen years of age when Dad decided it was time we had a home telephone. It got me into serious trouble and taught me a lesson I would never forget!

Although I am honestly grateful to my Dadda for teaching me that invaluable lesson!

I also learnt that some people use telephones for sorting things out and making arrangements, or friendly conversations of a sensible length; whereas there are others who have very different ideas when it comes to telephone conversations. My friend Kat was unbelievable! She could go on and on for hours without waiting for me to respond or ask her any questions. I started to dread her calls because I could not figure out to end a telephone conversation with Kat! I love her very much! But I prefer her in person rather than on the end of a telephone.

Why am I telling you this?

Well….I have been tagged by the lovely Dr Tanya, the creator of Salted Caramel to take part in a “3.2.1. Quote me!” challenge with the superb theme of CONVERSATION:

https://saltedcaramel.blog/2018/11/11/3-2-1-quote-me-tag-conversation/

If by any chance you are not familiar with the “3.2.1 Quote Me!” challenges, please check out the original post from Rory, creator of A Guy Called Bloke and K9 Doodlepip!

https://aguycalledbloke.blog/2018/11/09/321-quote-me-conservation/

Rules: 3.2.1 Quote Me!

Thank the Selector – thank you Dr Tanya!

Post 2 quotes for the dedicated Topic of the Day.

Select 3 bloggers to take part in ‘3.2.1 Quote Me!’

My two quotes (with a third thrown in at the bottom because I just could not resist it!):

I was at work the other day, when this young man in his twenties came in and stared at me in surprise. He exclaimed he had never seen me before! I confirmed that I am fairly new.

This young man was one of the chattiest chatterboxes I have come across. He was amazing! He just went on and on and shared numerous snippets from his life-story.

But he went on and on and on and on and on (like Ariston!) and I became kind of embarassed. I had so much work to do! It came to a point when I started to do some work while I was listening and nodding. Which is rude isn’t it! But it didn’t put this champion chattterbox off at all. He carried on and on and on and on! Then a couple of clients came in and stood patiently waiting to speak to me, and they too looked incredulous at this young man who was now sharing some surprisingly personal details quite openly! Sooooo awkward having to explain to him I really needed to crack on with work and see to the clients who had arrived.

Bless him! Do you know what he said? “It was so great talking to you, I will come back again so we can carry on talking, you’re lovely!”

_____________________

Now with that first quote, I might have come across a little bit anti-conversation. Nothing could be further from the truth. I love conversations!

I like a chatter. I like a laugh. But I love a deep conversation. I love listening to friends and workmates when I ask them what do they believe? Since I was a little girl I have had a hunger to discuss deep subjects.

There are some people who are really really difficult to have deep conversations with. Either they shy away from them, or they are aggressive and belligerent and adamant they are right and noone else can be. They seem to lack the ability to contemplate and reason on deep subjects.

However, I realize that to some, their treasured beliefs are like major construction supports – they have helped to build their character and outlook on the world. Even if you disagree with someone, you cannot wade in and start attacking a person’s most sacred beliefs – shatter and crush all that impels them!

Don’t be the proverbial bull in a china shop! If you sincerely think someone else is wrong and feel you have the best motive in wishing to adjust their perceptions…it is much better to give them an alternative to consider and allow them to do the pondering. Throttling someone by mocking, trashing, obliterating their beliefs is just cruel and could have very serious effects on another person’s state of mind. A person may cling to their treasured beliefs because a person they adore like their parents have taught them since childhood. Discussion should not be a demolition derby!

__________________________

Now I know this challenge only calls for two quotes, but I am going to throw in a third because I could not resist it!

I have realized that one of the major things I find attractive in a man, is the ability to have a good conversation. I am not talking about the kind of  champion chatterbox I mentioned earlier.

It is wonderful when you find a man who is capable of the art of conversation – for it is an art, and requires practice to excel! I love the conversations Goldfinch and I share. We can easily have an animated exchange on an array of subjects and show enthusiasm for each other’s interests. It is very easy for those conversations to lead to feelings and more and more affection – a good conversation is far more intoxicating than the finest cologne!  I have to say, a man who can have a good conversation makes himself incredibly attractive – AM I RIGHT LADIES?

