Poetry

Last December, my lovely sister Jessica challenged me to join her in doing something new for 30 days. She got the idea from a TEDtalk, found here. I decided my goal would be to write for fun, 10 minutes a night. This was to be different from routine email or journal writing.
I can't say I reached my goal of writing for 30 days straight, but it was still a great experience. I ended up with a lot of half-finished stories and memories (that hopefully I'll finish someday) and I actually started a couple of poems too. Here's one that's pretty much done, finally.
Thanks Jess for giving me the motivation to try this!

Zoo Picnic, by Jennifer Neal (that's me!)
The animal picnic each year at the zoo
Is delicious, nutritious and good for you too.
Each animal brings something tasty to munch.
Let's join them and see what we're having for lunch.
The apes brought some grapes (and bananas of course)
The parrots brought carrots and so did the horse.
The bears have some pears and a honeycomb pie,
The yak has a snack of bologna on rye.
The turkey brought jerky, the gnu made a stew,
The eagles brought bagels, the pandas - bamboo.
The peanuts and tree nuts were brought by the squirrels
The otters brought oysters (but kept all the pearls).
The reindeer and plain deer brought soda and ice.
The spider made cider with help from the mice.
To top it all off the good zookeeper Burt
Brought animal cookies to serve for dessert.
So balance your plate on a paw or a fin
Every beast at the feast open wide and begin!

E-Junkmail

Have you ever wondered what type of person writes spam emails? I think it would be kind of fun to write one, trying to use as many ungrammatical phrases and emotional pleas as are contained in most of the emails in my junk box. Here are a few favorite subject lines I found one day, as I prepared to empty my junk folder:

Regards.. (I just love this word – it’s so proper, and doesn’t really mean anything)

WHAT IS TO BE DONE: (According to the email, the answer to this question is to provide personal info to a gentleman in Hong Kong so he can send me 35 million dollars.)

The world wants to talk to you (Uh, hello world?)

Hide spy cameras to catch the culprit (Yes! I can finally find out who keeps throwing away the peanut butter jar before I can use a spatula to get the last few licks)

Got goals? Get grants to go back to school. Make your dreams come (For some reason this last phrase made me think of someone calling a dog. “Here dream! Come ‘ere boy!”)

And my personal favorite:

Re:BE CAREFUL OF THE HUDLOOMS///ARE YOU DEAD OR ALIVE? (Hold on a minute, let me think….yes, I’m definitely dead. I guess the hudlooms got me.)