Monday June 9th, 2008

Today's exercise:

Think of something you did today or yesterday. Think of a noise you made while doing it, or heard at the time. What does that sound remind you of? Something totally unrelated? Good. Make that leap - connect them.

Mine:

The hazelnuts from the farmers market need cracking, they're no use to anyone in those shells. I pluck them from their clear plastic bag, one by one, and place them in the nut cracker.

I grasp the handle and squeeze and squeeze until the shell gives way with a loud crack. I place the naked nut in a white bowl, the shattered remnants of the shell in a silver bowl and pluck another hazelnut from the bag. This goes on for hours.

It would have gone much faster if I wasn't constantly looking out the living room window to see if the police had arrived, responding to a "shots fired!" call.

1 comment:

Greg said...

Since this is your first ever prompt, I guess it's about time I got round to adding a comment :)
I like the foreshadowing of the farmers' market's importance in your life by the way ;-) And the idea that shelling nuts might be mistaken by gunfire by nervous neighbours!

Today or yesterday
Yesterday evening I sat waiting for a friend who, despite having texted me the previous evening to remind me about our meeting, turned out to have forgotten himself. The evening was not a waste though, as the coffee was good and I read my way through half of an academic paper on linear programming algorithms that I needed for my work the following morning.
The paper was actually interesting (which is not always the case with academic literature) though the notation was a little... odd... in places and I soon found myself reaching for my pencil and starting to make notes in the margin. Then I found myself correcting the paper as well.
In the end, for all that I was slightly annoyed that my friend had forgotten me, I was rather pleased with the work I'd got done in the time I'd had!