If you are a teenage boy this might be the last thing you want to hear! But practice practice practice! Because by the time you are thirty-five, you are going to need to have developed this art. Nobody is going to forgive you if you just grunt whenever someone asks you a question. And you need to be able to show interest in another person’s thoughts and views. That means learning to listen and ask questions to show you are interested. Now is the time to make a fool of yourself practising. I know it must be horrible if you find it awkward and embarrassing – but if you can persist, you will see that people will find you endearing as you try to show interest in them. You will become a girl magnet – because it is such a lovely thing to have a good conversation with a man. And hey – if you fork out and pay for her cappuccino, she will be even more impressed.

I know there are some extreme feministos who might be infuriated by some of this – but hey, I am just being honest, if a guy asks me if I want to go for a coffee, and I don’t really want to, I am just saying yes to be kind, him paying for the coffee is a nice thing. He has an hour to impress me by his conversation skills – I am not picky about what he wears – jeans and a T-shirt is fine. But he needs to have showered and combed his hair. If he can convince me in that hour that I am going to enjoy meeting up with him again and again, then I am more than happy to split future bills 50/50.

_____________________

My Three Nominees

So that is my take on the theme of CONVERSATION.  To carry on the “3.2.1 Quote Me!” challenge I nominate the following bloggers:

 

The Effulgent A Guy Called Bloke (or Rory) Has Nominated Me For The Sunshine Blogger Award

It has been pouring down with rain here in London. Yesterday was grey and cold and damp, and I ended up with a right old soaking because my umbrella collapsed. Thank goodness I have a ray of sunshine in my drafts folder all ready to brighten up the weekend!

sunshine bloffer award 3.jpg

Around a week ago Rory, the creator of A Guy Called Bloke and K9 Doodlepip! nominated me for The Sunshine Blogger Award as you can see from his post below:

https://aguycalledbloke.blog/2018/11/05/the-sunshine-blogger-award-nomination-2018-6-7/

Rory is one of the loveliest bloggers around. It is always a treat to be nominated by him!

Rory’s Rules

Now normally at this point, I would list the rules of The Sunshine Blogger Award, but on this occasion we have an advanced rule – THE NOMINEE EXEMPTION CARD rule – as explained by Rory below:

“Ok, l am going to do this slightly differently – l am going to nominate some of my favourite bloggers for this award but give them the Nominee Exemption Card …. This allows them however to answer the questions l pose should they wish, but they do not have to nominate others unless they wish to.”

I am going to accept the Nominee Exemption Card on this occasion…because I have to admit, I am tired! I want to go to bed! And it will take me at least another half an hour to prepare a list of nominees and come up with some questions. I hope everyone is alright with me accepting Rory’s provision on this occasion – any complaints can be forwarded directly to Rory @ A Guy Called Bloke and K9 Doodlepip!

Rory’s “Unique” Questions For His Nominees

1) What’s the most fun you have ever had without being under the influence of something or someone?

Oh Rory…I could tell when I read the first question this was going to be fun! I have little experience with being “under the influence”…I might have the occasional half glass of vino or cider, but I am a lemonade girl for the most part! See the video below for a blast from the past!

Oh my goodness I have had fun.

  • I love playing games with a huge gang of us. In my twenties about fifty of us would go to the nearby woods and play a version of “hide and seek” named “40/40”. You may know it by another name. Basically there is a base that you have to reach before the seeker finds you. The seeker takes a risk that the further they wander away from that base the more chance the hiders have of getting back there without being seen. For safety reasons we used to play it in teams of three (we were usually playing in the dark). You had to link each other’s arms and if one let go, the whole team were disqualified. It was so much fun.
  • I was a contestant in a Bollywood version of Strictly Come Dancing – that was hilarious!
  • I have had so much karaoke fun.
  • I love ceilidhs – they are fun – although after the one I went to a couple of weeks ago I had bruises all over me. Some of the men seem to think it is a rugby match.
  • We have had pine-cone wars in the woods in North Wales with a huge gang of friends and family members.
  • The snow-mobiles our friends took us on in the middle of the night in Northern Sweden – WOW!
  • We went go-carting on a frozen lake in Northern Sweden…I ended up skidding way off the track and then driving the wrong way round the track.
  • Lots of fun on construction sites (safety first of course) working with some incredible characters – especially working with roofers! Lots of singing “up on the roof”.

