Words for Wednesday: The Recession and the Future

It's been a while since I've done a Words for Wednesday, but this week's words inspired me, and also I can not often resist a rhyming challenge.

'Words for Wednesday' is a writing prompt held by Delores at Under the Porch Light.
Use some or all of the week's words, write a poem or a story or part of a story, and visit Delores' current week's prompt to let her know you've joined in.

This week there were two lists; I chose the rhyming one:

trepidation

stagnation

depreciation

domination

acclimatization

corroboration 

Here is my effort:

The Recession and the Future

The GFC caused wide stagnation

Unemployment, depreciation

The end of the US domination

Of economic occupation

Now things are getting better, slowly

So they say, though here in lowly

Mortal world it doesn’t seem so

Money’s tight and jobs are more so

We read the news with trepidation

Stories lend corroboration

To fears and predeterminations

Nothing seems in moderation

Is it a question of familiarisation?

What’s the secret of acclimatization

To economic deprivation

And social want and dislocation?

We hope for better, kinder days

A future mapped in better ways

We wait and wonder what will follow

When today becomes tomorrow.

Flu

Flu, flu, I hate you

I'm all laid up, what can I do?

Very little, and I feel crap too

The house looks like an unkempt zoo

As for dinner, baked beans will do

And the kids will buy lunch tomorrow too.

Flu, flu, I hate you

And I used to scoff at flu shots too

Next winter I'll know what to do

I'll get the shot and love it too.

Next winter I'll be good as new

Without the burden of the flu.

Flu, flu, I hate you

I've missed loads of work and parenting too

I've passed through days without a clue

My legs are sore and my head pounds too

I'm living between the bed and the loo

Darn you to heck, you rotten flu.

Flu, flu, I hate you

The doctor says there's nothing to do

The dog is neglected and feeling blue

The cat doesn't care but that's nothing new

I can't read to the kids without coughing anew

So now they play Minecraft in bed, boo-hoo

Flu, flu, I hate you

My head is fuzzy and hurting too

Moving feels like walking through glue

I don't even know if you ARE the flu

'Flu-like virus' is probably true
'Ebola' feels apt but I can't overdo

Flu, flu, I hate you

The office is hit and school is too

So many sick or struggling through

Projects on hold, no one will sue.

My boss says stay home, don't spread it anew
As people are catching it a second time too.

Flu, flu, I hate you
I'm out of clean clothes and my sheets stink too
And do I really need my period too?
Thanks body, what did I do to you?
My nose is swollen and just bled too
My face is spotty, my memory is too *

At home there are some saving graces
My husband's tea, my kids' kind faces
But the best thing of all that I can see:

So far the only one sick is me.

* I am blaming my illness for the standard of rhyming in this passage.

Words for Wednesday: Riddles

'Words for Wednesday' is a writing prompt held by Delores at Under the Porch Light.
Use some or all of the week's words, write a poem or a story or part of a story, and visit Delores' current week's prompt to let her know you've joined in.

This week we have the option of playing a description game, using a second list of words.

I've decided to do this with riddles.  Can you guess what this week's words are? 
(I'll put the answers in the Comments)


1. 

A safer place you will not find

To hide small secret things inside

But if it has a hole don't doubt

Your precious things will all fall out

   What is it?



2. 

I used to use this item's light

To help me read my books at night

But now I lie in the dark in bed

And read books on my phone instead

 What is it?



3. 

Write upon me what you will

To remember one who you miss still

May the words upon my face

Provide some comfort in their place

What is it?



4. 

This may hang upon a wall

It may be big or may be small

What it shows is not quite me

But is the only version I can see

What is it?



5. 

From Latin for 'a room' this comes

A thing not blind, but deaf and dumb

Catch an image, store it well

To keep, to print, upload or sell

What is it?




6.

Hold this item in your hand

You won't believe it's made from sand

Do not drop it, or you'll regret:

It will break and you'll get wet

What is it?

Children's Chanting Games

I love the chanting games kids play. Some of them have been around for years, some are new. They are invented by children and some survive with minimal changes for generations; others get reworked and change rapidly.  Often snippets from one chant work their way into another.

The benefits of chanting games are hand-eye co-ordination and memory training, but most of all friendship bonding. It's interesting to me that they are mostly played among girls.

