from Mary

Ever tried to do a writing exercise? I haven't since college. But I did enjoy them back in the day...before I had grey hair!

So Mary at Mary's Writing Nook, who is a professional-published writer (don't we all envy her!?), did one that looked like fun. I asked her for an assignment and stuck it away in the draft folder for just such a night as this. Work is "pleasantly paced" and I'm having trouble staying awake. Seems like a good time to let the imagination wander!

ready? go! (my 2 yr old has been boycotting "set"...)

The writing exercise we were given tonight was based on travel. We were to use the following sentence to write something and then we had to pick a mode of transportation out of an envelope. The sentence was: "I knew it was a mistake to travel by ------when...


Your mode of transportation is a camel. LOL See what you can do with it. It is a fun exercise. Thanks for participating.


I knew it was a mistake to travel by camel when I realized how tall they are in real life. Being a good sport I crossed myself with both right and left hands, then climbed up on "The Princess Ride" aka "Expect". In an attempt to keep a sense of humor I joked about how if our camel train ran off it's tracks I, for one, was in no danger of falling off thanks to the snug fit between Expect's humps. Then she started to stand up, and kept standing up, and up and up....I was beginning to wonder if I'd gotten on the elevator camel instead of the walking camel when she finally reached her full height of 42 feet from the ground. Or at least that's what it felt like to me. Someone hollered what I assume was Giddyup in Egyptian and away we went. As we trekked snake like across the desert I began to wonder. If my camel was "The Princess Ride" and I was riding her...wouldn't that make me the Princess? And if so, of what, precisely, was I the Princess?

Dramamine, perhaps, since I was really wishing I had a big bottle of it the longer we rode and the warmer it got. If horses walk like Fred Astaire then camels walk like John Wayne. Lots of sway and swagger!

Here I was, Princess Drama, perched atop The Princess Ride swaying our way across the desert when suddenly we topped a hill and there before us were those fabled pyramids I'd longed to view.

My double humped elevator started it's descent and soon I was standing at the foot of the pyramids in awe of ancient technology.

As I was walking around The Princess Ride in preparation for the journey back to my hotel I stopped and asked the camel wrangler why she was also known as Expect? He shrugged and said, "Because that's what she likes to do...." Before I could ask him what it is that a camel would look forward to I was hit on the top of the head by a large clump of something gooey. Putting a hand on my head and turning around to see what had hit me I saw the topic of our discussion standing right behind me.

The camel wrangler started chuckling and said, "yup, that's what she likes to do...Expectorate!"

As I gave The Princess Ride's knees my most withering "No! No!" look I remembered what Subvet always told me about visiting far away lands.....

"Just get a subscription to The National Geographic and save yourself some trouble."