2) What’s the most fun you have ever had without the obvious, naked?

swimwearWithout “the obvious” being the cause…I am not often naked Rory!

Hmm…do I have any naked stories that I am willing to share on my blog-site???

I have had fun “almost naked”…except for my swimming costume, which is always a modest one-piece because I am a real swimmer. Lots of swimming games and snorkelling.

Maybe in hospital…I was naked accept for a thin smock thingy the hospital had put over me. I woke up in the middle of the night with water splashing on my face. I was so groggy and heavily tired (it was after my attack and I was still in quite a bad way although I was mobile at this point) I really did not understand what was happening because I could sense it was raining outside. I wondered it there was some kind of a leak coming through the ceiling.

I pressed my buzzer, and a nurse came and asked if I was alright. I told her there was a leak in the ceiling. She looked up and could not see anything. She told me to try to sleep. I did, but the water kept on splashing in my face. I rang the buzzer again. The nurse came again and tried to reassure me there was no leak. I became so distressed that eventually I could not bear the splashing any longer, so I climbed out of bed. I was attached to an IV drip which was keeping me hydrated and feeding a type of medicine that I had not been successful at keeping down when they tried to give it me in tablet form.

I started wandering around the ward with my smock thingy unfastened so I was fully exposed from behind! I am glad most of the patients I passed were sleeping. I was mooning the whole ward!

Another nurse found me and was chuckling slightly and asked me where I was going. I explained I could not cope with the leaky ceiling and I was going to ask someone else to look at it.

She took me back towards my bed and she said she could not see any water coming from the ceiling. I kept telling her there was a leak. Anyway…because she had stayed around she happened to notice that there was a drip noise splashing onto the floor. She kept on looking up at the ceiling and hearing the splash splash. She was puzzled. Eventually she worked out it was my bag of fluids that was going into me intravenously…the bag had a puncture and fluid was dripping out and it had been landing on my face while I was in bed.

The first nurse felt terrible. It was her that had put that bag of fluids up and she realized she must have punctured it somehow. More was splashing out rather than going into me intravenously.

3) What’s the most fun you have ever had whilst under the influence of something or someone?

I remember playing the animal pair game at two o’clock in the morning with a big group of friends after a summer barbecue my friends had held. After all the food, we had ended the night sitting chatting underneath the stars and I remember we were finishing off the booozy fruit punch. Then we started playing games…and one of them was the animal pair game.

Have you ever played the animal pair game? Someone has written out on scraps of paper the names of animals – like cow, dog, cat, pig, sheep, lion etc. There will be two scraps for each animal. Everyone randomly pulls out a scrap. Then when the whistle is blown the idea of the game is to find your animal match by making the sound of your animal.

It is one of the noisiest games I play (usually when there is a big family get-together in North Wales). Everyone is running around and you hear this din of mooooos, wooooofs, meeee-ows, oinks, baaaaaas and roooooaaaars. It’s absolutely nuts! Especially after boooozy fruit punch.

4) What’s the stupidest question l have ever asked of you?

So the first time I was ever tagged for one of Rory’s challenges I was kind of baffled by how I was going to begin to answer half of the questions. Immediately, I took the delete three and replace them with your own option…but it still left me with a handful of questions that I did a really bad job of answering.

It took me a while to get used to some of Rory’s questions – but now I love his challenges! In fact…I feel that working on posts in response to Rory’s challenges has helped me to develop my own style, and I love him to bits for that – because I was a bit confused with what my style was when I first started blogging. I try to show my appreciation for the effort he puts in to creating these challenges by using finesse and panache when I am preparing my response to publish!