Skipping rope chants

This one was what we chanted jumping rope when I was a kid, and I heard it all through my primary school years - but my kids had no knowledge of it (until I taught them):

Cinderella dressed in yella

Went upstairs to kiss a fella

Made a mistake, kissed a snake

How many doctors did it take?

One, two, three....

Here's one my kids do know:

Teddy bear, teddy bear, turn around

Teddy bear, teddy bear touch the ground

Teddy bear, teddy bear jump up high

Teddy bear, teddy bear say good night! [jump out]

Hand Clap Chants

Years ago I taught my kids the classic Pat-a-cake chant:

Pat a cake, pat a cake, baker's man

Bake me a cake as fast as you can

Pat it and prick it and mark it with B

And put it in the oven for baby and me

That one appears in every nursery rhyme book and was probably written by an adult.


But more interesting are the chants that are made up by children and passed around between them, from primary school to primary school, between cousins and friends, and morphing with generations.

These come with more complicated hand-clap routines, which I was never good at as a kid. I learned the chants in my head but rarely got to say them as I couldn't do the hand-clap routines.


I remember this one from when I was a kid:

Under the bamboo bushes under the trees, boom-boom-boom

True love for you my darling true love for me

When we get married we'll raise a family

Of fifty children, all in a row-row-row your boat, gently down the stream, 

Throw your teacher overboard, listen to her scream [make loud scream noise]

My kids don't know that one.  They do this one:

Armela

Kiss a fella

Naughty boy

Ping pong

Armela, kiss a fella, naughty boy, ping pong

Turn around, touch the ground, push your friend, freeze!

...and this one. I remember my cousin's daughter chanting this with her friends years ago, too:

Apple on a stick
makes me sick
makes my heart beat two-forty-six
not because you're dirty, not because you're clean
just because you kissed the boys behind the magazine
Girls, boys, having fun
here comes the baby with the big fat bum
with a jiggle and a wiggle he can do the splits
but I betcha, I betcha, you can't do this:
Close your eyes and count to ten,
if you don't muck it up you're my best friend
One, two, three..... [continue complicated hand-clap routine with eyes closed]
You didn't muck it up so you're my best friend! [hug]
[or]
You mucked it up but you're still my best friend! [hug]

I have a video of my kids playing Apple On A Stick (with cameo from Harry the dog) - I haven't been able to upload it here (too big, and having trouble compressing it) but you can see it here on my Flickr.

Here are some other kids doing it:

Counting games

These are the chants you use to count off among a group of friends to see who will be "it".  They're variations on Eenie-Meenie-Miney-Moe.

Ibble obble black bubble 

Ibble obble out

Turn your trousers inside out

If they're black, turn them back

Ibble obble black bubble

Ibble obble out

Or:

Mickey Mouse had a house

underneath the movies

when the movie started 

Mickey Mouse farted 

What colour was it?

[child landed on chooses a colour, then all spell out the colour to finish counting off]

Songs

At our primary school in LA we learned this one:

Great green gobs of green grimy gopher's guts

Marinated monkey's meat

Carbonated birdies' feet

Ten bear eyeballs floating in a pool of blood

Oops, I forgot my spoon

But I have a straw.... [make gross slurping noise] 

The kids have learned a couple of variants on Happy Birthday, the most recent one being:

Happy birthday to you

Put your hands in the loo

If you feel something squishy

It's a present for you: poo!

I love this stuff!

Do you know any more? Remember any from your own childhood?

Edit: here are a couple more.

Here's another hand clap game my kids and their friends play:

Two kids face each other and do hand-claps saying: 

Tick tack toe, give me a high give me a low

Johnny got hit by a UFO!

On the syllables "UFO" they do rock paper scissors.

The loser then turns around and the winner pokes the loser in the back with one or more fingers, then holds their hands out in front of them.

The loser turns back around and has to guess which finger or fingers were used.

This is pretty funny, because it's impossible to work out which finger has poked you in the back.

But they all look over the winner's hands and try hard to guess.

And here's a "new" song for them:

While looking for a YouTube video for Apple on a Stick I came across "Sally was a baby", and I thought my kids would like it.

So I taught it to them and they LOVE it, and they have taught their friends.  Yesterday it was going around the playground and one of their friends performed it for their PE teacher.  It's a hit!

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