The question below was in the first Rory challenge I ever attempted and I have included my answer:

Would you rather be eaten alive by wolves or eat another human alive?

vegetarian.jpgWhat a choice! These are all boy questions.  Rory – did you write these questions?

I am a vegetarian – so I don’t know if that helps answer that one!  I have no problem with other people eating animals – that is allowed.  Eating another human is not allowed.  Of course neither would I particularly desire to be eaten by wolves.  But I might be dead already and it would be beyond my control.  But there is no way I would eat a human.

5) What’s the question you want to answer but no one yet, even me has not yet asked you?

Ask me about my dream wedding!

Go on…I know you want to hear all about it! Men love hearing all the detailed description about a woman’s dream wedding don’t they? NOT!!!

To be fair…there are very few of my friends who would have the patience to hear about my dream wedding – why should bloggers be interested?

6) What’s your suggestion for the Christmas Challenge?

Hows about…let’s see how long we can all go without mentioning it?!!! Ay karumba they’ve been selling tat in the local shopping mall since August. I can’t stand the commercialism and the waste. I am all for days off work and being with family (I am going to Wales) but pleeeeeeeze, it is a so cringe worthy how much of a commercial jackpot it is.

And the songs…I don’t want song posts…I can’t cope with the radio or going to the local shopping center because of all the annoying songs.

Can I just hibernate instead? Wake me up in January when it is all over please. But of course I cannot wait to have a few days off work so I can be with my family!

7) What is the craziest blog you have ever read, and l don’t mean mine?

Oooooh…how could I possibly answer that question? I have seen a couple of really crazy blogs I must admit.

I must have accidentally clicked “follow” on one blog which is probably the polar opposite to anything I would want to read, because I suddenly had this message which horrified me saying “thanks for following” and when I looked at the site belonging to the blogger it was from…my reaction was “Aaaaaagh! Unfollow unfollow unfollow! Aaaaaaagh!”

I know you are all want to know whose blog this was so you can start following them, but the answer is NO!

8) What is the theory of what is?

What is or What if? – could this be a typo?

Well, since a theory, by Google’s definition, is a contemplative and rational type of abstract or generalized thinking, or the results of such advanced thinking….I can understand the theorist starting his train of thought with “what if….?”

However, “what is….?” requires a less theoretical and more of a factual reply.

Wouldn’t you agree?

9) What is the colour red when mixed with Tripping the Light Fantastic?

I have no idea! Is this a cryptic question? It could be a really lush cocktail?

To “trip the light fantastic” is to dance nimbly or lightly, or to move in a pattern to musical accompaniment. Who dances more nimbly or lightly than a ballerina?

So a red ballerina. Or a ballerina wearing red. There was a film called “The Red Shoes”.

10) What is the answer to the Dodo, like seriously why?

Why…?

I think they are lovely. They have bred them up on my brother-in-law’s uncle’s farm. The farm lies in a secluded valley in a remote area in North Wales. The dodos are the sweetest and most docile of all the “different” animals we have had up at the farm.

They are much more docile than the pushmi-pullyus which are so very hard to herd.

The giant lunar moths have concerned the local villages who are afraid their woollies are going to be gobbled up. But we have assured them we don’t let any of the animals go hungry.

PLEASE SEE FOOTNOTE AT BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE

11) And finally, what is the answer to this riddle?

There is no answer!

Why do I say that? Because there is no riddle. No riddle, no answer to a riddle.

Please don’t ask me to explain!

__________________

Well….thank you again Rory for nominating me for The Sunshine Blogger Award! I hope you enjoy my answers!

I hope any bloggers reading this find it as fun as I did! Rory and Caramel Creations – so much fun!

*FOOTNOTE: You do know that I am making this up don’t you. Other than the dodo, the other animals I mentioned are all from Dr Doolittle. We do not breed any of them on any of the farms in North Wales.

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/11/11/fowc-with-fandango-advanced/

https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2018/11/11/your-daily-word-prompt-unique-november-11-2018/

https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/11/11/finesse/